Reflective report Nietzsche Seminar
September 14, 2007
Hedwig Gaasterland
Paul van Tongeren:
Vom “Arzt der Cultur” zum “Arzt und Kranker in einer Person”
Eine Hypothese zur Entwicklung Nietzsches als Philosoph der Kultur(en)
This report consists of two parts. In the first part, I will present a summary of the article of Paul van
Tongeren, “Vom “Arzt der Cultur” zum “Arzt und Kranker in einer Person”, Eine Hypothese zur
Entwicklung Nietzsches als Philosoph der Kultur(en)”, which was discussed in the seminar. In the
second part, I will give an overview of the main points that have been made during the discussion over
the paper.
Part I: The Article
Introduction
Van Tongeren’s article contains 5 sections, apart from the introduction. It combines two main issues.
One of the topics of the article is ‘Nietzsche on culture’. Van Tongeren presented this article in a
conference in Naumburg, and the title of the conference was ‘Nietzsche – Philosoph der Kultur(en)?’.
Hence the choice for this first subject, which section 1, 2, 4 and 5 discuss in detail. Secondly, Van
Tongeren has done some research for the Nietzsche Wörterbuch on Nietzsche’s use of the word
‘Frage’. Section 3, the most extended section of the article, presents these results. In the last two
sections, these results are combined with the theme on culture.
I shall discuss Van Tongeren’s article section by section, beginning with the introduction. Van
Tongeren begins with the overall topic of the conference: ‘Nietzsche – Philosoph der Kultur(en)?’, and
states that it is an ambiguous theme. It has the form of a question, but it is not immediately clear which
question is addressed. Van Tongeren offers four possible issues, which are the following. First: what
has Nietzsche to say as a philosopher of culture? Second: how does Nietzsche’s philosophy address
the plurality of culture(s)? The third question combines the former questions by asking whether
Nietzsche actually can be said to have ‘a philosophy of culture’ at all. In what way can Nietzsche’s
cultural philosophy be understood as a philosophy? What does philosophy mean, for Nietzsche? The
fourth question is related to this third one, and asks what it means for Nietzsche to be a philosopher.
Both this question and the second question are related to the theme of the conference: ‘Nietzsche –
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Philosoph der Kultur(en)’. The title does not mention ‘philosophy’, but rather approaches Nietzsche as
a philosopher. What is it like to be a philosopher, for Nietzsche?
Van Tongeren wishes to combine these four sets of questions in his article. His main question
is: how are the notions ‘philosophy’/‘philosopher’ and ‘culture’ related to one another within
Nietzsche’s thinking? The notion of plurality will be given some attention as well, mostly at the very
end of the article.
Section 1: Nietzsches Sprachgebrauch m.B. auf sein Denken über die Kultur
In this section, Van Tongeren speaks about the development of Nietzsche’s own thinking regarding
culture. It is worth noticing that Nietzsche very rarely refers to his philosophy as a ‘cultural
philosophy’. The only places where a reference to cultural philosophy can be found, is in his earlier
works. Van Tongeren makes two observations with respect to this. In the first place, we know from
Nietzsche’s unpublished notes that he planned to call the first chapter of Menschliches,
Allzumenschliches I. Band1 ‘Philosophie der Cultur’. However, this title is the only one that has not
reappeared in the final version. The chapter has been replaced and has become the fifth chapter with a
different title (‘Anzeichen höherer und niederer Cultur’). This tells us that Nietzsche might have had
some doubts considering his philosophy as a ‘cultural philosophy’. In the second place, there are many
striking similarities between Menschliches, Allzumenschliches I. Band and Jenseits von Gut und Böse.
These similarities are not coincidental. It was Nietzsche’s plan to rewrite his Menschliches, but after
some time he decided to write a whole new work – which was to become Jenseits. One of the most
interesting dissimilarities between the two works concerns culture. For in both of them, the fifth
chapter contains the central theme of the work. As I mentioned before, in Menschliches, this central
topic concerns culture, even though the title has been changed. In Jenseits, however, the main theme
has become ‘Der freie Geist’. This ‘free spirit’ has turned out to be one of the most prominent images
of Nietzsche as philosopher, and apparently it has replaced the image of Nietzsche as the cultural
philosopher. What has happened in the years between Menschliches and Jenseits? And what does this
tell us about the relation between philosophy and culture?
