The Imitation of Christ: The Gospel Narrative and a Nietzschean Interpretation

“Who was Jesus?” Answering this question is not easy. It is as if Jesus, by fulfilling his own promise that “I have come to bring fire on the earth,” has cast a fire into the world whose flames consume the tongue, just like any other earthly phenomenon. Perhaps this is why Karl Jaspers, the twentieth-century German philosopher, when he wishes to speak of Jesus, prefers to say “who Jesus was not” rather than directly stating “who Jesus was.” In Jaspers’s view, Jesus “was not a philosopher who possessed a systematic thought and organized his beliefs within an intellectual apparatus. He was not a social reformer who had a program of action for his goals, nor a political man who wanted to transform and rebuild the country. Jesus did not baptize; just as he founded no organization, no nation, and no church. He was not a genius; one could even say he was not a hero.”

The Imitation of Christ: The Gospel Narrative and a Nietzschean Interpretation (On the Occasion of the New Year)

Glad tidings, O heart, that a Christ-like breath is coming, From whose sweet breezes the scent of someone is coming. (Hafez)

“Who was Jesus?” Answering this question is not easy. It is as if Jesus, by fulfilling his own promise that “I have come to bring fire on the earth,” has cast a fire into the world whose flames consume the tongue, just like any other earthly phenomenon. Perhaps this is why Karl Jaspers, the twentieth-century German philosopher, when he wishes to speak of Jesus, prefers to say “who Jesus was not” rather than directly stating “who Jesus was.” In Jaspers’s view, Jesus “was not a philosopher who possessed a systematic thought and organized his beliefs within an intellectual apparatus. He was not a social reformer who had a program of action for his goals, nor a political man who wanted to transform and rebuild the country. Jesus did not baptize; just as he founded no organization, no nation, and no church. He was not a genius; one could even say he was not a hero.”

But perhaps reflecting on the question, “To whom did Jesus turn his face?” can also bring us closer to the horizon of his life and illuminate our reflections on the initial question.

The Gospel Narrative:

According to the Gospel narrative, Jesus turned his face to all people and was ever intent on kindling a light in the path of whoever he found lost and bewildered, and making more aflame the soul he saw enamored and entranced by Truth and reality.

The physician of love has the breath of Christ and is compassionate, but When he sees no pain in you, whom shall he heal? (Hafez)

Jesus was a sky whose sun shone equally on the good and the bad, and whose rain also fell upon all, the just and the unjust. In the language of Rumi, he was a sea that gifted rain to the distant and sent pearls of greeting to the near. And in the beautiful expression of Oscar Wilde, “he made all of humanity his bride and, upon the cross of suffering and service, signed the covenant of his marriage with that bride, and he will take his bride with him to paradise.” (From the translator’s introduction to the book “The Other Wise Man”; Henry van Dyke; translated by Hossein Elahi Ghomshei)

His manner of love was such that he kept company with those like tax collectors and prostitutes whom society scorned, and he went to those who had a pitiable life in the community. He held the poor, the degraded, and the sinners in higher esteem, because he believed their souls had softened and the path to accepting the new faith had become smoother for them. Jesus said, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick,” and “I have come to call not the righteous, but sinners.”

Paradise is our lot, O knower of God, go away, For sinners are deserving of grace. (Hafez)

در مقابل، او از كسانی دوری می‌گُزید كه خود را ايمن می‌دیدند و به توانایی‌ها و دارايی‌هایشان دل بسته بودند. «توانگران را دشوار است كه به ملكوت خدا درآيند». «باجگيران و روسپيان پيش از شما به ملكوتِ خدا درخواهند آمد». از نظر او، آن باجگير كه يارای چشم به آسمان انداختن ندارد، بلكه بر سينهٔ خود زده و می‌گويد که خدايا بر منِ گنهكار رحم كن، بخشوده و رستگار می‌شود؛ اما آن فريسی (روحانی يهودی) كه خدا را نيايش كرده و می‌گويد که خدايا تو را سپاس می‌گويم كه نه چون ديگر مردمان دزد و ظالم و زناكارم و نه چون اين باجگير، از لطف و رستگاری محروم می‌مانَد. باری، به جز عیسی، هیچ‌كس روسپی‌ای را سر یک سجّاده جدّی نگرفت!

