Timothy Morrison
asked:
what exactly does "God is dead" mean, and what exactly is the role of the mad man in this book?
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The Gay Science: With a Prelude in Rhymes and an Appendix of Songs,
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Grant Pierce
That is a great question. The answer is complicated and gets at the heart of Nietzsche's philosophy but I will do my best to explain it.
When Nietzsche writes "God is dead. God remains dead. And we have killed him" he does not literally mean that God has died, rather he means that the idea of God and by extension Judaeo/Christian morality and even the idea of morality have been destroyed by humanity's scientific, cultural and philosophical development. However, this often quoted line is misunderstood by many.
This is why understanding the madman is important. The madman in the parable is essentially Zarathustra (from Nietzsche's later work, Thus Spoke Zarathustra) and a representation of Nietzsche himself. He is a "madman" because he holds views and opinions that are far removed from those of common people (atheists included). He is prophetic. The beginning of the parable explains that the villagers standing in the market are common atheists who scoff at and mock the madman (Nietzsche) for his frantic search for God (morality, purpose, meaning, truth). They trivialize his desperate search and assume that the madman is either scared of atheists, a proselytizer from another land, or a religious fool.
None of these assumptions is correct. Because the villagers do not understand what he is doing and saying, the madman "jumped into their midst and pierced them with his eyes" and attempts to convey to the villagers how deep and profound the death of "God" is. He likens "God's" death to the earth being unchained from the sun, the wiping away of the horizon, continuous night, falling through an infinite nothing, etc.
In the next paragraph, the madman uses rhetorical questions to attempt to explain to the villagers why "God's" death is as calamitous as he just described. "Who will wipe this (God's) blood off us? What water is there for us to clean ourselves? What festivals of atonement, what sacred games will we have to invent?" These questions are really just one big question: Given the destruction of objective morality, meaning, and purpose, what principles can we believe in, what morality can we follow, what purpose can we live for, and do principles, morality, and purpose even mean anything anymore? Essentially, it is the question of nihilism.
The villagers do not understand what the madman means because although they do not believe in God, they have (unknowingly) retained the morality, principles, and purpose of people who do believe in God. But God is dead, so morality, principles, and purpose die with him. Because of their lack of understanding the villagers simply stare at the madman in silence. Seeing this, the madman smashes his lantern and says that he "has come too early" because the people have yet to grasp the implications of atheism.
The madman and Nietzsche himself were both confronted with the void of nihilism upon understanding the implications of their atheism. Nihilism, when lived or really understood, feels, as Nietzsche wrote, like "straying, as through an infinite nothing" or "plunging continually... backward, sideward, forward, in all directions." Understandably, this is not a pleasant experience and is potentially even less pleasant that extreme physical and emotional pain. Given this realization (nihilism) and the experience associated with it, no wonder the madman began desperately searching for some way to escape, to find objective morality, truth, meaning, and purpose.
When Nietzsche writes "God is dead. God remains dead. And we have killed him" he does not literally mean that God has died, rather he means that the idea of God and by extension Judaeo/Christian morality and even the idea of morality have been destroyed by humanity's scientific, cultural and philosophical development. However, this often quoted line is misunderstood by many.
This is why understanding the madman is important. The madman in the parable is essentially Zarathustra (from Nietzsche's later work, Thus Spoke Zarathustra) and a representation of Nietzsche himself. He is a "madman" because he holds views and opinions that are far removed from those of common people (atheists included). He is prophetic. The beginning of the parable explains that the villagers standing in the market are common atheists who scoff at and mock the madman (Nietzsche) for his frantic search for God (morality, purpose, meaning, truth). They trivialize his desperate search and assume that the madman is either scared of atheists, a proselytizer from another land, or a religious fool.
None of these assumptions is correct. Because the villagers do not understand what he is doing and saying, the madman "jumped into their midst and pierced them with his eyes" and attempts to convey to the villagers how deep and profound the death of "God" is. He likens "God's" death to the earth being unchained from the sun, the wiping away of the horizon, continuous night, falling through an infinite nothing, etc.
In the next paragraph, the madman uses rhetorical questions to attempt to explain to the villagers why "God's" death is as calamitous as he just described. "Who will wipe this (God's) blood off us? What water is there for us to clean ourselves? What festivals of atonement, what sacred games will we have to invent?" These questions are really just one big question: Given the destruction of objective morality, meaning, and purpose, what principles can we believe in, what morality can we follow, what purpose can we live for, and do principles, morality, and purpose even mean anything anymore? Essentially, it is the question of nihilism.