Section 2: Der Arzt der Kultur
In the first section, Nietzsche’s thoughts on culture have been central. It has become clear that the
image of Nietzsche as a cultural philosopher has led to another picture: the philosopher as a ‘free
spirit’. In the second section, Van Tongeren wants to discuss another important metaphor Nietzsche
uses to characterize his own philosophy. This is the picture of the philosopher as a physician. The
important point of this metaphor is its recurrence in Nietzsche’s work. In the earlier works, the
philosopher is connected to culture, and in these cases Nietzsche speaks of ‘the philosopher as
1
NL 25[3] 8.485.
2
physician of culture’.2 However, when ‘culture’ starts to vanish as a dominant theme, the metaphor of
the physician undergoes a shift of meaning. The philosopher as physician then attaches is transformed
into to the metaphor of the free spirit. But before explaining how this connection exactly works, Van
Tongeren interrupts this discourse in order to focus on the second subject of the article: Nietzsche’s
questions.
Section 3: Nietzsches Fragezeichen
As mentioned before, in the third section Van Tongeren presents some of the results of his Nietzsche
Wörterbuch–research on the word ‘Frage’. This enquiry about Nietzsche’s questions and his way of
formulating them is, according to the author, not only a central defining feature of philosophy in
general, but also a fruitful way to understand what has happened in the period in which the
development from the ‘philosopher of culture’ to the ‘free spirit’ took place, between 1872 and 1886.
The results of this enquiry will shed light on the relation between philosophy and culture as well.
Firstly, from a quantitative aspect, the new prefaces of 1886 display a very high occurrence of
question marks. The profusion of question marks is particularly striking if one compares the two
‘Vorreden’ of Die Geburt der Tragödie aus dem Geiste der Musik; the first ‘Vorrede’ is written in
1872, the second in 1886. In the first one, there are no question marks. In the second, there are 74.
Secondly, the use of the word ‘question’ also indicates a shift in Nietzsche’s thought. In his early
writings, Nietzsche does not differentiate between diverse kinds of questions. He just uses the word
‘Frage’. Yet later on, he develops a wide variety of types of questions: personal questions,
psychological questions, physiological questions, serious questions, etc. This multiplication of
question marks and types of questions points out that Nietzsche is much more aware of the questions
he has in 1886 than in 1872.
Thirdly, the function of questions in Nietzsche’s writings changes too. In the years around
1872, questions do not usually play a significant role in Nietzsche’s writings. Mostly, the questions are
rhetorical and only posed in order to structure the text. The great questions do not appear on the
surface. In Die Geburt, for example, this is very clear. In the 1886 ‘Vorrede’ of this text, Nietzsche
confesses that he only understood much later which great question was present beneath the surface of
the text. In Die Unzeitgemäße Betrachtungen, (1873-1876), the same tendency is noticeable. There,
Nietzsche wants to discuss some ‘serious questions’, like: ‘What do you live for?’, or ‘What is life
worth?’. However, he presents the questions within a framework that consists of rather different
questions – rhetorical questions, offering structure. And a tension between ‘superficial’ and ‘great’
questions becomes apparent. Only later, when Nietzsche starts writing in the form of aphorisms, this
tension disappears. Aphorisms lack the well-structured form of the early writings, and this opens the
2
NL 23[15] 7.545; Brief An E. Rhode 22.3.73 KSA 4.136, ‘Der Philosoph als Arzt der Cultur’.
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way for Nietzsche to ask his serious questions without the urge of giving any answers. Because the
rhetorical questions are no longer there, the force of some questions becomes finally visible.
Apart from the quantity, the variety, and the role of the questions, Van Tongeren describes a
fourth development. This development has to do with the relation between the question and its
questioner. In the beginning of the period described, Nietzsche is the master and author of his
questions. Later on, this changes. The questions become more and more compelling. Nietzsche no
longer controls the questions, but the questions start to take control over him. Nietzsche describes
some questions as ‘terrifying’, and some are so disturbing that they cannot be answered – some cannot
even be posed. The distance between himself and the questions disappears. He gets so involved in the
force of the questions, that everything becomes ‘fragwürdig’, the questioning itself as well. At last,
Nietzsche becomes a question mark for himself.
