Blasphemy charge irrelevant: offence was deliberate

Let us set aside at the start that great host of critics whose chief objection to Nietzsche is that he is blasphemous, that his philosophy and his manner outrage the piety and prudery of the world. Of such sort are the pale parsons who arise in suburban pulpits to dispose of him in the half hour between the first and second lessons, as their predecessors of the 70's and 80's disposed of Darwin, Huxley and Spencer. Let them read their indictments and bring in their verdicts and pronounce their bitter sentences! The student of Nietzsche must perceive at once the irrelevance of that sort of criticism. It was the deliberate effort of the philosopher, from the very start of what he calls his tunnelling period, to provoke and deserve the accusation of sacrilege. In framing his accusations against Christian morality he tried to make them, not only persuasive and just, but also as offensive as possible. No man ever had more belief in the propagandist value of a succès de scandale. He tried his best to shock the guardians of the sacred vessels, to force upon them the burdens of an active defense, to bring them out into the open, to attract attention to the combat by accentuating its mere fuming and fury. If he succeeded in the effort, if he really outraged Christendom, then it is certainly absurd to bring forward that deliberate achievement as an exhibit against itself.