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Nietzsche and Untimeliness The Philosoph
Nietzsche and Untimeliness The Philosoph
Wisdom
Author(s): Steven V. Hicks and Alan Rosenberg
Reviewed work(s):
Source: Journal of Nietzsche Studies, No. 25 (SPRING 2003), pp. 1-34
Published by: Penn State University Press
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20717799 .
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Introduction
gestions. A most pervasive debt of gratitude goes to James N. Jordan and Morris
Rabinowitz for their extensive and insightful editorial comments on the entire manu
script. A special thanks also goes to Sarah Yeates for her energetic research efforts.
e.g., in the figure of the "comedians of the ascetic ideal" in the Genealogy
ofMorals (1887), or in the transformed figure of "Dionysus" in Twilight of
the Idols (1889).
Yet despite Nietzsche's pervasive employment of innovative figures and
"valuable [figurative] exemplars" (t/M III, ? 6), few commentators have ven
tured to undertake a systematic analysis of just what Nietzsche was trying to
accomplish throughhis constant use of figures and figurative language.2 This
is surprising given the current debates and controversies regarding how best
to read Nietzsche, e.g., as either a philosopher, a literary critic, or a rhetori
cian.3 Situated, as they are, at the "interface" of philosophy, literature, and
rhetoric,Nietzsche's figures would seem to play an important role in any suc
cessful attempt to illuminate these controversies. Like Plato's picturesque
images and myths, Nietzsche's figures are not just inessential "icing on the
(conceptual) cake," but are part and parcel of one's understanding of his
thoughts and values. The figures are essential for the proper understanding
of the direction and development, both intellectually and affectively, of his
unique philosophical views.
The lack of attention paid toNietzsche's use of figures is likewise sur
prising given the recent interest in issues of language inNietzsche's texts.
And yet most commentators who are interested in issues of language in
Nietzsche tend to focus either on interpretinghis "multifarious stylings"?
the epigrammatic, the aphoristic, the apothegmatic, and themetaphorical?
or theydiscuss themany difficulties involved inmaking sense of Nietzsche's
hyperbolic, seemingly self-contradictory (and self-consciously self-referen
tial) manner of expression. Few have directly addressed the question "Why
figures?" Why the constant emphasis on figurative language and thinking?
Perhaps not surprisingly, those who have addressed this issue have failed to
reach any consensus. Heidegger, for example, makes the intriguing sugges
tion thatbecause the thoughtsNietzsche is grappling with are so hard to bear
(so untimely), "no prior, mediocre human being" can think them [discur
sively, propositionally]... and "that holds forNietzsche himself. ... Nietzsche
must thereforefirst create poetically the thinker [figure] of [these thoughts]"
before he can come to termswith them.4By way of example, Heidegger fur
ther observes that "the communication of the thoughtmost difficult to bear
[i.e., the thoughtof the eternal returnof the same] . . .first of all requires the
poetic creation of thefigurewho will think this thought [viz., Zarathustra]....
But in such creation [of thefigure], thedoctrine itselfcannot be wholly disre
garded."5 More recently,Peter Berkowitz has made the claim thatNietzsche's
preferred figures of the "?bermensch" the "free spirits," and the "Philosopher
of the Future" function as emblems of a sort?the "identifying mark" of a
new philosophical sobriety, a "free spirited skepticism"?which Nietzsche
hoped would eventually help philosophy break free from traditional (dog
matic) metaphysical thinking.6Wayne Klein, on the other hand, offers a far
concepts, but occasionally and with great difficulty become vividly con
cretized for us via figures or images (Gestalten)" (DWV, ? 2). The figures,
then, help to provide such a concrete intuitive illustration of certain pecu
liarly "human, all too human" (and possibly difficult to comprehend or accept)
views or possibilities of life; they are a means "for trying to express and fix
this [intuitive] vision" of life.17Sometimes they do this by imaginatively cre
ating or re-creating relevant experiences for those who have not directly had
them. Like the "mediating figure of the statue" or some other work of art,
the "living figure" Nietzsche presents us with?be itDionysus, Apollo, the
saint, themartyr, etc.?helps "engender" in the reader certain experiential
states or ways of being in theworld (e.g., that of theDionysian practitioner
or that of the "world-denying" saint). It allows the reader "to experience all
that a soul can encounter when itgoes on its journey?participation inother
souls and theirdestiny, acquisition of the ability to look at theworld through
many eyes, and through knowledge of strange and remote things," etc. (UM
IV, ? 7). When we "see clearly before us the figure," thatfigure in our mind's
eye "demonstrates its life, inmovement, tone, word, and action; [it] forces
us to trace a mass of effects back to theircause; [it] requires us to engage its
artistic composition," and consequently, to experiment with thedifferentpos
sibilities itoffers (DWV ? 2).18
As Nietzsche once remarked in a letter to Brandes (10 April 1888). "the
person who does not find himself addressed personally by [my] work will
probably have nothing more to do with me."19 The figures, itwould seem, are
also designed to offer the reader that "profound personal significance"
Nietzsche evidently attached to his own "dangerous," untimely meditations.
The figures offer the reader "personal embodiments" of certain ways of liv
ing, images of particular human possibilities or particular human persona.
For example, Nietzsche often uses the pre-Socratic philosophers as figurai
embodiments or exemplars of a way of life (and a kind of wisdom) that has
largely disappeared in the modern world, and that he thinks needs to be
revived: viz., an "untimely" or "out of season" way of life that struggles tire
. . contemporary
lessly to combat "the taming and restraining influences of.
culture."20As Nietzsche describes it inhis essay "Schopenhauer as Educator,"
the philosopher's job is to "measure, stamp, and weigh things," to establish
"new values'' and "new images of humanity," and to provide his and her con
temporaries with "new images of life" (cf. UM III, ?? 3-4). But according
toNietzsche, the philosopher best accomplishes this job of educating others,
not through abstract doctrines and treatises?at least not initially?but by
way of personal example, for example, through the "courageous visibility of
the philosophical life" of a Thaies, Anaxagoras, Socrates, or even Schopenhauer
(UM III, ? 3; cf. TAG, ?? 3-4). Nietzsche's figures are thusdesigned to address
thatpersonal dimension, and to "serve as a [personal] example," so that the
reader can understand his work "as though itwere for the [individual reader]
he had written" (UM III, ? 3).
As Nietzsche once described it in a letter to his sister (15 August 1885),
the figures also function as "fishhooks" or "bait" for "attracting and captur
so desperately trying to
ing the personal attention of the readers he was
reach."21 In some cases, this "bait" takes the form of "moral exemplars and
models," or "exemplary specimens" of human advancement, for example,
great literaryand world historical figures such as Homer, Manu, Thucydides,
Socrates, and Goethe (cf. UM III, ? 2).22 In some cases, he employs figures
of particular saints and martyrs as "exemplary specimens" of faith,piety, sim
plicity, honesty, suffering, self-discipline, self-mastery, and self-denial.23 In
both cases, these "exemplary specimens" embody ways of living or sets of
related practices that remind us of the powers of perfectibility that reside
within each of us by providing us (via the figures) with the "visible epitome"
of such moral perfectionism (UM III, ? 2).
