Weltgeist

If you also can't resist a good cup of coffee, you're in great (and eccentric) company. This short video explores the strange coffee habits of notable philosophers, as reported by their biographers. We discuss the Parisian Café Procope, Voltaire, Immanuel Kant, and Soren Kierkegaard. Do you have any weird coffee habits? Let us know in the comments.

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We have seen how Nietzsche attacks Christianity on multiple fronts. Previous parts tackled his critique of pity and compassion – decadent emotions of weakness that found their sanction in Christianity. We have discussed Nietzsche’s attack on the so-called theological instinct: the drive to reason away empirical reality and the material world in favor of some kind of Hinterwelt or Beyond: whether it be Schopenhauer’s Will, Kant’s thing-in-itself or Christianity’s Heaven or Kingdom of God.

And finally, we saw how, according to Nietzsche, even the message of Jesus Christ himself was distorted by his pupils after he was crucified.

But what is Nietzsche’s endgoal in writing this scathing critique of the Christian faith? Nietzsche wanted a transvaluation of all values – a new system of ethics, of philosophy, a new system of life, completely opposed to the decadent values that he saw were dominating the culture; decadent values that found their source and justification in Christianity.

Nietzsche finds in the Renaissance the revival of pre-Christian Greco-Roman culture, an age of nobler values, above all, a celebration of life.


Even the papacy underwent this drastic transvaluation of values during the Renaissance.

The corrupt Renaissance Popes, who used the riches of the Vatican to live lavish lifestyles full of bacchanalia and banquets, which are generally considered a low-point in Church history, find in Nietzsche’s estimation a celebration of life where previously Christianity had promoted something else.

Martin Luther, the Protestant reformer, launched an attack on what he viewed as corruption and excesses of the Catholic Church. But of course, for Nietzsche, these excesses and this corruption was a good thing. In Nietzsche’s historical analysis, Luther was responsible for the failure of the spirit of the Renaissance to remove Christianity from Europe.

Luther’s Protestant Reformation was a restoration of the old Christian order.


Luther’s actions ultimately rendered the Renaissance futile, meaningless. A revolution was preparing itself in Europe, but it was stopped short by the advent of Protestantism.

Still, the message is clear. Nietzsche invites us to look at the Renaissance for inspiration of what he envisions as his project for the future: the Transvaluation of values. In the Renaissance Nietzsche saw a renewed lust for life, an appreciation of beauty, an affirmation of existence, displays of strength and of a healthy culture – in short, in the Renaissance he saw everything that Christianity is not.

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Chapters:
0:00 Introduction
7:54 First Essay
18:27 Second Essay
32:03 Third Essay


On the Genealogy of Morals is considered by many to be Nietzsche's masterpiece. It certainly is one of the more accessible works, as it (largely) lacks the poetry and allegory of Thus Spoke Zarathustra and is not as aphoristic as Beyond Good and Evil. On the Genealogy of Morals consists of three essays which will be tackled each in their own, separate video. The introductory part of the video aims to provide a solid understanding by first asking the question: "What exactly is Nietzsche's genealogical method?" and situating the relevance of the Genealogy in the bigger Nietzschean corpus (namely: the transvaluation of all values and setting humanity up for a philosophy and morality of the future.)

The second part tackles the first essay of Nietzsche's On the Genealogy of Morals. Much of it will sound familiar to those who have read Beyond Good and Evil or Daybreak. Nietzsche makes a historical-genealogical (even linguistic) case for the good/bad and good/evil dichotomy.

In the third part, we see Nietzsche dive deep into prehistory towards the creation of a morality of custom which leads to man's instinct for cruelty being repressed, and finally, turn inwards.
The bad conscience, in this analysis of Nietzsche, is not "the voice of God" as Kant and Christianity claim. Rather, the bad conscience is the paradoxical self-torture and self-pleasure that results from a drive for cruelty which cannot be directed externally and therefore must wreck havoc internally.
This is a notoriously difficult essay and it has been somewhat overlooked as a result. With this video, we hope to do it justice.

