Nietzsche's Philosophy of the Eternal Recurrence of the Same

by Karl Löwith, J. Harvey Lomax (Translator)

This long overdue English translation of Karl Löwith's magisterial study is a major event in Nietzsche scholarship in the Anglo-American intellectual world. Its initial publication was extraordinary in itself―a dissident interpretation, written by a Jew, appearing in National Socialist Germany in 1935. Since then, Löwith's book has continued to gain recognition as one of the key texts in the German Nietzsche reception, as well as a remarkable effort to reclaim the philosopher's work from political misappropriation.

For Löwith, the centerpiece of Nietzsche's thought is the doctrine of eternal recurrence, a notion which Löwith, unlike Heidegger, deems incompatible with the will to power. His careful examination of Nietzsche's cosmological theory of the infinite repetition of a finite number of states of the world suggests the paradoxical consequences this theory implies for human freedom. How is it possible to will the eternal recurrence of each moment of one's life, if both this decision and the states of affairs governed by it appear to be predestined? Löwith's book, one of the most important, if seldom acknowledged, sources for recent Anglophone Nietzsche studies, remains a central text for all concerned with understanding the philosopher's work.

Genres: Philosophy, Nonfiction

276 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1935

About the author

Karl Löwith was a German philosopher, a student of Heidegger. Löwith was one of the most prolific German philosophers of the twentieth century; the bibliography of his works comprising more than 300 titles.
Löwith was born in Munich. Though he was himself Protestant, his family was of Jewish descent and he therefore had to emigrate Germany in 1934 because of the National Socialist regime. He went to Italy and in 1936 he went to Japan. But because of the alliance between the Third Reich and Japan he had to leave Japan in 1941 and went to the USA. From 1941 to 1952, he taught at the Hartford Theological Seminary and the New School for Social Research. In 1952 he returned to Germany to teach as Professor of Philosophy at Heidelberg, where he died.

He is probably most known for his two books From Hegel to Nietzsche, which describes the decline of German classical philosophy, and Meaning in History, which discusses the problematic relationship between theology and history. Löwith's argument in Meaning in History is that the western view of history is confused by the relationship between Christian faith and the modern view, which is neither Christian nor pagan. Löwith describes this relationship through famous western philosophers and historians, including Burckhardt, Marx, Hegel, Kierkegaard, Voltaire, Vico, Bossuet, Augustine and Orosius. The modern historical consciousness is, according to Löwith, derived from Christianity. But, Christians are not a historical people, as their view of the world is based on faith. This explains the tendency in history (and philosophy) to an eschatological view of human progress.

Reviews

[nonegloga]

Così tra Hegel e Nietzsche la volontà di un’ultima conservazione della tradizione è giunta, passando attraverso la tendenza rivoluzionaria a un suo “cambiamento”, fino alla coscienza della propria insostenibilità e a questo corrisponde anche un mutamento caratteristico della considerazione filosofica del cristianesimo. All’orizzonte dell’”ateismo” nietzscheano, che riconosce per la prima volta che la “morte di Dio” significa per l’uomo la “libertà per la morte”, Hegel e Feuerbach si avvicinano l’uno all’altro quali “padri della chiesa”, “mezzi preti” e “tessitori di veli”. Hegel trasforma, alla fine di Fede e sapere, la fede nel Dio morto in Cristo in un “venerdì santo speculativo”. La morte di Dio è per lui l’abisso del nulla, in cui sprofonda ogni essere, per risorgere nel movimento del divenire.
“Ma il puro concetto, ossia l’infinitezza come abisso del nulla, in cui ogni essere sprofonda, deve designare il dolore infinito – dolore che esisteva in precedenza nella cultura solo storicamente e come quel sentimento su cui riposa la religione dei tempi moderni, il sentimento: Dio stesso è morto, quello stesso sentimento che era stato, per così dire espresso solo empiricamente nella frase di Pascal: la nature est telle qu’elle marque partout un Dieu perdu et dans l’homme et hors de l’homme – come mero momento dell’idea assoluta, ma anche niente di più che un momento; e così a ciò che era ancora, all’incirca, o precetto morale di un sacrificio dell’essere empirico o il concetto dell’astrazione formale, il concetto puro deve dare un’esistenza filosofica, deve dare dunque alla filosofia l’idea della libertà assoluta, e con ciò la Passione assoluta o il Venerdì Santo speculativo, che fu già storico, e deve ristabilire quest’ultimo in tutta la verità e la durezza della sua assenza di Dio. è solo da questa durezza (...) che la suprema totalità in tutta la sua serietà e dal suo più riposto fondamento, abbracciando tutto contemporaneamente, e nella più serena libertà della sua figura, può e deve risuscitare”
Per Hegel il farsi uomo di Dio in Cristo significa la conciliazione, realizzatasi una volta per tutte, della natura umana con quella divina; per Nietzsche questo significa che l’uomo è stato crocefisso e ucciso nella sua vera natura.

[Jonathan Birch · Rating 5 out of 5]

The long Chapter 3 of this book is truly masterful (especially pp. 82-94). It's one of the best things I've read on Nietzsche. It offers a reading that makes sense of the centrality of the eternal recurrence doctrine to Nietzsche and clearly explains its ethical and cosmological sides. On the ethical side, the doctrine is a new categorical imperative: live every moment such that you could will it to repeat eternally. On the cosmological side, it asserts that the whole of Earth's history will literally repeat eternally as part of a great cosmic cycle. This second part is so bold that most scholars try to find a way of reading Nietzsche as not asserting this. But Lowith piles on the textual evidence until the case is hard to resist. He then skilfully shows the tensions between the two sides. For if human history will recur inevitably anyway, how can it also be willed? There is only the illusion of willing in such a cosmos, not the real thing. It's fascinating.