The S. Freud Reader and F. Nietzsche’s Genealogy of Morals Spiritual Revelations Essay

January 18, 2022 by Essay Writer

Introduction

Nietzsche and Sigmund Freud were great scholars in philosophy and psychology during the industrial revolution. However, their work remains influential in modern philosophy, literature, law, religion, and psychology.

In an attempt to define the origin of religion and human civilization, the two philosophers presented several theories, which are largely reductionist.

Both philosophers have attempted to derive a theory that can effectively explain the origins of several human aspects such as religion, creation of god and moral conscience in a modern context.

In “Freud Reader” and “Totem and Taboo,” Sigmund Freud argues that guilt is a fundamental aspect that explains the beginning of human religion.

On the other hand, in his “Genealogy of Morals,” Nietzsche argues that a superior society is created by the transcendence of artificial fear. However, both theories explicitly open a topic of debate that is crucial in the philosophy of religion, morals, and sociology.

Although both philosophers have attempted to base their theories on psychosocial, anthropological and ethnographic foundations, their assertions and theories are still relevant in modern philosophy.

Although their theories are significantly different, they are important in analyzing the human understanding of the origins of religion, morals, spirituality, and civilization.

Arguably, the two philosophers developed different theories to explain the same phenomenon, but both show a major similarity in that each philosopher’s aim was to establish the origins of human morality, moral systems and the process of moving from an innate-self to civilized society.

Freudian and Nietzsche view of religion, god and civilization

The origin of religion and civilization, according to the philosophy of Nietzsche and Freud, seem to begin with their inquest to the existence of god(s). First, religion is the notion of god(s). Along with society and its culture, religion exists within the sphere of anthropological studies.

Over a long time, these areas have been major topics of interest in philosophy. With the works by Nietzsche and Freud, the true intrigue to the origins of moral systems began in the late 19th century and early 20th century due to the industrial revolution in Europe.

On the genealogy of Morals: the Concept of Ancestral fear and its role in the origin of moral systems

Nietzsche, a German philosopher, developed his theory of the origin of morals based on the concept of ancestral fear. His thesis argued that the origin of god(s) is deeply rooted in human’s fear of the ancestors.

In his book, Nietzsche argues that both pain and fear are important in the development of morals through the concepts of “guilt” and “bad conscience” (Nietzsche 56). He argues that fear and pain develops legal obligations of debtor-creditor in humans after or before a person takes action.

According to this theory, in ancient times, only the people who could fulfill their obligations or keep their promise had the right to make promises. They were not only free but also independent persons in ancient societies.

On the other hand, the majority of the individuals in those societies could not fulfill their obligations after a promise. As such, a creditor-debtor disparity could only be settled when such persons make compensations by offering their bodies, their children, spouses or their lives to clear the debt.

Nietzsche further argues that the debtors would gain powers over the creditor once the promise is not fulfilled. It went to the extent of infliction of pain on the debtor by the creditor.

The creditor had the freedom to inflict acts of indignity on the debtor by torturing, beating, assaulting, abusing or even mutilating the debtor or the spouse/children as a way of getting compensation on the debt.

Nietzsche seems to argue that this was a form of gaining pleasure, which would make the debtor feel satisfied. From this finding, Nietzsche argues that it is the origin and basis of all forms of punishment that have been part of human societies.

Nietzsche then proceeds to argue that the moral concepts of “bad conscience” and guiltiness developed from this method of fulfilling the debtor-creditor obligations (Nietzsche 23). Nietzsche takes the example of primitive races in the past as well as apes.

Among them, the common method of exercising pleasure was through cruelty against other individuals or other communities.

Since humans developed from primitive races in the past, the aspect of exercising pleasure with cruelty against each other is the basis of normal quality of modern humans.

One community or an individual would feel pleasure only when the debtor (an individual or a community) felt pain in some way, and the only way to do this was to act cruelly towards the debtor. In most cases, it always involved conflicts, fighting, war and spilling of blood.

Nietzsche uses this view of human nature as the origin of the concept of satisfaction of compensation by the debtor to the creditor.

Thus, this theory seems to argue that such legal structures as Tao and Law, in addition to categorical imperative developed Kant, are all factors of spilling blood and thus cruel.

A main important aspect to consider in this form of justice among the primitive races is that cruelty as a form of compensation to the creditor always enforced memory in the debtor. It is worth noting that infliction of pain through cruelty on a person or animals always enforces some memory.

