Key Arguments

• The state lies that it is the people, whereas peoples were created by creators who hung faith and love over them, serving life.
• Those who set up the state are annihilators who ensnare the many, hanging over them a sword and innumerable desires.
• Where a people still exists, it hates the state as an evil eye and a sin against its customs and rights.
• Each people speaks its own tongue of good and evil, but the state lies in all tongues of good and evil and steals whatever it has.
• Everything about the state is false—its teeth, snarl, and entrails—signifying systemic falsity rather than contingent corruption.
• The state causes a confusion of the language of good and evil, a sign that indicates the will to death and beckons preachers of death.
• The state was invented for the ‘far too many’ (the superfluous), enticing, devouring, and endlessly chewing them up.

Source Quotes

Now open your ears for me, for now I say to you my word about the death of peoples. State is the name for the coldest of all cold monsters. Coldly it tells lies; and this lie crawls out of its mouth: ‘I, the state, am the people.’ That is a lie!

That is a lie! Creators it was who created peoples and hung a faith and a love over them: thus they served the cause of life. Annihilators are they who set up snares for the many and call them a state: they hang a sword and a hundred desires over them all.

Creators it was who created peoples and hung a faith and a love over them: thus they served the cause of life. Annihilators are they who set up snares for the many and call them a state: they hang a sword and a hundred desires over them all. Where a people still exists, it does not understand the state and hates it as an evil eye and a sin against customs and rights.

Where a people still exists, it does not understand the state and hates it as an evil eye and a sin against customs and rights. This sign I give to you: every people speaks its own tongue of good and evil: this the neighbour does not understand. It has invented its own language of customs and rights.

It has invented its own language of customs and rights. But the state lies in all the tongues of good and evil; and whatever it talks about, it lies—and whatever it has, it has stolen. Everything about it is false; it bites with stolen teeth, and it snarls.

But the state lies in all the tongues of good and evil; and whatever it talks about, it lies—and whatever it has, it has stolen. Everything about it is false; it bites with stolen teeth, and it snarls. Even its very entrails are false. Confusion of the language of good and evil: this sign I give you as a sign of the state.

Even its very entrails are false. Confusion of the language of good and evil: this sign I give you as a sign of the state. Verily, the will to death is what this sign signifies! Verily, it beckons to the preachers of death!

Key Concepts

• State is the name for the coldest of all cold monsters. Coldly it tells lies; and this lie crawls out of its mouth: ‘I, the state, am the people.’
• Creators it was who created peoples and hung a faith and a love over them: thus they served the cause of life.
• Annihilators are they who set up snares for the many and call them a state: they hang a sword and a hundred desires over them all.
• every people speaks its own tongue of good and evil
• the state lies in all the tongues of good and evil; and whatever it talks about, it lies—and whatever it has, it has stolen.
• Everything about it is false; it bites with stolen teeth, and it snarls. Even its very entrails are false.
• Confusion of the language of good and evil: this sign I give you as a sign of the state. Verily, the will to death is what this sign signifies!

Context

Opening of ‘On the New Idol’: Zarathustra contrasts living peoples with states, indicting the state as a nihilistic, mendacious construct that parasitizes creators and peoples.

Perspectives

Nietzsche

Affirms as a genealogical-political critique: the modern state (especially mass-democratic or statist-national formations) appropriates the aura of ‘the people’ while enforcing herd values, homogenizing moral languages, and advancing a nihilistic will to nothingness; aligns with his suspicion of nationalism and statist culture.

Zarathustra

Warns disciples that the state is anti-life and anti-creation: avoid its lies and protect the distinct tongue of a people born from creators rather than bureaucratic idols.