This almost obsessed questioning leads to a new and crucial insight for understanding the
relation between philosophy and culture. In Die fröhliche Wissenschaft Nietzsche understands his
questioning as the result of a passion for knowledge, a ‘Leidenschaft der Erkenntnis’.3 This desire is
life threatening, for the truth-seeker has to face the lies we need in order to stay alive. In that manner,
the philosopher becomes himself the battlefield in which the desire for living and the desire for
knowledge fight each other, although the longing for knowledge appears to be a life-promoting force
as well. This new insight is formulated in the following question:
‘die letzte Frage um die Bedingung des Lebens ist hier gestellt, und der erste Versuch wird hier
gemacht, mit dem Experiment auf diese Frage zu antworten. Inwieweit verträgt die Wahrheit die
Einverleibung? – das ist die Frage, das ist das Experiment.’4
This question does not only provide us with the answer to our own question, as we will see, but it has
been a decisive discovery for Nietzsche as well. According to Van Tongeren, Nietzsche has now found
his ‘eigentliche und endgültige Frage’.5 And this finding offers him the chance to view all his earlier
writings in a different light, and to perceive them as whole. In the way as a hermeneutic reader
understands a text only by finding out its underlying question, Nietzsche too has come to understand
his own earlier writings in this new light. Van Tongeren suggests that this interpretation not only
supplies to Nietzsche’s ‘Vorreden’, but also to the texts beyond 1886.
Section 4: ‘Nietzsche – Philosoph…’
Now that we have found out what happened in the years between 1872 and 1886, we can come back to
where we were before the digression started. We still have not seen how the metaphor of the physician
3
FW 3, 107, and 123.
FW 110 3.471.
5
Van Tongeren, p. 10.
4
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connects to the later picture of the free spirit. And how can we understand these metaphors in
connection to Nietzsche’s development regarding his questioning?
In this fourth section, Van Tongeren introduces one part of the answers to these two questions.
The section is titled: ‘‘Nietzsche – Philosoph…’’, and it anticipates the fifth section: ‘‘… der
Kultur(en)?’’ In the fourth section, Van Tongeren discusses Nietzsche’s philosophy, and in the fifth,
the connection with culture is made. The main question of the article is, after all, how the notions of
‘philosophy’ and ‘culture’ are related within Nietzsche’s thinking. In the fifth section, the answers to
all the questions will be completed.
Van Tongeren begins here with an interpretation of Nietzsche’s ‘Vorreden’ from 1886.
Nietzsche presents these ‘Vorreden’ as the portrayal of his disease and his process of recovery. This
process contains three stages. The first stage is the discovery of illness. This is an important discovery,
especially for our investigation, for the symptoms of illness are closely related to culture. One of the
most well-known cultural symptoms Nietzsche points to, is Christianity. But not only religion is a
symptom of sickness. Any cultural theme is suspect: politics, science, and art. This discovery of illness
implies a very typical method of thinking of culture: Nietzsche regards it as a complex of symptoms,
which have to be interpreted by an experienced physician. Here we recognize the metaphor of the
philosopher as ‘physician of culture’. The second stage is another discovery: Nietzsche understands
now that he is not only the physician, but the patient as well. In fact, this is not a new finding. Already
in his early works, Nietzsche claims that a physician will be able to help others only if he is capable of
helping himself. However, it takes him a decade to discover that he has to cure himself instead of the
culture in which he lives. He realizes that the disease of the culture is also within him. The third stage
concerns the therapy of the disease. At this point, Nietzsche discovers that there is no medicine. Health
is not just another state of being; illness and health are interdependent. So in order to become healthy,
the only thing that is required, is ‘a transformative capacity to respond in an assertive way to a painful
stimulus’.6 In other words: there is not one way of being healthy – one has to face the symptoms and
find one’s own assertive way of dealing with them. This is a process of transfiguration.
Transfiguration is a key word, for becoming healthy, for understanding life, and for understanding
philosophy - and what it means exactly will be discussed in the next section.