عيسی را منادیِ دين انسانی و انسان‌دوستانه می‌دانیم؛ دينی كه برای انسان است، نه انسان برای آن. دينی كه از درونِ آدمی نشأت می‌گيرد و نه آنكه از بيرون بر او تحميل و حُقنه شود و توانِ تفکّر و امکانِ تفرّد او را نادیده بگیرد و مُثله کند. عیسی می‌گفت که جان بايد پاك باشد و آنگاه «هر چيز برای پاكان پاك است». «نه آن چيز كه به دهان فرومی‌رود، بلكه آن چيز كه از دهان بيرون می‌آيد، انسان را ناپاك می‌گرداند». «نمی‌ارزد جهانی را بدست آوری، ولی، در مقابل، تكّه‌ای از روحِ خود را از دست بدهی» و به نقل از ارمیای نبی می‌گفت که «خداوند قانونِ خود را در دلِ آدمی نوشته است». عيسی به روحانیونی که بنا به شریعت یهود او را از کار در روز شنبه نهی می‌کردند، می‌گفت که «شنبه (سبت) برای آدمی مقرّر شده است و نه آدمی برای شنبه».

عيسی در واپسین دم حیاتش نیز از خود تصويری انسانی، زیاده انسانی، به جاگذاشت. زندگی تراژيك عيسی با چنين كلماتِ تکان‌دهنده‌ای بر صليب به پايان بُرده می‌شود: «خدايا! خدايا! چرا مرا وانهاده‌ای!» (ايلي ايلي لِمَ سَبقتني!)

"و البته پس از آن، با افزودن این جملهٔ رازآلود که «کار به انجام رسید»، تاریخی را که با انتساب به او «مسیحیّت» خوانده می‌شود آغاز کرد."

تفسیرِ نیچه‌ای:

آیا نباید دربارهٔ خود عیسی هم چنین گفت که «عیسی برای انسان است و نه انسان برای عیسی»؟ اگر چنین است، آنگاه باید پرسید آیا با نظر به امکاناتِ متنی که به طور خاصّ انجیل‌ها در اختیار ما می‌نهند، و همچنین شواهدِ برون‌متنی، اساساً، چنین تعبیری از عیسی ممکن است؟ آیا آیاتی مانند «هر كه صليب خود را برنگيرد و در پیِ من نیاید شایستهٔ من نیست»، به صراحت، امکانِ چنین تعبیری را مُنتفی نمی‌سازند؟

می‌دانیم برداشت عادّی و سنّتی از این آیه و سخنِ عیسی، و اساساً درکِ تاریخی و رسمی، در تاریخِ مسیحیّت، و نزد تمام فرقه و مذاهب آن، چنین بوده است که عیسی و رستگاری از طریق او، تنها شایستهٔ کسی است که نه پیروِ خویش، بلکه پیروِ عیسی است؛ یعنی دقیقاً همان کسی که به معنای متداول و متعارف، یک «مسیحی باایمان» خوانده می‌شود. حال، اگرچه تردید نداریم که تعبیرِ رسمی و تاریخی چنین بوده، اما آیا این توجیه موجّهی است که این تعبیر، لزوماً تنها تعبیرِ ممکن دانسته شود؛ و یا اینکه نهایتاً، به مثابهٔ بهترین و درست‌ترین تعبیرِ ممکن انگاشته شود که بر همهٔ تعابیرِ دیگر ترجیح دارد؟ می‌توان گفت نیچه از ما می‌خواهد که به این تعبیرِ رسمی و تاریخی سوء‌ظن داشته باشیم.

تنها کافی است دربارهٔ مفهومِ «پیروی» کمی تعمّق کنیم تا احیاناً معنایی ژرف‌تر از معانی متداول از آن را دریابیم و آنگاه از رهگذر آن، تعبیری شایسته‌تر از مسیحی بودن و پیروی از عیسی (اقتدا به مسیح) برایمان ممکن شود. آیا مسیحی راستین یا پیروِ حقیقی عیسی، کسی است که به اختیارِ خویش خود را مسلوب‌الاختیار می‌کند، خویشتنِ خویش را فراموش می‌کند، و در پیِ عیسی می‌رود؛ یا برعکس، کسی است که به سانِ عیسی خود را به عهده می‌گیرد و به هیچ روی اختیارش را به دیگری وانمی‌گذارد؟ آیا نباید گفت مسیحی حقیقی کسی است که صلیبش را برگیرد و در پیِ خویش رَوَد؛ و نه در پیِ هیچکس دیگر، و نه حتّی مسیح؟ به تعبیرِ مونتنی: «آنکس که از دیگری پیروی می‌کند، از هیچکس پیروی نمی‌کند؛ او هیچ چیز نمی‌یابد، زیرا هیچ چیزی را نمی‌جوید!»