By such means, Nietzsche argues that the debtor was in a position to get some cautions by remembering “what should be done and what someone should not do” (Nietzsche 17).

Nietzsche then explains the role of “bad conscience” and “guilt.” He argues that these concepts originated from the obligations within the debtor-creditor contract.

This theory argues that the debtor-creditor relationship has evolved alongside the evolution of human beings from primitive races to modern societies.

For instance, Nietzsche says that the relationship between the creditor and the debtor has evolved from the primitive forms of punishment in the ancient world to the modern aspect in which repression and internalization of human instincts of cruelty, joy, and torture are common in modern societies.

According to Nietzsche, humanity has been developed by imprisoning modern man so that he cannot exercise his instincts, which he desires to fulfill. Humans want to exercise their instincts and freedom but are prohibited from doing so.

Therefore, they look for an alternative by inventing or creating the “bad conscience.” Accordingly, bad conscience is the illness of guilty indebtedness. Humans invent religion to free themselves from the guiltiness.

Nietzsche then argues that since the biggest religion is the one with the greatest god, it is characterized by a greater sense of guilt. Here, Nietzsche gives an example of Christianity as the largest religion with the largest sense of guilt.

They despise their freedom for the sale of the sense of guilt and the religion invented. The argument here is that religion and morals have originated from the debtor-creditor relationship in the past.

Nietzsche’s theory then attempts to interpret the fear of ancestor based on the “bad conscience.” They recognized themselves to be indebted to their ancestors by assuming that the ancestors are part of the present generation.

They assumed that the ancestors played an important role in the survival of the current generations. They thought that without the ancestors, they would not survive. Therefore, to settle the debt, the tribal communities had the obligation to appease their ancestors.

From this aspect, the fear of the ancestor increased and evolved along with the evolving human societies. Also, as the power of bad consciousness and indebtedness increased, the power of the tribe escalated.

Similarly, the powers of the ancestors increased as the powers of the tribes grew over those of the others. Finally, the ancestors of the most powerful tribes increased in powers to the extent that they became their gods.

According to Nietzsche, this is the concept of existence and origin of the gods. Since the western world consists of the tribes that obtained the greatest tribal powers over the others in the world, the Christian God is powerful than those of the other religions.

Freud Reader: The origin of Morals, religion, and civilization according to Sigmund Freud

On his part, Sigmund Freud employs his psychoanalysis theories to examine the existence of cultural life and the origin of culture, religion, and morals. In his first writing on the “Reader,” Freud talks of “Totem and Taboo.”

Using psychoanalysis, Freud analysis the life of the primitive races to show how religion and morals came to be. Magic and Animism play an important role in this analysis. Freud associates the ideas of animism and magic critical in explaining the origin of religion and civilization.

According to this theory, a system of totemism exists among tribes where social and religious aspects or institutions are not in existence.

According to Freud, a totem is an object such as an animal, a plant, a natural phenomenon or a feature that is considered as an ancestor to a given group of people such as a tribe, a clan or a race (Freud 237).

The object is regarded as a guide, a guardian, an ancestor or a supernatural power that protects and governs the group of people.

However, in cases such as animal or object is destroyed, the individuals involved will feel guilty on realizing that the totem was their object of love, hatred, honor, wisdom, and protection.

Due to such guiltiness, tribes would develop rules and regulations as well as finding alternative totems that stood powerful over humans.

Such rules would prohibit people from dishonoring the totem in any way. Thus, this is the origin of guiltiness, which then proceeds to the development of morals and religion.

To explain this theory, Sigmund Freud uses western culture and religion as an example of how Totems and Taboos contributed to the development of religion and morals (Freud 288). Freud’s Oedipus complex seeks to explain how Judaism and Christianity originated.

Freud has based his Oedipus complex theory on a Greek Mythology of the 5th century BC in which Oedipus killed Laius, his father, to marry his mother, Jocasta.

According to the Freudian theory of psychoanalysis, the Oedipus complex occurs in young children aged between 3 and six years (or earlier). This is the same time when libido and ego are formed (Freud 528).

Boys experience phallic stage in which their Oedipus complex develops a strong attraction to their mothers, which in turn leads to a father-son competition over the mother.

The genitals of the child become an important part of the body because they become aware of their differences with each other by identifying differences in their genial anatomies.

They recognize the differences between males and females. In infantilism stage, every boy experiences a strong attraction towards the mother, which makes him jealous of the father because the father has direct access to the mother and even sleeps with her.

