According to Nietzsche, the greatest problem man confronts is how to justify his life and make it meaningful and valuable. Nietzsche believes that human beings before him have been justifying human existence and life through a moral conception of the world or universe, but that this leads finally to the nihilism of his time when human beings lost their goal and meaning. He maintains that the real justification of human life and existence is not anything "beyond" or "God", but the highest earthly type of man--Superman. In fact, Nietzsche as a warrior of the "free spirit" soars aloft "beyond good and evil". With a solemn and stirring mood of "amor fati" he faces bravely the "nihilistic" reality and "twilight of the idols". He comes to the "daybreak" of affirming life; in a word, he devotes all his life to writing a prescription to cure declining Western civilization. His prescription is the Superman.

Superman is the fresh goal set for human beings by Nietzsche after his analysis of the "declining" and "nihilistic" features of the 19th century. It brings to light the nature of Western civilization, namely, to pursue the "beyond" and to depress "instinct".

The horizon of Nietzsche’s time was that of speculative philosophy falling asleep in the ambitious systems of F. Schelling and G.W.F. Hegel, while the doctrine of C. Darwin was conquering the world, science and technology were progressing astonishingly, and the army of Prussia was the political overlord in Europe. Thus "bon sens" and "cheerfulness" became the prevailing taste and optimism spread. But all of this worried Nietzsche to the point of nausea. He realized more keenly than most of his contemporaries that this was a warning symptom of the "last days of the world", and that the Western world then was suffering a deep spiritual crisis. As a new Hamlet Nietzsche uttered cries of anguish for the "rotting of Denmark". More unfortunately, Nietzsche’s patient "Denmark" went beyond that country to the whole of Europe.

Nietzsche pointed out that the shallow optimistic phenomena were a symptom of degeneration: it was abnormal in nature. The progress and richness of the material obscures the poverty of the life of spiritual creativity and culture. He reminds people: "Our time . . . is a time of the poor. Our "rich" are the poorest of all; the true purpose of all riches is forgotten" (WP 61). Nietzsche states this because he takes a person or nation as an "energy" (will to power). "If one spends in this direction the quantum of understanding, seriousness, will and self-overcoming which one represents, then this will lack for another direction" (TI, p. 62). To Nietzsche the degeneration of the 19th century represents a misuse of "energy" for state, politics and the material, but because "culture and state . . . thrive(s) at the expense of the other", finally the "energy" dries up in the non-political and non-material fields, and culture that represents the creativity of life degenerates.

Nietzsche believed that the reason why Western civilization finally came to the "degeneration" and "nihilism" of the 19th century is that the bases of Western civilization -- Platonism and Christianity -- are abnormal, and the history of Western civilization on the level of philosophy is a history of "how the `true world’ finally became a fable", a "history of an error" (TI, p. 40). Reason is the warrior of Platonism, while faith is the knight of Christianity; both have common features -- based on the same prejudice -- namely the moral conception of the world. This is manifest in the Western civilization as follows: In order to enjoy dignity and security, human beings project their desires onto the natural universe or world as morality and values. They objectify and sacralize these desires, that is, they create a "true world" beside "this world". In Nietzsche, the "true world" is a world invented by lies; the "true world", "the absolute", "the truth" and "God" are different names of the same mistake. They are invented as concepts opposite life (EH, p. 115).

In the history of Western civilization, the "true world" as the highest value prevails, but it seems to Nietzsche that it weakened repeatedly, and finally becomes "a fable". According to Nietzsche’s analysis, Kantian philosophy is the first shock wave to "the true world" which finally becomes "untenable, indemonstrable, unpromisable" (TI, p. 40). The "true world" as "the old sun" is no longer maintained by reason (as in the case of Platonism), nor by faith (as in the case of Christianity). But as Kant is "a cunning Christian" (TI, p. 39), this time "the true world" is for the moral people acting according to the imperative, although neither for "the virtuous person" as in the case of Platonism, nor for "the sinner who repents" as in the case of Christianity.

