Nietzsche’s Protestant Fathers: A Study in Prodigal Christianity

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Nietzsche was famously an atheist, despite coming from a strongly Protestant family. This heritage influenced much of his thought, but was it in fact the very thing that led him to his atheism? This work provides a radical re-assessment of Protestantism by documenting and extrapolating Nietzsche’s view that Christianity dies from the head down. That is, through Protestantism’s inherent anarchy. In this book, Nietzsche is put into conversation with the initiatives of several powerful thinking writers; Luther, Boehme, Leibniz, and Lessing. Using Nietzsche as a critical guide to the evolution of Protestant thinking, each is shown to violate, warp, or ignore gospel injunctions, and otherwise pose hazards to the primacy of Christian ethics. Demonstrating that a responsible understanding of Protestantism as a historical movement needs to engage with its inherent flaws, this is a text that will engage scholars of philosophy, theology, and religious studies alike. Cover......Page 1 Title......Page 4 Copyright......Page 5 Dedication......Page 6 Contents......Page 8 Preface......Page 10 Introduction: Nietzsche, companion and commentator......Page 14 I Backgrounds and foregrounds......Page 19 II Approaching Luther......Page 21 III What the Theologia Deutsch told Luther about love......Page 28 IV Grace, the slavish will, impossible love......Page 30 V The earlier Luther on love......Page 39 VI Loveless, Luther faces Islam......Page 45 VII Luther on true and false Jews......Page 51 VIII The Finnish re-make: putting a best face onto Luther......Page 62 IX Nietzsche on Luther......Page 65 2 The evil in God: Jacob Boehme finds the cosmos......Page 91 I Sebastian Franck shows Boehme the way......Page 92 II The legacy of Theophrastus von Hohenheim, known as Paracelsus......Page 104 III God the good son, God the evil father......Page 110 IV Boehme’s ontotheology: from nothing to nothing......Page 118 V Boehme in and out of the Lutherans’ dock......Page 120 VI Nietzsche, Boehme, and the metaphysics of suffering......Page 128 3 Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz presumes to scan God......Page 153 I Leibniz thinking for his dukes......Page 154 II Pre-establishing harmony......Page 160 III Working for Christian concord......Page 164 IV Toward the theodicy......Page 173 V Monads, briefly......Page 175 VI Of damnation and extra-terrestrial piety......Page 180 VII Pierre Bayle as witness for the prosecution of God and Leibniz......Page 184 VIII Leibniz and Bayle on Christian mystery......Page 192 IX Nietzsche (and Goethe) on Leibniz......Page 200 4 The prodigality of reason: Gotthold Ephraim Lessing......Page 215 I What was enlightenment?......Page 216 II An assassin of God?......Page 221 III Adornments for the half-religious: “The Free Thinker” (1749) and “Vindications” (1754)......Page 225 IV The Reimarus controversy and Hauptpastor Goeze (1778)......Page 231 V Nathan der Weise (1779)......Page 241 VI Lessing’s Jesus, Leibniz’s optimism......Page 247 VII Educating humanity with Spinoza......Page 254 VIII Nietzsche seduced by Lessing......Page 260 Conclusion: Nietzsche facing Christianity......Page 273 Index......Page 290