Early in the novel, Zarathustra comes upon a praying saint in the forest and is surprised to discover that someone exists who doesn’t yet know that “God is dead.” This is one of Nietzsche’s best-known statements, but it’s often misunderstood. More than an avowal of atheism, it is meant to announce the death of an old value system and an obligation to seek a new one (at least for those stronger individuals capable of it). In that sense, it isn’t an entirely hopeless statement. As portrayed in the book, traditional religion, especially in its focus on sin and the afterlife, keeps people from wholeheartedly affirming this life and asserting their will to power. Religion, in other words, keeps weaker people bound to a “good and evil” value system. But for the strong—people who are capable of creating their own values—the idea that “God is dead” is an opportunity to affirm life and human potential. Nietzsche argues that the statement “God is dead” should spur higher individuals not to despair, but to greater agency and creativity.
Nietzsche argues through Zarathustra that religion, and specifically Christianity, is a human invention that, whatever its usefulness to society in the past, is no longer believable in the modern world. Zarathustra explains that those who were incapable of wholeheartedly affirming life created religion in order to comfort themselves: “It was the sick and dying who despised the body and the earth and invented the things of heaven and the redeeming drops of blood […] They wanted to escape from their misery and the stars were too far for them. Then they sighed: 'Oh if only there were heavenly paths by which to creep into another existence and into happiness!'—then they contrived for themselves their secret ways.” Zarathustra suggests, in other words, that there aren’t “heavenly paths,” but that the weak fall back on “contrived” beliefs for solace—beliefs that allow people to pretend this world can be escaped.
Zarathustra argues that Christianity has outlived its usefulness because its God is too weak. This is demonstrated by the story of an ex-pope he encounters. The old pope narrates the death of God: “When he was young, this god from the orient, he was hard and revengeful and built himself a Hell for the delight of his favourites. But at length he grew old and soft and mellow and compassionate, more like a grandfather than a father […] Then he sat […] world-weary, weary of willing, and one day suffocated through his excessive pity.” In other words, Nietzsche sees the Judeo-Christian God as being most godlike when he was “revengeful” and punitive; but as God “softened” to the point of sacrificing himself on humanity’s behalf (a reference to Jesus dying on the cross), he ultimately brought about his own death in humanity’s collective consciousness. The fearsome god was at least respectable to the strong; but the “grandfatherly,” pitying god is useful only to the weak and therefore obsolete. Because he is “world-weary, weary of willing,” the obsolete god does not encourage the strong to exercise their own wills.
Nietzsche argues through Zarathustra that the “death of God” can spur the strong to greater freedom and agency. In one passage, he envisions a more liberating form of belief: “I should believe only in a God who understood how to dance. And when I beheld my devil, I found him serious, thorough, profound, solemn: it was the Spirit of Gravity […] Come, let us kill the Spirit of Gravity! I have learned to walk: since then I have run. I have learned to fly: since then I do not have to be pushed in order to move.” In this complicated passage, Zarathustra equates the “Spirit of Gravity,” or the “devil,” with the heavy, solemn, demanding ways of traditional religion—dragging humanity earthward. On the other hand, if there were a god, Zarathustra would only believe in one who could “dance”—who does not exert an oppressive, dragging effect on humanity, but rather lets them “fly” and move freely. The strong, set free from belief in an oppressive god, can embrace life and exert their creative will upon the world. “Once you said 'God' when you gazed upon distant seas,” Zarathustra prophesies to the strong, “but now I have taught you to say 'Superman' […] And you yourselves should create what you have hitherto called the world: the World should be formed in your image by your reason, your will, and your love! And truly, it will be to your happiness, you enlightened men!” Instead of the world being seen as created in God’s image, in other words, the strong should regard it as theirs to create. When the strong realize this, they not only needn’t despair over the death of God, they can even be happy.
In Nietzsche’s view, religion has traditionally kept the weak bound to moral systems like “good and evil,” which make life burdensome and weaken people’s wills. Since Nietzsche’s goal in Thus Spoke Zarathustra is to prophesy a higher form of humanity, declaring the “death of God” is not simply a cynical avowal of atheism; it’s a necessary step toward freeing people from moral systems, like Christianity, that oppress their potential. It’s also worth noting that, though Nietzsche does not make many overt political statements in the novel, he considered the state to be a fellow “beast” alongside the church—suggesting that these institutions share an oppressive, stunting effect on human potential which the strong must fight. Like the church, the state has an interest in perpetuating systems of good and evil that keep human wills in check.
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Death of God and Christianity ThemeTracker
Death of God and Christianity Quotes in Thus Spoke Zarathustra
“With singing, weeping, laughing, and muttering I praise the God who is my God. But what do you bring us as a gift?”