To Nietzsche, the rise of positivism is the "first yawn of reason". According to the spirit of positivism, "the true world", "the Absolute" "as unattained" is "also unknown, and consequently also not consoling, redeeming or obligating" (TI, p. 40). It seems to Nietzsche that under the influence of positivism, people unlock themselves from the "true world", "error", or "fable". With positivism and the vulgar worship of science and technology prevailing in Europe, step by step the "true world" becomes "a useless idea and superfluous" (TI, p. 40). "Modern" Europeans do not need security for a "better" life any longer; their actions and conditions declare that their "true world" is a refuted idea, let us abolish it!" (TI, p. 40P). This is the "Death of God".

To Nietzsche the "death of God" seems to be an historical fact and its consequences are significant. Nietzsche asks: After we abolish "the true world . . . which world remains? The apparent one perhaps? . . . But no! With the true world we have abolished the apparent one as well!" This means that the highest values of the tradition such as reason, God, the absolute, etc. -- truth itself -- is unable to govern philosophies and control individuals, unable to sustain Western civilization any longer. For Nietzsche, because the traditional highest value has come to be devalued and Western civilization has lost its unifying basis in "myth", although Europe is full of "cheerfulness" and on its face people commonly feel that "bon sens" and material welfare have progressed leaps and bounds, in fact, at bottom Western civilization since Socrates has gradually degenerated to a kind of lifeless decorative civilization due to its separation from the source of life. Moreover, because of the disappearance of the "true World" or "God" that had replaced life as the basis of culture, "previous goals and values have become incommensurate and no longer are believed, so that the synthesis of values and goals (on which every strong culture rests) dissolves" (WP, 23). Thus Europe lost its cultural unity. All standards and differences disappeared with the abolition of "the true world". To Nietzsche, Europeans are in fact in a nihilistic condition, without faith and goals.

Nietzsche pointed out that the history of "the true world" becoming a fable and of the death of God meant that the orbit of the highest value was devalued. This is a two way process. It was a way for people to recover from abnormal conditions by abolishing the "beyond" and cherishing "earthly life". For this reason, Nietzsche thought that the soil of the 19th century was still rich. But he foresaw that some day it would become dry and barren allowing no big tree to grow up. Therefore, he shouted: It is time to set up our goals, it is time to plant seeds of the highest hope (Z, p. 31). In other words, according to Nietzsche, the nihilistic conditions of the 19th century meant that the declining Christian civilization of Europe would be overthrown; people were at the eve of revaluating values and a new daybreak. If people want to step out of the black history, "an aim? a new aim? -- that is what humanity needs" (WP, 867). For this new aim or goal "not `mankind’, but overman is the goal!" (WP, 1001).

Superman as a fresh new ideal or goal for man is essentially different from the decaying type Nietzsche criticized and which had been cultivated in the Platonic-Christian tradition. Superman is "a type of ascending life"; it affirms and pursues earthly life and self-mastery; it is able to live "beyond good and evil", to return to life and rejoin nature.

This point of Nietzsche was based on his theory of "order of rank". From the position of aristocratic radicalism Nietzsche openly advocated the "order of rank". He pointed out that the notion that "everyone has equal rank with everyone else" was a metaphysical-religious hypothesis once ensured by God. But because human beings have no common human nature that sets them collectively apart from all forms of merely animal life, because "the true world" had become "a fable" and "god has died" (Z, IV:13) people have no reason to hold to a basic equality of all men. Nietzsche firmly maintained that men were absolutely not equal: there were higher men and there were lower men. This was the truth of the world, because the will to power as the principle of the world is form-giving and shaping. Because of the different degrees of the development and ramification of the will to power (B.G.E., 36), the world takes on different orders of rank. Things in different orders embody different degrees of "will to power" and the "order of rank" becomes a feature of the world. Nietzsche thought that the reason why some people held the doctrine of equality was that they wanted to draw others back to the same level as themselves, or wanted to surpass others in various respects. It seemed to Nietzsche that this proved that men were not equal, and indicated that there were at least potential "exceptions" to the average men.