Nietzsche believed that the contemporary world was short on actual exist
ing heroic "models and exemplars." Thus the figures also offerNietzsche
"brave companions and imaginary free spirits"?in the absence of any actual
existing ones?that help keep him (and his readers) "in good spirits while
surrounded by ills," e.g., thedecadence of modern society (see Z, "Prologue";
77, I).24 Such imaginative figures or figurative companions (Zarathustra,
Dionysus, the?bermensch, the "music practicing Socrates") help Nietzsche
identifyhimselfwith a possible future (nondecadent, nonnihilistic) community
?a community of "free spirits," "revaluers," "hyperboreans" (see AC, 1).
Such figurations provide poetic exemplars of emulation for those "who must
"
come one "men of the future," those "antinihilists those "vic
day"?those
tors over God and nothingness"?and for theirepochal "revaluation of val
ues" and attempted (future) enhancement of humanity (see GM II, ? 24).
Figures thus function as imaginative or indirectways of producing redemp
tive "exemplars and models" in the absence of actual "timely" ones. Put dif
ferently, the figures provide "microincarnations" of Nietzsche's own moral
perfectionism or expressionism since, in his view, themacro level (of polit
ical and cultural institutions) has become "motley" and "decadent" in the
contemporary world, and characterized by nihilistic tendencies. In this sense,
theexemplary figures inNietzsche's works begin to take on some of themedi
ating role traditionally played by civic and cultural institutions in "healthier"
times (e.g., in ancient Greek Sittlichkeit).15
In lightof Nietzsche's later perspectivist claims and his perspectival denial
of transcendent/metaphysical meanings, humankind must, in his view, begin
to create for itself new (nontranscendent, nondogmatic) meanings in order
to secure its own continued (imperiled) existence. Such nontranscendent
meanings Nietzsche hoped to glean, in part at least, from the heroic exploits
of his figurative exemplars and models, e.g., from Zarathustra, or from "the
example supplied by the outward life" of certain ancient Greek and Indian
philosophers (cf. UM III, ? 3). In his view, such exemplary figures help to
test the limits and "plasticity" of the human soul as well as thatof our mod
ern cultural horizon.26 From his sometimes "untimely" and "dangerous" fig
urai experiments, humankind can begin to compile a storehouse or repository
of wisdom upon which the evolving species can draw. His figurative embod
iments of perfection (or imperfection, as the case may be) provide an imag
inative resource fromwhich others can begin to derive inspiration and courage.
As he observes in theUntimelyMeditations: How completely this courageous
. . .
visibility of the philosophical life is currently lacking inGermany! Only
he who has a clear view of the picture of life and existence as a whole can
in turnemploy the individual sciences without harm to himself, forwithout
such a regulatory total picture they are threads that nowhere come to an end
and render our lifemore confused and labyrinthine" {UM III, ? 3). Nietzsche's
figurative models, from the "pale criminals" and "apostates" to the "conva
lescents" and "higher men," can be seen as an attempt to paint such a "pic
ture of all human life," a picture fromwhich we can "learn themeaning of
[our] own individual lives" {UM III, ? 3). Nietzsche's philosophy thus chal
lenges the reader through the image or figure of life itpresents and through
the need it engenders in the reader to learn from that image or figure "the
meaning" of the reader's own individual life.
In this context, Nietzsche's figures can also be seen as offering a partial
answer to the enigmatic question Nietzsche raises in one of his most haunt
ing aphorisms inEcce Homo: viz, "How can one become what one is?" The
figures aid us?visually, metaphorically, aesthetically?to strive to become
who we really are, our "ownmost selves." In some cases, the figures are specif
ically designed to help reveal those all too conventional elements of one's
character?elements thatNietzsche refers to as "timely," "complacent," "self
satisfied," "decadent," "reactive," and even "resentful." More often than not,
Yet Nietzsche's figures, more often than not, offer a peculiarly disruptive
kind of seduction. They are designed to seduce us into something "untimely"
and "out of season"; they lure us into experiencing theworld differently and
thinking differently about theworld. They help us to alter or refine our aes
thetic sensibilities, for example, by discouraging us from simply deferring
to those "useless squanderers" or "cultural philistines" who currently preside
over the "catalysis of culture."29As an aesthetic counterpoint to the current
"timely" decadent figureswho dominate our cultural horizon, Nietzsche offers
"untimely" alternative figures. For example, he offers the figures of the "buf
foons," the "comedians," and the "untimely ones," who, in his words, "free
themselves [from the squanderers and philistines] only by farcical caricatures
and ridiculous re-interpretations"(TAG, ? 19). To quote Ian Hacking, Nietzsche
is one of those thinkerswho is always "working and living at the edge of our
moral sensibilities," and who is concerned to generate ethical problems for
us that are often not yet experienced by us as problems.30 Nietzsche's treat
ment of these emerging ethical issues is typically cast in terms of "masks,"
irony, contradiction, and especially in terms of "untimely" figures?figures
that are often "self-consuming," disruptive, offensive to some, and charac
terized by a "hammerlike" force that crushes our foundationalist aspirations
and opens up new spaces for thinking and acting.
Nietzsche would hardly agree with Alain de Botton's recent assertion that
philosophical wisdom is just a matter of finding comfort in consoling fig
ures, images, and ideas.31For Nietzsche, philosophy is not about offering con
solation for frustration and suffering at all; it is about disrupting those
as
prevailing "timely" human, all too human myths and illusions (especially,
we shall see, themyths and illusions associated with the ascetic ideal) which
perpetuate that sufferingand frustration.As he says, "to make the individual
uncomfortable, chat ismy task."32 In this context, Nietzsche's most innova
tive figures, the "Philosopher of theFuture," the "music-practicing Socrates,"
etc., are, as Marianne Cowan puts it, "timely by being untimely," for they
our
help to provide an affirmative, nonascetic, and antinihilistic alternative to
cultural idols and societal discontents.33 They help to fashion an
prevailing
interpretive context inwhich the suffering, fragmentation, and social malaise
endemic tomodern society become meaningful, even transfigured.
