Christian Origins of Human Rights: A Nietzschean Genealogy

According to the predominant narrative, the concept of human rights is founded within the context of modernity and based on the secular theories of Enlightenment philosophers. However, there is a minority view that traces the roots of modern theoretical and political movements such as humanism, liberalism and socialism, which form the intellectual foundation of human rights, in Christian theology and ethics. Nietzsche is one of the pioneer philosophers who considers the basic principles of the international human rights system, including inherent dignity, freedom, equality and universality, to be influenced by Christian moral values which are based on the representation of the morality of slaves against the morality of masters. This theory is different from the westernization of human rights claimed by cultural relativism and postmodern theorists, although both opinions lead to the same result; challenging the universality of human rights. The present paper tries to investigate the course of this intellectual flow by focusing on the works of Nietzsche and to give an appropriate answer to the question of how the universality of human rights has a paradox with its Christian roots.