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.

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

  • §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 moment,… 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

  • §5. A Book Written Outside Its Time

    (Doctrine of Eternal Recurrence — Preface, aph. 5) Another question is this: how is it possible that such a thought — one so distant from today’s “social reality,” from the “noise of everyday life” — could even occur to someone? How could anyone seriously contemplate… Read more

  • §4. The End of Infinity and the Science of Eternal Recurrence

    (Doctrine of Eternal Recurrence — Preface, aph. 4) Enlightened by an insight into the ultimate eschatological possibilities of the world in which we live — that it is finite rather than infinite in its possibilities — the author of this book came to realize that… Read more

  • §3. The Moment of Illumination (or The Birth of the Insight-Feeling)

    (Doctrine of Eternal Recurrence — Preface, aph. 3) Before April two thousand and nineteen, even the author of these lines was not convinced that Eternal Recurrence was truly at work in this world. Having first encountered that—then merely an idea from The Gay Science—twenty-five years… Read more

Read more: §12. The Eternal Return: A First Determination