Ressentiment

Ressentiment arises when those who lack the power to act directly are forced to live in perpetual reaction. Rather than affirming themselves, they define themselves by negating the enemy. The noble says "I am good" and creates "bad" as a secondary afterthought; the man of ressentiment says "you are evil" first, and constructs "good" only as a contrast.

Unable to discharge their hostility through action, those possessed by ressentiment discharge it through valuation. They cannot overthrow the strong, so they declare the strong wicked. This is not merely bitterness but a creative act: ressentiment is the origin of the moral framework that has dominated European history for two thousand years.

Nietzsche traces this revolution to the Jewish priestly class and, through them, to Christianity. The powerless inverted the aristocratic values entirely: the noble became the evil one, the suffering became the blessed, the humble the righteous. What had been weakness was repackaged as virtue. This is what Nietzsche calls the slave revolt in morals: not a political uprising but a revolution in the fundamental ordering of values.

Nietzsche uses the French word "ressentiment" throughout to give the concept a clinical flavour distinct from ordinary German resentment, signalling that he means a specific psychological type rather than a passing emotion.