A Comparative Study of Nietzsche's Ecological Philosophy and Hauerwas' Eschatological Creation Theology - Focusing on Ontological Non-violence Ethics -

Nietzsche criticized Christianity for causing us to lose the value of present life based on its belief in the afterlife and placed a new emphasis on life on earth in harmony with nature. He did not want the real natural world to be alienated by any more metaphysical hierarchy, nor did he want nature itself to be understood as a philosophical universal or scientific mechanistic theory through a human-centred hierarchy. At the end of his life, he emphasized the concept of ‘eternal return(Ewige Wiederkunft des Gleichen),’ where nature and human life come together within the earth and all ontological aspects are affirmed within it. However, Hauerwas agrees with Milbank's criticism that monistic ontology from Nietzsche to Deleuze does not solve the problem of violence that exists in the universe. He argues that human sin and violence in the world can be eliminated only through non-violence advocated in the historical narrative of Jesus Christ and eschatological creation theology that faithfully achieves the divine purpose in history. In addition, Hauerwas believes that the natural law-friendly idea shown by scholastic theology in the Catholic tradition ultimately undermines Christianity's unique creation theology. It is argued that true Christian ethics is possible only through the narrative of eschatological divine history that began from creation and was preceded by the life and resurrection of Jesus Christ. This paper focuses on ontological non-violence and discusses how Nietzsche and Hauerwas show similarities in the epistemological aspect but are completely opposite in their belief in the existence of a metaphysical world in the ontological aspect.