In the history of Western thought, Friedrich Nietzsche (October 15, 1844–August 25, 1900) and Joseph Ratzinger (April 16, 1927–December 31, 2022) appear so diametrically opposed that finding a meeting point between them might be a near impossibility. Because both were German, one might be tempted to think they shared what one might call the German spirit—whatever that category entails. But even more strangely, what might further unite Nietzsche and Ratzinger is the question of God, which logically leads one to the question of the human world. Given Nietzsche’s interest, or perhaps even obsession with the God-question, Ratzinger frequently engages him in his own theological reflections. Both figures take the dialectics surrounding the question of God seriously, and yet arrive at such vastly

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