And what infuriated the slavesabout and against their masters was never faith itself,but rather the freedom from faith,that half-stoic and smiling nonchalancewhen it came to the seriousness of faith. Enlightenment is infuriating. Slaves want the unconditional;they understand only tyranny, even in morality.They love as they hate,without nuance, into the depths, to the point of…
From the beginning,Christian faith has been sacrifice:sacrifice of all freedom, of all pride, of all self-confidence of the spirit;it is simultaneously enslavement and self-derision, self-mutilation. There is cruelty and religious Phoenicianism in this faith,which is expected of a worn-down,many-sided, badly spoiled conscience. Its presuppositionis that the subjugation of spirit causes indescribable pain,and that the…
A spring morning is yet one more delectable indication of the natality of the world. Nothing is fixed, unmoved, but all is in motion, the exuberance of growth, a driving trajectory of maximum expression. Perhaps that sentence is nonsense. What is my basis for knowing anything? When I know, I make the claim with…
Memorial Day weekend is commonly recognized as unofficial beginning of summer. The kids are out of school, all grinning ear to ear, imagining the adventures that await. Perhaps there remains a kid in me!? Year to year I too anticipate the warm months of summer by planning to be present for the first big…
What is good? -All that heightens the feeling of power, the will to power, power itself in man. What is bad? -Everything that is born of weakness. What is happiness? -The feeling that power is growing -That resistance is overcome. The Anti-Christ, by Friedrich Nietzsche, Trans. R. J. Hollingdale. aphorism 2 The good and…
In naturethe rule is not the state of distressit is superfluity, prodigality,even to the point of absurdity. The struggle for existence is only an exception,a temporary restriction of the will of life.The struggle, great and small,everywhere turns on ascendancy, on growth and extension,–in accordance with the will to powerwhich is the will of life….
Sunday dawns as one more day. This day is incomparable, a day only superficially similar to any other. We Americans have designated the seventh day Sunday, as a day of rest, reflection. To say it in a degraded form, “the Lord’s day,” a day for collective worship. Degraded you say!? Yes. Do not feel…
Today is my birthday. It is early but already several have greeted me with, “happy birthday.” As an adult it has been difficult to dwell on my birthday. “Happy Birthday…” Really!? A pure happiness is not of this world. I am here after 75 years, an astonishing, lucky win. After all the odds of…
The Sunday of the time change, the switch to daylight ‘savings’ time. Is anything at all ‘saved’? Describe for me how shifting the imposed grid of punctuated time, industrial time, upon the flow of natural-seasonal time is useful? Disruptive yes. Worth it? Why keep doing, in lock step what we’ve always done? I glimpsed…
Japanese: Oshōgatsu is the festival of year’s end and of a new beginning. The holiday is celebrated by gathering with family and friends to eat traditional foods. The feasting is typically preceded by the visit to a local temple where at the stroke of midnight one offers a coin to the deity. The temple…