In the fourth and final part, we arrive at the grand conclusion. Nietzsche explores the question: "What do ascetic ideals mean?" Throughout history and throughout different types of men: the artist (Wagner), the philosopher (Schopenhauer), the aesthete (Kant) but most importantly, the priest (Christianity) and the scholar (scientists like Darwin and Copernicus). Nietzsche will argue that a Will to Nothingness underpins the ascetic ideal: it gives meaning to our suffering. Because, as Nietzsche said it at the start: Man would sooner will nothingness, than not will at all.

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WATCH:
▶ Why Nietzsche Hated Socrates: https://youtu.be/DM78nStythg
▶ Nietzsche's Warning to Scientists: https://youtu.be/Qy8Xof92OYQ
▶ Why Nietzsche Hated Plato: https://youtu.be/nEhNRuPh4As
▶ Why Nietzsche Hated Kant: https://youtu.be/9E_RLvcZ8jI

OUR ANALYSES:
▶ Beyond Good and Evil: https://youtu.be/WIHXZUltfqk
▶ The Antichrist: https://youtu.be/qej1Z8Qzq_c
▶ Genealogy of Morals: https://youtu.be/6PUx4cOfFcI
▶ Twilight of the Idols: https://youtu.be/YpVr_NEvWYA
▶ The Will to Power: https://youtu.be/He6ZC7ZFBt8
▶ Daybreak: https://youtu.be/cOL2z7nuXdA
▶ The Joyful Science: https://youtu.be/U0fTBOJ-C_I

TIMESTAMPS:
00:00 Intro
01:04 Delirious Socrates
02:23 Socrates gives thanks
06:08 Clairvoyant Socrates
12:46 Socrates the pessimist
17:18 Conclusion

The meaning of these final words has been shrouded in mystery. They’ve been the subject of debate from the time of Plato up until the present day.

Socrates instructs his friend Crito to prepare a sacrificial rooster for the god Asclepius. A sacrifice for what? And why to this particular god? And why would these be his famous last words? Didn’t have anything more profound to say?

We can imagine the disappointment in the words of his friend Crito. After Socrates mentions the sacrifice, Crito asks him: if there is anything else. As if to say, “is that it? those are your final words?” But Socrates remained silent.


And indeed, most ancient commentators don’t assign all too much value to these final words. They are mostly dismissed as the ramblings of a man who has just drunk lethal poison, babbling on about roosters in a moment of hemlock-induced delirium.

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OUR ANALYSES:
▶ Beyond Good and Evil: https://youtu.be/WIHXZUltfqk
▶ The Antichrist: https://youtu.be/qej1Z8Qzq_c
▶ Genealogy of Morals: https://youtu.be/6PUx4cOfFcI
▶ Twilight of the Idols: https://youtu.be/YpVr_NEvWYA
▶ The Will to Power: https://youtu.be/He6ZC7ZFBt8
▶ Daybreak: https://youtu.be/cOL2z7nuXdA
▶ The Joyful Science: https://youtu.be/U0fTBOJ-C_I

In 2013, Pope Francis quoted Friedrich Nietzsche in his first encyclical, Lumen Fidei, a text he completed from a draft by Pope Benedict XVI. This encyclical, part of a trilogy exploring the theological virtues of charity, hope, and faith, cites a letter Nietzsche wrote to his sister Elisabeth, where he contrasts the comfort and peace offered by faith with the bold, uncertain pursuit of truth through philosophy and exploration. By including this quote, the encyclical positions Nietzsche as a representative of modern rationalism, embodying the contemporary challenge to Christianity’s relevance in an era that prioritizes science, reason, and individual inquiry over traditional religious frameworks.

The inclusion of Nietzsche underscores a profound tension between two opposing worldviews. The Catholic Church, as articulated in Lumen Fidei, pursues a universal mission to promote the “common good,” seeking to provide moral and spiritual guidance for all. Nietzsche, however, is an elitist thinker who writes for a select few, emphasizing the individual—particularly the Übermensch, or "overman"—who forges new values and transcends conventional morality. In works like Beyond Good and Evil and The Antichrist, Nietzsche explicitly rejects the idea of a shared “common good,” arguing that what is common lacks value and that true greatness lies in the exceptional individual’s ability to create meaning and bend the world to their will. This stark contrast highlights not just a philosophical disagreement but a fundamental difference in purpose: the Church’s inclusive, collective vision versus Nietzsche’s focus on solitary, transformative genius.

