God is dead and we killed him. Nietzsche is a man who challenged God and lost! Starting point, not end point

Not so long ago, atheists were disappointed. Even denying the existence of God, they recognized that the world with God would be better than without Him. They still find various arguments and arguments against the existence of God, such as the problem of evil and the apparent ability of the natural sciences to explain the workings of the universe. Although it is now recognized that God does not belong in space, many still find it difficult to reconcile the fact of His existence with evil and suffering. But the sad thing is that most atheists turned out to be extremely concerned about this. By their own admission, they reluctantly came to unbelief.

However, this is not the case with the so-called "New Atheists" - people like Richard Dawkins, Daniel Dennett, Sam Harris and Christopher Hitchens. These courageous thinkers saw in the statement about the absence of God not a reason for regret, but, on the contrary, a reason for joy. And yet, their enthusiasm and sarcastic attacks on religious beliefs find their counterpart in the past, namely in the writings of the 19th century philosopher, Friedrich Nietzsche.

Starting point, not end point

Despite the wide spread of this movement, the most interesting feature of the "New Atheism" is its evangelical fervor and militant eloquence - all of which do not originate with Dawkins, Harris and Hitchens. In fact, what is unprecedented is the weakness of their argument. Careful readers will find that compelling arguments and weighty arguments have no place in Dawkins' God Delusion, Hitchens' God Is Not Love, or Harris' Letter to a Christian Nation. On the contrary, their arguments are surprisingly weak. If you are looking for an excuse to take the views of the New Atheists seriously, their writings will seem rather weak to you.

However, this does not mean that Nietzsche represents the best arguments in favor of their disbelief; he does nothing of the sort. Unlike Dawkins and company, he sees no need for it. Nietzsche sees atheism not as a conclusion to be presented, but as a postulate to be developed. In other words, he argues per atheism, but rather repelling from him; unbelief is for him a starting point, not an end point. When he publicly proclaimed the death of God, for example, he didn't do it to show – he didn't even try to show it – that God doesn't exist. Rather, he considered it a given, because, in his opinion, critics of the second half of the 19th century, such as himself, could no longer take faith in God seriously. He stated that such faith "became incredible."

Joyful knowledge

Nietzsche made this statement in his The Gay Science The Gay Science), whose name deserves special attention. Here the word “gay” has a completely different meaning than it has acquired over the past 50 years, but rather its traditional meaning of “joyful”. Moreover, the term “science” (science) comes from the Latin word scientia, which means "knowledge". So " Gay Science” means “joyful knowledge” - such knowledge that brings joy to the knower. From Nietzsche's point of view, joyful knowledge is the knowledge that God is dead.

In proclaiming the death of God, Nietzsche did not mean the literal meaning of this phrase. In his opinion, God never existed originally, therefore, talk about His "death" refers more to the human than to the divine. We humans, Nietzsche suggests, find the existence of God both unprovable and undesirable. Therefore, he suggests rather than states the unprovability of belief in God, even when explaining its undesirability.

Why is faith in God undesirable? Because the death of God allows us to become gods ourselves.

God does not die alone

In simple words, God does not die alone. When He dies, meaning, morality, and reason die with Him.

First, if God does not exist, then life has no meaning. When there is no author, the story has no meaning; moreover, when there is no author, there is no history itself. Also, if God does not exist, morality becomes biased and moral judgment becomes mere interpretation with nothing but personal preference.

Secondly, Nietzsche shows the artificial nature morality, inviting us to reflect on the birds of prey and the sheep they prey on. When birds feed on sheep, their actions are not morally good or bad. Birds simply act according to their nature; morality has nothing to do with it.

So, while the "judgment" of birds by sheep surprises no one - except perhaps the birds themselves - their judgment has nothing to do with morality, but rather their understandable desire not to become bird food. Of course, as Nietzsche points out, birds see things differently. But in neither case can moral categories be applied - and if this applies to birds and sheep, then it also applies to us. Moral judgments express our own preferences; they do not reflect objective reality.

Finally, the death of God shows the importance mind. When it comes to the origin of man, uncontrolled evolutionary processes are the best argument of atheists. Given the fact that evolution selects the fittest for survival, the intellectual abilities resulting from these processes should be well adapted to survival. But, according to Nietzsche, there is no necessary connection between survival and truth; as far as we know, he draws our attention to the fact that the naturalistic universe will be one in which the knowledge of truth will hinder rather than promote survival. In his own opinion, then there is no reason for the atheist to trust his own reason.

Liberation leading to slavery

For Nietzsche, the death of God leads to the end of meaning, morality, and reason—which means he sees the potential consequences of his disbelief more clearly than other atheist contemporaries such as Karl Marx and Sigmund Freud. Although, it is noteworthy that Nietzsche sees these possible consequences as liberating rather than destructive. Neither God, nor meaning, nor morality, nor reason hold us back, he exclaims. We are free to live the way we like and do what satisfies us with our lives.

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It is only in such a radically human-centric way that Nietzsche proclaims life – and thereby scratches curious ears. But, of course, this approach of Nietzsche does not lead to blessing, peace and life, but to sorrow, pain and death. May God give our friends and neighbors eyes to see this truth.

Douglas Blount is Professor of Christian Philosophy and Ethics at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, NY. Kentucky.

The great German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche was born on September 15, 1844 in the town of Rexen near the town of Lützen in the family of a Protestant pastor. When little Fritz was five years old, his father died, leaving his son in the care of a fanatically believing mother. Zealous religiosity reigned in the family, which already in adolescence caused protest in the boy. So, at the age of eleven, he refused to go to Mass.

Seeing the obstinate character of her son, the mother hastened to remove him from the family, sending him to study at the gymnasium in the city of Naumburg. Then Nietzsche continued his studies at the famous in Germany boarding school "The Gates of Learning", where he showed a brilliant mind and ability in the humanities. He easily coped with ancient languages ​​and was interested in literature.

In 1864, Nietzsche entered the University of Bonn, and from there he transferred to Leipzig, where he graduated with a diploma in classical philology. In 1869, the future philosopher received a professorship at the University of Basel, where he worked until 1879. In 1889, Nietzsche fell seriously ill (as the researchers say, his illness was inherited from his father). The philosopher died in 1900.

All the work of Nietzsche is usually divided into four stages, each of which has its own characteristics. Thus, the first stage of creativity is characterized by an interest in philology, aesthetics, the work of the irrationalist philosopher Schopenhauer and friendship with the great German neo-romantic composer Richard Wagner. Nietzsche's works such as "The Birth of Tragedy from the Spirit of Music", "Philosophy in a Tragic Age", "Untimely Reflections" belong to this period.

The second period of Nietzsche's work came after the break with Wagner and was characterized by the beginning of criticism of the philosophical heritage. It includes the works "Human, too human", "Dawn", "Merry Science".

