Nietzsche's Explanation Of Eternal Recurrence

Friedrich Nietzsche was one of the most monumental philosophers of the 19th century. Nietzsche published many texts which critically examined a large and fairly diverse range of subjects such as morality, culture, religion, philosophy, and science. In these texts Nietzsche comes to establish what we today consider his main ideas such as perspectivism, his concept of the human will to power, his assertion of the death of God, his belief in the Übermensch, and the theory of eternal recurrence. The focus of my paper will be on explaining Nietzsche’s proposed belief in the phenomenon of eternal recurrence, it’s relation to the principles of amor fati and life affirming values, and whether these ideologies fit together when examined as a whole.

249-250) asserts that one will continue to relive the exact same life which one has lived, is currently living, and will continue living again and again in an infinite succession. He explains that throughout this infinite living of lives nothing will alter from past life in any way shape or form; for all intents and purposes each life will be exactly identical. Every action one has committed, every thought one has had, every experience one has undergone, every opinion or attitude one has adopted in the past, present, or future will diverge from one another in each successive life that is experienced. It is also crucial to understand that Nietzsche does not refer to an ideal such as the Buddhist philosophy of reincarnation, where one is returned to existence and placed along the timeline once more as if it were some kind of track that had an end, but to view time as a massive circle along which the universe progresses endlessly in a repeating loop having no start and no end; progressing infinitely backwards and forwards. This method of approach to understanding is outlined in a passage from Z III The Convalescent when Zarathustra states “I shall return, with this sun, with this earth, with this eagle, with this serpent – not to a new life or a better life or a similar life: I shall return eternally to this identical and self-same life...”. (Reader pg. 253) I believe that Nietzsche held this view in