Section 5: ‘… der Kultur(en)?’
In this final section, Van Tongeren expresses his hypothesis with respect to Nietzsche’s view on
culture. Finally, we come to understand the connection between the metaphor of the physician and the
free spirit. For in his later works, Nietzsche no longer regards himself as a physician of culture; he
understands that he should cure himself first. This ‘turning to the inside’ can be understood as the shift
from ‘philosopher of culture’ to the ‘free spirit.’ And it is the combination of the physician with the
6
Van Tongeren (p. 11) here refers to Thomas Long, o.c. S. 117.
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free spirit that provides, according to Van Tongeren, a new understanding of culture. Culture is no
longer understood as the set of symptoms outside of him, but it is now found inside himself. Nietzsche
has become himself the laboratory, where he, as a free spirit, performs the experiments of becoming
healthy. Culture should from now on be understood as part of that process.
The analysis of Nietzsche’s questions sheds light on this new view on culture. As we have
noticed, there is a ‘turning to the inside’ with respect to the questions as well. Nietzsche is submitted
to the force of the questions, or, in his own words, by the ‘Leidenschaft der Erkenntnis’. And this
process ends with the finding of Nietzsche’s ‘eigentliche und endgültige Frage’: ‘Inwieweit verträgt
die Wahrheit die Einverleibung?’. This last question turns out to be a question with no clearly
formulated answer. The only way to answer it, is by doing it, by practicing. Nietzsche: ‘das ist die
Frage, das ist das Experiment.’ And the experiment of becoming healthy is the exact same praxis.
However, it is not a single praxis. It rather amounts to a life style: a continuing process of
experimenting to tolerate an amount of truth. In Nietzsche’s words: it can be only the philosopher who
‘den Gang durch viele Gesundheiten gemacht hat und immer wieder macht.’ Another word for this
process is ‘transfiguration’ or ‘perspectivism’. Eventually, the philosopher’s life becomes a piece of
art – even more than his writings.
According to Van Tongeren, we should see all Nietzsche’s later works in the light of this
praxis. In these works, there are not as many question marks as in the 1886 texts. However, this does
not mean that questions do not matter anymore. On the contrary – Nietzsche actually answers his most
important question in his texts, by performing his experiment. The texts are the experiments.
Let us return to the concept of plurality. In what sense is this new view on culture an argument
against it? On the one hand, culture has been internalized, and has now turned into a private thing: it
belongs to Nietzsche alone. In that respect, culture has become ‘singular’. On the other hand, the
process of ‘transfiguration’, or ‘perspectivism’, is far from singular. Plurality is a central feature of this
praxis. So is Nietzsche’s new view of culture an argument against pluralism? According to Van
Tongeren, the answer to that question must be negative.
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Part II: The Seminar
Introduction
I will focus upon three main topics that have been brought up during the discussion of Van Tongeren’s
article. The first issue is culture. Here, I will discuss the impact of Nietzsche’s development regarding
the ‘physician of culture’ and the ‘free spirit’ on his notion of culture, and I will consider the
difference between singularity and particularity. The second topic is sickness. This sickness is
connected to the other metaphor that is prominent in Nietzsche’s writing: the philosopher as a
physician. I will examine the meaning of this sickness. The third topic is connected to the picture of
the ‘free spirit’, and here I will discuss the notion of freedom. Attached to this notion is Nietzsche’s
development with respect to his questions.
1. Culture
Two main critical points have been raised regarding van Tongeren’s interpretation of Nietzsche’s view
on culture. The first one has been mentioned only briefly, but deserves to be brought to our attention.
The second has been discussed more elaborately.
According to Van Tongeren, there has been a shift in Nietzsche’s view on culture. Whereas
Nietzsche begins by understanding culture as the complex of institutions like politics and religion, he
later comes to see culture as something inside of him. Van Tongeren comes to this hypothesis, because
Nietzsche no longer considers himself as a ‘philosopher of culture’, but more and more as a ‘free
spirit’ with an inside focus. Thus, the word ‘culture’ disappears as a part of Nietzsche’s understanding
of a philosopher. However, what exactly can we conclude from this with respect to Nietzsche’s
understanding of culture? Can we conclude, as Van Tongeren does, that Nietzsche from now on
considers culture as something inside of him? Or should we collect more evidence in order to make
such a claim? Could it be the case that other, later text fragments point to yet another understanding of
culture?
