Nietzsche's "God is dead", clarification?

Question:Ok, so how i understand it is that because society is becoming so secularized, worship along with the moral values attached to it are being abandoned which can then in turn send society into chaos.
Am I right, or is there more?

Best Answer - Chosen by Asker: Ok, so how i understand it is that because society is becoming so secularized, worship along with the moral values attached to it are being abandoned which can then in turn send society into chaos.
Am I right, or is there more?

Nietzsche due to the nature of his writing style, requires a certain amount of reconstruction. To be honest, no one really knows what he was on about a lot of the time. I'm more of a fan of the Analytical style of philosophy as opposed to the Continental style.
you're basically right, yes. but to be honest, its whatever out take from it.
what I got in reading the Gay Science, and I notice none else has cared to mention this, is when he first rights "God is dead", it is a madman who is speaking these words (later he says it himself, but the first utterance was from the madman)
so what is he trying to say here? that a madman would believe such a thing? unlikely, but a religious man may take this meaning...
I believe personally that he is trying to show us that we need not adopt nihilism in this secular world we live in. Morality need not come from religious mens preaching, but from our own collective definition of morality. he suggested such things as the eternal return as a viable morality system whith which to maintain a sense of order in this secular world.
i wish i could explain this better, but its late & im trying to write a moral philosophy essay.

i'll just end with this abstract from an essay on Nietzsche I wrote last term;

When Nietzsche says 'God is dead', he is not stating 'God is physically dead'; he is saying that God no longer is relavent, nor should he be used as a basis for moral code. However, this is where it gets slightly confusing for people when they read his work. They believe if you take away God as a morality measurer, because the majority does not believe in God anymore, you arrive at Nihilism. This is not what Nietzsche was hoping to achieve. The loss of an absolute basis formorality does not, for Nietszche automatically arrive at Nihilis, although he recognises the crisis which the death of God represents for existing moral considerations, because "When one gives up the Christian faith, one pulls the right to Christian morality out from under one's feet. This morality is by no means self-evident.... By breaking one main concept out of Christianity, the faith in God, one breaks the whole: nothing necessary remains in one's hands."(Twilight of the Idols: sect. 5) This is why Nietzsche has written the words "God is dead" being spoke by madman. The madman runs into the market square screaming that he is looking for God, but he can't find him. No one understands what he is trying to say. It then dawns on the madman that God is dead, & 'we' have killed him. (cf. The Gay Science: sect. 125) The madman is mainly speaking to Athiests when he is shouting at people in the market place; the problem with Nihilism is it is hard to retain any system of values in the absence of a divine order. What Nietzsche wanted people to do, after they regect Religious morality, is reevaluate their basis for human morality, & arrive at an etical system based purely on human values, with which one can make a judgement for morality, not involving God or any higher cosmic order. We are own own authority, & need to make our own values. I think in this instance then one can safely say Nietzsche is an affirmative philosopher, as it appears that he wants to regect Nihilism as the only result of the regection of a cosmic order, despite its simplicty, in favour a more positive outlook on morality. An philsopher who is not affirmative would not take steps, after this regection of God, to rebuild any meaning to life. They would be happier to exist within Nihilism.

But just remember, I believe Nietzsche wasn't a Nihilist... and I'm not alone in that belief.

hope that helped.

the good thing about god is that it teaches teamwork .
communism works the same way but need the barrel of a gun to make the point in the real world.

There is just a little more: Nietzsche referred to the anthropomorphic God of religion. That's the one he said died in 1900. I agree with him.

Not quite. It's more that science and rationality has "killed" God. Society's focus has swung between the extremes of science and of spirituality for centuries (Medieval to the Enlightenment to Romanticism...).

This has Nietzsche's actual words (translated into English) that caused all the hullaballoo, and a commentary. Looks pretty good:

http://www.age-of-the-sage.org/philosoph...