Being Your Own God
“A discerning one might easily regard himself at present as the animilisation of God.”
-Friedrich Nietzsche (Beyond Good and Evil, pg. 574)
This is a fascinating quote from Nietzsche. In one sentence, Nietzsche encapsulates his thoughts on religion and the evolution of mankind.
NIETZSCHE ON RELIGION
Throughout Nietzsche’s books discussing religion, he discussed mankind being held back by religion. Specifically, he highlighted that Christianity was a “European nihilism” in his book “The Genealogy of Morals.” The reason is that Christianity teaches us that the life we live on earth is unimportant. That the only important thing to look forward to is death and then we’ll finally enter Heaven. This is tantamount to what Buddhism teaches, except in Buddhism, Heaven is replaced with Nirvana.
MANKIND SURPASSING ITSELF
In his book “Thus Spake Zarathustra,” Nietzsche talks about mankind surpassing itself. One day the great longing in life is that man evolves past its current state into the Ubermench, or Overman. This would be the most evolved that humanity has become. We would be like gods amongst men, similar to how we view ourselves as being above apes.
Nietzsche saw this as being necessary due to the oncoming of the decline in the Christian religion that he saw forthcoming in the 20th and 21st centuries. Clearly, Nietzsche was correct about the great decline in the Christian religion during the last few centuries. Church attendance is down. Churches and houses of worship are being sold to the highest bidder. New converts are harder to attract, especially among the younger generations.
Nietzsche’s solution to this would be for people to become their own gods. This would relieve us of the nihililsm that would inevitably occur with the decline in the Christian religion. We would no longer allow religion to chastise and rebuke humanity with religoius morals and dogmatism. We could finally become our own masters and gods.
Becoming our own God means that we do not look to a higher authority to make decisions for ourselves. We would also not look elsewhere for our morality and values, because we would decide our morality for ourselves. This would give us more control over own lives.
THE ANIMALISATION OF GOD
This is where the validity of a discerning person now viewing themselves as the animalization of God according to Nietzsche makes sense. As humans, we’re obviously animals. A discerning person can conceive and recognize that we are our own Gods, except, we’re in the form on animals and not in some spirit form.
BENEFITS OF BECOMING YOUR OWN GOD
1. Free to choose own values.
2. Count upon yourself.
3. More control over your own life.
NOTES:
Nietzsche, Friedrich (2014). Beyond Good and Evil. Wordsworth Editions Limited. (originally published, 1886)
You have a typo in the quote.
The claim that Buddhism considers this life on earth to be unimportant, and we ought to look forward to entering nirvana after death, is lacking support. It's possible that someone calling themselves a Buddhist might have said this, but it's not found in anything the Buddha taught.
Canonically, the Buddha directed people's attention and efforts to present moment experience. That's the only place where human activity will bear fruit. Nirvana (nibbāna in Pali) is just one of the epithets for a state free from greed, hatred, and delusion. The world is real, but wrongly grasped.