The third period is the heyday of Nietzsche's philosophical genius, during which he created his most famous works: "Thus Spoke Zarathustra", "Beyond Good and Evil", "On the Genealogy of Morals", "Antichrist".

And in the fourth period, immediately preceding the illness, he wrote the works "Twilight of the idols" and "Esse homo".

When it comes to the work of Nietzsche, the first thing we think of is the superman, with whom the Nazi sermons of the superiority of the Aryan race and dreams of "tall, slender and blond" people are associated, filling the cities of the whole earth. However, in reality it turns out that initially the idea of ​​a superman was something else, and only later was it distorted by the ideologists of fascism.

The idea of ​​a superman naturally arose at a time when philosophy stood at a crossroads, not knowing where to move on. Until that moment, it was believed that any individual can endlessly improve and develop, that he is kind and fair by nature - and sooner or later will reach the limit of all perfections. However, in the 19th century, philosophers came to the conclusion that this is not at all the case and that a person is fundamentally imperfect, insignificant, undeveloped. It was on the wave of such decadent moods that Nietzsche's doctrine of the superman appeared.

The first thing he hastened to declare was the death of God. This phrase should not be taken literally. It is not about the fact of death, but about the fact that at the time when Nietzsche wrote his book, thinking about God was practically impossible (that is, the philosophical god, the god of metaphysics, died, following which man aspired to perfection). What came to replace the already non-existent deity? Of course, it couldn't be just a human, as he is just an underdeveloped animal. Only a being truly endowed with perfection, that is, a superman, could become a new God.

To the question of what Nietzsche's superman is, it is quite simple to answer, relying on the book Thus Spoke Zarathustra. It was in it that the philosopher placed his doctrine of a being, designed to serve as a role model and the goal of the development of all ordinary people. A superman is a being whose mind is so perfect that it allows him to control his body and will. This is a creature that despises the world of ordinary people and leaves it for the mountains in order to achieve the ultimate perfection of thoughts and actions.

Nietzsche considers the ancient Persian prophet and founder of the religion of Zoroastrianism Zarathustra, who becomes the main character of the book, as an example of such a superman. The philosopher recommends to everyone who has decided to rise above the ordinary and surpass their flawed human nature, to look up to the great prophet and make a leap across the abyss that separates a mere person from a superman.

In order to become a superman, you need to change your worldview, look around you and see that the world of people is worthy of only contempt. Moving away from this world, the future superman concentrates on himself, on his thoughts. His spirit goes through three stages of development:

1) "camel" - a person loaded with traditions and cultural attitudes and traditions of previous generations;

2) "lion" - a person who denies himself as a "camel", that is, refusing absolutely everything on which he depends;

3) "child" - a person open to everything new, a clean slate, he creates laws for himself and controls his will.

The main characteristic of the superman is that he has the will to power. The will to power is the desire to be above all, to be the best, to exalt thanks to one's mind and talents, and to rule over flawed people. The will to power governs the world and forces in the struggle to prove their strength and right to exist. However, the will to power is not the natural selection that Darwin talked about. By natural selection, only opportunists survive, that is, not always the strongest and most talented. On the contrary, these may be the weakest individuals endowed with cunning. Nietzsche does not preach cunning and resourcefulness, but the real power of the mind and unbending will, a rare personality capable of exploits.

In order to show how important it is to cultivate willpower and how dangerous pity for the weak, concealing deceit, Nietzsche criticizes Christianity. In the book Antichrist, he writes that this religion preaches pity for the weak and weak, insists that only weak-willed and spineless people who rely on God in everything are righteous. The philosopher believes that this is fundamentally wrong.

In fact, pity for the weak and the desire to be like them, entrusting the choice of one's own destiny to the will of God, threatens with a lack of will and decadence, that is, the decline and degeneration of a real person. Instead, Nietzsche advises holding on to a healthy selfishness and cultivating self-sufficiency, leaving everyone to survive on their own.

It is known that the famous German philosopher Nietzsche suffered from an incurable brain disease. Year after year, the attacks of the disease became so severe that they lasted for several days, making the thinker unable to see the light, eat, or talk. After one of these attacks, Nietzsche, already a mature man, lost his mind.

Friedrich Nietzsche "THUS SAITH ZARATHUSTRA"

It has been more than a hundred years since Friedrich Nietzsche declared that "God is dead" (or "Gott ist tot" in German), and in so doing provided a headache for all students of philosophy that continues to this day. This phrase has become Nietzsche's most famous statement - it is known even to those who are not familiar with his book "Merry Science", where it is contained. But how well do we understand the meaning of these words? Or, more importantly, what do they mean to us?

Nietzsche was an atheist all his adult life, and therefore the literal meaning of the phrase is excluded, but rather it is about the idea of ​​God. After the Age of Enlightenment, the idea that our universe is governed by the laws of physics, and not by divine providence, became a reality. Philosophy has shown that the legitimacy of power is justified not by divine anointing, but by the consent of citizens; all moral theories could now also exist without reference to a creator. It was a significant event. Europe no longer needed God as the source of morality, human values, or the laws of the universe; philosophy and science took its place. The massive secularization of Western thought helped Nietzsche to realize that God was not just dead, but that it was people who killed him with their scientific revolution, with their desire to know the world.

However, the death of God was not perceived by Nietzsche as an unambiguously positive phenomenon. Without God, the core belief system of Western Europe was in danger, in Twilight of the Idols the philosopher wrote:

“By renouncing the Christian faith, you pull out from under your feet the right to Christian morality. The latter is by no means intelligible in itself... Christianity is a system, a coherent and integral view of things. If you break out of it the main concept, faith in God, then you also destroy the whole.”

However, for some people, according to Nietzsche, such a turn of events will be a good sign: "... having heard the news that "the old God is dead", we, philosophers and "free souls", meet a new dawn." A bright future was already visible ahead. When the old system of meanings has become obsolete, it became possible to create a new one. However, Nietzsche believed that the elimination of this system would cause despair and hopelessness in many people. After all, the question arises: what is the meaning of life if there is no God? Even if there was a God, the entire Western world now knew that he did not place us at the center of the universe. The real world opened up before us. The universe was not created solely for human existence. Nietzsche feared that such an understanding of the world would lead to mass pessimism, a "will to nothing", which was contrary to the life-affirming philosophy he promoted.

Nietzsche described his fear of nihilism and humanity's reaction to it in his book The Will to Power:

“What I am talking about is the history of the next two centuries. I describe what is coming, which now cannot come in a different form: the emergence of nihilism ... Our entire European culture has long been moving in some kind of torture of tension, growing from century to century, and, as it were, is heading towards a catastrophe.

Nietzsche would not have been surprised by the events that took place in Europe after his death. Communism, Nazism, nationalism, and other ideologies that proliferated after the First World War sought to provide a person with meaning and values ​​as a worker or an Aryan, or inspire some other feat in the same way that Christianity gave meaning to the children of God in the form of life on Earth. While Nietzsche might have rejected all these ideologies, he would certainly have recognized the need of humanity for the meaning they gave.

