An Attempt at Self-Criticism, Section 5
Original German
Bereits im Vorwort an Richard Wagner wird die Kunst—und nicht die Moral—als die eigentlich metaphysische Thätigkeit des Menschen hingestellt; im Buche selbst kehrt der anzügliche Satz mehrfach wieder, dass nur als ästhetisches Phänomen das Dasein der Welt gerechtfertigt ist. In der That, das ganze Buch kennt nur einen Künstler-Sinn und -Hintersinn hinter allem Geschehen,—einen „Gott“, wenn man will, aber gewiss nur einen gänzlich unbedenklichen und unmoralischen Künstler-Gott, der im Bauen wie im Zerstören, im Guten wie im Schlimmen, seiner gleichen Lust und Selbstherrlichkeit inne werden will, der sich, Welten schaffend, von der Noth der Fülle und Ueberfülle, vom Leiden der in ihm gedrängten Gegensätze löst. Die Welt, in jedem Augenblicke die erreichte Erlösung Gottes, als die ewig wechselnde, ewig neue Vision des Leidendsten, Gegensätzlichsten, Widerspruchreichsten, der nur im Scheine sich zu erlösen weiss: diese ganze Artisten-Metaphysik mag man willkürlich, müssig, phantastisch nennen -, das Wesentliche daran ist, dass sie bereits einen Geist verräth, der sich einmal auf jede Gefahr hin gegen die moralische Ausdeutung und Bedeutsamkeit des Daseins zur Wehre setzen wird. Hier kündigt sich, vielleicht zum ersten Male, ein Pessimismus „jenseits von Gut und Böse“ an, hier kommt jene „Perversität der Gesinnung“ zu Wort und Formel, gegen welche Schopenhauer nicht müde geworden ist, im Voraus seine zornigsten Flüche und Donnerkeile zu schleudern,—eine Philosophie, welche es wagt, die Moral selbst in die Welt der Erscheinung zu setzen, herabzusetzen und nicht nur unter die „Erscheinungen“ (im Sinne des idealistischen terminus technicus), sondern unter die „Täuschungen“, als Schein, Wahn, Irrthum, Ausdeutung, Zurechtmachung, Kunst. Vielleicht lässt sich die Tiefe dieses widermoralischen Hanges am besten aus dem behutsamen und feindseligen Schweigen ermessen, mit dem in dem ganzen Buche das Christenthum behandelt ist,—das Christenthum als die ausschweifendste Durchfigurirung des moralischen Thema's, welche die Menschheit bisher anzuhören bekommen hat. In Wahrheit, es giebt zu der rein ästhetischen Weltauslegung und Welt-Rechtfertigung, wie sie in diesem Buche gelehrt wird, keinen grösseren Gegensatz als die christliche Lehre, welche nur moralisch ist und sein will und mit ihren absoluten Maassen, zum Beispiel schon mit ihrer Wahrhaftigkeit Gottes, die Kunst, jede Kunst in's Reich der Lüge verweist,—das heisst verneint, verdammt, verurtheilt. Hinter einer derartigen Denk- und Werthungsweise, welche kunstfeindlich sein muss, so lange sie irgendwie ächt ist, empfand ich von jeher auch das Lebensfeindliche, den ingrimmigen rachsüchtigen Widerwillen gegen das Leben selbst: denn alles Leben ruht auf Schein, Kunst, Täuschung, Optik, Nothwendigkeit des Perspektivischen und des Irrthums. Christenthum war von Anfang an, wesentlich und gründlich, Ekel und Ueberdruss des Lebens am Leben, welcher sich unter dem Glauben an ein „anderes“ oder „besseres“ Leben nur verkleidete, nur versteckte, nur aufputzte. Der Hass auf die „Welt“, der Fluch auf die Affekte, die Furcht vor der Schönheit und Sinnlichkeit, ein Jenseits, erfunden, um das Diesseits besser zu verleumden, im Grunde ein Verlangen in's Nichts, an's Ende, in's Ausruhen, hin zum „Sabbat der Sabbate“—dies Alles dünkte mich, ebenso wie der unbedingte Wille des Christenthums, nur moralische Werthe gelten zu lassen, immer wie die gefährlichste und unheimlichste Form aller möglichen Formen eines „Willens zum Untergang“, zum Mindesten ein Zeichen tiefster Erkrankung, Müdigkeit, Missmuthigkeit, Erschöpfung, Verarmung an Leben,—denn vor der Moral (in Sonderheit christlichen, das heisst unbedingten Moral) muss das Leben beständig und unvermeidlich Unrecht bekommen, weil Leben etwas essentiell Unmoralisches ist,—muss endlich das Leben, erdrückt unter dem Gewichte der Verachtung und des ewigen Nein's, als begehrens-unwürdig, als unwerth an sich empfunden werden. Moral selbst—wie? sollte Moral nicht ein „Wille zur Verneinung des Lebens“, ein heimlicher Instinkt der Vernichtung, ein Verfalls-, Verkleinerungs-, Verleumdungsprincip, ein Anfang vom Ende sein? Und, folglich, die Gefahr der Gefahren?… Gegen die Moral also kehrte sich damals, mit diesem fragwürdigen Buche, mein Instinkt, als ein fürsprechender Instinkt des Lebens, und erfand sich eine grundsätzliche Gegenlehre und Gegenwerthung des Lebens, eine rein artistische, eine antichristliche. Wie sie nennen? Als Philologe und Mensch der Worte taufte ich sie, nicht ohne einige Freiheit—denn wer wüsste den rechten Namen des Antichrist?—auf den Namen eines griechischen Gottes: ich hiess sie die dionysische.—
Musean translation
