"PunishmentA strange thing, our punishment! It does not cleanse the criminal, it is no atonement; on the contrary, it pollutes worse than the crime does.” In this statement, Nietzsche questions the contemporary perspective on punishment, the good and evil. According to Nietzsche (a self-confessed Dionysian), punishment is a creation of the Apollonian god who alternately punishes and shows mercy, to demonstrate his power. This sets a poor precedent for modern civilization, established to nurture creativity over rationality. Unfortunately, modern civilization anchors on similar precedents. Punishment has nothing to do with reforming character and behavior; it has everything to do with making people feel guilty for their free willed actions.
Nietzsche has a bleak view of punishment. He sees punishment as a means of tormenting people for acting on their own volition. Revenge for insults and wrongdoing makes the controller appear to hold immense power over the subjects. Nietzsche sees the Apollonian god as a creative genius who punishes and alternately shows mercy to satisfy his own artistic impulses. Therefore, punishment has little to do with reforming one’s character and behavior. This contrasts the view (held by Liberals and Christians) that punishment is necessary to make reforms in the society. The punishment is a means to induce guilt and inward pain on the wrongdoers. The punishment breaks the creative and vital Dionysian spirit in a person to “bring a miserable prostration and self-abasement” (Nietzsche 19).
Nietzsche regards Christianity and its ideas on morality, the good and the evil as “a religion for slaves and inferior people” (Nietzsche 20). Therefore, his conception of the good and the evil, the right and wrong is quite different from the conception found in the Bible and the teachings of the Christian churches. Nietzsche attempts to reason that revenge and punishment inflicted on the people is designed to civilize, weaken and tame them, bringing them down to their level. The punishment of people, which Christianity has successfully inflicted on people for centuries, has led to the decay of the true genius, art, creativity and human life itself.
In the Dionysian spirit, the people are to be dynamic, bold and victors; they also take pride in their achievements. Christianity and its slave-morality are the enemies of this vital, creative force and human life itself. For Nietzsche, Dionysus is the proper god, rather than the rational, self-controlled Apollo. Dionysus motivates the sheer madness and irrationality which frightens the Christians and Apollonians. Nietzsche reasons that this “madness” should not be curtailed; instead, it should be nourished and nurtured to flourish into a creative being. As he rightly observes “should it have been madness, to use one of Plato’s phrases that brought the greatest blessings on Greece?” (Nietzsche 21). If the Dionysian spirit in Plato had been curtailed through punishment, the world would have missed the philosopher’s brilliant ideas. This makes Christianity a soulless and bloodless philosophy of the slaves and mass men- symptoms of an over-civilized society that has lost its creative vitality.
A Dionysian empire is not motivated by morality or rationalism, but art, which Nietzsche believes, is “the truly metaphysical activity of man” (Nietzsche 22). This worldview has always been in a constant struggle with moralistic (rationalistic) ideas designed to tame and control the primitive and instinctual impulses in humanity. Adventurers and aggressors are “tormented and enchanted by unknown fevers and irresistibly pressed beyond themselves, in love with and lusting after foreign races” (Nietzsche 475). However, Dionysians are supposed to dominate and conquer everything they come across, which is will of Dionysian gods.
Nietzsche’s opinion on punishment disdainfully dismisses the entire concept of punishment as applied by the democratic and utilitarian governments. According to Nietzsche, the Dionysian spirit is vital for any civilized nation. Great barbarian nations like the Greeks, Romans, Germans and Vikings created civilized societies due to their Dionysian spirit, even though their intentions had only been to satisfy primitive lusts for blood, plunder and adventure. In the early periods, the aggressive and vital races did not feel guilt or shame when they conquered their enemies and engaged in murder, torture, rape and plunder; instead, they made war joyously, knowing that they were providing endless amounts of material for poets and musicians. As young people, Barbarians possessed the vital, dynamic energy (Dionysian force). However, they were not like the primitives who use the law as a demonstration of their Will to Power, and domination over weaker and inferior people; they use the law as a matter of social utility or protecting the community.
In the statement, "PunishmentA strange thing, our punishment! It does not cleanse the criminal, it is no atonement; on the contrary, it pollutes worse than the crime does”, Nietzsche explores the concepts of law, crime, and punishment, but with a great disdain for the Christian version. Christianity, with its slave-morality theme, is an enemy of the creative, human nature. Punishment, as used by Apollonians, is a means of humiliating the conquered. It is a primitive display of power, and mastery over the masses of humanity. This is why, modern civilization, anchored on similar grounds needs a second thought.
Works Cited
Nietzsche, Friedrich. Basic Writings of Nietzsche. Trans. and ed. Walter Kaufmann. New York, NY: Modern Library, 2000. Print.
