GENIUS FORUMS

Mattfaust: ...am guessing it will take more than 6 reads before the real picture is uncovered. How important (or potentially important) is Nietzsche on the path toward Enlightenment?

I recently ordered "Zarathustra" from Amazon. About twenty years ago I read the German original version. I remember that it didn't make a great impression on me. Alright, why not give Mr. Nietzsche a second try, this time in English. I mean, everybody here speaks highly of Nietzsche. The book arrived last month. I started to read from the beginning. After twenty pages or so I became severely exhasuted, so I began skipping pages and reading random sections. Needless to say this wasn't improving the experience. Along with the same shipment came a book about brick laying, masonry and concrete construction. I read it from cover to cover.

I am sorry, Friedrich, it didn't work out between us.

Marsha: In the twenty-first century, superficial allusions to the tenets of Buddhism are everywhere. There are commercials on television that purport to offer "uncommon wisdom" to bank investors in a "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance" sort of way: "What can glass teach us about .." and "What can a foreign film teach us about.." "What can a squeegee teach us about re-planning retirement?"

That's amusing.

During the last 2500 years Buddhism has been adapted to many different cultures, Tibetan, Chinese, Japanese, South-East-Asian, all very different. Each Buddhist country has its own idiosyncratic forms of expressions of Buddhist ideas, teachings, rituals which are always seen, interpreted, and reproduced through the predominant "geo-social" cultural lens. America is no exception. If Buddhism is being commercialized or otherwise put into 'trivial' contexts, this seems a natural expression of American culture to me, which is -occasionally- fairly uncomplicated. Don't blame the Buddha. :-)

Cheers, Thomas Edited by: Thomas Knierim at: 9/19/03 1:57 pm

I am sorry, Friedrich, it didn't work out between us.

I vaguely remember tyring to read Zarathustra many years ago, and it was too garbled and crazy for me to get interested in. Recently, for the same reason as you, I tried again, (although I got it from the library and didn't lose any money) and I just couldn't stand it. I got an old copy of Beyond Good and Evil, and was about half way through it when I lost it. Perhaps it will turn up. Even there though, there were large chunks that I couldn't make heads or tails of, which I annoyed me considerably. Yet there were other parts that were delightful.

Is it more understandable in German?

I'm planning to make a concerted effort to better aquaint myself with the philosophers, although I can see already that my own assessment of the great and the not-so-great is going to be at great variance with the accepted cannon.

Nietzsche has not yet impresssed me, although there were some real gems.

It is well to pretend a book could contend with Zarathustra that is is all about brick-laying. You'd have a brick for a head to believe it.

If you peasants could read Zarathustra you'd enjoy it.

We all know Thomas is none too bright. It was unkind of you to mention it.

It's unkind of you to have a brick for a head.

Quote:Quote:<hr>It's unkind of you to have a brick for a head.<hr>
If I come to Australia and drink a beer with you, will you elucidate the book for me?

That was certainly a disappointing hurricane. Marsha should be enjoying the full force of it right about now.

If you come here we must sit at a hole in the ground and drink carva, it will put us on neutral ground since neither of us are Fijian.

Carva? Figi? Why a hole in the ground?

Has anyone listened to Nietzsche's musical compositions?

Excellent question, I've not.

Quote:Quote:<hr>New struggles.— After Buddha was dead, his shadow was still shown for centuries in a cave—a tremendous, gruesome shadow. God is dead; but given the way of men, there may still be caves for thousands of years in which his shadow will be shown.— And we—we still have to vanquish his shadow, too!<hr>

From The Gay Science.

Surergaz,

You seem to feel you understand Nietzsche. Is having gained an understanding of Nietzsche important to you ? If so, in what way ?

Corbin

I think the above question from Corbin is a good one. I do not think "Zarathustra" is Nietzsche's best work. However, I am certainly open to having my opinion changed.

I find it to be disappointing when one defends something through the attempted start at a bickering contest rather than to substantiate his opinion through reasonable analysis.

It is very easy to come here and declare everyone who does not like Zarathustra to be "brickheads." Anyone can do that. A three year old child can do that.

I realize that I am a cockeyed optimist but I truly believe -- I have faith, for crying out loud -- that discussion is possible here.

AMEN!! Ah ba-leeve!! Halelujiah!! Yassuh -- that shadow of Gawd be long indeed! Cave, my ass!!

Rather than poking your tongue out at truth, Zag, why can you not engage the forum in your analysis of the value and meaning of "Zarathustra?" Since you hold the poem in such high esteem, surely, you can do it justice.

I am weary of the one liners. Please give us a paragraph or two of careful, delineated thought. For once, do the topic justice.

If you won't, I will. I will decipher and analyze the poem stanza by stanza.

You need not correct my English. I meant "effect," not "affect."

Faizi

Corbin:--Quote:Quote:<hr>Surergaz,

You seem to feel you understand Nietzsche. Is having gained an understanding of Nietzsche important to you ? If so, in what way ?

Corbin<hr>


The importance could be likened to gaining the understanding of how a friend or loved one died. I do not feel I've ever had to gain an understanding of Nietzsche even though there is no question that I have.


Marsha:--Quote:Quote:<hr>I find it to be disappointing when one defends something through the attempted start at a bickering contest rather than to substantiate his opinion through reasonable analysis.<hr>

I suppose you're talking about me. I never bicker.
My opinion requires no further substantiation than my reason gives it, in any expression. Do you require some scholarly exposition of Zarthustra in order to approach it?

Quote:Quote:<hr>It is very easy to come here and declare everyone who does not like Zarathustra to be "brickheads." Anyone can do that. A three year old child can do that.<hr>

Perhaps, but his parents would be behind it.

Quote:Quote:<hr>I realize that I am a cockeyed optimist but I truly believe -- I have faith, for crying out loud -- that discussion is possible here


AMEN!! Ah ba-leeve!! Halelujiah!! Yassuh -- that shadow of Gawd be long indeed! Cave, my ass!!<hr>

Discussion is possible. It does not however depend upon making concessions of opinion to ones reason because the other person happens to possess a little(reason).



Quote:Quote:<hr>Rather than poking your tongue out at truth, Zag, why can you not engage the forum in your analysis of the value and meaning of "Zarathustra?" Since you hold the poem in such high esteem, surely, you can do it justice.<hr>

The only truth I've poked my tongue out at is the one in the heading of this forum.

Quote:Quote:<hr>I am weary of the one liners. Please give us a paragraph or two of careful, delineated thought. For once, do the topic justice.<hr>

Careful thought? This forum is for dangerous thinkers woman! Not funeral directors! Delineate my ass!

Quote:Quote:<hr>If you won't, I will. I will decipher and analyze the poem stanza by stanza.<hr>

In prosaic laymans terms, you'll pluck, stuff, and roast that bird. Even if you could, you'd find it a phoenix.

Quote:Quote:<hr>You need not correct my English. I meant "effect," not "affect."<hr>

Ok.