Complete machine-assisted Musean translation of the 1886 issue, with the Attempt at Self-Criticism and the Preface to Richard Wagner, made directly from the German of the Fritzsch Neue Ausgabe and read against its page images; reviewed against the German before publication.
Already in the preface to Richard Wagner, art—and not morality—is presented as the truly metaphysical activity of humanity; in the book itself, the provocative proposition recurs several times that the existence of the world is justified only as an aesthetic phenomenon. In fact, the whole book recognizes only an artist’s meaning and hidden meaning behind all that happens—a “god,” if you will, but certainly only an entirely unscrupulous and immoral artist-god who wants to become conscious of his equal pleasure and sovereignty in building as in destroying, in good as in bad, who, by creating worlds, releases himself from the distress of fullness and overfullness, from the suffering of the opposites crowded within him. The world, at every moment the achieved redemption of God, as the eternally changing, eternally new vision of the one who suffers most, who is most full of opposites, most rich in contradiction, and who knows how to redeem himself only in semblance: one may call this entire artists’ metaphysics arbitrary, idle, fantastic—the essential thing is that it already betrays a spirit that will one day, at any risk, defend itself against the moral interpretation and significance of existence. Here, perhaps for the first time, a pessimism “beyond good and evil” announces itself; here that “perversity of disposition” finds words and a formula against which Schopenhauer never tired of hurling his fiercest curses and thunderbolts in advance—a philosophy that dares to place morality itself in the world of appearance, to demote it, and not merely to the rank of “appearances” (in the sense of the idealist technical term), but to that of “deceptions,” as semblance, delusion, error, interpretation, contrivance, art. Perhaps the depth of this antimoral tendency can best be measured by the cautious and hostile silence with which Christianity is treated throughout the book—Christianity as the most extravagant figuration of the moral theme that humanity has yet been made to hear. In truth, there is no greater opposite to the purely aesthetic interpretation and justification of the world taught in this book than Christian doctrine, which is and wants to be only moral, and which, with its absolute standards—for example, with the truthfulness of its God alone—relegates art, all art, to the realm of lies—that is, denies, damns, condemns it. Behind such a way of thinking and valuing, which must be hostile to art so long as it is at all genuine, I have always also sensed its hostility to life, its furious, vengeful aversion to life itself: for all life rests on semblance, art, deception, a way of seeing, the necessity of perspective and error. From the beginning, essentially and fundamentally, Christianity was life’s disgust and weariness with life, which merely disguised itself, merely hid itself, merely decked itself out under the belief in an “other” or “better” life. Hatred of the “world,” the curse upon the passions, fear of beauty and sensuality, a beyond invented to slander this world all the better, at bottom a craving for nothingness, for the end, for rest, for the “Sabbath of Sabbaths”—all this, like Christianity’s unconditional will to recognize only moral values, always struck me as the most dangerous and sinister of all possible forms of a “will to downfall,” at the very least a sign of the deepest sickness, weariness, discontent, exhaustion, impoverishment of life—for before morality (especially Christian, that is, unconditional morality), life must continually and inevitably be found in the wrong, because life is something essentially immoral—life, crushed beneath the weight of contempt and the eternal No, must finally come to be felt as undeserving of desire, as worthless in itself. Morality itself—what? Might morality not be a “will to the denial of life,” a secret instinct of annihilation, a principle of decay, diminishment, slander, a beginning of the end? And consequently the danger of dangers?… It was against morality, then, that my instinct turned at the time, with this questionable book, as an instinct speaking on behalf of life, and invented for itself a fundamental counter-doctrine and counter-valuation of life, a purely artistic, an anti-Christian one. What should it be called? As a philologist and a man of words, I baptized it, not without some freedom—for who could know the right name of the Antichrist?—with the name of a Greek god: I called it the Dionysian.—
Plain English translation
Complete machine-assisted Plain English edition, made independently and directly from the same German text, without reference to the Musean edition or to any English translation.