Nietzsche not only believed that there were orders of rank in the world, but pointed out further that this was true of "different kinds of life" (WP, 592) which were essentially different. If human life is to develop and flourish, it is imperative "to maintain the order of rank in the world" (BGE, 219), to widen the "difference between strata" and to intensify "the pathos of distance" deriving therefrom. This is a condition of the possibility of "the enhancement of the type `man’", of the continual "self-overcoming of man" (BGE, 257). If this condition is not met, the alternative possibility is an overall "degeneration and diminution of man into the animal herd . . . the dwarf animal of equal right and claims" (BGE, 203). Thus, Nietzsche pays special attention to two orders of rank among all orders, and proposes to "distinguish between a type of ascending life and the other type of decay, disintegration and weakness", contending that there can be no doubt about "the relative rank of these two types" (WP, 857).

Based on this difference of order of rank, Nietzsche divides human beings into one or the other of two radically different and widely disparate groups. One group is very numerous occupying "the human lowlands"; the other group is "very small in number", but constitutes "a higher brighter humanity" standing far "above" the rest (WP, 993). The former is the general run of mankind, the latter is "man’s lucky hits", which consist of "the rare cases of great power of soul and body" (GM, III:1). Thus Nietzsche pointed out, on the one hand, there is "the domestic animal, the animal herd" (A, 3); on the other hand, there are the "exceptions", the "fortunate accidents of great success",which are "encountered in the most widely different places and cultures" (A, 4). The former, "the lower man", is the typical traditional human whose feature is to depress the instinct of life (the will to power). The latter Nietzsche names "higher men" whose "exception" consists in being the "strongest, richest, most independent and most courageous. They have at their disposal "a great quantum of power to which one is able to give direction" (WP, 776). This "higher man" is "the sovereign individual, like only to himself . . . , autonomous and supermoral . . . , who has his own protracted will," and whose "mastery over himself necessarily gives him mastery also over circumstances and nature," and elevates him above "all more short-willed and unreliable creatures" (GM, II:2).

Thus, what makes Nietzsche’s "higher men" different from and higher than others is not only that they possess "overflowing power and abundance", "great power of soul and body", "creative power and strength". It is especially that such resources "are controlled" (WP, 966) and that they know "how to press these magnificent monsters into service" (WP, 933). Therefore, in Nietzsche the "higher man" is different from "the splendid blond beast prowling about avidly in search of spoil and victory," no less than from the "tamed" (and "sickened") "domestic animal" which civilization reduces, as well as from the inherently weak, ill-constituted and mediocre type of man he calls the "herd animal" (GM, I:11). What makes the "higher man" higher is a strong will to power and its rational utilization.

Up to now we can conclude that "higher men" as "man’s lucky hits" acquire a "union of spiritual superiority with well-being and an excess of strength" (WP, 899) and a kind of "wholeness" and "completeness" that is lacking among the greater part of humankind. Thus the latter have a merely supporting role to play, as the "precondition" and "base" on which this exceptional type of man "can invent his higher form of being" (WP, 866). In Nietzsche the "higher men" are "synthetic, summarizing, justifying" human beings, and are "encountered in the most widely different places and cultures" (A, 4). For this reason the "higher men" are great or "higher" not as individuals or as members of a certain race, nation or ethnic group, but as examples of a "different type of life". They are non-ethnic and non-national. Further, "higher man" constitutes "a higher type that arises and preserves itself under different conditions from those of the average man". It represents the emergence of a "higher form of being" with regard to human existence generally. Nietzsche’s "metaphor" for this, he remarks in passing, is "the word Ubermensch" (WP, 866): "Here we really do find a higher type, which in relation to humankind as a whole is a kind of Ubermensch" (A, 4). So in the final analysis Nietzsche’s Superman is referred as "the ascending type of life", which incarnates the will to power. In personified terms Superman is a personalization of those qualities by which one belongs to the "higher" "type". Superman is a function of those qualities which human beings need in order to become "higher" and "higher". Hence it is not proper to interpret Superman in terms of heroism and racism.