Van Tongeren claims that Nietzsche in his later stage considers himself to be the laboratory in
which culture has its place, in an experimental way. However, he does not claim to be definite. In his
own words, it is a ‘hypothesis’. During the seminar, the speculative character of this hypothesis has
been underlined once more. Nevertheless, there has not been a lengthy discussion devoted to it. This
speculative issue has been one of the main points of the article, and I think it deserved somewhat more
consideration.
The second critical point concerns the difference between the ‘particular’ and the ‘singular’.
This difference has come up as an issue at the very end of the article, where Van Tongeren discusses
the theme of plurality. The last sentence is somewhat puzzling: ‘A philosophy that understands the art
of transfiguration, becomes inevitably a singular philosophy – which is something completely
different from a particular one, for ‘why would the fact that Herr Nietzsche has become healthy again
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be of any concern to us?’’7 What is the difference between the particular and the singular? And how is
it important for our understanding the article?
During the seminar, this difference has been clarified. It amounts to the following. A
particular philosophy is a philosophy that can be compared with other philosophies, and can be seen as
a well distinguished part within a greater structure. Nietzsche’s ‘turn to the inside’ should not be
interpreted as a particular move, for it is not of interest to us that Herr Nietzsche in particular tries to
cure himself. Looking at it that way would imply that there are many philosophers of this kind, and
that the choice for studying Nietzsche’s texts is more or less arbitrary. Instead, we are very interested
in the art of transfiguration in itself. This art must be singular, for it concerns one person; in this case,
Nietzsche. He is the one who can tell us something about it, and that is the reason why we should take
his texts into consideration. Singularity with respect to his philosophy should thus be interpreted as the
impossibility to compare it with other philosophies. It is a philosophy that stands in itself, as a
complete universe. So we should understand Nietzsche’s art of transfiguration in this way: singular,
not particular.
Moreover, plurality still plays an important role as well in the shaping of one’s singularity.
Within this singular art of transfiguration there is a powerful tension between plurality and unity – but
I will discuss this tension in the next section.
2. Sickness
Nietzsche’s conception of disease has not been entirely clarified in the paper. His metaphor of the
philosopher as a physician continues appearing in his work, and as long as Nietzsche considers himself
a physician, he keeps occupied with sickness. What exactly is this sickness?
At least one thing is clear: sickness has something to do with the plurality that I mentioned at
the end of the first section. Already in Nietzsche’s early works for example, some criticism can be
found on Wagner. Nietzsche did not find enough unity in his music, and a lack of it can cause any
piece of art to fall apart. Plurality without order or unity breaks down and ends up being nothing.
Illness can be thus understood as a disintegration.
Although this interpretation of sickness might be correct, it certainly does not cover every
aspect of it. During the seminar, some other aspects have been discussed. One of these aspects is
related to Nietzsche’s ‘turning inward’. It can be said that Nietzsche’s illness has turned inside him,
while he considered it to be part of culture before. Maybe there is a difference in method between
curing culture and curing himself as well. For when it comes to healing himself, Nietzsche
understands that he can not eliminate the disease completely in order to find a perfect health. Health is
not a state of being free from symptoms. It is, as we have seen already, ‘a transformative capacity to
7
Van Tongeren, p. 13, my translation. Van Tongeren refers here to Nietzsche, FW Vorr. 2.
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respond in an assertive way to a painful stimulus’8 – disease should not be cut out, but transformed.
However, this method seems to differ quite drastically from his way of approaching symptoms in
culture. Especially when it comes to Christianity, Nietzsche is famous for his aggressive way of
dealing with this religion. In Ecce Homo or in Der Antichrist he merely wants to cut this tradition out
of culture as if it were some kind of tumour. How can we understand this discontinuity regarding
Nietzsche’s therapy in micro and macro level?
