The Antichrist
The Antichrist (Der Antichrist) is a German philosophical book by Friedrich Nietzsche, originally published in 1895.
Quotes
[edit]- What is good? — All that heightens the feeling of power, the will to power, power itself in man.
What is bad? — All that proceeds from weakness.
What is happiness? — The feeling that power increases — that a resistance is overcome.- Aphorism 2
- The weak and ill-constituted shall perish: first principle of our philanthropy. And one shall help them to do so.
- Aphorism 2
- I call an animal, a species, an individual depraved when it loses its instincts, when it chooses, when it prefers what is harmful to it.
- Aphorism 6
- Pity on the whole thwarts the law of evolution, which is the law of selection.
- Aphorism 7.
- The very word 'Christianity' is a misunderstanding--at bottom there was only one Christian, and he died on the cross.
- Aphorism 39.
- Note: Often misquoted as "The last Christian died on the cross"
- The Christian church has left nothing untouched by its depravity; it has turned every value into worthlessness, and every truth into a lie, and every integrity into baseness of soul.
- Aphorism 62
Unsorted
[edit]
- Einige werden posthum geboren.
- Some are born posthumously.
- Foreword
- Some are born posthumously.
- What is good? All that heightens the feeling of power in man, the will to power, power itself. What is bad? All that is born of weakness. What is happiness? The feeling that power is growing, that resistance is overcome.
- Sec. 2
- In Christianity neither morality nor religion come into contact with reality at any point.
- Sec. 16
- Hope, in its stronger forms, is a great deal more powerful stimulans to life than any sort of realized joy can ever be. Man must be sustained in suffering by a hope so high that no conflict with actuality can dash it—so high, indeed, that no fulfilment can satisfy it: a hope reaching out beyond this world.
- Sec. 23
- Love is a state in which a man sees things most decidedly as they are not.
- Sec. 23
- ... to the priestly class — decadence is no more than a means to an end. Men of this sort have a vital interest in making mankind sick, and in confusing the values of "good" and "bad," "true" and "false" in a manner that is not only dangerous to life, but also slanders it.
- Sec. 24
- The 'Kingdom of Heaven' is a condition of the heart — not something that comes 'upon the earth' or 'after death'.
- Sec. 34
- The 'kingdom of God' is not something one waits for; it has no yesterday or tomorrow, it does not come 'in a thousand years' — it is an experience within a heart; it is everywhere, it is nowhere...
- Sec. 34
- The very word "Christianity" is a misunderstanding — in truth, there was only one Christian, and he died on the cross.
- This has commonly been paraphrased: The last Christian died on the cross.
- Sec. 39
- As an artistic triumph in psychological corruption ... the Gospels, in fact, stand alone ... Here we are among Jews: this is the first thing to be borne in mind if we are not to lose the thread of the matter. This positive genius for conjuring up a delusion of personal "holiness" unmatched anywhere else, either in books or by men; this elevation of fraud in word and attitude to the level of an art — all this is not an accident due to the chance talents of an individual, or to any violation of nature. The thing responsible is race.
- Sec. 44
- The whole disaster was only made possible by the fact that there already existed in the world a similar megalomania, allied to this one in race, to wit, the Jewish.
- Sec. 44
- What follows, then? That one had better put on gloves before reading the New Testament. The presence of so much filth makes it very advisable. One would as little choose early Christians for companions as Polish Jews: not that one need seek out an objection to them — neither has a pleasant smell.
- Sec. 46
- "Do I still have to add that in the entire New Testament there is only one solitary figure one is obliged to respect? Pilate, the Roman governor. To take a Jewish affair seriously — he cannot persuade himself to do that. One Jew more or less — what does it matter ?... The noble scorn of a Roman before whom an impudent misuse of the word 'truth' was carried on has enriched the New Testament with the only expression which possesses value — which is its criticism, its annihilation even: 'What is truth?..."
- Sec. 46
- The God that Paul invented for himself, a God who "reduced to absurdity" "the wisdom of this world" (especially the two great enemies of superstition, philology and medicine), is in truth only an indication of Paul's resolute determination to accomplish that very thing himself: to give one's own will the name of God, Torah — that is essentially Jewish.
- Sec. 47
- God created woman. And boredom did indeed cease from that moment — but many other things ceased as well! Woman was God's second mistake.
- Sec. 48
- Gegen die Langeweile kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens.
- Against boredom even gods struggle in vain.
- Sec. 48
- That faith makes blessed under certain circumstances, that blessedness does not make of a fixed idea a true idea, that faith moves no mountains but puts mountains where there are none: a quick walk through a madhouse enlightens one sufficiently about this.
- Sec. 51; often paraphrased as: "A casual stroll through the lunatic asylum shows that faith does not prove anything".
- »Glaube« heißt Nicht-wissen-wollen.
- "Faith" means not wanting to know.
- Sec. 52
- Whom do I hate most among the rabble of today? The socialist rabble, the chandala apostles, who undermine the instinct, the pleasure, the worker's sense of satisfaction with his small existence–who make him envious, who teach him revenge. The source of wrong is never unequal rights but the claim of "equal" rights.
- Sec. 57
- Nihilist und Christ: das reimt sich, das reimt sich nicht bloss.
- Nihilist and Christian. They rhyme, and do not merely rhyme...
- Sec. 58, as translated by R. J. Hollingdale. In German these words do rhyme; variant translation: Nihilist and Christian. They rhyme, and they do indeed do more than just rhyme.
- Christianity destroyed for us the whole harvest of ancient civilization, and later it also destroyed for us the whole harvest of Mohammedan civilization. The wonderful culture of the Moors in Spain, which was fundamentally nearer to us and appealed more to our senses and tastes than that of Rome and Greece, was trampled down ( — I do not say by what sort of feet — ) Why? Because it had to thank noble and manly instincts for its origin — because it said yes to life, even to the rare and refined luxuriousness of Moorish life! The crusaders later made war on something before which it would have been more fitting for them to have grovelled in the dust — a civilization beside which even that of our nineteenth century seems very poor and very "senile." [...] Intrinsically there should be no more choice between Islam and Christianity than there is between an Arab and a Jew. The decision is already reached; nobody remains at liberty to choose here. Either a man is a Chandala or he is not.... "War to the knife with Rome! Peace and friendship with Islam!": this was the feeling, this was the act, of that great free spirit, that genius among German emperors, Frederick II.
- Sec. 60
- I call Christianity the one great curse, the one great intrinsic depravity, the one great instinct for revenge for which no expedient is sufficiently poisonous, secret, subterranean, petty — I call it the one immortal blemish of mankind.And time is reckoned from the dies nefastus with which this calamity began — from the first day of Christianity! Why not rather after its last day? From today? Revaluation of all values!
- Sec. 62
