Key Arguments

• The animals swarm him like a 'cloud of love', not hostility, indicating affirmation and kinship.
• Zarathustra recognizes and names the sign, his heart transformed amid tears, indicating existential confirmation.
• The lion’s tender behavior with the doves dramatizes a reconciliation of opposites (power/innocence) consistent with his doctrine.
• The lion’s roar drives away the 'superior humans', contrasting true companions (animals/sign) with false ones.

Source Quotes

‘But my rightful humans are still lacking!’– Thus spoke Zarathustra; but then it happened that he suddenly heard himself surrounded as by innumerable birds swarming and fluttering around– and the whirring of so many wings and the thronging about his head was so great that he closed his eyes. And verily, like a cloud it descended upon him, like a cloud of arrows that shakes itself out over some new enemy. But behold, here it was a cloud of love, and over a new friend. ‘What is happening to me?’ thought Zarathustra in his astonished heart, and let himself down slowly onto the large rock that lay beside the exit of his cave.

‘What is happening to me?’ thought Zarathustra in his astonished heart, and let himself down slowly onto the large rock that lay beside the exit of his cave. But as he felt with his hands around and above and beneath him, warding off the affectionate birds, behold, something even stranger happened to him: for he found himself with his hand unwittingly in a thick warm mane; and at the same time a roar came forth before him– a soft long lion’s roar. ‘ ,’ said Zarathustra and his heart was transformed. And in truth, as it became light before him, there lay at his feet a powerful yellow animal and nestled its head against his knee and did not want to leave him for love, and it was like a dog that finds his former master again.

But the doves were no less eager in their love than the lion; and every time a dove flitted by the lion’s nose, the lion shook his head and was amazed and laughed. To all this Zarathustra said only one thing: ‘ ’– then he fell completely silent. But his heart was loosened, and from his eyes tears dripped down and fell upon his hands. And he no longer heeded anything and sat there, unmoving and without warding off the animals any more.

And in truth, as it became light before him, there lay at his feet a powerful yellow animal and nestled its head against his knee and did not want to leave him for love, and it was like a dog that finds his former master again. But the doves were no less eager in their love than the lion; and every time a dove flitted by the lion’s nose, the lion shook his head and was amazed and laughed. To all this Zarathustra said only one thing: ‘ ’– then he fell completely silent.

Am I striving then for I am striving for my ‘Well then! The lion came, my children are near, Zarathustra has ripened, my hour has come:– ‘This is morning, day is beginning: ’— Thus spoke Zarathustra and left his cave, glowing and strong, like a morning sun coming out of dark mountains.

Key Concepts

• like a cloud it descended upon him, like a cloud of arrows that shakes itself out over some new enemy. But behold, here it was a cloud of love, and over a new friend.
• for he found himself with his hand unwittingly in a thick warm mane; and at the same time a roar came forth before him– a soft long lion’s roar.
• ’– then he fell completely silent. But his heart was loosened, and from his eyes tears dripped down and fell upon his hands.
• But the doves were no less eager in their love than the lion; and every time a dove flitted by the lion’s nose, the lion shook his head and was amazed and laughed.
• The lion came, my children are near, Zarathustra has ripened, my hour has come:– ‘This is morning, day is beginning: ’— Thus spoke Zarathustra and left his cave, glowing and strong, like a morning sun coming out of dark mountains.

Context

Immediately after he greets the morning, Zarathustra is surrounded by doves and a lion; he recognizes this as the sign that inaugurates his day.

Perspectives

Nietzsche

Symbolic consummation: lion (strength, sovereignty) with doves (innocence, love) embodies the pathos of distance fused with overflowing affirmation; a signal of ripeness.

Zarathustra

The sign I awaited arrives as love and strength conjoined; my heart knows it—my hour has come.