Anticipating the possible outcome of events, the philosopher offered us a way out - the creation of our own individual values. Creation of the meaning of life by those who live this life. The archetype of the individual capable of this is the "superman" (Übermensch). However, Nietzsche presented it as an incomprehensible ideal that most would not be able to achieve. The superman, who, as it seemed to him, should have already existed on Earth, would create the meaning of life, relying on his own will, and would realize that in the end, people themselves are responsible for their choice. In Thus Spoke Zarathustra, the philosopher writes:

“For the game of creation, my brothers, a sacred “yes” is needed for life: now the spirit wants its will.”

The brave superman will not rely on dogma or public opinion regarding his own values.

Anticipating the difficulties in creating a superman, Nietzsche offered an alternative answer to nihilism - the one that people are likely to choose: "The Last Man." The “most despicable thing” that lives a quiet life without thinking about its individuality or personal growth: “We discovered happiness,” the last people say and blink. To the dismay of Zarathustra, Nietzsche's mouthpiece, the people to whom he preaches are interested in the lifestyle of the last man. Nietzsche considered it the most likely solution regarding our ability to cope with the death of God.

However, one can ask the question here: if we know that God died so long ago, then why didn't we all become atheists? Nietzsche says:

“God is dead: but such is the nature of people that for thousands of years, perhaps, there will be caves in which his shadow is shown.”

Perhaps we are only now seeing the manifestation of the philosopher's statement.

Atheism is becoming more popular in almost every European country, and its newfound growth in the United States is indicative of a new cultural shift. But, unlike when atheism was imposed by communist groups, there is no need now for a worldview that supports the absence of God. It just doesn't exist. And, indeed, the British philosopher Bertrand Russell saw Bolshevism practically as a religion; it gave meaning and dictated values ​​to people. But this source of meaning without faith ceased to exist.

As many atheists know, the absence of God without additional philosophical structure to give meaning can cause an existential crisis. Are we in danger of becoming a society struggling with our own meaninglessness? Are we on the brink of nihilism? Are we now more vulnerable to ideologies and swindlers who promise to do what God has done for us and for society? While Americans are becoming increasingly pessimistic about the future, there are fewer atheists than religious people. It seems that, in the long run, Nietzsche was wrong about our ability to deal with the idea that God is dead.

Perhaps we have dealt with the death of God better than Nietzsche thought; not all of us are the last people, and humanity has not found itself in a situation where all morality is considered relative and meaningless. We seem to have succeeded in creating a world in which people's need for God is reduced without the consequences of collective despair or chaos.

Do we strive, as independent people, to create our own values? Do we create the meaning of life ourselves without the help of God, dogma or public choice? Perhaps some of us do, and if we understand the meaning of Nietzsche's phrase "God is dead", we are more likely to create ourselves. Despair over his death may give way to a new meaning in our lives, because, as Jean-Paul Sartre said:

"Life begins on the other side of despair."

A selection of materials on the topic

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Original: "God is dead": what Nietzsche really meant/ Big Think

Cover: Edvard Munch, Golgotha, 1900

Sources

1. Abrams, Daniel, Haley Yaple, and Richard Wiener. "ArXiv.org Physics ArXiv:1012.1375v2." A Mathematical Model of Social Group Competition with Application to the Growth of Religious Non-affiliation. N.p., n.d. Web. 04 Aug. 2016.

2. "Americans Overwhelmingly Pessimistic about Country's Path, Poll Finds." McClatchydc. N.p., n.d. Web. 04 Aug. 2016.

3. "America's Growing Pessimism." The Atlantic. Atlantic Media Company, 10 Oct. 2015. Web. 04 Aug. 2016. CNN/ORC Poll: 57% Pessimistic about U.S. Future, Highest in 2 Years.

5. Nietzsche, Friedrich Wilhelm, and Walter Arnold Kaufmann. "The Meaning of Our Cheerfulness." The Gay Science: With a Prelude in Rhymes and an Appendix of Songs. New York: Vintage, 1974. N. pag. print.

6. Press, Connie Cass Associated. Gloom and Doom? Americans More Pessimistic about Future. Las Vegas Review-Journal. N.p., 03 Jan. 2014. Web. 04 Aug. 2016.

7. Russell, Bertrand. Bolshevism: Practice and Theory. New York: Arno, 1972. Print.

The God Who Never Was Rajneesh Bhagwan Shri

CHAPTER 1 GOD IS DEAD AND MAN IS FREE... FOR WHAT?

GOD IS DEAD AND MAN IS FREE... FOR WHAT?

Responsibility belongs to those who have freedom of action. There is either God or freedom, they cannot coexist. This is the main meaning of Friedrich Nietzsche's saying: "God is dead, therefore man is free."

Friedrich Nietzsche declared for the first time in the history of mankind: "God is dead, therefore man is free." This is an amazing saying and it has many meanings. First, I would like to discuss the saying itself.

All religions believe that God created the world and man. But if someone created you, then you are just a puppet in his hands, you do not have your own soul. And if someone gave you life, then at any moment he can take it away from you. He didn't ask you if you want life to be given to you, and he's not going to ask you if you want it to be taken from you.

God is the greatest dictator if you accept the fiction that he created the world and man. If God is real, then man is his slave, his puppet. All the strings are in his hands, even your life. Then there can be no question of enlightenment. Then there can be no Gautama Buddha, because freedom does not exist. God pulls you on some strings - you dance, on others - you cry, on others - you start killing others, commit suicide, start a war. You are just a puppet, he is a puppeteer.

Then there can be no question of sin and virtue, of sinners and saints. There is no good and evil, because you are just a puppet. A puppet cannot be held accountable for his actions. Responsibility belongs to those who have freedom of action. There is either God or freedom, they cannot coexist. This is the basic meaning of Friedrich Nietzsche's saying: "God is dead, Consequently, man is free."

Neither theologians nor the founders of religious movements have ever thought that if you accept God as the Creator, you destroy all the dignity of consciousness, freedom and love. You deprive a person of responsibility and freedom. You reduce the whole existence to the whim of some strange guy called God.

However, Nietzsche's statement is only one side of the coin. He is absolutely right, but only as far as this side of the coin is concerned. He made a very important and significant statement, but he forgot one thing, which was inevitable, because his statement is based on rationality, logic and intelligence, and not on meditation.

Man is free but free for what? If there is no God and a person is free, this means that a person can now do anything: both good and bad; no one will judge him, no one will forgive him. Such freedom would be mere debauchery.

