If religion has set up the proposition that we are sinners altogether, I set over
\nagainst it the other: we are perfect altogether! For we are, every moment, all that
\nwe can be; and we never need be more. Since no defect cleaves to us, sin has no
\nmeaning either. Show me a sinner in the world still, if no one any longer needs to
\ndo what suits a superior! If I only need do what suits myself, I am no sinner if I do
\nnot do what suits myself, as I do not injure in myself a \u201choly one\u201d; if, on the other
\nhand, I am to be pious, then I must do what suits God; if I am to act humanly, I
\nmust do what suits the essence of man, the idea of mankind, etc. What religion
\ncalls the \u201csinner,\u201d humanitarianism calls the \u201cegoist.\u201d But, once more: if I need not
\ndo what suits any other, is the \u201cegoist,\u201d in whom humanitarianism has borne to
\nitself a new-fangled devil, anything more than a piece of nonsense? The egoist,
\nbefore whom the humane shudder, is a spook as much as the devil is: he exists
\nonly as a bogie and phantasm in their brain. If they were not unsophisticatedly
\ndrifting back and forth in the antediluvian opposition of good and evil, to which
\nthey have given the modern names of \u201chuman\u201d and \u201cegoistic,\u201d they would not
\nhave freshened up the hoary \u201csinner\u201d into an \u201cegoist\u201d either, and put a new patch
\non an old garment. But they could not do otherwise, for they hold it for their task
\nto be \u201cmen.\u201d They are rid of the Good One; good is left!<\/p>\n
We are perfect altogether, and on the whole earth there is not one man who is
\na sinner! There are crazy people who imagine that they are God the Father, God
\nthe Son, or the man in the moon, and so too the world swarms with fools who
\nseem to themselves to be sinners; but, as the former are not the man in the moon,
\nso the latter are \u2014 not sinners. Their sin is imaginary.<\/p>\n
Yet, it is insidiously objected, their craziness or their possessedness is at least
\ntheir sin. Their possessedness is nothing but what they \u2014 could achieve, the
\nresult of their development, just as Luther\u2019s faith in the Bible was all that he was
\n\u2014 competent to make out. The one brings himself into the madhouse with his
\ndevelopment, the other brings himself therewith into the Pantheon and to the
\nloss of \u2014Valhalla.<\/p>\n
There is no sinner and no sinful egoism!<\/p>\n
Get away from me with your \u201cphilanthropy\u201d! Creep in, you philanthropist,
\ninto the \u201cdens of vice,\u201d linger awhile in the throng of the great city: will you
\nnot everywhere find sin, and sin, and again sin? Will you not wail over corrupt
\nhumanity, not lament at the monstrous egoism? Will you see a rich man without
\nfinding him pitiless and \u201cegoistic?\u201d Perhaps you already call yourself an atheist,
\nbut you remain true to the Christian feeling that a camel will sooner go through a
\nneedle\u2019s eye than a rich man not be an \u201cun-man.\u201d How many do you see anyhow
\nthat you would not throw into the \u201cegoistic mass\u201d? What, therefore, has your
\nphilanthropy [love of man] found? Nothing but unlovable men! And where do
\nthey all come from? From you, from your philanthropy! You brought the sinner
\nwith you in your head, therefore you found him, therefore you inserted him
\neverywhere. Do not call men sinners, and they are not: you alone are the creator
\nof sinners; you, who fancy that you love men, are the very one to throw them into
\nthe mire of sin, the very one to divide them into vicious and virtuous, into men
\nand un-men, the very one to befoul them with the slaver of your possessedness;
\nfor you love not men, but man. But I tell you, you have never seen a sinner, you
\nhave only \u2014 dreamed of him.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
If religion has set up the proposition that we are sinners altogether, I set over against it the other: we are perfect altogether! For we are, every moment, all that we can be; and we never need be more. Since no defect cleaves to us, sin has no meaning either. Show me a sinner in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2408","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.peoplevstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2408","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.peoplevstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.peoplevstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.peoplevstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.peoplevstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2408"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.peoplevstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2408\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2409,"href":"https:\/\/www.peoplevstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2408\/revisions\/2409"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.peoplevstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2408"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.peoplevstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2408"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.peoplevstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2408"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}