tion was with regard to the priest- and clergy-hating author ofrnThe Antichrist, he confessed that he had first stumbled on Nietzschernat the age of 16 and had been so enthralled by what hernread that he had remained fascinated ever since. “It’s easy,rnthough often useless, to argue with an ordinary atheist,” he explained.rn”But to tackle Nietzsche is an intellectual challenge.rnIndeed, it’s what I tell my students: no one is worthy of becomingrna theologian who has not met this challenge.”rnAs a special treat we were offered a bus ride to nearbyrnSchulpforte; the boarding school where Nietzsche (its 10,544thrnstudent) spent six studious years (1858-1864), most of them atrnthe head of his class. I would frankly have preferred to havernmade the four-kilometer pilgrimage on foot, as the young Fritzrnused to do, often coming out on Sunday as far as the midwayrnpoint of Almrich to meet his mother and his sister; but this wasrna guided tour, and had I trudged out alone, I would almost certainlyrnhave been denied admittance.rnOriginally a Cistercian monastery bearing the Latin name ofrnPorta coeU (Gate of Heaven), Pforta was transformed in 1543rninto a Lutheran Prinzenschule by the Prince-Elector Spritz ofrnSaxony, who had first sided with Emperor Charles V (thernCatholic “Defender of the Eaith”) and had then helped to defeatrnhim at Innsbruck, shortly before the convening of thernCouncil of Trent. In Nietzsche’s day, when it numbered 12 residentrnteachers and 180 boarders, it was generally regarded as thernforemost preparatory school for classical studies in Germany.rnTimes have changed, but not apparently the lofty ideals of itsrnfounders and successive rectors; for though it was recently expandedrnfrom 150 to 350 boarders—almost half of them are girlsrn. . . would Nietzsche have approved? I wonder—the presentrnheadmaster emphasized the fact that during their four years ofrnschooling every boarder must master four foreign languages, includingrnLatin. Tuition is free, now generously provided by thernLand of Sachsen-Anhalt. Greek is no longer compulsory,rnwhich I personally find a pity; but instruction in Hebrew isrnavailable for students particularly interested in biblical studies.rnInside the venerable walls we were soberly recalled to orderrnby a bust of Johann Gottlieb Fichte (a Pforta student from 1774rnto 1780), accompanied by the words: “Gross und glilckUcil warernder Meister, der alle seine Schiller grosser machen konnte als errnselbst war.” (“Great and happy would be the Master who couldrnmake his pupils greater than he himself was.”) One of thernhumblest and most moving exhortations to scholastic excellencernI have ever encountered.rnWe were led past an impressive photographic display of eminentrnPforta graduates—the poet Klopstoek, the historianrnLeopold von Ranke, the great classicist Ulrich von Wilamowitz-rnMoellendorff, author of a blistering critique of The Birthrnof Tragedy—into the old library. Its 80,000 volumes—includingrnpriceless first editions of works by Galileo and Copernicusrn—miraculously escaped the predatory ravages of Nazi “artrncollectors,” Soviet pillagers, and Marxist detesters of antiquity.rnStacked all the way to the ceiling on eight successive bookshelves,rnthe ancient tomes—many of them gratefully bequeathedrnby deceased graduates or teachers—^were quite visiblyrnpresent, even though “off-limits” to ordinary Pforta students,rnwho are offered a smaller “working library” of 30,000 books.rn(Incredible as it may sound, each Pfortensian is expected torn”consult” 4,000 different books during his or her four years ofrnschooling.)rnOn the eve of Nietzsche’s birthday anniversary, the symposium’srnprime mover, Professor Manfred Riedel, formcriy of Erlangenrnand now of Halle University, decided to stage an informalrnpress conference in an upper chamber of Naumburg’srnTown Hall. Some pipsqueak of a journalist had accused him ofrnbeing a fascist—for having dared to set up a Martin HeideggerrnGesellschaft in once East German Halle and to have compoundedrnthis “provocation” by now honoring Nietzsche.rnShort, balding, bespectacled, the smiling professor wanted thernhalf-dozen newshounds to know that, though he had used thernword Herrschaft (“rule” or “dominion”) and had spoken of hisrnUbermenschen as destined to become die Herrn der Welt (Lordsrnof the Worid), Nietzsche could not in any sense be regarded asrna pre- or proto-Nazi. I chimed in to say that Bismarck was onernof Nietzsche’s bites noires and that toward the end of his creativernlife he was thinking of launching one more thunderbolt,rnaimed this time at the Second (Wilhelmian) Reich. “Besides,”rnI added, “Nietzsche hated the masses”—a reference to Hitler’srnBrownshirts.rnThis kind of riskless worldexcoriatedrnby Nietzsche asrnsoft, flabby, and corrupting—isrnprecisely the kind of mushy,rnpulpous world in which wernnow find ourselves.rn”No, not the masses,” Riedel corrected me. “Simply thosernwho use, exploit, and mislead them.” After which he returnedrnto his favorite theme—one he had stressed during previous debatesrn—to the effect that Nietzsche had always been the enemyrnof a caste, whether priestly or other, that the very notion ofrn”caste” was an Oriental concept, dear to India and ancient China,rnwhereas Nietzsche in his thinking had always been a European.rnAh, how difficult it is to defend Nietzsche against himself!rnFor was it not Nietzsche who wrote in one of his last works,rnDer Antichrist (which in German has the double meaning ofrn”The Anti-Christ” or “The Anti-Christian”): “The organizationrnof castes, the supreme, dominating law, is merely the sanctionrnof a natural order [Natur-Ordnung in German], of a Nature-rnLawfulness of the first rank, over which no arbitrary whim,rnno ‘modern idea’ has any force”? And even if the “artists” preordainedrnto rule us include thinkers as well as poets and composers,rnwhat guarantee is there that they would prove any wiserrnand more competent to govern the restless masses than the poetry-rncondemning Guardians of Plato’s Republic? Alas, none.rnAndre Malraux liked to say that the 20th century hadrnproved Nietzsche right and Kad Marx wrong in predictingrnthat it would be a century of violence and warfare, not one ofrnthe messianic triumph of the proletariat and the magical witheringrnaway of the state. But there arc at least three otherrnAPRIL 1996/15rnrnrn