According to Nietzsche, in his book “The Problem of Socrates” Socrates is anti-life. This is as a result of the fact that Socrates never made any attempt to save his life. Nietzsche began by stating that the judgment reached by the wisest sages of all times about life is that “life is worthless.
The way the western cultures traditionally interpretes the Socrates’ judgment is that it is a one-sided rationalism of the enlightenment which reaches its highest point in such trivial schemes as utilitarianism, with its bland disregard of the instinctive basis of life. This is because the curbing of the Dionysian, the spread of rationality, most especially during the era of Socrates to the era of Alexandrian, resulted in the continuous fading of the springs of creativity, to decadence, shallow rationalism, and the ensuing death of the Hellenic spirit which flourished in misfortune and the pre-Socratic philosophers.
Nietzsche himself wants us to interpret Socrates position about life as that of someone who doesnt give the appropriate value to life but instead believes that the healthiness of his soul is determined by his ability to avoid committing injustice, and that his life will not be worth living if he stops practicing philosophy. Nietzsche wants us to believe that Socrates position ostracizes man’s instinctive attraction to the aesthetic virtues in life, making them to be considered as sheer irrationalities.
Reference
Kaufmann W., The Portable Nietzsche, New York: Viking, 1954, p. 463
The Life or Anti-Life: Nietzsche vs Socrates. (2000, January 01). In DirectEssays.com. Retrieved 12:21, December 07, 2013, from http://www.directessays.com/viewpaper/33597.html
Nietzsche, Friedrich. Twilight of the Idols; and the Anti-Christ. Trans. R. J. Hollingdale.
Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1977, pgs. 40, 55.
Nietzsche, Twilight of the Idols, “The Problem with Socrates” section 5.
