Is God dead?| Fredrich Nietzsche’s The Madman

In 1883 the German philosopher Fredrich Nietzsche wrote these words: “Have you not heard of that Madman who lit a lantern in the bright morning hours, ran to the marketplace, and cried incessantly: ‘I seek God! I seek God!’—-As many of those who did not believe in God were standing around just then, he provoked much laughter. Has he got lost? asked one. Did he lose his way like a child? asked another. Or is he hiding? Is he afraid of us? Has he gone on a voyage? emigrated?—-Thus they yelled and laughed.

The Madman jumped into their midst and pierced them with his eyes. ‘Whither is God?’ he cried; ‘I will tell you. We have killed him—-you and I. All of us are his murderers. But how did we do this? How could we drink up the sea? Who gave us the sponge to wipe away the entire horizon? What were we doing when we unchained this earth from its sun? Whither is it moving now? Whither are we moving? Away from all suns? Are we not plunging continually? Backward, sideward, forward, in all directions? Is there still any up or down? Are we not straying, as through an infinite nothing? Do we not feel the breath of empty space? Has it not become colder? Is not night continually closing in on us? Do we not need to light lanterns in the morning? Do we hear nothing as yet of the noise of the gravediggers who are burying God? Do we smell nothing as yet of the divine decomposition? Gods, too, decompose. God is dead. God remains dead. And we have killed him.’

‘How shall we comfort ourselves, the murderers of all murderers? What was holiest and mightiest of all that the world has yet owned has bled to death under our knives: who will wipe this blood off us? What water is there for us to clean ourselves? What festivals of atonement, what sacred games shall we have to invent? Is not the greatness of this deed too great for us? Must we ourselves not become gods simply to appear worthy of it? There has never been a greater deed, and whoever is born after us—-for the sake of this deed he will belong to a higher history than all history hitherto.’

Here the Madman fell silent and looked again at his listeners; and they, too, were silent and stared at him in astonishment. At last, he threw his lantern on the ground, and it broke into pieces and went out. ‘I have come too early,’ he said then; ‘my time is not yet. This tremendous event is still on its way, still wandering; it has not yet reached the ears of men. Lightning and thunder require time; the light of the stars requires time; deeds, though done, still require time to be seen and heard. This deed is still more distant from them than most distant stars—-and yet they have done it themselves.’”

Fredrich Nietzsche’s The Madman reigns supreme in the grand scheme of irony. It is the story of a “madman” looking for God. However, in all her wisdom, society has “outgrown” the need for God. The irony comes in that Nietzsche’s Madman is not mad after all. It turns out that the Madman is the only sane man left in a society that has gone completely mad. No one gets it; no one seems to care. The Madman realizes he is too early: they are all mad but have not yet realized it. In the meantime, a few years later, in January 1889, the real-life atheist author of The Madman, Nietzsche himself, collapsed in the streets of Turin, Italy, in January 1889; he had lost

complete control of his mental faculties. But there is one more twist of irony: immediately after his collapse, Nietzsche is able to scrawl out a plea for help to his friend, the Christian theologian Franz Overbeck. Overbeck travels to Italy and safely returns Nietzsche home to his mother. He died, insane, in Germany, in 1900 with his sister and lover Elisabeth at his side.

Who cares? You might say. Why does it even matter? Well, it matters, and it matters greatly for three important reasons. First, German soldiers under Hitler were sent off to war during World War II with field-gray editions of Nietzsche’s works in their packs (Hitler loved Nietzsche). Second, Nietzsche’s popularity as a philosopher continues to grow; he is widely read and studied around the world today. Finally, history matters. And history matters because it has such an inescapable hold on the future. If God is dead, then we have killed Him. Others say no, He never existed.

Nevertheless, if God never existed, then it is only because we have killed Him. Then, who is to say that by His murder, we are not ALL mad? Join us again next week as we continue to look at the human mind for evidence to help answer the question: Is God Dead?

Gloria in excelsis Deo!