theme Zarathustra's relation to followers: seeking companions, bidding them deny him, returning only when they have all denied him.
Long slept Zarathustra; and not only the rosy dawn passed over his head, but also the morning. At last, however, his eyes opened, and amazedly he gazed into the forest and the stillness, amazedly he gazed into himself.…
He resolves to speak to companions and not to the people.
Read in the book →People commended unto Zarathustra a wise man, as one who could discourse well about sleep and virtue: greatly was he honoured and rewarded for it, and all the youths sat before his chair. To him went Zarathustra, and…
Zarathustra sits among the youths as a listener before a honoured teacher of virtue, the opposite of his own way of teaching.
Read in the book →I am a railing alongside the torrent; whoever is able to grasp me may grasp me! Your crutch, however, I am not.—
Zarathustra offers support only to those who can grasp it and refuses to be a crutch.
Read in the book →That your dying may not be a reproach to man and the earth, my friends: that do I solicit from the honey of your soul. In your dying shall your spirit and your virtue still shine like an evening after-glow around the…
He asks the friends to inherit his goal and tarries a little longer for them.
Read in the book →I now go alone, my disciples! Ye also now go away, and alone! So will I have it. Verily, I advise you: depart from me, and guard yourselves against Zarathustra! And better still: be ashamed of him! Perhaps he hath…
Zarathustra bids the disciples leave him, be ashamed of him, and deny him before he returns.
Read in the book →Now do I bid you lose me and find yourselves; and only when ye have all denied me, will I return unto you.
The core formula of the teacher's relation to his followers.
Read in the book →Why did I startle in my dream, so that I awoke? Did not a child come to me, carrying a mirror? “O Zarathustra”—said the child unto me—“look at thyself in the mirror!” But when I looked into the mirror, I shrieked, and…
The dream shows his teaching distorted by enemies, so that his dearest ones blush for his gifts and he must seek his lost friends.
Read in the book →Ah, that my lioness wisdom would learn to roar softly!
He hopes to lure his friends back and to give his wisdom a place in their hearts.
Read in the book →The figs fall from the trees, they are good and sweet; and in falling the red skins of them break. A north wind am I to ripe figs. Thus, like figs, do these doctrines fall for you, my friends: imbibe now their juice and…
He offers his doctrines to his friends as ripe figs to be tasted, a gift of overflow.
Read in the book →“Since I have known the body better”—said Zarathustra to one of his disciples—“the spirit hath only been to me symbolically spirit; and all the ‘imperishable’—that is also but a simile.” “So have I heard thee say once…
Zarathustra refuses to be taken on trust and declines belief, even in himself.
Read in the book →Thus did Zarathustra relate his dream, and then was silent: for as yet he knew not the interpretation thereof. But the disciple whom he loved most arose quickly, seized Zarathustra’s hand, and said: “Thy life itself…
The favourite disciple tries to console and flatter his teacher with an interpretation.
Read in the book →Thus spake the disciple; and all the others then thronged around Zarathustra, grasped him by the hands, and tried to persuade him to leave his bed and his sadness, and return unto them. Zarathustra, however, sat upright…
He shakes his head at the interpreter, doubting the easy interpretation.
Read in the book →When Zarathustra had spoken thus unto the hunchback, and unto those of whom the hunchback was the mouthpiece and advocate, then did he turn to his disciples in profound dejection, and said: Verily, my friends, I walk…
He turns in dejection to his disciples and asks who he is to them.
Read in the book →—But at this point in his discourse it chanced that Zarathustra suddenly paused, and looked like a person in the greatest alarm. With terror in his eyes did he gaze on his disciples; his glances pierced as with arrows…
The hunchback notices that Zarathustra speaks differently to disciples, to cripples, and to himself.
Read in the book →What hath happened unto me, my friends? Ye see me troubled, driven forth, unwillingly obedient, ready to go—alas, to go away from YOU! Yea, once more must Zarathustra retire to his solitude: but unjoyously this time…
He owes his friends a full account so that their hearts do not harden against his sudden departure.
Read in the book →Do ye know the terror of him who falleth asleep?— To the very toes he is terrified, because the ground giveth way under him, and the dream beginneth. This do I speak unto you in parable. Yesterday at the stillest hour…
The voice demands that Zarathustra speak his word and succumb, and he refuses, saying he is unworthy and awaits a worthier one.
Read in the book →Then was there again spoken unto me without voice: “What matter about their mockery! Thou art one who hast unlearned to obey: now shalt thou command! Knowest thou not who is most needed by all? He who commandeth great…
He is to go ahead as the shadow of what is to come, leading by commanding.
Read in the book →—Now have ye heard all, and why I have to return into my solitude. Nothing have I kept hidden from you, my friends. But even this have ye heard from me, WHO is still the most reserved of men—and will be so! Ah, my…
Zarathustra parts from his friends, feeling he has more to give them that he cannot yet give.
Read in the book →Companions did the creating one once seek, and children of HIS hope: and lo, it turned out that he could not find them, except he himself should first create them. Thus am I in the midst of my work, to my children…
He will set each follower apart to be tested and recognised as a fellow-creator who writes his will on the tables.
Read in the book →But why talk I, when no one hath MINE ears! It is still an hour too early for me here. Mine own forerunner am I among this people, mine own cockcrow in dark lanes. But THEIR hour cometh! And there cometh also mine!…
No one has his ears yet, so he is his own forerunner and cockcrow.
