Beyond Good and Evil Imagery

Beyond Good and Evil Imagery

Morality

Unsurprisingly, the imagery of moral thought and opinion becomes a major consideration as Nietzsche explains his personal views of Good and Evil. He explains that what typically passes as "moral goodness" is actually a kind of weakness. By rejecting one's moral authority in their own life, a "morally good person" lets others tell them what to think and believe, trading autonomy for personal clout or approval. The truth is that no person has an objective sense for morality outside their experience of shame and fear. Nietzsche goes as far to say that nature defined good as power and survival of the fittest.

True honesty

Beyond tells the reader what honesty really looks like. To claim belief in a system of thought which is objectively unprovable is obviously a kind of acceptance of ethos. His opinion is simply that only one's own ethos is authoritative. Nietzsche is not a writer who cared whatsoever about critical reception or approval, and that is why his literature will survive until the sun explodes—in his own words, he explains that he has never met another "honest" person besides himself because most people accept ethos from their leaders and community.

True skepticism

What emerges behind the imagery of Good and Evil is a skepticism that is taken by Nietzsche to extreme lengths. By committing to absolute scrutiny, one heals one's self of false ideas that govern behavior and emotion. He is skeptical of human religion, human legalism (because law is contrary to natural animal design), and he is even skeptical of his own thoughts—he rehearses old conundrums and explains to the reader why skepticism prevailed; the major reason for his skepticism seems to be a commitment to true freedom, such that freedom is an abstract quality of his skepticism.

Power as morality

As mentioned above, Nietzsche accepts the obvious scientific facts of nature and death as a higher morality. The typical point of view is that animal morality is largely evil and base, and to be replaced by religious morality or legal morality. Nietzsche deconstructs the remaining popular argument that morality stems from human intuition. He says that socially, one can adopt ideas which seem obvious once believed, but through skepticism, he reveals that the only true governing factor in life is power. A wonderful companion to this book might be The Anti-Christ which deals with the Western preference for Christian morality.

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