The Doctrine of Eternal Recurrence

The Doctrine of Eternal Recurrence

in the form of a pantheistic religious-philosophical teaching intended for all free spirits…

Only one who no longer believes in an otherworldly immortality and eternal life beyond this world, and who cannot bear even the thought of transience or the final mortality as assumed by science, might find solace in the only remaining — this-worldly — form of immortality: the Eternal Reccurrence.

>>> PREFACE (pdf)

“Would you be able to desire this once more — and again — for all eternity?” (Nietzsche)

  • §15 On the Philosophical Character of the Thought of Eternal Return

    (Doctrine of Eternal Recurrence — INTRODUCTION, aph. 4) The most ambitious intention of this book is not to point to new moments or aspects that would render the thought of Eternal Return rationally more comprehensible. This can scarcely be achieved under conditions in which science… Read more

  • §14 On the Human Endurability of the Eternal Return

    (Doctrine of Eternal Recurrence — INTRODUCTION, aph. 3) Yet since this book is addressed, first and foremost, to those free spirits who still carry within themselves that never-sufficiently-mourned spirit of Enlightenment—the spirit that seeks to dispel the “post-structuralist darkness” that has come to dominate the… Read more

  • §13 On the Existential Unbearability of Eternal Recurrence

    (Doctrine of Eternal Recurrence — INTRODUCTION, aph. 2) Beyond its rational incomprehensibility, disbelief in the Eternal Return rests upon yet another unease — the existential unbearability of one’s own life, consciously imprisoned within a hopeless circle: a life that meaninglessly “repeats itself” ad infinitum, without… Read more

  • §12 The Eternal Return: A First Determination

    (Doctrine of Eternal Recurrence — INTRODUCTION, aph. 1) According to its most general formulation, the Doctrine of Eternal Return holds that everything that has ever “existed” or will “exist,” everything that has unfolded or will unfold as a “process,” in the most diverse modes of… Read more

  • §11 On the Eternal Return of the Same — or the Eternal Departure into the Different?

    (Doctrine of Eternal Recurrence — Preface, aph. 11) And so — is it the Eternal Return of the Same that is “at work,” or the Eternal Departure into the Different? And since we have already mentioned this second possibility — the one that, at this… Read more

  • §10 Who Is Actually Writing This Book — and Why Him? (on the Writer of these Lines)

    (Doctrine of Eternal Recurrence — Preface, aph. 10) Naturally, every author, while writing a book, eventually asks himself: why him? Why is it he — or, as we shall show, his ‘peculiarity within the Whole’, which compels him to write in the third person —… Read more

  • §9 Why Is Eternal Recurrence So Hard to Accept?

    (Doctrine of Eternal Recurrence — Preface, aph. 9) And what is it, in truth, that is hardest to accept in the possibility of Eternal Return—and what repels people from it at the very outset? It is not, as one might first assume, the endurance of… Read more

  • §8 On Nihilism — the Uncanniest of All Guests (as the Reason Behind This Book)

    (Doctrine of Eternal Recurrence — Preface, aph. 8) Nihilism stands at the door: whence comes this uncanniest of all guests? (Kaufmann & Hollingdale, The Will to Power, Book I §1) Since we have already touched upon nihilism — “the uncanniest of all guests” standing before… Read more

  • §7 On Disbelief in the Eternal Return

    (Doctrine of Eternal Recurrence — Preface, aph. 7) Yet the question arises: what if it is sometimes necessary that some part of us does not (be)lieve in this doctrine…..? What if, at times, this ultimate certainty of being in the world must be told “no”… Read more

  • §6 A Faith of the Few

    (Doctrine of Eternal Recurrence — Preface, aph. 6) However ultimate it may be, this thought seeks neither to intrude nor to impose itself upon anyone. Once spoken — though it was surely spoken more than once — it allows itself to be ignored. It will… Read more

Read more: §15 On the Philosophical Character of the Thought of Eternal Return