Secularity the Day after Tomorrow: Discerning Nietzsche’s Postsecular Thought

It is common in accounts of the secularization of Western thought to make reference to the name of Nietzsche. Nietzsche is undeniably a critic of religion, but he is equally a critic of the secular. It is for this reason that I propose thinking about Nietzsche’s philosophy as postsecular. This term...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Author: Cauchi, Mark (Author)
Format: Electronic Article
Language:English
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Published: Brill 2024
In: Journal for continental philosophy of religion
Year: 2024, Volume: 6, Issue: 2, Pages: 155-188
Further subjects:B Atheism
B Judeo-Christianity
B Postsecularism
B Friedrich Nietzsche
B Secularization
B hermeneutics of religion
B Christianity
B Secularism
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Summary:It is common in accounts of the secularization of Western thought to make reference to the name of Nietzsche. Nietzsche is undeniably a critic of religion, but he is equally a critic of the secular. It is for this reason that I propose thinking about Nietzsche’s philosophy as postsecular. This term is one that has evolved over the last couple decades in response to the so-called “return of the religious” in society, social theory, and philosophy and suggests that secularity and religiosity are not antithetical and therefore that we must move beyond the forms of thinking that would regard them as such. First, I focus on his concepts of will to power, interpretation, perspectivism, and history, and sketch how they are all interrelated and how these ground his interpretation of religion. Based on this view, I show, second, that while religion is, for Nietzsche, a historical perspective, it is also, for him, part of the historical genealogy of secularity. This point leads to my final one on the relationship between secularity and religion in Nietzsche’s thought, where I argue that, on his own terms, Nietzsche’s anti-Christianity is a hyper-Christianity, even while rejecting facets of Christianity.
ISSN:2588-9613
Contains:Enthalten in: Journal for continental philosophy of religion
Persistent identifiers:DOI: 10.1163/25889613-bja10053