The Death of God

By Jesse Berkowitz ‘24

“God is dead. God remains dead. And we have killed him. How shall we comfort ourselves, the murderers of all murderers?” -Friedrich Nietzche
Quite the quote indeed, but what does it mean? Friedrich Nietzche was a late 1800’s philosopher who claimed that God had died. Nietzche recognized that humanity as a whole was turning away from the morals of the Bible, and claimed that we were either doomed to perish, or would be forced to create our own morals. But what kind of morality will mankind create, and if we do not have religion dictating our moral code, what will guide our morals? 

In America, today’s youth are significantly less religious. According to a 2010 Pew Research Center study, 68% of adults under 30 would not consider themselves as part of any religion. This is compared to 81% of adults ages 30 and over who consider themselves a Christian, according to Joseph Liu’s 2020 study “Religion Among the Millennials.”  Religion is declining in America and according to Liu, people seem to have a “God-shaped hole in their hearts.”
Political extremism is on the rise to fill that void, with Marxism becoming a popular alternative to religion. The 2012 The Guardian article “Why Marxism is on the rise again” states that “yes, Karl Marx is going mainstream – and goodness knows where it will end.”
Instead of focusing on how they can better themselves as the Bible promotes, youth are placing the salvation of mankind on the government. Expecting the government to solve everyone’s problems through the distribution of wealth is a mentality that, if acted upon, will almost indefinitely lead to catastrophe, as shown in how communism has been tried and failed before, and also resulted in tens of millions of deaths.
But the danger in the loss of religion isn’t only shown through harmful political ideology, with another lying in the growth of moral nihilism. Moral nihilism is an abhorrent philosophy that revolves around the concept that good and bad are subjective and that suffering is the only reality. This line of thinking can lead to suicide and mass shootings, as nihilists believe that the only way to get rid of people’s suffering is to get rid of people themselves. 
The Bible rejects this notion by teaching that the best way to alleviate suffering is to try to become the best version of oneself and live a life of traditional moral integrity. Both nihilism and religion agree that there is suffering in the world, but each philosophy goes about addressing that completely differently, religion positively and nihilism negatively. 
My religious identity has gone through significant change within the past few months. I used to write off the Bible as outdated and irrelevant, but I eventually discovered I was wrong. On a whim, I decided to watch a Bible lecture and quickly learned that every story in Genesis is completely relevant to the modern world. Whether it be the resentment of others’ success found in Cain and Abel, the development of the human consciousness discovered in Adam and Eve or the importance of the individual in Noah, I took away much more than I thought I would.
A few particular stories from the Bible have deeply affected me. These were the Abrahamic stories, with the stories of a man forced to travel to a new land to face the unknown, being the original hero’s journey. This concept was something I could relate to with my transition to GOA. Before learning about these stories and watching many self-help lectures, I was perfectly content with hiding away in my basement, but I came to recognize that the way to find meaning in life is to embark on journeys that will allow me to overcome adversity. I always knew that I could never truly be fulfilled with hiding away like a hermit, but after learning about the stories of Abraham, my brain solidified what I needed to do in order to find meaning.
If you are currently struggling with your faith like many others today, the lessons of the Bible will help you to find meaning in the world and a moral guideline that political affiliations or nihilism can not provide.