Nietzsche was certainly not the first philosopher tomake use of figures in
the context of his overall philosophical project. They abound in Plato, and
Hegel (in his Philosophy of Right) gives a famous figure of philosophical
wisdom: the "Owl ofMinerva," which, Hegel says, "only begins itsflight
with the onset of dusk"34 Having argued thatwe cannot fully understand the
meaning of world-historical deeds because such meaning always depends
upon a futurewe cannot foresee; and having warned us thatwe cannot over
leap our own time any more than we can "jump over Rhodes," Hegel con
cludes that the only self-transparency available to us lies inphilosophy, which
"comprehends its own time in thought," and "rejoices in the rational com
prehension" of the historical present. As Hegel expresses it in another image,
philosophical wisdom allows us to see "the rose in the cross of the present"
(PR, "Preface"). But philosophy can "paint its gray on gray" and "reconcile
us to the historical present" only when "a form of life has grown old, and
cannot be rejuvenated, only recognized after the fact" by traditional philo
sophical analysis. As Allen Wood observes, Hegel's views "are not neces
sarily conservative in their import, since they allow for rational action to
actualize the existing social order, reforming it by correcting (as far as we
are able) its (inevitable) contingent flaws and bringing itas fully as
possible
into harmony with its rational idea."-5 But they do seem to rule out the pos
sibility of radical change of the "timely" social horizon based on historical
and philosophical reason.
In a surprisingly parallel passage from one of his early essays, Nietzsche
also depicts traditional philosophy and its "unmeasured and indiscriminate
knowledge drive" as always coming on the scene after the fact "as a sign that
a form of [culturali life has grown old" (P, ? 25). Nietzsche does not com
pletely reject this traditional characterization of philosophy; indeed, he later
insists that his own genealogical method prefers the "gray" of conceptual
analysis (GM, "Preface"). But from the early 1870s onward, he also offers
the reader an alternative figure to the "owl" of traditional philosophical wis
dom: the "Philosopher of theFuture" (P, ? 59). This figure is variously char
acterized inNietzsche's writings as "appearing during those times of great
danger," as being "the brakeshoe on thewheel of time," and as always being
"far ahead of [his] time" or "untimely" (P, ? 24). He also claims that this fig
ure "commands and legislates" "the bad conscience of [his] time" (BGE, ??
211-12). Moreover, Nietzsche insists that, to date, "there is no appropriate
category" for such a philosopher (P, ? 53), that he or she is an "anomaly" of
sorts and "unclassifiable" (PCP, ? 173), or atopic in the ancient Greek sense,
meaning "out of place," hence absurd, unclassifiable,
"strange, extravagant,
and disconcerting."36 In order to understand him, we must therefore imagine
or re-create "a totally new type of
philosopher" as opposed to the "philoso
phers of the present." We must a a "music
imagine "philosopher-artist," prac
ticing Socrates," i.e., a philosopher whose activities "are often carried out by
means of metaphor," whose love of wisdom ruptures "commonplaces" and
"completely breaks with the customs and habits" of daily life; a philosopher
whose "selective knowledge drive" is pursued, not for knowledge's sake, but
"in the service of thebest possible life," and a philosopher who will "forcibly
wring nihilism from the fabric of modernity" (P, ?? 25-26, 37, 44-53; see
also BT, ? 17 and GM II, ? 24).37 But what accounts for this Nietzschean
emphasis on the "untimely" as opposed to the "timely" figure of wisdom?
Why emphasize the "anomalous," "atopic" character of this "new species"
of philosopher as opposed towhat he terms the "stunted" and conventional
character of past and present philosophers? (UM III, ? 3). Why stress the
"disruptive" side of wisdom rather than the conciliatory? Why the "brakeshoe
of time" rather than the "rose in the cross of the present"?38
Nietzsche sees the language of philosophy and traditional conceptual think
ing as always embedded in an "inarticulable" shared background of prac
tices,what Heidegger would later terma "clearing," which contains a concealed
epistemic content or understanding of being within which particular events
become evident, and things and people appear as intelligible. This shared
background of language, customs, habits, and skills, against which objects
and people appear as meaningful and usable, is never itself fully accessible
to philosophical reflection or wholly representable as a system of beliefs and
values. It ismore of a historically transmitted "horizon" thatwe have inher
ited,which we largely take for granted, and which we do not completely con
trol.As Nietzsche puts it,"the philosopher [as well as others] remains caught
in the nets of [the] language" of our "timely" cultural horizon (P, ? 118; cf.
UM IV, ? 5). One of themajor difficulties confrontingNietzsche's "untimely"
and "dangerous" meditations is how to think about and question one's own
epistemic, linguistic, and nomothetic horizon. How does one go about open
ing up a space inwhich to thinkabout thatwhich typically demands no think
ing and which is usually taken for granted by the prevailing culture? How
does one thinkwithin a horizon thatone wants to open up to critical scrutiny
when the only modality of thought available to undertake this scrutiny is the
very one being put into question? It is at this juncture thatNietzsche's
"untimely" "atopic" figures play an important role in helping us (and
Nietzsche) "twist free" or "recoil away" from the constraining "nets" of our
modern nomothetic horizon, pointing us toward possible ways of thinking
and acting beyond it.But before we examine how thisworks, we first need
to ask ourselves: Why does Nietzsche feel such an urgent need to "twist free"
of the "timely {zeitgem??) present"?
Nietzsche believes that there is somethingmore than slightly "askew" about
our modern cultural horizon, and he struggles in his various works to artic
ulate this problem. In his earlier works he tends to attributemany of our civ
ilizational discontents to what he calls a "motley" or "modish" culture that
lacks the "unity of style" that characterized earlier "healthy" cultures, such
as ancient Greece (cf. UM I, ? 1; III, ? 6). He is also critical of the "uncul
tured chauvinists" who equate military superiority (e.g., Prussian superior
ityafter theFranco-Prussian War) with cultural superiority; and he particularly
singles out those voyeuristic self-satisfied newspaper readers and consumers
proportions."43Why did the ascetic ideal triumph? Simply put, itgave human
suffering a meaning and, according toNietzsche, any meaning for suffering
is better than none: people would rather "will nothing than not will at all"
(GM III, ? 28). While its overt message may be that thisworld?the natural
world, our everyday life?has no ultimate value and ought therefore to be
denied in favor of some "other world" or "true world" view (cf. I, 3);
nonetheless, the ascetic ideal still gives us a feeling that there is, after all,
something worth living for?something that can satisfy our psychological
need for a sense of power and effectiveness in life?even if this feeling of
effectiveness is attained through "dishonest" ascetic means of self-denial and
devaluation of the natural world. Nietzsche argues that the "self-contradic
tion" represented by the ascetic ideal is that, in fact, it is a disguised form of
the "will-to-preserve-life" (GM III, ? 13). Its valuation-plus-interpretation
both gives suffering a meaning (the figure of the "ascetic priest" says "we
sufferbecause we are guilty") and initiates a process of excess "debauchery"
of feelings, a spiral of feelings of guilt, ascetic practices, sense of sin, etc.,
which, temporarily at least, numbs the suffering (GM III, ? 19). For a long
time, the ascetic ideal actually served an essential life-enhancing function: it
helped humanity overcome depression and disgust with life caused by the
constraints of modern urbanization (cf. GM II, ? 16). It gave lifemeaning,
spurred our willingness to go on, to keep acting and willing. In short, itgave
humankind a feeling of power, a feeling thatwe could effectively take on
even more sufferingand endure it.44As such, the ascetic ideal "saved thewill"
and transformed man into "an interesting animal," characterized by "depth
and intelligence," and "pregnant with a future" (GM I, ? 6 and II, 16).Why
then, according toNietzsche, did it fail?
