And the winner is....
Jesus?
How can Jesus be the strongest of the weak?
Nietzche explains the origins of our modern value system by first explaining what it was before. He says that what predated our current system was a system that gave value to the strong and the noble. It makes sense. The people that were originally on top of the natural hierarchy were the ones that assumed the roles of "value-makers". The things that were noble and strong were considered "good", and obviously, the things that were not strong became "weak". But somewhere down the line (centuries later I assume), a priestly caste used God and eventually Jesus as a catalyst or a means for this reciprocated value system. Unlike the aristocratic morality system, this system treated the strong (master) as evil and the weak (the slaves) as good. Nietzche explains that this is natural for the weak to not want to accept this faith.
So what happens? The priestly caste devises a plan to separate the good and bad by making it a choice to be weak or strong. This illusion makes it a choice to be strong or weak by completely ignoring the natural hierarchy (the natural deterministic characteristics). By saying this, you can essentially place blame on the strong for being strong and the weak for being weak. Thus, creating good and evil. Essentially, it is a struggle between determinism and free will (reminds me of Dostoevsky).
So how does this relate to Jesus? Well according to Nietzche, Jesus would be considered the strongest of the weak. He is the one who rallied the weak to change the moral system. Well, I question that that means that He is weak. I believe that there is a separation from the church and Jesus. The priestly caste is life-denying. They assume that Jesus would call the strong and noble evil, while in fact I do not see that to be the case. First, Jesus is considered a God - a figure that is beyond all things. He is life-affirming. Unlike the priestly caste who condemn the strong, Jesus does not even pays them attention. To me those are the attributes of a strong person.
It is my understanding that Jesus preached about choices and decisions and that he gave us free will to choose between the good and bad. But did he live his life that way. I argue that he does not. He lives his life beyond that. He does not react to the strong. He does not react to his oppression. No, he accepts it whole-heartedly. That makes him strong. Yes, he preached about free-will and choices, but that is not how he lived his life. He is life affirming and a strong individual.
Tell me what you think.
I think you are right, Jesus is one of the strong. However, by offering up his life for the salvation of others he is life-denying, and thus weak. By being strong, but acting weak, Jesus is defining the new moral order.
ReplyDeleteI too am finding it hard to define Jesus as weak or strong. By being oppressed he is weak. Even though he accepts it whole heartedly the fact of the matter is he is oppressed and therefore weak. Additionally he gave his life for others and therefore is life denying.
ReplyDeleteI find it hard to accept the argument that he is life affirming. While he does not pay attention to the strong caste, he is still weak. I think that I will have to agree with the title of this entry, that Jesus may be the strongest of the weak.
Jesus is certainly a paradoxical individual. By my understanding of him and how it relates to Nietzschean morality theory, it is almost as if Jesus is strong THROUGH his weakness, if that makes sense. I'm not sure if I completely agree that the way Jesus lived his life is entirely life affirming. He did after all associate with the "weak" individuals of society and participated in more ascetic practices. However, by doing so and through his influence, he was able to revolutionize religious thinking, and in this way he seems strong.
ReplyDeleteThis may raise a problem with strict Nietzschean thinking. As has often been noted, the separation between subject and action is inappropriate. But here Jesus does some actions that are weak and some that are strong -- or maybe even some actions that are both strong and weak at the same time! However, we usually consider such categories to be mutually exclusive, and if Jesus is capable of both weakness and strength (which seems inconsistent by Nietzsche's account), perhaps a separation between doer and deed is appropriate after all. If it is, we should investigate the implications and how it relates to the deterministic stance.