Friedrich Nietzsche knew nothing about meditation - this is the other side of the coin. Man is free, but his freedom can bring him joy and bliss only if he is immersed in meditation. Take God away from man - this is completely normal, he was a huge danger to human freedom - but give him meaning and significance, creativity, receptivity, the path to the knowledge of the eternal being. Zen is the other side of the coin.

There is no God in Zen, and that is its beauty. But Zen has tremendous knowledge about how to transform your consciousness, how to make you so aware that you cannot do evil. This is not an order from outside, this is a prompting from your innermost being. Once you know your innermost being, once you realize that you are one with the cosmos - and the cosmos was not created, it has existed and will exist forever - once you comprehend your inner light, your inner Gautama Buddha, you cannot do nothing bad, you can't do evil, you can't sin.

Shortly before his death, Friedrich Nietzsche almost completely lost his mind. He was hospitalized and kept in a psychiatric hospital. What happened to this giant of thought? He came to the conclusion, "God is dead," but that is a negative conclusion. He became free, but his freedom was meaningless. There was no joy in her, because it was only freedom from God, but for what? Freedom has two sides: “from” and “for”. The other side was missing, and that drove Nietzsche crazy.

Emptiness always drives people crazy. Some kind of foundation is needed, finding a center, some kind of connection with existence. God is dead, and your connection to existence is severed. God is dead and you are uprooted. And a person, just like a tree, cannot live without roots.

God didn't really exist, but he was a good consolation. Although he was a deception, but he filled the inner world of people. After all, even a lie, if repeated thousands of times over thousands of years, becomes almost the truth. God was a great comfort to people in their fear, in their horror before aging and death, before what awaits them after death - before the unknown darkness. Although God was a lie, he was a tremendous comfort to people. You must understand that lies are indeed capable of comforting. Moreover, a lie is more pleasant than the truth.

It is said that Gautama Buddha said: "Truth is bitter at the beginning and sweet at the end, but lies are sweet at the beginning and bitter at the end." Lies are bitter when they are discovered. Then it becomes terribly bitter that all this time your parents, teachers, priests and so-called leaders have deceived you. You have been deceived all the time.

This frustration leads to the fact that you generally cease to trust anyone. "No one can be trusted..." The result is a vacuum.

So, at the end of his life, Nietzsche didn't just go insane, his condition was the inevitable consequence of his negative attitude of mind. The mind can only be negative: it can argue, criticize, sting; but he is not able to feed you. A negative point of view cannot serve as a support for you. Nietzsche lost God, lost consolation. He became free to go crazy.

This happened not only to Friedrich Nietzsche, so it cannot be said that there was only one such accident. So many great thinkers ended up in mental hospitals or committed suicide because it is impossible to live in negative darkness. All need light and a positive, life-affirming experience of truth. Nietzsche destroyed the light and created a vacuum for himself and for his followers.

If deep down inside you feel a vacuum, a completely meaningless emptiness, then you owe it to Nietzsche. On the basis of Nietzsche's negative approach to life, an entire philosophical school has grown up in the West.

Soren Kierkegaard, Jean-Paul Sartre, Marcel, Jaspers, Martin Heidegger - all the great philosophers of the first half of the 20th century - talked about meaninglessness, pain, suffering, anxiety, fear, horror and longing. This philosophical trend was called existentialism in the West. But this is not existentialism, but anti-existentialism. He destroys everything that gave you comfort.

I agree with such destruction, because what comforted man was a lie. God, heaven, hell - all these are fictions created for the comfort of man. It is good that they are destroyed, but at the same time the person remains in a complete vacuum. From this vacuum, existentialism is born, which is why it speaks exclusively of the meaninglessness of existence: "Life has no meaning." He does not talk about your importance: “You are an accident. Whether you are or not is immaterial to beings.” And yet these people call their philosophy existentialism. They should call it "accident". You are not needed; you appeared quite by accident somewhere in the outskirts of existence. God has made a puppet of you, and these philosophers, from Nietzsche to Jean-Paul Sartre, are making you an accident.

However, a person must necessarily be connected with existence. He has to take root in it, because only when he is deeply rooted in existence will he blossom into millions of flowers and become a buddha, and his life will no longer be meaningless. Then his life will overflow with meaning, significance, bliss; it will become a permanent holiday.

But the so-called existentialists have come to the conclusion that you are not needed, that your life is meaningless and stupid. Existence doesn't need you at all!

So, I want to finish the work that Nietzsche started, because it is not finished. In this form, it will lead all mankind to madness, as it led Nietzsche to madness in its time. Without God you are, of course, free - but for what? You are left empty handed. Before that, you were essentially empty-handed, because they were filled with lies. Now you are very clearly aware that your hands are empty and you have nowhere to go.

I heard this story about a very famous atheist. He died, and his wife, before putting him in the coffin, put on him his best suit, best shoes, and most expensive tie. She wanted to arrange a magnificent send-off for him, to say goodbye to him properly. He was dressed up like never before in his life.

Friends and neighbors attended the funeral. And one woman said: “Well, wow! So dressy and nowhere to go."

This is how any negative philosophy leaves the whole of humanity: beautiful and smart, but with nowhere to go! This position leads to insanity.

Friedrich Nietzsche did not go mad by chance, it was a natural consequence of his negative philosophy. That's why I call this series of talks: "God is dead, now Zen is the only living truth."

As far as God is concerned, I completely agree with Nietzsche on this, but I want to add to his statement, he himself was not able to do it. He was not awakened, he was not enlightened.

Gautama Buddha also had no God, just like Mahavira, but they did not go crazy. All the Zen masters and all the great Tao masters - Lao Tzu, Chuang Tzu, Li Tzu - none of them went mad, even though they had no God. They had neither hell nor heaven. What is the difference? Why didn't Gautama Buddha go crazy?

And not only Gautama Buddha. In twenty-five centuries, hundreds of his followers have attained enlightenment, and they have not even spoken a word about God. They don't even say there is no God, because that is meaningless: they are not atheists. I'm not an atheist, but I'm not a theist either. God simply does not exist, therefore there can be no question of either atheism or theism.

I'm not crazy. You yourself are the witnesses. The absence of God does not create a vacuum in me, on the contrary, thanks to this I have acquired the dignity of a free individuality - free to become a Buddha. This is the highest goal of freedom. If freedom does not become the flowering of your awareness, if the experience of freedom does not lead you to Eternity, does not lead you to your origins, to the cosmos and existence, you will go crazy. And until then, your life will have no meaning and no meaning, no matter what you do.

Existence, according to the so-called existentialists, followers of Friedrich Nietzsche, is completely unreasonable. They have got rid of God and think - this is quite logical - that since there is no God, then existence is also dead, there is neither mind nor life in it. Formerly God was life and consciousness. Previously, God was the meaning and the very essence of our existence. Since God is no more, the whole existence becomes soulless, life becomes a by-product of matter. Therefore, when you die, you will die completely and completely, and there will be nothing left after you. And it does not matter at all whether you did evil or good. Existence is absolutely indifferent, you don't care about it at all. Before, God took care of you. Once God was rejected, a deep estrangement arose between you and existence. There is no connection between you, you are not interested in existence, it is not maybe be interested in you because it is no longer conscious. It is no longer an intelligent universe, it is just dead matter, just like you. And the life you perceive is just a consequence.