It is the idiosyncratic problem of the ascetic ideal that,while itcultivates
truthfulnessand introspection (e.g., Christian confession about self and world),
it is "a form of valuation which requires itsdevotees tomake claims and have
beliefs thatwon't stand up to truthful introspective scrutiny (such as that
moral action arises from altruistic sources)."45 Hence iteventually "dissolves
itself (GM III, ? 27). It dissolves what is "exoteric" in the ideal, namely, the
"other-worldly myths," the comforting illusions, the "lie involved in thebelief
inGod," while still clinging to the life-denying "esoteric" remnants of the
ideal (GM III, ? 27). "The awe-inspiring catastrophe of two thousand years
of training" in the ascetic ideal is that humanity can no longer get what it
really needs from the ideal?viz., a feeling of power and effectiveness in the
world?except by denying or ignoring the cornerstone of that ideal, the "will
to-truth."One would feel foolish rather than powerful in embracing a life
denying ideal ifone's motive for embracing itwere to feel better about life.46
Hence the need for an alternative culture-wide ideal.
But this brings us towhat Nietzsche claims is "the most terrifyingaspect
of the ascetic ideal" (GM III, ? 27). For "when the death of God informsour
lives, when the trueworld has been abolished with it, [when] loss of faith in
values per se accompanies loss of faith in those values specifically nurtured"
by the ascetic ideal, and when the theological foundations and sanctions for
morality collapse, "only a pervasive sense of ultimate purposelessness, mean
inglessness, remains."47Thus, humanity is in grave danger from the "harm
fulness" of the ascetic ideal and its inevitable demise (EH III; WP, ?? 2, 3,
12). Simply put, itwill be increasingly difficultforpeople in themodern world
to avoid realizing thattraditionalmoral beliefs (as grounded in theascetic ideal)
are false; and thedissolution of these beliefs will cause serious social and cul
turaldislocation: themodern world will be increasingly oriented toward "wars
the likeof which have never yet been seen on earth," as well as unchecked con
sumption,materialism, pessimism, passive nihilism, and general social malaise
(EH XIV, ? l).48As Bernd Magnus observes: "The triumph of meaningless
ness, theAbsurd, is at the same time the triumphof nihilism.When the high
est values become devalued nihilism is a danger not because thereare no other
possible values, but because most ofWestern humanity knows no other values
than those associated with . . . [the] ascetic ideal."49
Hence, as Nietzsche sees it, there is an urgency to promote an alternative
ideal. However, the vexing problem confronting any attempt to formulate a
"nonascetic" ideal is that the various disciplines of modernity?science, his
tory,art, politics?can be shown, upon genealogical analysis, to be bound up
with the ascetic ideal in complex and subtle ways, it is here thatNietzsche's
most "timely" of timely figures, the "Nay-sayers and outsiders of today," "all
these pale atheists, anti-Christians, immoralists, nihilists, these skeptics . . .
"
these last idealists of knowledge . . . these free, very free spirits appear on
the scene to "disclose" or exemplify, in a peculiarly performativeway, "what
they themselves cannot see, for they are too close to themselves: viz., that
this [ascetic] ideal is precisely their ideal too" (GM III, ? 24). In a manner
somewhat reminiscent of Hegel's notion of immanent critique, Nietzsche's
"timely" figures all reveal a discrepancy between their performative utter
ances and sayings, on the one hand?for example, their performative denial
of any theological or metaphysical foundations and sanctions for values?
and theireffective or practical ways of measuring and justifying these claims,
viz., that they are to be accepted simply "because theyare true"What makes
these self-professed timely "opponents of the ascetic ideal, these coun
teridealists" suspect is precisely "the most captious, tender, intangible form
of seduction" of the ascetic ideal: faith in the absolute value of truth,in "truth
for truth's sake" (GM III, ?? 23-24). "That which constrains thesemen, this
unconditional will to truth, is faith in the ascetic ideal itself even if as an
unconscious imperative ... it is faith in a metaphysical value, the absolute
value of truth,sanctioned and guaranteed by this ideal alone" (GM III, ? 24).
Through theirperformative utterances and effective claims to knowledge,
Nietzsche's timely figures all reveal themselves to be flawed in that they are
all still captivated by the ascetic ideal (albeit in disguised forms) and hence
incapable of offering a nonascetic, nonnihilistic alternative to it. For exam
ple, the figure of the "Man of Science"?the reigning "god of modernity"?
can only offer as an alternative ideal the underlying belief in the importance
of "being scientific," coupled with the faith that science alone can redeem
the human condition. His striving after objectivity (i.e., "truth" about the
world as it is "in-itself '; the "lawful and necessary") requires the "Man of
Science" to adopt an attitude of "disinterested" objectifying investigation:
for example, holding himself back from imposing an interpretationon results,
refraining from allowing his interests to play a role in determining the out
come of the investigation, etc. (cf. GS ? 335). This is a case of a (relatively
close) approximation in the cognitive sphere to the ascetic ideal (e.g., direct
ing human energies back against themselves). While this practice has impor
tant uses and is successful in certain contexts, and while Nietzsche has no
objection to science as an activity (see his note entitled "Long Live Physics,"
? 335), what it does not give us is a new "counterideal" to the heretofore
reigning ascetic ideal, that is, a set of positive values for life.And to the extent
that it offers us an "ideal" for life, that of "being scientific for the sake of
"
being scientific it is simply the "latest expression" of the ascetic ideal. In
a similar "performative" way, the "pale atheists" reveal themselves to be
flawed in that theycondemn the comforting illusions of the theological, meta
physical tradition, but without condemning thatwhich condemns life, viz.,
the values generated by the ascetic ideal and thus, inNietzsche's view, gen
erated out of a situation of failure.50Likewise, the "Utopian socialists" and
"free thinkers" disclose themselves to be all-too-bound to the ascetic ideal.
They see this life as valuable only in terms of some unrealized (and proba
bly unrealizable) future state of affairs, such as the Utopian "worker's state,"
which involves sacrifice and self-denial here and now (e.g., embracing the
next "five year" plan, denying oneself the comforts of religious beliefs, and
taking a stand against natural desires and practical inclinations). Even those
"philosophical laborers" and "Wissenschaftler" after "the noble models of
Kant and Hegel" who claim to overcome dogmatic metaphysics still reveal
that they too are held captive by the ascetic ideal. As Nietzsche says, in their
knowledge and thought "affects grow cold, the tempo of life slows down,
dialectics replace instinct, seriousness is imprinted on their faces and ges
tures (seriousness, themost unmistakable sign of a labored metabolism, or a
struggling, laborious life)" (GM III, ? 25; BGE, ? 211).
