Nietzsche is known as the ultimate nihilist, but essentially, he thought he was being completely descriptive. When he said modern society was nihilistic, he wasn’t proscribing nihilism, he was describing an alienated state that modern man found himself in. Nietzsche was very clear that humans can never live outside a value construct; in fact, he said these constructs were the only horizons in which meaning could occur. But he questioned modern society’s fascination with scientific truth, and he questioned universal moral principles such as equality and reason. He thought these “truths” worked against life itself – science because it objectified humans and distanced them from nature, from each other and from themselves, and universal moral principles because they framed human existence according to ideologies that were disconnected from the way people actually experienced life, and carried ramifications that people didn’t fully understand.

As people continued to exist in this alienated state, it would become increasingly uncomfortable and unsatisfying. Society was alienating people and they were becoming more and more nihilistic. He even predicted that in the 20th century there would be extended warfare between different ideologies in the battles to try to create a new value construct that people would believe in.

He observed that modern people saw life as a chore – having to be productive, having to be moral, and so on. All these chores that people were involved in got in the way of direct human existence, and the more chores that we picked up, the more difficult life became. He thought humans were weighed down by guilt — not only moral guilt, but guilt about their productivity. He said there was no real basis for this guilt, because morality and productivity are actually about power relations. Who is benefitting from your morality, your productivity?

In order to get back to a playful, artistic, creative existence, humans had to give up this idea of value outside of the dynamic moment. In some places, Nietzsche says that the goal is to be like a child -- completely caught up in the moment like a child absorbed in a game, and not burdened by the ideas about self that have been handed down by culture.

We start to form identity within value constructs, but as we gain our identity through a cultural system, we simultaneously lose our momentary, existential identity. In this way, I think existentialism does come out of Nietzsche.

Excerpted from the edited transcript: “Buddhism and Postmodernism: Nietzsche [Part 1 of 4]”

Douglas Powers is Provost and Vice-President for Operations at Dharma Realm Buddhist University. Mr. Powers holds an MA in theology and philosophy from the Graduate Theological Union and a BA and MA in political science from the University of the Redlands. He currently teaches Western philosphy and Buddhist studies and practice.

The edited transcript: “Buddhism and Postmodernism: Nietzsche [Part 1 of 4]” is taken from Lecture 3 of the Spring 2008 course: “Buddhism and Postmodernism,” a collaboration between Dharma Realm Buddhist University and the Graduate Theological Union, with Dr. Snjezana Akpinar and Douglas Powers as instructors.

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