The consequence disappears as soon as the elements that create it are separated. For example, according to some religions, a person consists of five elements: earth, air, fire, water and ether. Once these elements come together, life emerges as a consequence. When these elements are separated, death occurs and life disappears.

To make it clear to you, let me give you this example: when you start learning to ride a bicycle, you constantly fall. I also learned this, but I didn't fall, because in the beginning I watched other students and tried to understand why they fall. They fell because they lacked self-confidence. It takes tremendous balance to keep on two wheels, and if you start to wobble... it's like walking on a tightrope. If you hesitate even for a second, two wheels will not support you. You can only keep balance on the wheels at a certain speed, and a beginner always rides very slowly. And this is obvious and reasonable - beginners should not drive fast.

I watched all my friends learn to ride a bike, and they kept asking me, "Why don't you learn?"

I answered: “First, I need to observe. I'm trying to understand why you fall and why you stop falling after a few days." Once I figured out why this was happening, I got on my bike and raced as fast as I could!

All my friends were amazed. They said, “We've never seen a rookie drive that fast. A beginner must fall several times, only then will he learn to maintain balance.

I said, “I have watched and understood the secret. You just lack the confidence and understanding that a certain speed is needed for the bike to move. It is impossible to sit on a stationary bike and not fall, you need acceleration, and for this you need to pedal.”

Once I figured out what the problem was, I got on my bike and pedaled as hard as I could. The whole village was alarmed: “How so, he doesn’t know how to ride a bicycle, but he rushes at such a speed!”

I did not know how to stop: I thought that if I stopped, the bike would immediately fall. So I had to drive to a place near the railway station, about three miles from my house, where there was a huge bodhi tree. These three miles I raced at such a speed that people parted and stepped aside. They said, "He's gone mad!"

But my madness was well founded. I drove right up to the tree because I knew it was hollow inside. I drove into it with the front wheel and thus was able to stop and not fall.

One of my fellow villagers who worked in the field saw this. He said, “Strange! And if there was no such tree, how would you stop?”

I replied, “Now I have learned to stop because I just did; I don't need a tree anymore. But this was my first experience. Before that, I had not seen others stop, I had only seen them fall. So I had no stopping experience and raced as hard as I could to get to that tree.” It was a giant tree, and one part of it was completely hollow, so I knew that if I drove my front wheel into it, it would support the bike and I could stop. But as soon as I stopped, I learned how to do it.

When I decided to learn how to drive a car, my teacher was a man named Majid, he was a Muslim. He was one of the best drivers in town and loved me very much. By the way, he chose my first car. So he told me:

I'll teach you.

I don't like being taught. You just drive very slowly so that I can watch and observe, I replied.

What do you mean?

I can only learn by watching. I don't need a teacher!

But it's dangerous! he exclaimed. “A bicycle is one thing: in the worst case, you could hurt yourself or hurt someone else, that’s all. But a car is a very dangerous thing.

And I'm a dangerous person. Just drive the car slowly and tell me everything: where is the gas pedal, where is the brake. Then you will drive slowly, and I will walk beside you and watch what you are doing.

Since you want it so much, I can do it, but I'm very afraid for you. If you do the same thing you once did with a bicycle...

That is why I try to observe as carefully as possible.

As soon as I understood how everything was going on, I asked him to get out of the car. And I did exactly the same as I once did with a bicycle. I drove very fast. Majid, my teacher, ran after me and shouted: "Not so fast!" There were no speed limit signs in that city, because in India you can drive on the streets at a speed of no more than fifty-five kilometers per hour; and there is no need to hang signs everywhere that the speed is limited to fifty-five kilometers per hour, because it is impossible to exceed this speed anywhere.

The poor guy was very scared. He kept running and running after me. He was a very tall man, a first-class runner, he had every chance of becoming an Indian champion or even taking part in the Olympics. He tried his best to keep up with me, but soon I was out of his sight.

When I returned, he prayed under a tree for my salvation. When I approached him, he jumped up, completely forgetting about the prayer.

Do not worry. I learned to drive a car. What have you been doing?

I ran after you, but very soon you disappeared from sight. Then I thought that all I can do is pray to God to help you, because you don't know how to drive at all. You sat behind the wheel for the first time and sped off to no one knows where. How did you turn around? Where did you turn back?

I had no idea how to turn around, because you were driving straight all the time, and I was walking next to you. So I had to go around the whole city. I had no idea how to turn around and what signals to give because you never gave any signals. But I did it. I drove through the whole city so fast that everyone gave way to me. So I went back.

- Khuda hafiz, he said, which means "God saved you."

God has nothing to do with it, I replied.

Once you understand that you need to maintain a balance between negative and positive, you will become rooted in existence. One extreme is to believe in God, the other is not to believe in God, and you have to be exactly in the middle, keeping a complete balance. Then neither atheism nor theism matters anymore. But through balance, there is a new light in you, a new joy, a new bliss, a new understanding that does not come from the mind. This understanding, which is not of the mind, allows you to realize that everything in existence is incredibly intelligent. It is not only alive, but also sensitive and intelligent.

Once you reach a state of balance, silence and stillness in your being, the doors that were closed by your thoughts are easily opened and a clear understanding of all existence comes to you. You are not an accident. Existence needs you. Without you, there will be something missing in existence, and no one can replace you.

Understanding that you will be lacking in existence will instill in you a sense of dignity. Stars, Sun, Moon, trees, birds and earth - the whole universe will feel that some place remains empty without you, and no one but you cannot fill it. Feeling that you are connected with existence, that it cares for you, will fill you with boundless joy and satisfaction. Once you are cleansed, you will see infinite love pouring out on you from all sides.

You are at the very top of the evolution of existence, intelligence, and existence depends on you. If you outgrow your mind and its understanding and reach the understanding of no-mind, there will be a celebration for existence: another person has reached the top. One part of existence has suddenly risen to the highest possibilities of the inner potential of each person.

There is a parable according to which on the day when Gautama Buddha became enlightened, the tree under which he was sitting suddenly began to sway its branches without any wind. He was very surprised, because it was calm, and not a single tree, not a single leaf moved around. But the tree under which he was sitting swayed as if dancing. The tree has no legs, it is rooted to the ground, but it can still demonstrate its joy.

A very strange phenomenon: some of the chemical elements that contribute to the development of your intellect and mind are found in large quantities in the bodhi tree. So it is no coincidence that the tree under which Gautama Buddha became enlightened is named after him. Bodhi means enlightenment. And scientists have discovered that this tree is smarter than all the other trees in the world. It is simply overflowing with chemical elements responsible for mental development.