Nietzsche even goes so far as to suggest thathis own preferred figure for
destructuring the traditional moral (ascetic) mode of evaluation, the figure
of "the genealogist," is still characterized by an unconscious collaboration
with the ascetic ideal. For even the "genealogist" reveals that the values which
structure his or her discourse?for example, the desire to get a more honest
account of the origin of values, the drive to provide a trueraccount of moral
ity than theChristian-ascetic?are the very ones his analysis puts into ques
tion.The timely figure of the "genealogist" exemplifies thathe too is char
acterized by "faith" in the overriding value of "truth for truth's sake." As
such, he exemplifies, in a performative way, the continuing presence of the
ascetic ideal in the practice of his own "counter" genealogical method, thus
"exposing the genealogist's own subjective interestsand prejudices" and con
suming his own "originary authority."51
So Nietzsche's innovative use of "timely figures" in connection with his own
genealogical analysis discloses, he thinks, a common unifying thread con
necting the strands of our cultural decadence and societal discontents. This is
the unconscious collaboration between the ascetic ideal and the various mod
em disciplines of thoughtand action. According toNietzsche, theunquestioned
faith in "truth for truth's sake" remains themoving force behind so much of
modern thoughtand knowledge. Moreover, the unconscious internalization of
the ascetic ideal (in its various subtle guises) is still theway most contempla
tivepeople explain and justify themselves, search formeaning, or find value.
Given the grave danger Nietzsche thinkshumanity faces vis-?-vis the ascetic
ideal and itspending demise, it is extremely importantforhim to sketch pos
sible modes of self-overcoming, forms of perspectival knowledge, experimen
talways of thinking,thatwould not be committed, eitherexplicitly or implicitly,
to the ascetic ideal and to themetaphysical tradition in theWest that supports
it.But how can one break out of the shell of theprevailing cultural horizon and
open up alternative spaces of discourse and disclosure within which new
nonascetic, nondecadent, and antinihilistic ideals and values can be generated?
How can one go about embodying or exemplifying a modality for thinking
beyond the prevailing modality? Can one successfully represent an aspect or
aspects of a possible counter-ideal thatwould reconnect our legitimatepursuit
of knowledge and truthto the natural world, knowledge to the senses, truthto
our cognitive intereststhatare rooted inour practical interestsas human
beings?
thus removing any excuse fordevaluing thenaturalworld, or abstracting knowl
edge and thoughtfrom thatworld? Or alternatively, is itpossible for us, while
still embodying theascetic ideal in complex and subtle ways, to accomplish a
"twistingmetamorphosis" or "twisting recoil" away from the ascetic ideal that
would loosen its stranglehold, deflect the advent of a dead-end nihilism, and
provide us with at least an intimation of what may lie beyond our prevailing
(decadent) cultural horizon?
We do not know ifNietzsche is correct in his identification of the "asce
tic ideal" (and itspending demise) as themain source of modernity's prob
lems. Nor do we know ifhe is correct in his insistence on the urgent need to
commend some alternative (nonascetic) ideal to modernity's attention.
However, a full century of world wars, unchecked consumption in theWestern
world, and environmental degradation since Nietzsche predicted the imma
nent demise of the ascetic ideal suggest thathe was not wrong. What we are
courage to disclose to themselves that the ascetic ideal, which they profess
to deny, "is still their ideal too, they themselves embody it today ... for they
still have faith in truth" (GM III, ? 24). "Take care, philosophers and friends
of wisdom, and beware ofmartyrdom! Of sufferingfor truth 's sake (BGE,
? 25). In a performative way, the timely figure of the "mere free spirit" helps
to cultivate the "courage of conscience" as a requisite feature of "genuine
wisdom" by exemplifying the lack of such courage. This, in turn,helps bring
to lightwhat would still be required of those "genuine" free spirits and "true
philosophers": namely, the courage to pursue truth"for life's sake," to rec
ognize that "their knowing is creating, their creating is a legislation, their
will to truthis?will topower" (BGE, ?? 205, 21 1).52But again, why use fig
ures rather than propositions to convey this idea?
One suggestion is thatNietzsche employs figures as the preferredmode of
presentation of his "untimely" and "dangerous" ideas inorder to avoid one of
themost common trapsof theascetic ideal?viz., the trapof "dogmatism," or
inotherwords, the trapof accepting an ideal or doctrine as having an absolute,
fixed, nonperspectival claim to value "simply because it is true." One of
Nietzsche's most commonly expressed fears is thathis own "untimely medi
tations" will come to be valued not as "a great stimulus to life" but simply
"for truth'ssake": "Alas, what are you after all, my written and painted thoughts.
. .. You have
already taken off your novelty, and some of you are ready, I fear,
to become truths" (BGE, ? 296). Thus he employs poetic figures to convey
his "untimely" message so thatboth themode of presentation, as well as the
content being presented, will exemplify the very novelty and "courage of con
science" he exhorts his "true philosophers" or "philosophers of the future" to
pursue. So, again, the effect of the poetic figure is tomake the reader ask, not
dogmatically, "Does Nietzsche get it right?" but rather, "Who do I become,
and what do I do, as a result of trying to understand thefigure9"'
Another possible suggestion here is that the use of "solemn pomp-and
virtue names" such as and "conscience," as well as other "moral"
"courage"
terms, to characterize the alternative values and ideals of the "philosophers
of the future" is itself suspect, and thus inadequate to the task at hand, sim
ply because such terms have already been corrupted "by common [or dog
matic] usage" (cf. BGE, ?? 295, 230).34 Moral terms and "pomp-and-virtue
names" generated in the situation of experience of failure (e.g., the demise
of the ascetic ideal) are themselves, according toNietzsche, a formof "coun
ternature" (cf. 77,V). So just as the ancient Greeks needed to appeal first to
mythical figures (e.g., Apollo and Dionysus) in order to "heal thewound of
existence" in the "tragic age" (BT, ? 7); and just as the "ascetic ideal" needed
to employ its own mythology (e.g., the passion and resurrection story; the
promise of heaven and hell) in order to succeed in overcoming "the will to
nothingness" in the early modern age; so tooNietzsche thinkshis own trans
This lifeas you now live itand have lived it,you will have to live once more
and innumerable times more; and there will be nothing new in it, but every
pain and every joy and every thoughtand sigh and everythingunutterably
small or greatin your life will have to return to you, all in the same succes
. . Would
.
sion and
sequence. you not throw yourself down and gnash your
teeth and curse the demon who spoke thus? Or have you once experienced a
tremendous moment when you would have answered him "You are a god and
never have I heard anythingmore divine." If this thoughtgained possession
of you, itwould you as you are or perhaps
change crush you. The question in
each and every
thing, "Do you desire this once more and innumerable times
more?" would lie upon your actions as the greatest weight. Or how well dis
posed would you have to become to yourself and to life to crave nothing more
dent] nature withers away (UM II, ? 3); and using "weapons of humor" to
generate a "lost sense of strangeness," surprise, and "ironic self-awareness"
thatmay one day turn"history" and "knowledge" against itself and lead to a
"new hunger" that transforms the outside world (cf. UM I, ? 2; II, ? 8). But
Nietzsche typically defers the "commanding and legislating" of positive alter
natives to the ascetic ideal to the "philosophers of the future" (cf.BGE, ? 211).