It could be said, in Nietzsche's view, the true Christian is one who is not a "Christian"! For although "Jesus belongs only to the one who follows him," yet since the necessity of "following oneself" is the true message of Jesus's life and the truth of all his messages, then it must be said: "Only the one who follows himself follows Jesus." Now the meaning of Nietzsche's statement in The Antichrist can also be understood: "There was only one Christian, and he died on the cross."

In Nietzsche's view, the true message of Christ's life, as an "individual" who shattered many idols and taboos in the Jewish tradition and law of his time, was that each and every human being should, like him, live with dignity and authenticity, flourish their own truth and inwardness, and transform themselves into an "individual." But alas, the herd of humanity, heedless of such a message, fearful and fleeing from the perils of the byways of thought and individuation, fled into a decadent and comfort-seeking interpretation. Indeed, thought and individuation require daring and courage, and human wretchedness and cowardice are such that one prefers to live slothfully and ignorantly rather than freely and consciously, and by one's own choice selects bondage, self-alienation, and every form of baseness for oneself, and even makes a virtue of one's own captivity and abjection.

It is to avoid such consequences that Nietzsche's Zarathustra prefers to be called a "poet," a "jester," and "one banished from all truth" rather than a "saint." As he warns: "You had not yet sought yourselves when you found me... Now I bid you lose me and find yourselves; and only when you have all denied me will I return to you." Nietzsche's Zarathustra, paradoxically, describes the possibility of following oneself thus: "Only the one who honestly follows himself will, slowly, slowly, follow me."

Therefore, the intellectual horizon of someone like Nietzsche, who calls himself the Antichrist, will help us more in understanding Jesus; even far more than a disciple of Jesus! As if sometimes only one who is so "distant" can be very close! Now it is not difficult to understand why, when that official meaning of "the imitation of Christ" is at issue, someone like Nietzsche, who finds within himself a purer meaning of this concept, is compelled to call himself the Antichrist, and, in Saadi's phrase, to speak a little roughly so that perhaps others might understand him a little rightly. It can be said that a thinker like Nietzsche has no antagonism toward Christ himself; he can even praise him as one of the complete and perfect manifestations and instances of achieved individuality. For Nietzsche, the problem lies not in Christ, but in Christianity and its conception of Christ and the imitation of Christ, which has made a new idol out of an iconoclast.

Now we understand why, in Jaspers's view, Christ as narrated by Nietzsche "remains a power in opposition to the Christianity that resulted from him; an explosive material that has repeatedly come close to shattering the worldly and petrified forms of the church."

Footnote: It could be said that "antagonism" or "absolute opposition" to anything is itself a form of hidden imitation of that very thing. In other words, "antagonism" toward an idea or phenomenon ultimately leads to the defeat of its own purpose and, instead of transcending it, becomes entangled and identified with it! As Lichtenberg says: "To be completely opposed to something is to imitate it."

In other words, the problem lies in the human being who constantly shirks the responsibility of taking charge of oneself, which is accompanied by the suffering of concrete individuation and critical thinking. In this sense, humans often prefer to live a comfort-seeking life by accepting and absolutely following the nearest models in their environment, and ultimately, when those same models engage them with fundamental challenges and questions beyond their capacity, they turn to absolute antagonism and opposition to them, and this time, with a ridiculous display of freedom, continue their self-alienation and self-deception in a deeper way. But liberation from any destructive idea or phenomenon is not possible through a passive (emotional and impulsive) reaction, and even revolutionary efforts and uprisings, if not accompanied by a critical (creative and reflective) action, will only be a desperate struggle that both wastes our time and troubles ourselves and everyone else.

In any case, any revolutionary resolve and action aimed at changing the world and humanity, without a prior radical change in our interpretation of the world and humanity, will only serve to consolidate and reinforce the status quo, and even reproduce it at a more stable and destructive level. Iron wills clad in armor, in the absence of luminous and illuminating ideas, even if accompanied by a thousand good intentions, will not only fail to lead anywhere, but will also pave the roads to hell.

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The Imitation of Christ: The Gospel Narrative and a Nietzschean Interpretation

Author: Masoud Zanjani

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