It is said that when Manjushri, one of the Buddha's closest disciples, became enlightened, the tree under which he was sitting began to shower flowers on him, although trees do not bloom at this time of the year.

Perhaps these are just stories. But they point out that we are inseparable from existence, that even trees and stones share our joy with us, that our enlightenment becomes a celebration for all that exists.

It is meditation that fills your inner being and that vacuum that used to be filled with lies called God and other fictions.

If you stay with the negative, then sooner or later you will go crazy, because you have already lost touch with existence, your life has lost its meaning, and you have no chance of finding it. You got rid of the lies, which is very good, but it is not enough to get the truth.

Drop the lies, try to get inside and find the truth. This is the whole art of Zen. That's why I called the series of talks: "God is dead, now Zen is the only living truth." If God is dead and you have not experienced Zen, you will go crazy. Your mental health now depends solely on Zen, for this is the only way to comprehend the truth. Only then will you become one with existence, you will no longer be a puppet, you will be a master.

A person who knows that he is deeply connected with existence will never be able to harm him, will never go against another life. It's just not possible. He can only shower upon you as much bliss, grace, and mercy as you are willing to accept. Its sources are inexhaustible. When you find your inexhaustible source of life and bliss, then it will not matter at all whether you have a God or not, whether hell and heaven exist. It won't make any difference.

When religious people begin to study Zen, they are utterly astonished, because there is nothing in it that they have been taught before. It has strange dialogues in which No no place for God, no heaven, no hell. This is scientific religion. The search for Zen is based not on faith, but on experience. Just as science objectively relies on experiment, Zen subjectively relies on experience. Science plunges into the outer world, Zen into the inner.

Nietzsche had no idea how to dive into the inner world. The West is not the right place for people like Friedrich Nietzsche. If he lived in the East, he would be a master, a saint. He would belong to the same category of people, to the same family as the buddhas.

But, unfortunately, the West has not learned a lesson from the fate of Nietzsche. He continues to persist in working on the outer world. Just one tenth of his energy would be enough to find the inner truth. Even Albert Einstein died in deep disappointment. His disappointment was so great that before his death, when he was asked: “If you are born again, what would you like to be?”, He replied: “Anyone, but not a physicist. I'd rather be a plumber."

The greatest physicist in the world was dying in such disappointment that he did not want to have anything to do with physics and science in general. He would prefer to have a simple profession, such as a plumber. But that won't help either. If physics didn't help, if mathematics didn't help, if a giant of thought like Albert Einstein was dying of disappointment, a plumber's job won't help. Man still remains in the outside world. The scientist may be very absorbed in it, the plumber less so, but still he works outside. A job as a plumber would not have given Einstein what he needed. He needed the science of meditation. It is in her silence that meaning, meaning, and the boundless joy of realizing that your birth is not accidental bloom.

I am teaching you true existentialism, and what the West calls existentialism is just "accidentalism." I teach you how to get in touch with existence, how to find the place where you are connected, connected with existence. From where do you get life every moment? Where does your intelligence come from? If existence is unreasonable, how you can you be reasonable? Where will your mind come from?

When you saw a rose bloom, did you ever think that this color, this tenderness, all this beauty was once hidden in a seed? But a seed by itself cannot become a rose, it needs the support of existence - earth, water, sun. Then the seed will disappear into the ground and the rose bush will start to grow. He needs air, water, earth, sun, moon. All this transforms the seed, which before was like a dead stone. Suddenly there is a transformation, a metamorphosis. These flowers, these colours, this beauty, this fragrance can come from the seed only if they are already in existence. They can be hidden, hidden in the seed. But if something comes to light, it means that it has already existed before - as a potential possibility.

Do you have a mind...

I have told you the story of Ramakrishna and Keshav Chandra Sena. Keshav Chandra Sen was one of the smartest men of his time. On your intellectual philosophy brahmasamaj, which means "the society of God", he founded a religion. Hundreds and thousands of smart people became his followers. He wondered very much why this uneducated Ramakrishna, who had not even finished primary school - in India, primary school, the very first stage of education, includes four years of education, and he studied only two - why does this idiot attract thousands of people to him? This thought haunted Keshav Chandra Sen.

In the end, he decided to go and defeat Ramakrishna, he did not even think that this man could not be defeated in an argument. He just couldn't imagine it. This idiot from the village gathers thousands of people around him every day! People come from afar to see him and touch his feet!

Keshav Chandra informed Ramakrishna through his followers: “I am coming on such and such a day to call you to account on all points of your faith. Get ready!"

Ramakrishna's disciples were very afraid. They knew that Keshav Chandra was a great logician; poor Ramakrishna will not be able to answer a single question. But Ramakrishna was delighted and began to dance. He said:

I have been waiting for it for a long time. When Keshav Chandra comes, it will be a day of great joy!

What are you talking about? the students exclaimed. - It will be a day of great sorrow, because you will not be able to argue with him.

Wait. And who is going to argue with him? I don't need to argue with him. Let him come,” said Ramakrishna.

But the disciples still continued to tremble with fear, because they were very afraid that their master would be defeated, crushed. They knew Keshav Chandra, at that time in the whole country he had no equal in intelligence.

Keshav Chandra has come with a hundred of his very best students so that they can be witnesses to this argument, this debate, this duel. Ramakrishna met him on the road, quite far from the temple where he lived. He hugged Keshav Chandra, which made him a little embarrassed. Further, his embarrassment continued to grow.

Ramakrishna took him by the hand and led him to the temple. He said:

I've been waiting for you for a long time. Why didn't you come before?

A strange man, he doesn't seem to be afraid at all. You understand? I came to argue with you!

Yes, of course, said Ramakrishna.

They sat in a very beautiful place under a tree, near a temple on the banks of the Ganges.

Begin, said Ramakrishna.

What do you say about God?

Should I say something about God? Can't you see it in my eyes?

Keshav Chandra was a little puzzled:

What is this argument?

Can't you feel God in my hand? Sit closer, son.

What is this argument?

Keshav Chandra has taken part in many debates, he has defeated many great pundits, and this redneck... In Hindi, "idiot" is ganwar, but actually the word means "village dweller." Saop- village, ganwar means "from the village". But ganwar it also means "stupid", "mentally retarded", "idiot".

If you understand the language of my eyes, if you understand the energy of my hand, it proves that existence is intelligent. Where did your mind come from?

It was a serious argument. Then Ramakrishna said:

If you have this great mind - I know that you are a very intelligent person, I have always loved you - tell me where did it come from? If existence is devoid of intelligence, you cannot have it either. Where can he come from? You yourself are proof that existence is intelligent, that's what God means to me. For me, God is not someone sitting on a cloud. For me, God means that existence is intelligent. Our universe is intelligent, we belong to it, and it needs us. She rejoices with us, celebrates with us, dances with us. Have you seen my dance?

