In Reply to: (movingon reposted) I liked this post posted by susie on March 05, 2005 at 18:36:02:
Nietzsche maintained that all human behavior is motivated by the will to power.
He expanded on this core philosophical assumption through discussions about the rise of the "uber mensch" or "overman" who is not bound by the traditional values and slave morality of the masses. Nietzsche claimed that "God is dead," and that new values should be developed to replace the traditional ones.
The statement "God is dead" is generally interpreted to mean that questions like Is there a God? Who is God? How are we saved? are irrelevant and meaningless.
His writings are complex and easy to misunderstand. So easy to misunderstand, in fact, that Hitler & the Nazis misappropriated Nietzsche to the point that he was widely associated with totalitarianism in the first half of the 20th century. Perhaps in a similar way, Christianity has been misappropriated and associated with empirialism and Islam has been misappropriated and associated with terrorism.
In all three cases, people with the will to power have taken a philosophy or belief system and used it to justify their dominance over others.
While Nietzsche made a very interesting point about human motiviation being the will to power, I do not completely understand the philosophical concept as it was articulated in the German language to academic audiences of the late 19th century. Too often, I think Christians are in the same position with regard to their understanding of scripture--they simply do not know enough about the original intent to the writer.
I am skeptical as to whether all human behavior is motivated by "the will to power" in the same way that I am skeptical about doctrine of original sin. I doubt there's a single, comprehensive explanation for anything. Any thoughts on that?