Nietzsche's Proclamation "God is Dead"

Martin Heidegger

Newcomb Livraria Press

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A new 2024 translation of Heidegger's early work "Nietzsche's Proclamation "God is Dead", which is one of the 6 major papers published within the work "Holzwege" originally published in 1914. This edition contains a new afterword by the Translator, a timeline of Heidegger's life and works, a philosophic index of core Heideggerian concepts and a guide for Existentialist terminology across 19th and 20th century Existentialists. This translation is designed for readability and accessibility to Heidegger's enigmatic and dense philosophy. Complex and specific philosophic terms are translated as literally as possible and academic footnotes have been removed to ensure easy reading. This essay is part of Heidegger's extensive engagement with Nietzsche's philosophy and the topic of Nihilism. Heidegger interprets Nietzsche's famous proclamation that "God is dead" not merely as a statement about religious belief, but as an indication of a profound metaphysical shift in the Western understanding of Being- it is rather an observation than a belief. He explores how this declaration reflects the end of traditional metaphysical and moral frameworks and the work that must be done to return back to the question which these frameworks have obscured for millennia- the question of Being. Nietzsche, in a letter from 1887, defines Nihilism as meaning “that "That the highest values devalue themselves." The collection this paper comes from, Holzwege, is second only to "Being and Time" in fame. Here he levies some of his most perceptive commentary on Hegel, Descartes, Nietzsche, Anaximander, Rilke, and Hölderlin. Wood Paths consists of a collection of essays that reflect on philosophical and existential questions through the analysis of art, poetry, and history. The original German title "Holzwege" refers to the logging paths in German forests, which anyone who's hiked in Germany knows are always dead-ends. Hence, this is sometimes translated as "dead ends" or "logging roads" or "Off the Beaten Track" or something along those lines, as this is what the title means- the dead end trails of philosophy and the inherent obscurity of the pursuit of Being.