Friedrich Nietzsche
The 19th century philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche gives prominent focus to what he terms "the Brotherhood of Assassins", in section 24 of On the Genealogy of Morality. Nietzsche's signature work is to attempt the transvaluation of values, that is, to transcend the inherited Jewish and Christian politics, psychology and ethics of ressentiment and guilt. Nietzsche points to the Assassins as anti-ascetic 'free spirits' who no longer believe in metaphysical truth.
Importantly, Nietzsche attacks the false spirits who are the host of self-describing "unbelievers" of modern times who claim to reject religious deception as scholars and philosophers and yet retain the traditional refusal to question the value of truth. Nietzsche compares genuine free spirits with the Assassins: "When the Christian crusaders in the Orient came across that invincible order of Assassins – that order of free spirits par excellence whose lowest order received, through some channel or other, a hint about that symbol and spell reserved for the uppermost echelons alone, as their secret: "nothing is true, everything is permitted". Now that was freedom of the spirit, with that, belief in truth itself was renounced."
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Famous quotes by friedrich nietzsche:
“Life is fountain of joy; but where the rabble also gather to drink, all wells are poisoned.”
—Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900)
“Pain makes hens and poets cackle.”
—Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900)
“People are not ashamed to think about dirty things, but they are ashamed when they imagine that others believe them capable of having these dirty thoughts.”
—Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900)
“Childhood and youth are ends in themselves, not stages.”
—Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900)
“It was mankind that hung on the cross for two thousand years: and a terrible god practiced his cruelty and called it ‘love.’”
—Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900)