Not surprisingly, commentators have never reached consensus on the iden
tityof these mysterious successors. Many tend to equate the figure of the
"Philosopher of the Future" with that of Zarathustra's "?bermensch" who
will "preside over the long-awaited completion of the human species," but
about whom Zarathustra claims "there has never yet been one" ( II, 4).59 In
an attempt to shed some light on this issue, we turn to a particularly reveal
ing passage inNietzsche's fourth "Untimely Meditation":
The figures which an artist creates, while not the artist himself, are nonethe
less a succession of forms upon which he has bestowed his love and which
readers. "A philosophy of the future need not be a philosophy that is com
*1
posed in thefuture. It can also well be a philosophy that concerns thefuture
Thus the implied answer toNietzsche's own rhetorical question?'Are there
such philosophers today? ... Must therenot be such philosophers?"?is yes:
they are the very philosophers who are engaged in the forward-looking fig
urative self-experimentations Nietzsche himself is engaged in {BGE, ?211).
As such, they share inmany of the "goals and highest aims" of Zarathustra's
promised (but never realized) ?bermensch. For example, they share in his
"free-spirited skepticism," his experimentalism; they too have learned to say
"no" to a decadent age; they too speak frankly (in theGreek sense of par
rhesia) without the sanction of the community (or "herd").63 However, they
do not share inZarathustra's reactive resentment against the "small men" or
the "herd men," or against thosewho fail to live up to the?bermensch's dog
matically stated goals and drives.While challenging the status quo, they do
not devalue or denigrate it; instead they strive to transfigure it.
While recog
nizing (with an ironic self-awareness) that they sufferfrommany of the same
flaws theyfight against, the philosophers of the future adopt forward-look
ing strategies of resistance thatdisrupt and recoil fromwithin theclosed sys
tem of the ascetic ideal, contributing, gradually, to its self-overcoming. As
such, they share many of the same qualities as thatof Nietzsche's "Nay-say
ers and outsiders": themere "free spirits," the honest, traditional atheists,"
etc. They avoid much of what the "free spirits" and "free thinkers"avoid, but
theydo not misinterpret this avoidance ascetically or dogmatically in a way
thatdevalues life (cf. GM III, ? 10; BGE, ? 44).
This brings us to a thirdpoint: the figure of the "Philosopher of theFuture"
is the untimely figurewho refuses to be a dogmatist. As opposed to such dog
matic timely figures as "the mole and the dwarf who say, Good for all, Evil
for all" (Z III, 11), the philosophers of the future "legislate and command"
for themselves without assuming dogmatically that they are legislating for
all. As Nehamas says, "The philosophers of the future cannot engage in the
creation of a new [dogmatic] table of values thatwill hold [universally] for
all people and thatwill 'enhance' everyone."64 However, contra Nehamas's
claim, theymust somehow commend or propose alternative nonascetic ideals
to humanity's attention. They must do so by employing experimental
figu
rative exemplars that reveal or unearth discrepancies, for example, between
performance and practice, which critique and even consume themselves imma
nently, and thatdisclose a metaphorical "picture of human life" (e.g., thatof
the "eternal returnof the same," or thatof the "will-to-power") fromwhich
the individual is invited "to learn themeaning of an individual life" in all of
itsdiversity and manifoldness (cf. BGE, ?? 215, 224), The philosophers of
the future are thus the ones who must exemplify in their philosophical
performances the very open-ended, nondogmatic, nonascetic values they
commend. This iswhy, for example, theymust leave itup to the individual
Like othermythical figures (e.g., Apollo and Dionysus) thathave the power
to shape our ways of thinking and feeling but which are misunderstood if
subjected to an all-too-literal true/false dichotomy, so too the figure of the
"Philosopher of theFuture" is best understood as a means to our education
and development. It is a figure that prompts us to the sort of response that
may further the education of our lives, for example, by cultivating in us a
sensibility capable of passing theDemon's "recurrence test." The philoso
pher of the future, like Zarathustra and the ?bermensch, is best interpreted
as a figurative device in the context of Nietzsche's educational project (or
Bildungsproze?) of transformingour sensibilities, rather than literalistically.
As Nietzsche sees it,figures are necessary for education; but rather than fix
upon them,we are to use them as an aid in reaching the developmental point
at which we can, perhaps, go on without them, or at least go on with new,
fresh, and more innovative figures.
The philosopher of the future, then, is best viewed as an "untimely" figu
rativemodel for reeducating and forming (in the sense of bilden) our aspi
rations for enhancing life, rather than providing us with literal doctrinal
information to be learned or adopted. The philosopher of the futureprovides
posterity with a figurative exemplar capable of performing the kind of edu
cational functionNietzsche had discussed earlier inhis essay on Schopenhauer,
and which he claims Schopenhauer as an exemplary "figure" of the "educa
tor" (Erzieher) had provided for him, viz., a stimulus for drawing us outward
(erziehen) and upward toward "becoming who we are." In a decadent age,
Nietzsche insists, "we have to be lifted up?but who are theywho will lift
us?" (UM III, ? 5). The educational figure of the "Philosopher of the Future"
does so by evoking an alternative form of a trulyhuman "future humanity"?
a "new image and ideal of the free spirit"?healthy and vital
enough "to be
enduringly useful to theworld and creative and spiritualized enough to jus
At the same time,however, those (like Nietzsche) who educate them
tify it."69
selves by working theirway toward this "new image" of the free spirit they
themselves are becoming?while providing others with exemplars and "vis
ible epitomes" formoving in that direction?count as being "philosophers
of the future" because of their experimentalism, radical disillusionment,
uncompromising truthfulness,and unqualified life affirmation.
Nietzsche, of course, denies that he himself or any of his readers has yet
attained this goal. Rather, he insists that theymust first educate themselves
(e.g., via the figurative experimentations and Bildungsproze? depicted in
Zarathustra), drawing themselves "out and beyond" what they and theworld
already are toward what theymight become. Yet it is the idiosyncratic fea
tureof thephilosopher of the future thatwho or what he or she is, is not given
antecedently to the figurative self-experimentations in question. Thus like
Nietzsche, the philosophers of the futuremust construct themselves out of
the figurative exemplars they themselves are experimenting with, This is the
Conclusion
Nietzsche was acutely aware of the fact thathumans cannot step outside their
cultural horizon at will. To deflect the dangers implicit in, for example, the
advent of nihilism, Nietzsche evokes the untimely disruptive figure of the
philosopher of the futurewho, as the "comedian" and "musical-Socrates,"
makes us laugh at what we take to be so serious about life: our "regimes of
truth,"our ascetic devaluations of the natural world, etc. As untimely atopic
figures who make us laugh at our "holiest of holies," the philosophers of the
future disrupt our commonplaces, and by disrupting, teach us how to open
up spaces for rethinking our ways of being and acting in theworld, and to
revaluate our basic aspirations and sensibilities. Paraphrasing Diogenes,
Nietzsche asks, "How can any [philosopher] be considered great who has not
yet disrupted and disturbed anyone? And indeed, this ought to be the epitaph
of our current university philosophy: itdisrupted no one" (UM III, ? 8). By
disrupting us, these untimely atopic philosophers of the future evoke the
promise of alternate forms of humanity, new ways of valuing the earth and
one's life on it, thus drawing us "out and up" toward becoming who we are.
