Socrates.—If
all goes well, the time will come when one will take up the memorabilia of
Socrates rather than the Bible as a guide to morals and reason… The pathways of
the most various philosophical modes of life lead back to him… Socrates excels
the founder of Christianity in being able to be serious cheerful and in
possessing that wisdom full of roguishness that constitutes the finest state of
the human soul. And he also possessed the finer intellect.
From Nietzche’s The Wanderer and his
Shadow,s.86,
R.J. Hollingdale transl.
It
is interesting that Nietzche’s point of view might seem unthinkable but it is
true in some way. The memorabilia of Socrates is a Socratic writing, a kind of
leaflet that seeks his defense before the jury, during the classical Greek era.
It was generally accepted that Socrates had no written book, but his students
like Xynephon and Plato collected his works after he died. He challenged the
existing beliefs and the worship of gods, and seek his divinities elsewhere.
The memorabilia questions the morality of the ruling class, challenges their
reasoning. Therefore, the comparison
that Nietzche was making between the memorabilia and the Bible as guidance to
morality and reason can be right depending on the way we look at it. When
people look at philosophy of life, and quest for knowledge and reasoning, quite
a great number of them will be channeling through Socrates rather than the
founder of Christianity.
The only issue is when Nietzche thought of
Socrates being great in terms of
“possessing that wisdom full of roguishness that constitutes the finest
state of the human soul.” That wisdom is what I see to be unprincipled,
deceitful and not following the accepted norms and standards, and which most
human souls might conform to.
I think the quote can be applied today in a
way that, democracy has given everyone a right to worship any deity, divinity,
gods, etc without being subjected to any punishment. Freedom of worship separates
the church from the State, and it is the First Amendment in the Bill of Rights,
under the U.S Constitution.
No comments:
Post a Comment