On the Death of God

(2017)

Throughout his work, Nietzsche builds off of the concept of the Death of God, the idea that “the belief in the Christian god has become unbelievable.”(362) He makes this bold statement at the opening of Book V of The Gay Science, saying it is just now beginning to take hold in Europe. His prediction certainly held true, at least in terms of numbers. In the more than one hundred years since Nietzsche made this observation, atheism has spread wildly, particularly in Europe. But the question at hand, should anyone still believe in God, is a more complex issue. This entails two questions. First, does Nietzsche believe that no one should believe in God? And second, regardless of his opinion, are there any grounds for it? In other words, if people were informed and unbiased, would anyone not be an atheist?

Although Nietzsche uses the assumption of God not existing throughout his works, it is in The Genealogy of Morality that he offers an explanation of how Christianity formed, and his reasons for why its beliefs and doctrine are false. He argues that Christianity is a slave morality, or “imaginary revenge.”(400) Essentially, it is a vain hope for those whose lot in life has made them weaker that they can transcend their status, even to the point of becoming superior to their oppressors. Nietzsche points out that ironically, this creates a system that promotes love, yet is founded on spite. Nietzsche calls it a “love [that] grew out of the hatred,”(399) a plant which sets up a seemingly good display, but underneath its roots “[burrow] ever more thoroughly and greedily into everything…deep and evil.”(399) At the very least, this would make it inconsistent. But if Nietzsche’s accusations are true, it is problematic on a second level. Such a trick would make the very institution of Christianity a liar, while it triumphs truth. Its two sided nature makes it everything it condemns. Then it becomes a parasite, living in people’s hearts, so to speak, but never really giving them what it promises in return. In this way, it can never fulfill what it wishes (or feigns to wish) to do, which is to spread truth. Nietzsche says “the greatest haters in world history…have always been priests.”(398) And, concordantly, priests and monks have often acted contrary to what they preach and have dedicated themselves to. The very act of living separately from the masses in convents and monasteries opts for solitude and denies love. To some, such acts are an exception to the rule, or a necessary step towards a higher goal, but to Nietzsche, this is the founding principle of Christianity: spiteful rebellion.

And if Christianity can be traced back to this, everything about it is devalued. The messiah is a lie, or simply a tool for this enacted revenge. And the martyrs who sacrificed themselves for it were tricked into early death for no reason but this spite.

But, for all his accusations, Nietzsche is not explicitly arguing against belief in Christianity. The purpose of The Genealogy of Morality is to offer up a possibility for how Christianity formed that directly conflicts with convention. Whether or not Nietzsche subscribes to the idea as he writes it, (he probably does) it hinges on the assumption that Christianity formed as revenge for Roman oppression of Judea, and he would acknowledge it. But he would also point out that belief in Christianity is a large assumption, and to follow it only because it is well documented and works as an explanation is uninformed. Nietzsche is able to propose and flesh out another explanation for the emergence of Christianity, and it, too works out. This forces anyone who has been Christian for lack of other information to reconsider, to make a choice.

This is exactly what Nietzsche is talking about when in the Gay Science when he says that Christianity is becoming “unbelievable”(362) in Europe. People are seeing new options, and choosing them in stead.

But this does not mean that God, or Christianity cannot be believed, even by a very well informed, educated person. As Nietzsche predicted, every day, the evidence for various religions have grown thinner. More and more people are turning to Science. It seems one should no longer even believe in God. But therein lies Nietzsche’s best argument: nothing is universal. He is not trying to argue that his interpretation is the one and only correct version, with respect to the origin of Christianity or anything. It is an option that must be weighed against many others, then used or not used for the sake of something else. For Nietzsche, this is life. But similarly, someone may dedicate themselves to faith.

If there is a correct interpretation of the universe, it cannot be known through logic. We perceive things, and fit them into trends, but there is nothing to prove these perceptions and trends accurately describe reality, or are in any way meaningful. In truly authentic faith, belief in God is irrational, but at the same time deeper, more fundamental than reason, or any of these perceptions. That is why belief in God should not be based on proof.

Faith is irrational, but the nature of faith is different from that of other irrational claims in has to do with meaning, not fact. A factual claim, for example, would be that a unicorn appeared in a certain location at a certain time. It either happened, or it didn’t. And if someone could go back and objectively observe that location at that time, it could be either proven or disproven. In this way, Jesus resurrecting Lazarus from the dead, or Moses parting the Red Sea could be proven or disproven, given evidence. But the meaning of the universe can never be explained in this way. Nietzsche claims that it has none. But similarly, someone could claim that God, in some way, exists and because of that life has meaning. In this way it becomes a fundamental assumption, something not based on reason at all, but something simply accepted as irrational.

So belief in God is not warranted in a rational sense. But then neither is Science, at its core, or anything. For Nietzsche, this means one should commit one’s self to the idea of life and greatness, but again, this is ultimately a suggestion.

As for if anyone, free of outside influence, would believe in God, it is not known. Perhaps the idea was fabricated, a form of slave morality. Or maybe it was created to keep people in check. But life is filled with too many subjective factors to make a true evaluation. The best that anyone can do is understand that we make assumptions, and that some day, they may change. At the same time, we must understand that other people will hold conflicting assumptions, and in many cases there is no way to ascertain if one person is correct. Ultimately we make a choice that we will live our life believing in one thing or another, simply because we have to believe in something. Essentially, for certain things, we have no choice other than to trust our gut, so to speak. Nietzsche does exactly this when he suggests master morality. It might not seem appealing, and he never gives a solid argument for why we should embrace it, but to him, it is ‘natural.’ And so, if to the informed, mostly unbiased person, the belief in God is natural, then the belief in God is not unbelievable, or refutable and everything that comes along with the death of God does not apply. But, this belief is an assumption, and that should be known and remembered.