The villagers do not understand what the madman means because although they do not believe in God, they have (unknowingly) retained the morality, principles, and purpose of people who do believe in God. But God is dead, so morality, principles, and purpose die with him. Because of their lack of understanding the villagers simply stare at the madman in silence. Seeing this, the madman smashes his lantern and says that he "has come too early" because the people have yet to grasp the implications of atheism.
The madman and Nietzsche himself were both confronted with the void of nihilism upon understanding the implications of their atheism. Nihilism, when lived or really understood, feels, as Nietzsche wrote, like "straying, as through an infinite nothing" or "plunging continually... backward, sideward, forward, in all directions." Understandably, this is not a pleasant experience and is potentially even less pleasant that extreme physical and emotional pain. Given this realization (nihilism) and the experience associated with it, no wonder the madman began desperately searching for some way to escape, to find objective morality, truth, meaning, and purpose.
John Muckelbauer
To put it more succinctly than others, this phrase and the madman parable are a critique NOT of religion but of atheism. The basic claim here is that secularized knowledge still contains all manner of Jude-Christian morality and that even the so-called atheists haven’t even begun to realize the far deeper implications of their own atheism.
Fábio Rachid
The "God is dead" quote is much more than a declaration of Nietzsche's atheism - it's a statement about the impact of religious morals in society.
He always criticizes morals in his book and, in that statement, what he wants to say is that mankind has finally awakened and no longer needs religion as a guide to life. No longer people have to follow morals created by powerful people who wanted to control others (such as the catholic church) - humanity is now free to pave its own path, each human with its own values and ideas.
That particular statement refers to God, but he also attacks any kind of morals, such as those created by ideologies (communism, i.e.).
He always criticizes morals in his book and, in that statement, what he wants to say is that mankind has finally awakened and no longer needs religion as a guide to life. No longer people have to follow morals created by powerful people who wanted to control others (such as the catholic church) - humanity is now free to pave its own path, each human with its own values and ideas.
That particular statement refers to God, but he also attacks any kind of morals, such as those created by ideologies (communism, i.e.).
D. Neuser
"God is dead" is not actually a statement about God per se, but rather a comment on the state of religion in society.
Nietzsche thought that modern society in his day had already moved on from traditional Christianity. Even though most people continued to identify as Christians, the reality was that modern science had already replaced traditional theological beliefs at the center of the educated person's worldview. However, most people did not yet recognize this. We see this in the parable of the Madman: when the Madman cries to the people in the marketplace that "I seek God!" they only laugh and do not take his spiritual quest seriously. But with the declaration that "God is dead!" they are suddenly jolted out of complacency, and do not know what to make of him.
The Madman is ahead of his time. People are not ready for his declaration. They continue to believe in Christian moral ideas - despite the fact that the theological justification for this morality had disappeared. Nietzsche considered doctrines such as liberalism, nationalism and socialism to be secularized versions of Christian morality - and thoroughly disapproved of how these ideologies dominated society in his time.
Nietzsche's mature view, expressed in later writings such as Beyond Good and Evil and the Genealogy of Morals, was that the normal view of the relationship between faith and morality was actually backwards. The morality came first; the theology came later, to justify it. Nietzsche thought that modern secular ideologies were actually, so to speak, more Christian than Christianity: atheism itself is traceable to Christian motives. Ultimately, Nietzsche thought that those motives had their deepest roots in "ressentiment": the impulse of the weak to get revenge on the strong.
Nietzsche thought that modern society in his day had already moved on from traditional Christianity. Even though most people continued to identify as Christians, the reality was that modern science had already replaced traditional theological beliefs at the center of the educated person's worldview. However, most people did not yet recognize this. We see this in the parable of the Madman: when the Madman cries to the people in the marketplace that "I seek God!" they only laugh and do not take his spiritual quest seriously. But with the declaration that "God is dead!" they are suddenly jolted out of complacency, and do not know what to make of him.
The Madman is ahead of his time. People are not ready for his declaration. They continue to believe in Christian moral ideas - despite the fact that the theological justification for this morality had disappeared. Nietzsche considered doctrines such as liberalism, nationalism and socialism to be secularized versions of Christian morality - and thoroughly disapproved of how these ideologies dominated society in his time.
Nietzsche's mature view, expressed in later writings such as Beyond Good and Evil and the Genealogy of Morals, was that the normal view of the relationship between faith and morality was actually backwards. The morality came first; the theology came later, to justify it. Nietzsche thought that modern secular ideologies were actually, so to speak, more Christian than Christianity: atheism itself is traceable to Christian motives. Ultimately, Nietzsche thought that those motives had their deepest roots in "ressentiment": the impulse of the weak to get revenge on the strong.
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