Why should anyone voluntarily wish for their life to be so disrupted?What
exactly is to be gained by accepting the "disruptive wisdom" thatNietzsche's
untimely atopic philosophers of the future dispense? Why is this disruption
valuable or desirable? Nietzsche's answer: we need disruptive wisdom because
we are all "in danger of being cheated out of [ourselves]," cheated out of our
authenticity (UM III, ? 4). Nietzsche believes that the vast majority of human
beings are all too caught up in the common, everyday deployment of things:
those "human arrangements" that "distract our thoughts" so thatwe "cease
to be aware of life" (UM III, ? 4). Thus if I am to "remain my own," and fash
ion an authentic life formyself, then according to Nietzsche I must first
"renounce I once reverenced," even "reverence itself
everything renouncing
Notes
1. See Sander L. Gilman, "The Figure of the Black in theThought of Hegel and Nietzsche,"
German Quarterly 65, no. 2 (March 1980), 141-58. See also Daniel Conway, Nietzsche and the
Political (New York and London: Routledge, 1997), 51; and Alexander Nehamas, Life as Literature
University Press, 1979), de Man concludes that, inworks such as theBirth of Tragedy, Nietzsche
is "curiously ambivalent with regard to the main figures of [his] own discourse" (94).
3. For example, Paul de Man inAllegories of Reading claims thatNietzsche's work "strad
dles the two activities of the human intellect that are both the closest and themost impenetra
ble to each other?literature and philosophy" (103). Two more recent contributions to this debate
have been made by Douglas Thomas, Reading Nietzsche Rhetorically (New York: The Guilford
Press, 1999), and Bernd Magnus, Stanley Stewart, and Jean-Pierre Mileur, Nietzsche's Case:
Philosophy as/and Literature (New York: Routledge, 1993).
4. Martin Heidegger, Nietzsche, trans. David Krell (New York: Harper and Row, 1982), vol.
II, 30.
5. ibid., 34.
6. See Peter Berkowitz, Nietzsche: The Ethics of an Immor?list (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard
University Press, 1995), 13-14, 16-17. While their reasons differ, both Heidegger and Berkowitz
agree in their conclusion thatNietzsche's ingenious attempts to overcome themetaphysical tra
dition ofWestern philosophy ultimately fail.
7. Wayne Klein, Nietzsche and the Promise of Philosophy (Albany: State University of New
York Press, 1997). 102-6.
8. Conway, Nietzsche and the Political, 2-3.
9. John Sallis, Crossings: Nietzsche and the Space of Tragedy (Chicago: The University of
understanding the figures as we do, namely, as educational devices designed to generate certain
experiences that could not be generated by cognitive means alone. As we shall argue, the fig
ures make perceptible "to those today certain disruptive
capable of insight (den Einsichten)"
experiences that the reader would otherwise not have; and in doing so, the figures help bring
about a profound transformation of theway inwhich life and theworld are regarded, both exis
the work that contains the greatest number of diverse and remarkable kinds of Nietzschean fig
ures from beginning to end.
12. A more concise account of what we mean by "figures" would be helpful at this juncture.
However, the various German words thatNietzsche uses (e.g., Gestalten, Gebilde, Erscheinungen,
and Figuren), and that are commonly translated as "figures" or "figurai," range widely inmean
ing. Sometimes they are apparently intended tomean "image" or "image-type"; sometimes "char
acter" or "persona '; sometimes "form" or "appearance"; sometimes "pseudonym" or
"mouthpiece"; sometimes "trope" or "ideal"; and sometimes "mask" or "disguise." These mean
ings are not mutually exclusive or inconsistent; for all these "synonyms" are conceptually related,
and all revolve around the "literary" center of Nietzsche's writings. Still, a more precise and
narrow definition for these terms proves somewhat difficult to articulate. In light of these con
siderations, we have concluded that the translation that makes the most sense in the contexts
that we are concerned to explore in this essay is the one used by both Walter Kaufmann and
Ronald Speirs, e.g., at BT, ? 1, namely, "figures." In our view, this translation is especially appro
priate for capturing the unique function that many of Nietzsche's "Gestalten" or "Gebilde"
play in dispensing a "disruptive wisdom" that is not readily available from more traditional
sumptions and presuppositions. By relying on these "figures," Nietzsche is able to acquaint his
readers with "untimely" perspectives from which the received wisdom of the day can be called
into question.
13. Cf. Heidegger, Nietzsche, 30-34.
14. See Arthur Danto, Nietzsche as Philosopher (New York: Columbia University Press,
1980), 36-67.
15. This passage from Nietzsche's 1875 notes is quoted from Leslie Paul Thiele, Friedrich
Nietzsche and the Politics of the Soul (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1990), 119. In sec
tions 222 and 223 of Human, All Too Human, Nietzsche speaks of living in the "evening twi
light of art" and of the artist as a "glorious relic." He also claims that "the scientific man is the
further evolution of the artist." Yet as Thiele notes, inNietzsche's final years of work "the con
cept of the 'philosopher-artist' continued to occupy his thoughts {WP 419). In its broadest terms,
the reason for the coupling of philosophy and art is straightforward. Philosophy is themost spir
itual will to power, not because will finds its highest realization in philosophical thought or writ
ing, but because it finds its highest incarnation in the philosopher himself. The philosopher is
his own experiment in living, in the enhancement and sublimation of the will to power. He is,
in effect, his own artistic creation: The product of the philosopher is his life (first of all, before
his works). That is his work of art'" (119).
16. Sarah Kofman, "Accessories {Ecce Homo, 'Why I write Such Good Books,' The
Untimelies,' 3)," inNietzsche: A Critical Reader, ed. Peter Sedgwick (Cambridge, Mass.:
Blackwell, 1995), 146-47.
17. See ibid., 146.
18. "Though a child of the present time," Nietzsche claims that he was nonetheless able to
"acquire untimely experiences" by "drawing on the experiences of others" from earlier times,
especially via the "Hellenic" myths and figures (see UM II, "Foreword").
19. Cited from Daniel Breazeale's "Introduction" to R. J. Hollingdale's translation of
Nietzsche's Untimely Meditations (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997), xxiv.
