THE NIETZSCHE CATECHISM

I am referring with my title phrase to Nietzsche’s famous Second Chapter of his scandalously controversial 1888 book Der Antichrist (first published in late 1894), written in the form of a mini-catechism, which perhaps for the first time in his writings introduces the term Der Wille zur Macht. Because it is so short, I can present it here both in the original German plus an English translation. My first temptation was to give it a Mayakovskian title: What Is Good And What Is Bad? But I guess the present title should be all right, as it is funnier and deeper in its associative power.

2. Was ist gut?— Alles, was das Gefühl der Macht, den Willen zur Macht, die Macht selbst im Menschen erhöht. (What is good?--Whatever augments the feeling of power, the will to power, power itself, in man.)

Was ist schlecht? Alles, was aus der Schwäche stammt. (What is evil?--Whatever springs from weakness.)

Was ist Glück?— Das Gefühl davon, daß die Macht wächst, daß ein Widerstand überwunden wird. (What is happiness?--The feeling, that power increases, that resistance is overcome.)

Nicht Zufriedenheit, sondern mehr Macht; nicht Friede überhaupt, sondern Krieg; nicht Tugend, sondern Tüchtigkeit (Tugend im Renaissance-Stile, virtù, moralinfreie Tugend). (Not contentment, but more power; not  peace at any price, but war; not virtue, but efficiency [virtue in the Renaissance sense, virtù, virtue free of moral acid]).

Die Schwachen und Mißrathnen sollen zu Grunde gehen: erster Satz unsrer Menschenliebe. Und man soll ihnen noch dazu helfen. (The weak and the botched shall perish: first principle of our charity. And one is to help them to it.)

Was ist schädlicher als irgend ein Laster?— Das Mitleiden der That mit allen Mißrathnen und Schwachen — das Christenthum... (What is more harmful than any vice?-- Practical sympathy for the botched and the weak -- Christianity....)

Outrageous? Yes! Challenging? Yes! Valuable? Priceless! And Russia’s best Orthodox Christian theologians agree with me, that Nietzsche is unquestionably the best gadfly to bring the cow of modern Christianity out of its morbid torpor…