Abstract

It is widely thought that Nietzsche's entire approach to theological topics could be summed up in his famous phrase, "God is dead." And yet the author of The Anti-Christ betrays a deep concern for the importance of spiritual matters. Nietzsche thought modern human beings lived in a uniquely opportune, and dangerous, time. The collapse of traditional metaphysical structures had, according to him, revealed a nihilistic abyss lying beneath the individual self and the wider culture of the modern world. ;While many have explored the implications of Nietzsche's abyss, few have followed his explicit invitation to think in theological terms after this nihilistic abyss is negotiated. This study assumes that his announcement of the "death" of God was never meant to be the last word on the subject. Rather, Nietzsche, like several mystical thinkers before him, takes the "death" of God to be the true beginning of serious religious reflection. ;Central to Nietzsche's method is his recognition that the historical event of God's "death" is paralleled by an equally important unraveling of the modern self. He is acutely aware of the way in which each, though once supportive of the other, now contributes to the other's demise. ;This study is organized in two broad sections. The first explores Nietzsche's deconstruction of the modern self, as well as his enigmatic descriptions of what might lie beyond it: the healed subjectivity he called Ubermensch . The section concludes with an attempt to sketch a doctrine of God along the outlines of this reformulated subjectivity. The second section is based on the famous "three metamorphoses of the spirit" proposed in Thus Spake Zarathustra. The goal in this section is to go beyond mere description and, instead, closely follow Nietzsche's directions for spiritual praxis and the cure of the soul. Relying partly on his explication of the structure of music, the study concludes by exploring the end of craving in the experience of Eternal Return, as well as the identity of true self and God as will to power