Christian God

Nietzsche claimed that the Christian religion and its morality are based on imaginary fictions. However, "... this entire fictional world has its roots in hatred of the natural (—actuality!—)." Such hatred results from Christianity's decadence, which is reflected by the Christian conception of God. If Christians were naturally strong and confident, they would have a God who is destructive as well as good. A God who counsels love of enemy, as well as of friend, is a God of a people who feel themselves as perishing and without hope. Weak, decadent, and sick people, whose will to power has declined, will give themselves a God who is purely good, according to Nietzsche. They will then attribute evil and deviltry to their masters' God. Metaphysicians have eliminated the attributes of virile (männlichen) virtues, such as strength, bravery, and pride, from the concept of God. As a result, it deteriorated into an insubstantial ideal, pure spirit, Absolute, or thing in itself. Nietzsche opposed the Christian concept of God because it "... degenerated into the contradiction of life, instead of being life's transfiguration and eternal 'Yes'!"The Antichrist, § 18 The Christian God is a "... declaration of war against life, against nature, against the will to live!" This God is a "... formula for every slander against 'this world,' for every lie about the 'beyond'!" Recalling Schopenhauer's description of the denial of the will to live and the subsequent empty nothingness, Nietzsche proclaimed that the Christian God is "... the sanctification of the will to nothingness!"
Nietzsche criticized the "strong races of northern Europe" for accepting the Christian God and not creating a new god of their own. "Almost two thousand years — and not a single new god!"The Antichrist, § 19 He maintained that the traditional Christian God of "monotono-theism" (Monotono–Theismus) supports "... all the instincts of decadence, all cowardices and weariness of the soul ... ."