Master Morality Vs. Slave Morality: Neiztche
Master Morality vs. Slave Morality: Neiztche
Wikipedia defines morality as “a system of principles and judgments based on cultural, religious, and philosophical concepts and beliefs, by which humans determine whether given actions are right or wrong.” (Wikipedia Morality) Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche, a German philosopher thought up of the idea that there are two moralities; The master and slave morality. These define a person by there actions to there world around them and how they handle certain situations they encounter throughout their natural life. I believe he chose these two because they seem to be strong opposites and there are rational.
The first morality Nietzsche writes about is the master morality. Nietzsche defined master morality as the morality of the strong-willed. For these men the “good” is the noble, strong and powerful, while the “bad” is the weak, cowardly, timid and petty. Master morality begins in the “noble man” with a spontaneous idea of the “good”, then the idea of “bad” develops in opposition to it (On the Genealogy of Morals). He stated: “The noble type of man experiences itself as determining values; it does not need approval; it judges, what is harmful to me is harmful in itself”; it knows itself to be that which first accords honor to things; it is value-creating” (Beyond Good and Evil).
Nietzsche rationalized the idea that it was the heroes, or the “good”, that gave the master moratlity it’s name. It was not the actual good in it’s self. They realized they were good when they witnessed what would threaten them: the common people, the poor and the weak. Their position of power included the power over words, the power to decide what would be called “good” and what “bad” (On The Genealogy of Morals). Basically, it means is that what would good be with out bad? You couldn’t define anything unless it had something to contradict or contrast it.
On the other end of the spectrum is the slave moratilty....
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