Overrated German philosopher most popularly remembered for the idea of the Übermensch, 'superman,' which was—supposedly abusively—taken over by the ">Nazis to brace up their claim that they represented the Aryan super-race and, hence, the right to dominate other.
Friedrich Nietzsche was born the son of a Lutheran pastor in Prussia. Brilliant as a student he was appointed, even before he finished his final exams, an associate professor of philology at the University of Basle on the recommendation of the liberal theologian F. W. Ritschl. Except for a short break in 1870, when he volunteered as a medical orderly in the Franco-Prussian war, he remained in that post until his retirement in 1879. Ten years later he went insane.
Nietzsche is quite well-known for being difficult to grasp. What may reliably be said about him is that he was vehemently anti-Christianity, which he attacked openly in his work, The Anti-Christ, in 1895. Awed by the evolutionary ">naturalism of ">Charles Darwin, he thought that Christian ethics would not survive long as a result of Darwinism; which also led him to the idea of the Übermensch, 'the superman,' i.e., it is the destiny and goal of humans to master oneself and go beyond what Christianity has to offer. Though he opposed militarism and was no Jew hater, his idea of the Superman had been taken over by fascists everywhere, but especially by the Nazis for their anti-Semitic propaganda and murder.
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