Religious Imagination and Language in Emerson and Nietzsche (Studies in Literature and Religion)
Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
Published: June 1994
Language: eng
Format: Hardcover
Number of pages: 133
ISBN-13: 9780312120221
Subjects: Emerson, Ralph Waldo, 1803-1882; Nietzsche, Friedrich Wilhelm; American and German; German and American; History and criticism; Literature, Comparative; Religious literature; Religion
Description: This book considers Emerson and Nietzsche primarily as post-theological religious thinkers and treats their understanding of the nature of religion and language. It suggests that both thinkers articulated a deeply felt concern about the inadequacy of traditional concepts of God, religion and religious experience. As part of the process of reassessing received 'truth' they transformed theology into anthropology and privileged immanence over transcendence.

As a result of this paradigm shift, religion becomes a manifestation of the creative will engaged in the process of meaning-making. The critique of Christianity and rejection of transcendence which allowed these thinkers to recover the divine within the individual is informed by their emphasis on the humanity of Jesus. Emerson described Jesus as 'the Sayer'; Nietzsche described him as 'the Evangel'. The idea of Jesus as man is also the key to their interpretation of language.

The Word inscribed in the world becomes the condition for the possibility of meaning.