Lumen Fidei further explores this divide by addressing the nature of truth. The Church advocates for an objective truth rooted in Christian teachings, which it believes can guide humanity universally. Nietzsche, by contrast, questions the very concept of objective truth, viewing it as suspect when applied universally. For him, truth is subjective, tied to the individual’s deepest convictions and creative power, as exemplified by the Übermensch. This perspective is reflected in his admiration for figures like Pontius Pilate, whose skeptical question, “What is truth?” in The Antichrist captures Nietzsche’s disdain for universal claims to truth and his celebration of individual authenticity.

Despite his atheism and critique of Christianity, Nietzsche acknowledges the societal role of religion in shaping values and culture, as discussed in texts like On the Genealogy of Morality and Beyond Good and Evil. His famous declaration, “God is dead,” reflects not a personal triumph but a cultural observation about the decline of religious authority in the modern world. Lumen Fidei uses Nietzsche’s ideas to frame the challenges facing Christianity in a rational, post-Enlightenment era, where appeals to biblical authority or traditional teachings no longer hold the unchallenged sway they once did. The encyclical grapples with how Christian faith can still serve the common good in a world increasingly skeptical of absolute truths.

Ultimately, the dialogue between Pope Francis and Nietzsche in Lumen Fidei reveals a deeper question about human existence: “How should we live?” For the Catholic Church, this is a universal question, answered through shared faith and objective truth. For Nietzsche, it is an individual pursuit, answered through personal authenticity and t

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The figure of Jesus Christ is a complicated, complex character in Nietzsche’s writings. On the one hand, Nietzsche is obviously opposed to all values Christianity stands for. On the other hand, Nietzsche speaks high praise of Jesus Christ the person.

To completely understand this dichotomy, it’s necessary to make a distinction between Jesus Christ, his life and death, and Jesus Christ as he was later interpreted by his pupils, the Apostles, and subsequentely, the Church and its history.

Like many in the 19th century, Nietzsche was very interested in Jesus Christ beyond his depiction in the Gospels, the four books in the Bible that serve as a sort of biography. The Gospels were written decades after the death of Jesus, and they are not historical documents, but religious ones. What this means is that they are not necessarily an accurate depiction of what Jesus was like. The Evangelists, those who wrote the Gospels, had an agenda. And it’s this agenda that Nietzsche finds problematic, and it’s this agenda that has ruined the figure of Jesus Christ, and which, ironically, gave birth to Christianity.

When Jesus was crucificied, his Apostles could not believe it. The death of Jesus was an unexpected event: here was the Savior of humanity, tortured and put to death in the most humiliating way possible. Were they misled? What happened? This death of Jesus caused them great anguish. In all likelihood, some of them even felt cheated.

Nietzsche tries to understand the psychology of such an apostle.

The death of Jesus is now seen as a sacrifice, now there is need of a resurrection, or a state of life after death… None of which was really mentioned by Jesus himself.

Nietzsche often repeats the sentence “The Kingdom of God is within you.” (Luke 17:21) which is said by Jesus according to the Gospel of Luke. What Jesus meant is that the Kingdom of God is not a place, or not something that will come in the future. The Kingdom of God is within you, it’s a state of mind.

The Kingdom of God is within you… It’s already here. There is no need for “guilt, “sin”, “resurrection” or no need to be saved, even.

But where does this distortion come from? It’s rooted in ressentiment.

Nietzsche argues that the Apostles, and consequentely, all of Church history, fundamentally misunderstood Jesus. They couldn’t deal with his death, and to make this loss bearable, and justify it to themselves, they invented notions like the afterlife. Now, death does not have the last word… It was a way for the apostles to get back at those who killed their Teacher.

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OUR RECOMMENDED TRANSLATION: https://amzn.to/3BsOUJT

Friedrich Nietzsche’s Daybreak is probably the most underrated canonical work of the famous German philosopher. Overshadowed by Beyond Good and Evil and Thus Spoke Zarathustra, Daybreak offers an overview of Nietzsche’s main ideas in a way you might not have heard about them before.