20. See Marianne Cowan, "Introduction" toNietzsche's Philosophy in the Tragic Age of the
Greeks, trans. M. Cowan (Washington, D.C.: Regnery, 1962), 11-12. In this sense, Nietzsche
uses figures, e.g., the figures of the pre-Socratic philosophers, as an educational means for rein
"way of life."
21. See Breazeale's "Introduction," xxiv.
22. Also see Conway, Nietzsche and the Political, 2; 10-13.
23. Nietzsche is often quite positive toward the ascetic practices of particular saints and mar
tyrs (and even of particular artists and philosophers), especially insofar as such practices embody
an important dimension of self-discipline and self-mastery (cf. GM III, ?? 5, 9, 12). However,
as we shall argue, one of themost important things Nietzsche's "untimely" figures are designed
to disrupt is the "idealization" of asceticism.
24. See also Conway, Nietzsche and the Political, 32-33; 47.
25. See ibid., 48-50.
26. See ibid., 17-20.
"
27. See Breazeaie, "Introduction xlvii; see also Nehamas, Life as Literature, 193-95.
28. See Pierre Hadot, Philosophy as a Way of Life, trans.Michael Chase (Oxford: Blackwell
Publishers, 1995), 150.
29. See Conway, Nietzsche and the Political, 51.
30. Ian Hacking, "Our Fellow Animals," The New York Review of Books (June 29, 2000), 22.
31. See Alain de Botton, The Consolations of Philosophy (New York: Pantheon, 2000).
32. Note from 1875. Cited from The Portahle Nietzsche, ed. and trans.Walter Kaufmann
(New York: Viking Penguin, 1982), 50.
33. Cowan, "Introduction," 12.
34. G. W. F. Hegel, Grundlinien der Philosophie des Rechts (Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp,
1970), "Preface" Hereafter abbreviated as "PR."
35. See Allen Wood, Hegel's Ethical Thought (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
1990), 232.
36. See Hadot, Philosophy as a Way of Life, 158.
37. Also see Daniel Conway, "Comedians of theAscetic Ideal," The Politics of Irony: Essays
in Self-Betrayal, ed. Daniel Conway and John Seery (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1992), 83-89;
and Hadot, Philosophy as a Way of Life, 56-60, 147-58.
38. Here we should note thatNietzsche's notion of "untimeliness" parallels, inmany ways,
Hadot's understanding of the ancient Greek notion of atopia, or the "strangeness" of the philoso
pher in the human world. According to Hadot, "One does not know how to classify him, for he
is neither a sage nor a man like other men. He knows that the normal, natural state of men should
be wisdom, forwisdom is nothing more than the vision of things as they are , . .and wisdom is
also nothing more than themode of being and living that should correspond to this vision. But
the philosopher also knows that this wisdom is an ideal state, almost inaccessible. For such a
man, daily life, as it is organized and lived by other men, must necessarily appear abnormal,
like a state of madness, unconsciousness, and ignorance of reality. And nonetheless he must live
this life everyday, in thisworld inwhich he feels himself a stranger and inwhich others per
ceive him to be one as well. And it is precisely in this daily life that he must seek to attain that
way of life which is utterly foreign to the everyday world. The result is a perpetual conflict
between the philosopher's effort to see things as they are from the standpoint of universal nature
and the conventional vision of things underlying human society, a conflict between the life one
should live and the customs and conventions of daily life. This conflict can never be totally
resolved" (58).
39. See Breazeale's "Introduction" toNietzsche's Untimely Meditations, xiii.
40. See Bernd Magnus, "Nietzsche and the End of Philosophy." inNietzsche as Affirmative
Thinker (Dordrecht: Martinus Nijhoff, 1986), 45.
41. See Raymond Geuss, Morality, Culture, and History (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 1999), 56 and 174.
42. See ibid., 174.
43. See Magnus, "Nietzsche and the End of Philosophy," 51.
44. As Conway observes, "Under the aegis of the ascetic ideal, we have learned to experi
ment with ourselves and to exploit the plasticity of the human soul," "Comedians of theAscetic
Ideal," 87.
45. Geuss, Morality,Culture, and History, 21.
46. See Maudemarie Clark, Nietzsche on Truth and Philosophy (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 1990), 184-87, 191-92, 234.
47. Magnus, "Nietzsche and the End of Philosophy," 51.
48. See Geuss, Morality, Culture, and History, 178.
49. Magnus, "Nietzsche and the End of Philosophy," 51.
50. Among other things, Nietzsche has inmind Feurerbach's attempt to save Christian ethics
perspectives "at will" (EH I, ? 1). Today's "free spirits" lack the requisite "courage of con
science," and hence lack the requisite wisdom needed to formulate life-enhancing values, because
they still cling to "the most terrifying aspect of the ascetic ideal," viz., the "will to truth," the
desire for "truth for truth's sake" (cf. GM III, ? 23).
53. See the interview with Alexander Nehamas entitled "On the Philosophical Life," in The
Harvard Review of Philosophy 8 (Spring 2000): 31.
54. See Berkowitz, Nietzsche, 257.
55. See Clark, 232-33; 282-83.
56. Ibid., 284-85.
57. See Conway, Nietzsche and the Political, 104.
58. Ibid.
59. Cf. Harold Alderman, Nietzsche's Gift (Athens: Ohio University Press, 1977).
60. Cf. Alexander Nehamas, "Who Are the Philosophers of the Future? A Reading of Beyond
Good and Evil," Reading Nietzsche, ed. Robert Solomon and Kathleen Higgins (Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 1988), 52-53.
61. See Charles Larmore, Patterns ofMoral Complexity (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 1987), 15-16.
62. Nehamas, "A Reading of Beyond Good and Evil," 58.
63. Cf. Berkowitz, Nietzsche, 13-14.
64. Nehamas, "A Reading of Beyond Good and Evil," 57.
65. According toMagnus and Higgins, a self-consuming figure, character, or concept is one
that "requires as a condition of its intelligibility (or even possibility) the very contrastas] itwishes
to set aside or would have us set aside." See their "Introduction" to The Cambridge Companion
toNietzsche, ed. Bernd Magnus and Kathleen Higgins (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
1996), 7.
66. See Raymond Geuss, "Introduction" toNietzsche's Birth of Tragedy, trans. Ronald Speirs
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999), xii.
67. See Richard Schacht, "Zarathustra/Zarar/ms/ra as Educator," Nietzsche: A Critical Reader,
ed. Peter Sedgwick (Cambridge, Mass.: Blackwell, 1995), 232.
68. Ibid., 232.
69. See ibid., 226-28.
70. See ibid., "A Readingof Beyond Good and Evil," 51.
71. See Conway; Nietzsche and the Political, 137,141.
72. See "Zarathustra/Zarar?wsira," 233-39.
73. See Hadot, Philosophy as a Way of Life, 148.
74. See "Zarathustra/Zara/?wjfra," 240, 246.