According to Freud, the “id” drives the boy towards the need to eliminate the father similarly as Oedipus did in Greek mythology.

However, the ego and the principle of reality make the boy note that the father is stronger than he is- he cannot kill him. Rather, the boy remains jealous but afraid of the father (fear of castration).

Thus, when Oedipus killed his father and married Jocasta, he developed a sense of guiltiness after realizing that the father was his source of envy, protection and an object of his love. The sense of grief and guiltiness was so strong that he renounced his actions by developing laws of culture.

He prohibited murder and incest. Also, he developed rules and regulations to honor the father and the ancestors, including the Sphinx. This explains the origin of religion and morals.

For instance, Freud hypothesizes that western religions and cultures began with the killing of a primordial father (being), which then permeated into the consciousness of the western races.

For example, the Jewish religion was founded after the killing of Moses, who was the father-image to the Jews. Also, Christianity arose from the death of Jesus, who was the image of the Son of God.

This, according to the theory, is a filial rebellion against the father, and always leads to a feeling of guilt. To drive this argument, Freud seems to assume that the ancient tribes resembled that of the higher apes as described by Charles Darwin.

From innate being to civilized-society: Similarities of Nietzsche and Freudian theories

It is clear that the two theories largely rely on a historical aspect of the early tribes in their quest to explain the origin of religion and morals. The two philosophers attempt to interpret anthropological and historical aspects of communities, taking a tribal approach to the examination of the question.

For example, Sigmund Freud has repeatedly made references of the ancient tribes as the most effective representation of ancestors to the modern man.

Development of taboos and role of totems are critical in Freud’s theory. These are explained in the historical and anthropological aspects of communities.

Similarly, Nietzsche relies heavily on historical aspects of early tribes.

For instance, it would have been impossible for Nietzsche to explain his theory without reference to the early practices among primitive communities such as cruelty, debtor-creditor relationships and the role of “bad conscience” in the development of religion, morals and civilization.

Also, Nietzsche also refers to ancient apes as described by Charles Darwin in an attempt to explain the origins of cruelty as a way of fulfilling debts.

Therefore, it is clear that both Nietzsche and Freud have applied history and anthropology to trace the origin of morals and religion. They argue that the old practices have developed and evolved into the modern ways of life, thus producing the current concepts of religion and morals.

It is also evident that both theories attempt to describe a strong relationship between the practices of the ancient generations with the present generations.

Secondly, the two theories emphasize on human desire and its role in developing practices, religion, and morals. For instance, Nietzsche argues that human desire to seek satisfaction and fulfillment of pleasure by being cruel to the other led to blood splitting.

As such, restrictions and prohibitions on the acts of cruelty against the debtor led to the invention of an alternative- the “bad conscience.” From this point in history, religion and the aspect of god(s) came to exist among different tribes.

Similarly, Freud has based his theory on the strength of human desire. For example, in the Oedipus complex, a boy-child feels the desire to possess the mother. He feels the need to own her due to her opposite sex that is attracting his libido.

However, the fact that the father competes with the boy for the mother creates a strong desire in the boy to eliminate the father, as Oedipus did in Greek Mythology. Although the boy cannot eliminate the father due to his weakness and the father’s strength, he remains attracted to the mother.

Freud’s theory argues that this process of development that made Oedipus kill his father, but the feeling of guilt that overcame him became an important point at which religion in the ancient Greek began.

The desire to kill in Freudian theory is quite similar to the instincts of being cruel in Nietzsche’s theory. From these two theories, it is evident that the development of the civilized society, which has morals and religion, can be explained from the basis of human characteristics.

First, the innate self is responsible for the strong desire (the desire to kill or desire for cruelty). In ancient times, this desire was strong and drove people to kill, like Oedipus, and the ancient tribes in Nietzsche’s theory explain.

This desire is still present in young boys, but it seems civilization and development of law and order controls such desires.

Quite clearly, the development of religion and morals is strongly linked with the development of humans from the innate self to a situation where laws, regulations, and restrictions are made to prevent individuals from exercising their instincts.

Thus, religion and morals arose from these aspects of human nature. It is worth arguing that although the two theories are significantly different, they are important in analyzing the human understanding of the origins of religion, morals, spirituality, and civilization.

Also, the two philosophers developed different theories to explain the same phenomenon, but both show a major similarity in that each philosopher’s aim was to establish the origins of human morality, moral systems and the process of moving from an innate-self to civilized society.