And Ramakrishna began to dance.

What else is this? exclaimed Keshav Chandra.

But Ramakrishna danced so beautifully! He was a good dancer because he used to dance in the temple from morning to evening - without a coffee break! He danced and danced until he fell to the ground.

So he began to dance with such joy, with such grace, that suddenly there was a transformation in Keshav Chandra. He forgot his logic, he saw the beauty of this man, he felt a joy he had never felt before.

All his intellect, all his arguments were superficial, and inside there was complete emptiness. This person was overwhelmed. He touched Ramakrishna's feet and said:

I'm sorry. I was deeply mistaken. I didn't know anything, I was just philosophizing. You know all and you don't say a word.

I will forgive you only on one condition, - answered Ramakrishna.

I'm ready for any your conditions.

The condition is this: from time to time you must come to me, challenge me to a duel, discuss and argue with me.

That's what mystics do. Keshav Chandra was crushed. He became a completely different person, he began to come to Ramakrishna every day. Soon his disciples left him: “He went mad. Infected by that madman. There was one crazy, now there are two of them. They even dance together."

Keshav Chandra, who used to be a miserable person who grumbled and constantly complained because he lived in negativity, suddenly blossomed, joy and a new flavor appeared in his life. He completely forgot about logic. Ramakrishna helped him to get a taste of what is impossible to comprehend by the mind.

Zen is a way to go beyond the mind. Therefore, we will talk about God and Zen together. One has to reject God and embrace Zen with one's whole being. The lies must be destroyed and the truth revealed. That's why I decided to talk about God and Zen together. God is a lie, Zen is the truth.

Now for your questions...

First question:

Is God really dead? The very thought of his death inspires great anxiety, fear, horror and longing.

From my point of view, God never existed at all, how can he die? First, he was never born. It was invented by priests, and it was for these reasons that a person experienced anxiety, fear, horror and longing.

When there was no light, no fire - just imagine that time: wild animals prowl around, dark night, no fire, terrible cold, no clothes, and wild animals roam in the night in search of food, people hide from them in caves or sit in the trees... At least during the day they can see the approach of a lion and try to run away from him. But at night they are completely at the mercy of wild animals.

Then people discovered that the time comes and for some reason they grow old and one day someone dies. They couldn't understand what was happening. Just now he was talking, breathing, walking, was in perfect order. And suddenly he is no longer breathing or talking. This shocked primitive man so much that death became a taboo: one could not talk about it. Even talking about death inspired fear - fear that sooner or later you will also stand in this line and it will become shorter and shorter every second. One person dies and you come closer to death; another one dies and you are even closer to death.

Thus, even talking about death has become taboo, not only for ordinary primitive people, but also for the most educated. The founder of psychoanalysis, Sigmund Freud, hated the word "death". No one was even allowed to utter this word in his presence, because at the mere mention of death, he could have a seizure, he could lose consciousness and foam. So great was the fear of the man who founded psychoanalysis.

One day Sigmund Freud and Carl Gustav Jung, another great psychoanalyst, traveled together to America to lecture on psychoanalysis at various universities. While on the deck of a ship, Carl Gustav Jung mentioned death. Sigmund Freud immediately fell to the deck. It was for this reason that Sigmund Freud expelled Jung from psychoanalysis, and he had to found his own school. He called it analytical psychology. Just a different name, but the essence is the same. But the reason for his exclusion from the ranks of psychoanalysts was the mention of death.

Two things have become taboo in our world, and these two things are two poles of the same energy. One is sex: "Don't talk about him," the other is death: "Don't talk about her." Both phenomena are interconnected: at the beginning - sex, at the end - death; sex brings death.

There is only one living organism that does not die, and that is the amoeba. You know this very well - Pune is full of amoebas. I specifically chose this place because amoebas are immortal creatures. And their immortality is due to the fact that they are not sexual. They are not the result of sex, so there is no death for them. Sex and death are deeply intertwined. Try to understand it.

Sex gives you life, and life ends in death. Sex is the beginning, death is the end. In the middle is what is called life.

Amoeba is an asexual creature, the only monk in the world who has taken a vow of celibacy. It reproduces in a completely different way than humans. God should be infinitely pleased with amoebas (if there is one), they are all saints. They just constantly eat, get fat, and at some point split in two. As soon as the amoeba becomes so large that it can no longer move, it divides into two parts.

This is another way of reproduction. But since it is not related to sex, there is neither female nor male. Both amoebas begin to feed again. Soon they will become large again and separate. Thus, they multiply in a "mathematical way". There is no death, the amoeba never dies - unless it is killed! She can live forever if the doctors don't kill her. The immortality of amoebas is due to the fact that they are not the result of sex. Any animal born as a result of sex will inevitably die, its body cannot be immortal.

So, there are two taboos in the world: sex and death. Both are hidden.

I have been condemned all over the world just because I talk openly about taboos, because I want to know everything about life - from sex to death. Only then can sex and death be overcome. Once you have an understanding, you can begin to approach that which is beyond sex and death. This is your eternal life, your life energy, pure energy.

As a result of sex, your body is born, not you.

As a result of death, your body dies, but not you.

Throughout the world, religions and especially priests of all religious denominations have always exploited human fear, comforting people with God - a fiction, a lie, which at least temporarily covered their wound. “Don't be afraid, God is taking care of you. Don't worry, God is there and everything is all right. All you have to do is believe in God and his representatives, the priests, and believe in the scripture that God has given to the world. All you have to do is believe." This faith covered your anxiety, fear, horror and longing.

So when you hear that God is dead, the very thought of his death is unsettling. This means that your wound is opening. But a covered wound does not mean a healed wound; in fact, in order to heal a wound, it must be opened. Only then, under the sun's rays, in the open air, it will begin to heal. A wound should never be bandaged, because once you close it, you forget about it. You want to forget about her. Once the wound is bandaged, neither others nor yourself can see it. And under the bandage, the wound turns into cancer.

Wounds should be treated without bandaging. Bandaging won't help. God was a bandage, which is why the very thought that God is dead is fearful. Whatever you felt: acute anxiety, fear, horror, longing - the priests covered it all up with the word "God."

But by doing this, they prevented the evolution of man to the level of a Buddha, they interfered with the healing process, they did not allow a person to seek the truth. The lie was passed off as the truth, and naturally you didn't have to look for it, you already had it.

It is absolutely necessary that God be dead. But I want you to understand mine point of view. It's good that Friedrich Nietzsche declared that God is dead. I declare that he was never born. This is a fiction, an invention, not a discovery. Do you know the difference between invention and discovery? Discovery is connected with truth, invention is the work of your hands. This is a man-made fiction.

Of course, this is a consolation, but consolation is not the truth! Comfort is opium. It does not allow you to see the reality, and life passes by you very quickly - seventy years fly by unnoticed.