As stated above, Superman is referred as "the type of ascending life", and is the personification of the plentiful life, which embodies will to power. In this sense Nietzsche’s Superman becomes the incarnation of values, the new "highest value" replacing "God", and the direction of a "revaluation of values" and the yardstick of value judgement.

For Nietzsche, traditional Westerners make a big mistake in expanding their "requirements into cosmic and metaphysical values" (WP, 27), while the 19th century reaction to this religious-metaphysical illusion of values in history was a nihilism that rejects the objectivity of values and valuation. Contrary to all of this, Nietzsche maintains that value has objectivity, but its "objectivity" resides not in a metaphysical structure, but in life. Where traditional values were associated with "want", the values he advocates are associated with "abundance" (WP, 1009). The former are merely "utilitarian" modes of evaluation, whereas the latter are genuinely "creative". For Nietzsche, all earlier values were opposed to life, whereas he stresses life.

"Assuming that life itself is the will to power", nothing in life has value except the degree of power" (WP, 55). "What is the objective measure of value? Solely the quantum of enhanced and organized power" (WP, 674). This enhancement and organization of power is further associated with the notions of growth ("that is life itself") and development -- "the morality of development" being "the doctrine which preached life itself to all that has life" (WP, 125). Thus life itself is value, which ultimately must be understood as "value for life" (BGE, 2), measured by the extent to which "it is life-promoting, life-preserving" (BGE, 4). So in Nietzsche, Superman as "the type of ascending life" becomes the incarnation of value; everything has its value in relation to Superman. As Superman is the metaphor of the excellent qualities of human beings, this relation is just man in terms of man himself or herself, not of something beyond this. To have more Superman qualities, that is, to enhance and organize more will to power, is to have more value, while the value of things outside man is determined in relation to Superman.

As the human is individual and Superman is the qualities of the individual, the value and meaning of "humankind" also are determined in relation to Superman. "Value is the highest quantum of power a man is able to incorporate -- a man not mankind!" (Wp, 713). Against the traditional notion of man as "humankind", Nietzsche points out, that the individual is a new, creative, absolute thing to whom every action belongs (WP, 846). Because of such features of the individual it is possible that under certain circumstances "a single individual can justify the existence of whole millennia -- that is, a full, rich, great, whole human being in relation to countless incomplete fragmentary men" (WP, 997).

Every individual may be regarded as representing the ascending or descending line of life. . . . If he represents the ascending line his value is in fact extraordinary -- and for the sake of the life-collective, which with him takes a step forward. If he represents the descending line of development; decay, chronic degeneration, sickening -- then he can be accorded little value (TI, IV:33).

 

Thus for Nietzsche the only value of humankind is in relation to what it represents and produces; it is a function of the qualities they acquire. Because the product of humans is the human itself, the source of value is self-formation, self-transcending and repeated sublimation of the will to power, that is, continually approaching the Superman. Moreover, it seems to Nietzsche that the value of the whole of humankind resides in producing individuals of Superman qualities. So Superman justifies human existence and endows humans with value. Thus, in conditions where the traditional notions of a beyond or "true world" and of "God" are no longer able to justify human existence, an earthly Superman solves the biggest problem humans face, namely, how to justify human existence.

Z: Thus Spoke Zarathustra.

BGE: Beyond Good and Evil.

GM: Genealogy of Morals.

TI: Twilight of the Idols.

WP: The Will to Power.

EH: Ecce Homo.

A: The Antichrist.