.. [they mean] absolutely nothing!...Or they means so many things, that they amount to nothing at all!" (Nietzsche, sec. 5). His major problem with the logic of the ascetic ideal seems to be that it rejects everything outside the body as unimportant, but then places a major emphasis on refraining from these unimportant things. Nietzsche sees ascetic ideals as a way for the power structure to continue to control people, and to have the people think that it is good without even realizing that they are being controlled. Furthermore, he suggests that ascetic ideals are also nihilistic (Nietzsche, sec. 26). Though his rhetoric is often as emotional as it is logical -- and sometimes more so -- Nietzsche finds a way to dismantle any concept of ascetics as moral.
Gandhi, on the other hand, does a great deal to restore (or at least to attempt to restore) a sense of morality to the ascetic ideal. This begins in the very first chapter of The Story of my Experiments with the Truth. His description of his mother is that of the extreme ascetic: "To keep two or three consecutive fasts was nothing to her. Living on one meal a day during Chaturmas was a habit with her. Not content with that she fasted every alternate day during one Chaturmas" (Gandhi Part I, Chapter 1). The cheerfulness with which she undertook these fasts, her continued performance of all duties, and an opening statement regarding her "saintliness" all show quite clearly that Gandhi felt very strongly in favor of the ascetic...
In part three of his book, in the chapter entitle "The Spirit of Service," Gandhi opens by saying "My profession progressed satisfactorily, but that was far from satisfying me. The Question of further simplifying my life and of doing some concrete act of service to my fellowmen had been constantly agitating me" (Gandhi, III Chapter 6). Clearly, he saw enormous benefit in freeing himself from the distractions of the material and sensual world. Nietzsche did not consider these things to be distractions, but rather simply things like anything else, with no real objective value or purpose. Doubtless these two men were influenced by their religious beliefs, or lack thereof, in Nietzsche's case, but it is the differing philosophies that grew out of these religious views -- or perhaps that caused or enhanced the religious views -- that are of enduring interest to mankind. The answer might lie somewhere in the middle, with an enjoyment of the things that life has to offer without abandoning morality all together.
Works Cited
Gandhi, Mohandas. The Story of my Experiments with the Truth. Accessed 15 April 2009. http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/An_Autobiography_or_The_Story_of_my_Experiments_with_Truth
Nietzsche, Friedrich. On the Genealogy of Morals. Accessed 15 April 2009. http://records.viu.ca/~johnstoi/nietzsche/genealogy3.htm
