Translator's Preface
Author's Preface

First Paper: 'Good and Evil', 'Good and Bad'
Second Paper: 'Sin', 'Remorse of Conscience', and Others
Third Paper: What Does the Ascetic Ideal Mean?

Translator's Note
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Traditional notions of good and evil are deceptive.
Only those who are true to themselves can cultivate themselves into great human beings.
Nietzsche calls the value system that evaluates good and evil based on the standard 'slave morality'.
In contrast, the value system that evaluates based on greatness and inferiority is called 'master morality'.
Nietzsche called Western traditional morality 'slave morality' because it originated from slaves in ancient society and is a set of values ​​that reflect their class interests.
In modern societies where the caste system has been abolished, there is no slave class, but there are 'cowardly and weak people' who follow slave morality.
Nietzsche argues that slave morality is maintained for the benefit of these people, who expect that people will sympathize with them and help them even when they are in a miserable state due to their lack of power or ability.
The study of Nietzsche's concept of morality is based on etymological research.
In this first paper, it is analyzed that the German word gut, meaning 'good', had meanings such as 'humble' and 'kind' when used by the common people, and 'strong' and 'brave' when used by monarchs and nobles, and that the words opposing gut are divided into bose, meaning 'evil', and schlecht, meaning 'low'.
However, Nietzsche does not condemn the weak, but condemns the weak for deceiving not only themselves but also others.
Above all, because they are not true to themselves and deceive themselves.
This is in the context of Nietzsche's emphasis that only those who are true to themselves can acknowledge their own shortcomings and develop themselves into greater human beings.


The pangs of conscience are an outburst of human aggression directed inward.
“At the root of all 'good things' lies a great deal of blood and cruelty.”
Nietzsche believes that humans were bred to be 'animals capable of keeping promises'.
The ability of a human being to keep promises means that he or she has self-control.
A person who can control himself and keep his promises in any situation is called a strong person or a 'sovereign person'.
However, humans are inherently slaves to momentary emotions and desires, and are therefore creatures who cannot remember the promises they have made.
Historically, brutal measures have been necessary to ensure that these humans remember their promises.
Nietzsche argues that people who failed to keep their promises were subjected to torture, such as amputation of body parts, and that the fear of such pain led to people becoming more determined to keep their promises.
The most distorted fruit that has borne fruit in this process of discipline is a human being tormented by guilt and remorse.

In the process of tracing this phenomenon, Nietzsche notes that the German word schuld originally meant 'debt'.
The concept of sin, which was simply defined as debt, expanded into the concept of humans feeling beyond salvation as nations were formed and Christianity emerged.
The pangs of conscience are the aggressive impulses that weak humans cannot express outwardly being turned inward, and when this is combined with the sense of infinite indebtedness to God, a sense of guilt arises, making one consider oneself a sinner.
Nietzsche says that this sense of guilt is the most terrifying disease that has ever plagued human history.

The great lunatic asylum of Europe and the planet of asceticism
'The Earth is a refuge for discontented, arrogant, and terrible creatures.'
Asceticism is a mental attitude that regards instinctive desires as sinful and prohibits their fulfillment.
Nietzsche sees this asceticism as being dominated by a resentment toward life itself, and considers it masochistic in that it derives pleasure from abusing itself.
This is closely related to the dualism that has defined Western metaphysics and Christianity since Plato.
This is because ascetics reject physical desires and strive to become pure souls free from them, believing that they must reject earthly pleasures in order to enjoy true joy, which exists only in heaven.

But why do ascetics choose a life of melancholic asceticism? Nietzsche sees asceticism as a pathological way to overcome the unpleasant and painful feelings about life.
It means finding the cause of discomfort and pain within oneself and choosing abstinence as a means to alleviate it.
It is a pathological way of weakening and rendering life powerless.
The five main ways in which this is done are to eliminate will and desire, to engage in mechanical activities, to be kind to others and do good deeds, to form groups and eliminate oneself, and to regard suffering as the result of one's own sins.
Nietzsche believes that through these various methods, humans were not improved, but rather tamed and weakened, and that humanity was severely damaged and negative phenomena appeared.
Epilepsy, chronic depression, and a collective syndrome of longing for death are the consequences of asceticism, and they are diagnosed as having the most destructive impact on the health and racial strength of Europeans.