According to Van Tongeren, this seeming difference does however fit within his
interpretation. Both Ecce Homo and Der Antichrist have been written in 1888. At this point, Nietzsche
has already gone through the process of ‘turning to the inside’. Therefore, the polemical attack against
Christianity can also be interpreted as some experiment within Nietzsche, for he is perfectly aware of
the traces Christianity has left inside him. Only if we interpret his aggression this way, we will be able
to see how Nietzsche is practicing, that is: answering the question ‘Inwieweit verträgt die Wahrheit die
Einverleibung?’. As we have seen before, a clear-cut answer to that question cannot be given. The
only way of answering the question is by practicing it. Becoming healthy means conducting
experiments in order to find out what truth can and cannot be tolerated. These experiments are to be
found in these texts; these texts are experiments. Although this way of reading requires another type
of interpretation than other passages, it might still be the best way to view them.
Yet, there is another way of understanding how the two methods are not contradictory. For
with respect to Nietzsche’s therapy, the main focus is to find a way of facing the symptoms of the
disease. Becoming healthy consists partly in finding a way to endure them, and to accept the fact that
life will not be without disease. However, Nietzsche’s experiment implies that too much truth cannot
be handled: every truth-seeker has to face the lies we need in order to stay alive as well. Therefore, to
stay alive means that a selection must be made, and a form of health must be created. Like an artist,
the philosopher has to compose his own health. Here we find the tension between plurality and unity:
any unity is threatened by the force of chaos. In that sense, the aggressive force of cutting out
Christianity can be understood as a creative aspect of the ‘transformative capacity’ that has been
mentioned before.
This means that sickness cannot be understood as merely a lack of unity. Another way of
viewing Nietzsche’s conception of sickness is the incapacity of incorporating plurality. In that sense,
illness can be understood as a lack of creativity. Even more: a lack of courage. For courage is a
necessary requirement to undergo transfiguration and perspectivism over and over again. The only
cure for disease in that sense is to overcome that fear and become creative.
3. The free spirit
8
Van Tongeren (p. 11) here refers to Thomas Long, o.c. S. 117.
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As we now know, Nietzsche develops his picture of a philosopher from the ‘physician of culture’ to
the ‘free spirit’. However, there is a remarkable difficulty with respect to the combination of this
development with Nietzsche’s questions. Let me summarize Nietzsche’s process regarding his
questions again, briefly. In his early stage, his questions appear mostly as structuring elements, while
the deeper, ‘real’ questions can be found only under the surface of the text. In his later phase,
Nietzsche discovers those ‘real’ questions. Yet when he addresses these questions more directly, his
control diminishes and he gradually becomes subjected to their force. In the end, his distance to the
questions completely disappears and he eventually becomes a question mark to himself. How can
Nietzsche regard himself as a ‘free spirit’ while he appears to have less freedom?
In his reply, Van Tongeren first emphasises that Nietzsche does not conceive freedom as
opposed to constraint. Nonetheless, how can we think of it in this context? According to Van
Tongeren, we should understand it in connection with perspectivism and transfiguration. In that sense,
freedom has to do with courage. Nietzsche has had the courage to get rid of the distance between
himself and his questions, and has dared to become the question himself. As soon as his main question
(‘Inwieweit…’) does not appear anymore in his texts as a question, the distance between himself and
this question has disappeared as well. The texts written thereafter should be understood as the practice
of answering the question through experimenting. This experimenting is not different from performing
the art of transfiguration – and that is freedom.
There is a further way of understanding this kind of freedom. In the first section, I explained
the difference between particularity and singularity. One of the aspects mentioned there, is
comparability. A philosophy that stands in itself as a complete universe is singular, whereas a
philosophy that can be regarded a part of a greater context is particular. In this perspective,
Nietzsche’s experimental philosophy is to be regarded as singular: it stands on its own and it is not
comparable with others. One implication of this is that Nietzsche’s experiments cannot be expected to
‘fail’ or ‘succeed’. For failure and success do presuppose a greater framework in which an experiment
has its place, and in this case, the experimental force of Nietzsche’s philosophy is larger than any
framework. This incomparability can be considered freedom as well. In that sense, freedom can be
viewed as the total absence of a larger frame with which the philosophy is connected.
In the light of these explanations of freedom, we should be more cautious when interpreting
Nietzsche’s ‘free spirit’ as a spirit free from any oppression too quickly – there is more to it.
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