Nietzsche Summaries
...the origin or morality. They claim to be historians of morality, but they completely lack a historical spirit. Their theories suggest that, originally, people benefiting from the unegoistic actions of others would applaud those actions and call them "good." That is, initially, what was good and what was useful were considered one and the same. Over time, these genealogists suggest, we forgot this original association, and the habit of calling unegoistic actions "good" led us to conclude that they were somehow good in and of themselves.
Nietzsche disagrees with this account, suggesting that those to whom "goodness" was shown did not define "good." Rather, it was the "good" themselves - the noble and the powerful - who defined the term. They came to see themselves as good when they came to see the contrast between themselves and those who were below them: the common people, the poor and the weak. Their position of power included the power over words, the power to decide what would be called "good" and what "bad."
In support of his argument, Nietzsche remarks on the similarity between the German word for "bad" and the words for "plain" and "simple." By contrast, he notes, in most languages, the word for "good" derives from the same root as the words for "powerful" or "masters" or "rich." In the Greek, Nietzsche notes that "good" is associated also with "truth." The low, poor, commoners, are then associated with lying and cowardice.
Nietzsche also remarks on how "dark" and "black" are used as negative terms, presumable because of the dark-haired peoples of Europe who were overrun by blonde, Aryan conquerors. He notes the association of "good" with "war" and "warlike."
Nietzsche then considers the change in language that takes place when the priestly caste gains power. Here, "pure" and "impure" become opposites associated with "good" and "bad." This "pureness"...
View Full Essay
