From Nihilism to Perspectivism in 'On the Genealogy of Morals' and 'Beyond Good and Evil' Madeline Burleson College

Nietzsche’s concern with the analysis of the history of morals, expounded in his work The Genealogy of Morals, allows him to better understand the origins, conditions, and growth of moral concepts. The genealogy leads Nietzsche to argue that there are two general codes of morality, slave morality and noble morality. Ultimately, Nietzsche’s interests lie in the slave morality, for it is a morality that has lead to asceticism. Nietzsche finds the ascetic ideal intriguing, as he traces its development from the beginnings of Christianity to a modern asceticism. It is in this modern asceticism that Nietzsche argues the ascetic ideal has gone so far as to renounce God itself, essentially leaving the ascetic’s life without meaning. This is a problem for Nietzsche, for he argues that nihilism is a great danger because of its lack of a higher goal for humanity. He does not believe humankind should give up on life entirely. As a result, Nietzsche intends to create a new morality, one that is focused on the creation of oneself and a new set of one’s own morals. In order to do so, Nietzsche discusses the concept of perspectivism, which is essentially the lens through which one must look in order move beyond the dualism of the morality...