The first part covers the title of the book, Nietzsche’s overarching project, and his love for the empirical presocratic philosophers (Democritus, Heraclitus, Anaximenes, Thales of Miletus) and his distaste for the idealistic philosophy of Plato and his World of Forms.

In part two we dive deep into Nietzsche’s so-called assault on morality. Drawing heavily upon German materialism and “morality’s greatest prejudice”, Nietzsche will seek to destroy the moralities of old, moralities informed by false belief in a Hinterwelt. Plato, Kant, Schopenhauer, Christianity: all moral systems will have to meet their end. Nietzsche then challenges us to create a new morality. A morality not built on custom and tradition.

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WATCH:
▶ Schopenhauer: How Education Makes You Dumber: https://youtu.be/GE30yosa0cs
▶ Nietzsche's Warning to Scientists: https://youtu.be/Qy8Xof92OYQ
▶ Why Nietzsche Hated Socrates: https://youtu.be/DM78nStythg
▶ Why Nietzsche Hated Plato: https://youtu.be/nEhNRuPh4As
▶ Why Nietzsche Hated Kant: https://youtu.be/9E_RLvcZ8jI

OUR ANALYSES:
▶ Beyond Good and Evil: https://youtu.be/WIHXZUltfqk
▶ The Antichrist: https://youtu.be/qej1Z8Qzq_c
▶ Genealogy of Morals: https://youtu.be/6PUx4cOfFcI
▶ Twilight of the Idols: https://youtu.be/YpVr_NEvWYA
▶ The Will to Power: https://youtu.be/He6ZC7ZFBt8
▶ Daybreak: https://youtu.be/cOL2z7nuXdA
▶ The Joyful Science: https://youtu.be/U0fTBOJ-C_I

Nietzsche dedicates a few paragraphs in Twilight of the Idols to the problems with modern education.

Most of his problems with modern education stem from his elitism. Which in turn stems from his disdain for the herd, or the great masses.

Nietzsche’s antagonism towards modern education is built on three foundations:

First, the lack of good teachers. Second, the democratization of education. Third, the hastiness by which modern education must happen.

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In The Joyful Science, we can read how Nietzsche admits to having a made a mistake in his interpretation of the German Romantic movement. We learn that he mischaracterized the source from which this movement sprung: both Arthur Schopenhauer and Richard Wagner, seen as exemplars of Romanticism, were misinterpreted by Nietzsche. What was his mistake exactly? It has something to do with Dionysian art, suffering, and the character of philosophical pessimism.

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What is Nietzsche’s problem with theologians, and what does he mean exactly when he talks of the theological instinct?

Chiefly, Nietzsche points out “idealists” as exemplars of those with theological instinct. The theological instinct is the tendency of philosophers and priests to look at reality with suspicion.

When Nietzsche speaks of the theological instinct in the Antichrist, he is referring to this mistake – postulating God as the first cause, as the ultimate reality. Nothing could be further from the truth, according to Nietzsche – the theologian flips metaphysics on its head. He puts first, the thing that should come last, or rather, the thing that should not come at all.

The idealist philosopher is also guilty of making this mistake. Arthur Schopenhauer and Immanuel Kant, for example, have both reasoned that not this world, but some other world, the Will in Schopenhauer and the thing-in-itself in Kant, is the ens realissimum, or the most real thing.

But it is not just a metaphysical question. By flipping reality on its head, so to speak, the theologian also flips morality on its head.

The theological instinct against which Nietzsche declares war, is of course best exemplified not in the philosophy of Kant or Schopenhauer, but in Christianity itself. Thus Nietzsche characterizes Christianity as being completely imaginary: making up imaginary causes which lead to imaginary effects.

We can see how this theological instinct is, for Nietzsche, the root of everything that is bad with the world. The theological instinct leads to bad metaphysics, which leads to bad ethics, which leads to a distrust of nature, which leads to a distrust of life… Which leads to décadence, weakness, and ressentiment.

And the theological instinct finds expression in Kant and Schopenhauer, and with them in the entire tradition of Western philosophy, but most of all, it finds its expression in the religion of Christianity. And against this instinct, against this religion, Nietzsche will wage and attempt to set the record straight.

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