Anyone who imposes any belief on you is your enemy, because belief becomes a bandage on your eyes and you do not see the truth. The very desire to seek the truth disappears.

But in the beginning, when your faith is taken away, it hurts a lot. The fear and anxiety that you have been suppressing for millennia, but which is still alive, burst forth immediately. God cannot save you from them, only the search and experience of truth - and not faith - can heal your wounds and heal you, make you a whole person. A whole person for me is a holy person.

So, if there is no God and you start feeling fear and horror, anxiety and longing, that simply indicates that God is not the cure. He was just a ploy to keep your eyes closed. It was a way of blinding, to keep you in the dark and to inspire hope that after death, paradise will come. Why after death? Because you are afraid of death; the priest talks about heaven after death to assuage your fear. But fear does not disappear, it is simply suppressed and goes into the subconscious. And the deeper it goes into the subconscious, the harder it is to get rid of it.

So I want to destroy all your beliefs, all your theological theories, all your religions. I want to open all your wounds to heal them. The real cure is not belief, but meditation.

Once you get rid of God, you certainly become free. But as a result of such freedom, you are filled with anxiety, fear, horror and longing. If you don't start going deep within yourself in search of your true self, your real face, your buddha, you will tremble with fear, your whole life will be destroyed and you may go crazy like Friedrich Nietzsche.

And he's not the only one who lost his mind. Many philosophers have committed suicide because they found that life is meaningless; they never tried to look inside themselves. They learned that life has no meaning and meaning ... so why continue to live?

One of the greatest novels, perhaps the greatest novel of all time, is The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoyevsky. Reading it is much more important than reading the Bible, the Quran, the Gita individually, or all of these books combined. "The Brothers Karamazov" opens the deepest understanding of the essence of so many things... But Fyodor Dostoevsky went crazy.

He wrote the greatest novel in the world, but he himself lived a very unhappy, sad and fearful life. There was no joy in him, but he had an amazing ability to penetrate - intellectual penetration - into any problem that a person inevitably encounters in his life. He touched on all the existing problems. The Brothers Karamazov is such a great novel that nobody reads it today; people love to watch TV. There are about a thousand pages in the novel, and there are heated debates in it.

The younger brother - there are only three brothers - a very pious, believing and God-fearing young man, he wants to become a monk and live in a monastery. The second brother is categorically against God, against religion, and he constantly argues about this with his younger brother. He says, “If I ever meet God, the first thing I will do is give him my ticket to heaven and say, ‘Keep him. I do not need your eternal life, it is meaningless. Show me where the exit is, I don't want to be in this world anymore. I want to get out of existence; death seems more peaceful to me than your so-called life. Take the ticket back, I don't want to ride this train anymore. You never asked me, it's against my will. You forced me to take this train, and now I suffer needlessly. I don't have freedom of choice. Why did you give me life?'"

This is what he was going to ask if he met God: “On what basis did you give me life? You created me without my permission. This is real slavery. And one day, without asking, you will kill me. You planted in me all kinds of diseases and all kinds of sins, for which I am reproached, because of you I became a sinner.

Who put sex in you? It must be the God who created man and who told Adam and Eve to go into the world and multiply and give birth to as many children as possible. Obviously he made them sexy, he created a couple.

Ivan Karamazov, the atheist brother, says: "If I find him..." - who knows, maybe he is still alive, and Friedrich Nietzsche was wrong - "...I will kill him. I will be the first to free all of humanity from this dictator who, on the one hand, inoculates sex, violence, anger, greed, ambition and all kinds of poisons, and on the other hand, his intermediaries drum into you that sex is a sin, that you must be chaste. Weird".

George Gurdjieff said: "All religions are against God." This statement has deep meaning. Gurdjieff was not the kind of person who makes statements without deep, serious understanding. When he says that all religions are against God, he means that God gives you sex and religions teach you celibacy. What do they mean by this? God gives you greed, and religions teach you to be non-greedy. God gives you violence, and religions teach you non-violence. God gives you anger, and religions say no to anger. This is a clear argument that all religions are against God.

Ivan Karamazov says: "If I meet him anywhere, I will kill him, but before I kill him, I will ask him all these questions."

The whole novel is a tense argument. The third brother is not really a real brother. He was born from a woman who was not their father's wife, she was just a servant. The third brother is kept away from society, so he grows up mentally retarded. He is treated like an animal: he eats, sleeps and lives in a dark closet in the huge Karamazov mansion. Naturally, his life is completely meaningless.

Ivan Karamazov says: “Think of our half-brother, illegitimate, he was also created by God. What is the meaning of his life? He cannot even go out into the sun, into the air. Our father keeps it locked in the dark. No one comes to him, no one even greets him. He doesn't have a single friend in the whole wide world. He doesn't know anyone. He can't even speak properly because he's never spoken to anyone. He lives like an animal: he eats, drinks, sleeps; eats, drinks, sleeps... He will never know a woman, he will never know love. What will happen to his sexual instinct?"

In the novel, there is a very deep discussion of all the problems that any intelligent person faces. Ivan brings up all these issues: “What do you think God will say about my stepbrother? What is the meaning of his life? Why did he create it like this? If anyone is to blame, then he himself, and I'm going to take revenge on him. Just let me find it! And I hope, says Ivan Karamazov, that Nietzsche is wrong and he is alive. Otherwise, I won't be able to kill him. I want to kill him so that all of humanity can be freed from him."

But once mankind is free... It will be freedom for what? For fear? For death? For suicide? For stealing? Freedom for what?

One of the existential novels tells how a young man ends up in court because he killed a stranger on the beach - a man whose face he did not even see. He came up behind this man, who was sitting and watching the sunset, stuck a knife in his back and killed him. He didn't even see who it was.

It was a very strange thing. If there is no hostility, anger, revenge, then usually they do not kill. But they didn't even know each other, they weren't even friends. You can kill a friend - friends constantly kill each other - but he was not even a friend, what can we say about an enemy? Someone can become your enemy only after they have become your friend. This is a necessary condition: first a friend, then an enemy. A person cannot immediately become your enemy. This requires some kind of acquaintance, friendship.

The court was confused. The judge asked him: "Why did you kill a stranger whose face you did not see and whose name you did not know?"

The defendant replied: “It does not matter. I was very bored and wanted to do something so that my photograph could appear in all the newspapers. It happened - now I'm not so bored. Either way, life has no meaning. What was this idiot doing? What would he have done if I hadn't killed him? He would do the same thing that he has done many times before. So why all this noise? Why was I brought to court?”

CHAPTER 4 THE NEW MAN What do Drop and I mean by such a high-profile brand “new man”? Since school, we have heard about evolution, scientific and technological progress. And, if the second corresponds, with a big stretch (caused by the service of science to violence), to reality, then