Read in the book →Ah, lieth everything already withered and grey which but lately stood green and many-hued on this meadow! And how much honey of hope did I carry hence into my beehives! Those young hearts have already all become old—and…
Zarathustra mourns the young followers who have fallen away, and learns that his believers are not to be trusted with his heart.
Read in the book →Him who is of my type, will also the experiences of my type meet on the way: so that his first companions must be corpses and buffoons. His second companions, however—they will call themselves his BELIEVERS,—will be a…
The seeker's companions are first corpses and buffoons, then believers, to whom he must not bind his heart.
Read in the book →O lonesomeness! My HOME, lonesomeness! Too long have I lived wildly in wild remoteness, to return to thee without tears! Now threaten me with the finger as mothers threaten; now smile upon me as mothers smile; now say…
Among men he stays wild and strange, even to those who love him, because they want to be indulged.
Read in the book →Especially the human world, the human sea:—towards IT do I now throw out my golden angle-rod and say: Open up, thou human abyss! Open up, and throw unto me thy fish and shining crabs! With my best bait shall I allure to…
He casts his happiness as bait to draw the strangest men up to his height, as a trainer and drawer upward.
Read in the book →Here laugh, laugh, my hearty, healthy wickedness! From high mountains cast down thy glittering scorn-laughter! Allure for me with thy glittering the finest human fish! And whatever belongeth unto ME in all seas, my…
He casts his fishing-hook and bait of happiness to catch what belongs to him in all the seas.
Read in the book →When however the trodden one had heard the name of Zarathustra he was transformed. “What happeneth unto me!” he exclaimed, “WHO preoccupieth me so much in this life as this one man, namely Zarathustra, and that one…
The man learns who Zarathustra is and greets him with reverence, as the teacher who preoccupies him most.
Read in the book →—“Well!” said Zarathustra, “thou shouldst also see MINE animals, mine eagle and my serpent,—their like do not at present exist on earth. Behold, thither leadeth the way to my cave: be to-night its guest. And talk to…
Zarathustra sends the admiring beggar off, refusing his flattery.
Read in the book →Thus spake the king on the right, and seized the hand of Zarathustra in order to kiss it; but Zarathustra checked his veneration, and stepped back frightened, fleeing as it were, silently and suddenly into the far…
Zarathustra refuses the king's attempt to kiss his hand and rejects reverence.
Read in the book →LAUGHING LIONS must come!
He will not descend for the last time without those he waits for.
Read in the book →I am a law only for mine own; I am not a law for all.
Zarathustra sets the terms for those who belong to him: strong, light-footed and joyous, not a universal law.
Read in the book →In the morning, however, after this night, Zarathustra jumped up from his couch, and, having girded his loins, he came out of his cave glowing and strong, like a morning sun coming out of gloomy mountains. “Thou great…
He still lacks 'proper men' and waits for companions who can hear his morning.
Read in the book →Thus spake Zarathustra; then, however, it happened that all on a sudden he became aware that he was flocked around and fluttered around, as if by innumerable birds,—the whizzing of so many wings, however, and the…
The lion and doves are the sign that his true children, the companions he sought, are near.
Read in the book →“MY CHILDREN ARE NIGH, MY CHILDREN”—, then he became quite mute.
The long-sought companions are announced as his children.
Read in the book →Brandes argues that the young person who would become himself needs an educator who liberates rather than imposes dogma, contrasting this with Kierkegaard, whose call to become an individual still ended in a 'Thou shalt believe' and the return of the herd.
The true educator only frees the pupil to become himself, setting no fixed goal.
Brandes insists he was never Nietzsche's adherent: mature readers study Nietzsche not to adopt or propagate his opinions but as sceptics in search of a man.
Models a reading of Nietzsche that refuses discipleship.
Ludovici says that the Nietzschean ideal is the man of overflowing strength who must discharge it or perish, so that giving from overflow is the only charity Nietzsche recognises, and that the discourse urges disciples to become independent thinkers and find themselves before learning more from Zarathustra.
Reads section 3 as a call to disciples to find themselves first.
Ludovici reads 'The Child with the Mirror' as Nietzsche's grief at the misinterpretation of his writings, and says it hints that a creator of new values is most obstructed by language itself, whose words are stamped with the race's long-ruling values, hence the obscurity of original thinkers.
The teacher's doctrine distorted in the mirror of public opinion.
Ludovici reads 'The Stillest Hour' as an account of Nietzsche's inner struggle before resolving to reveal the more esoteric parts of his teaching, since the deepest feelings crave silence and are held sacred.
The teacher's reluctance to utter his deepest doctrine.
Ludovici holds that Zarathustra's greeting confirms his thesis that the philosophy aims to give higher men the great hope, but harshly: Nietzsche would be a hard bed to higher men, making them harder, not easing their way.
Zarathustra rebukes rather than indulges his guests.
This is an experiment in interactive reading, and in using AI to help you grow. Thus Spake Zarathustra is notoriously difficult for a modern reader; yet taken as a set of mental exercises, it is guaranteed to transform your thinking by the time you reach the end. Along the way you will have help from the companion, who is always beside the book.
Do you accept the challenge?
Nietzsche elsewhere
Nietzsche says that his name will recall an unprecedented crisis of conscience and a sentence passed on all that was hallowed; he is no founder of religion and wants no believers, would rather be a clown than a saint, and names the transvaluation of all values as mankind's greatest step toward coming to its senses, a contradiction that is nonetheless the reverse of a negative spirit.
He requires no believers and dreads being pronounced holy.