When Zarathustra heard these words, he saluted the saint and said: “What should I have to give you! But let me go quickly, that I may take nothing from you!” And thus they parted from one another, the old man and Zarathustra, laughing as two boys laugh.
But when Zarathustra was alone, he spoke thus to his heart: “Could it be possible! This old saint has not yet heard in his forest that God is dead!”
I teach you the Superman. Man is something that should be overcome. What have you done to overcome him?
All creatures hitherto have created something beyond themselves: and do you want to be the ebb of this great tide, and return to the animals rather than overcome man? […]
The Superman is the meaning of the earth. Let your will say: The Superman shall be the meaning of the earth!
I entreat you, my brothers, remain true to the earth, and do not believe those who speak to you of superterrestrial hopes! They are poisoners, whether they know it or not.
It was the sick and dying who despised the body and the earth and invented the things of heaven and the redeeming drops of blood: but even these sweet and dismal poisons they took from the body and the earth!
They wanted to escape from their misery and the stars were too far for them. Then they sighed: 'Oh if only there were heavenly paths by which to creep into another existence and into happiness!'—then they contrived for themselves their secret ways and their draughts of blood!
I should believe only in a God who understood how to dance.
And when I beheld my devil, I found him serious, thorough, profound, solemn: it was the Spirit of Gravity—through him all things are ruined.
One does not kill by anger but by laughter. Come, let us kill the Spirit of Gravity!
I have learned to walk: since then I have run. I have learned to fly: since then I do not have to be pushed in order to move.
Zarathustra has seen many lands and many peoples: thus he has discovered the good and evil of many peoples. Zarathustra has found no greater power on earth than good and evil. […]
Much that seemed good to one people seemed shame and disgrace to another: thus I found. I found much that was called evil in one place was in another decked with purple honours. […]
Truly, men have given themselves all their good and evil. Truly, they did not take it, they did not find it, it did not descend to them as a voice from heaven.
Do I exhort you to love of your neighbour? I exhort you rather to flight from your neighbour and to love of the most distant!
Higher than love of one's neighbour stands love of the most distant man and of the man of the future […]
You cannot endure to be alone with yourselves and do not love yourselves enough: now you want to mislead your neighbour into love and gild yourselves with his mistake.
Truly, too early died that Hebrew whom the preachers of slow death honour: and that he died too early has since been a fatality for many.
As yet he knew only tears and the melancholy of the Hebrews, together with the hatred of the good and just—the Hebrew Jesus: then he was seized by the longing for death.
Had he only remained in the desert and far from the good and just! Perhaps he would have learned to live and learned to love the earth—and laughter as well!
This will lured me away from God and gods; for what would there be to create if gods – existed!
But again and again it drives me to mankind, my ardent, creative will; thus it drives the hammer to the stone.
Ah, you men, I see an image sleeping in the stone, the image of my visions! […]
The beauty of the Superman came to me as a shadow. Ah, my brothers! What are the gods to me now!
Man is the cruellest animal towards himself; and […] all who call themselves "sinners" and “bearers of the Cross" and "penitents" […]
Ah, my animals, this alone have I learned, that the wickedest in man is necessary for the best in him,
that all that is most wicked in him is his best strength and the hardest stone for the highest creator; and that man must grow better and wickeder: […]
[I cried] ‘Alas, that his wickedest is so very small! Alas, that his best is so very small!’
If ever my anger broke graves open, moved boundary-stones, and rolled old shattered law-tables into deep chasms:
[…]
for I love even churches and the graves of gods, if only heaven is looking, pure-eyed, through their shattered roofs; I like to sit like grass and red poppies on shattered churches:
Oh how should I not lust for eternity and for the wedding ring of rings—the Ring of Recurrence!
When he was young, this god from the orient, he was hard and revengeful and built himself a Hell for the delight of his favourites.
But at length he grew old and soft and mellow and compassionate, more like a grandfather than a father, most like a tottery old grandmother.
Then he sat, shrivelled, in his chimney corner, fretting over his weak legs, world-weary, weary of willing, and one day suffocated through his excessive pity.'
And Zarathustra began to speak once more. 'O my new friends,' he said, 'you strange men, you Higher Men, how well you please me now […]
Truly, you have all blossomed forth: for such flowers as you, I think, new festivals are needed.
a little brave nonsense, some divine service and ass festival, some joyful old Zarathustra-fool, a blustering wind to blow your souls bright.
Do not forget this night and this ass festival, you Higher Men! You devised that at my home, I take that as a good omen—only convalescents devise such things!
