Abstract

My dissertation analyzes two central concepts--asceticism and affirmation--with which Nietzsche criticizes Christianity and from which he constructs a new religious vision. I explore the relevance of this vision for theology and philosophy of religion. Nietzsche argues that Christianity and metaphysics ape based on the "ascetic ideal," an ideal that identifies ultimate value with spirit and being and devalues nature and becoming. This ideal promises the escape from human suffering on the condition that human beings deny life's rootedness in nature and becoming. In contrast, Nietzsche offers a vision of Dionysian affirmation of mundane, embodied life that gives new meaning to suffering. Yet, Nietzsche also claims that human nature is "uncanny," rooted in a "bad conscience" that leaves the human spirit in perpetual self-conflict. To affirm life therefore means affirming the spirit's self-alienation and the accompanying suffering of self-creation. Nietzsche's affirmation requires a disciplined enactment of self-alienation, a "naturalized asceticism" in which one imposes "great suffering" upon oneself. Employing recent studies of asceticism that construe asceticism as a vital "practice of the self," I argue that Nietzsche is tied to the ascetic tradition he criticizes and that construing his discipline of self-creation as ascetic practice reveals the curious interplay of negation and affirmation in his thinking. Nietzsche's asceticism maintains and spiritualizes the tensions in self and thought between meaning and meaninglessness, suffering and joy. Focusing primarily on Zarathustra and Ecce Homo, I argue that a transfigurative spiritualization, based on an ecstatic experience of eternal recurrence, allows Nietzsche to move beyond ressentiment to an affirmation of both the suffering and joy of life. In turn, this joy sacrifices itself in creative giving and returns to suffering and striving. I explore some of the religious qualities and theological implications of Nietzsche's asceticism and affirmation. Explaining in particular the work of Paul Tillich, I suggest that Nietzsche's criticisms do not adequately characterize Christian forms of affirmation, but that his affirmation raises important questions about the way theologians have understood ideas such as self-surrender and tragedy. In a concluding chapter, I discuss Nietzsche's relevance for more recent work in feminism and postmodernism, devoting particular attention to the question of evil and the character of theology and philosophy as ascetic, spiritual, and affirmative practices