Already in the preface to Richard Wagner, art—and not morality—is presented as the truly metaphysical activity of human beings. In the book itself, the provocative statement returns several times: the existence of the world is justified only as an aesthetic phenomenon. In fact, the whole book recognizes only an artist’s meaning and hidden meaning behind everything that happens. A “god,” if you like, but certainly only a completely unscrupulous and nonmoral artist-god. In building as in destroying, in good things as in bad, he wants to experience the same pleasure and sovereign power of his own. By creating worlds, he frees himself from the distress of fullness and overfullness, from the suffering caused by the opposites crowded together inside him. At every moment the world is God’s achieved deliverance: the eternally changing, eternally new vision of the one who suffers most, who is most full of opposites and contradictions, and who can redeem himself only in semblance. You may call this whole artist’s metaphysics arbitrary, pointless, or fantastic. Its essential feature is that it already reveals a spirit that will one day resist the moral interpretation and significance of existence, whatever the danger. Here, perhaps for the first time, a pessimism “beyond good and evil” announces itself. Here that “perversity of outlook” finds a voice and a formula—the perversity against which Schopenhauer never tired of hurling his angriest curses and thunderbolts in advance. It is a philosophy that dares to put morality itself into the world of appearance, to lower it into that world. It puts morality not only among “appearances,” in the technical sense used by idealist philosophy, but among “deceptions,” as semblance, delusion, error, interpretation, something contrived, art. Perhaps the depth of this antimoral tendency is best measured by the cautious, hostile silence with which Christianity is treated throughout the book. Christianity is the most extravagant working-out of the moral theme that humanity has yet had to listen to. In truth, nothing stands more completely opposed to the purely aesthetic interpretation and justification of the world taught in this book than Christian teaching. It is and wants to be only moral. With its absolute standards—the truthfulness of its God, for example—it sends art, all art, into the realm of lies. That is, it denies, damns, and condemns it. Behind this way of thinking and valuing, which must be hostile to art as long as it is at all genuine, I have always also sensed hostility to life: a furious, vengeful disgust with life itself. For all life rests on semblance, art, deception, ways of seeing, the necessity of perspective and error. From the beginning, Christianity was essentially and thoroughly life’s disgust and weariness with life. It merely disguised, hid, and dressed up this disgust in the belief in an “other” or “better” life. Hatred of the “world,” curses on the passions, fear of beauty and sensuality, a world beyond invented to slander this world more effectively—at bottom, a longing for nothingness, for the end, for rest, for the “Sabbath of Sabbaths.” All this, like Christianity’s unconditional will to recognize only moral values, always seemed to me the most dangerous and sinister of all possible forms of a “will to destruction.” At the very least, it is a sign of the deepest sickness, fatigue, ill temper, exhaustion, and impoverishment of life. For, judged by morality—especially Christian, that is, unconditional morality—life must constantly and inevitably be found in the wrong, because life is something essentially nonmoral. Finally, crushed under the weight of contempt and the eternal No, life must be felt as unworthy of desire, worthless in itself. Morality itself—what? Could morality be a “will to deny life,” a hidden instinct of destruction, a principle of decay, belittlement, and slander, the beginning of the end? And therefore the danger of dangers?… So, with this questionable book, my instinct turned against morality. As an instinct speaking up for life, it invented a fundamentally opposed teaching and valuation of life: a purely artistic one, an anti-Christian one. What should I call it? As a scholar of ancient language and a man of words, I took some liberty in naming it—for who knows the true name of the Antichrist? I gave it the name of a Greek god: I called it Dionysian.—
About this section
An Attempt at Self-Criticism, Section 5 is part of The Birth of Tragedy by Friedrich Nietzsche. This page sets the German original beside 2 direct-source translations, so any line can be checked against the source. It is section 5 of 33 in the work, which is kept in the European tradition.
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