Today, I’d like to talk about one of my favorite slogans: “Nothing Is True, Everything Is Permitted.”
The most common misinterpretation is to read it as a combination of nihilism and lawlessness: nothing is real, so you can do whatever you want. It sounds plausible, but there’s a problem with that interpretation. If nothing is true, then the statement “nothing is true” must also be untrue. It refutes itself right out of the gate, which is why I don’t think this interpretation holds up.
“Nothing is true” doesn’t mean “nothing exists” or “everything is false.”
A chair is not “true” in the sense that it possesses some eternal, unchanging essence of chairness. It’s made of wood, it will eventually decay, it might have a different name in another culture, and in a different context, it could simply become firewood. What we consider its “essence” depends on the framework through which we perceive it.
“Nothing Is True” means that nothing has a fixed, unchanging essence.
This interpretation doesn’t contradict itself. The statement that nothing has a fixed essence is itself a proposition that can conform to the very principle it describes.
“Fire is hot” is an objective fact, a truth. But its validity depends on whether our current conceptual framework can correctly handle the concepts of “fire” and “heat.” Whether other possibilities exist beyond that framework is something we simply don’t know. Our understanding of a thing depends on how it presents itself to us. If things have no fixed essence, then the truths we construct upon them have no immutable foundation either.
The Cthulhu Mythos offers one of the clearest illustrations of this idea. Lovecraft’s horror doesn’t come from monsters being ugly or grotesque. It comes from the fact that these entities exist entirely outside the boundaries of human cognition. Our brains simply lack the tools to process them. People go mad not merely because they’ve witnessed something terrifying, but because the very framework through which they understand reality begins to collapse.
Essence isn’t something that exists inherently within an object. It’s something we project onto it through our conceptual framework. Change the framework, and the essence changes with it.
So the translation “Nothing Is True” isn’t necessarily wrong. The problem is that modern readers tend to associate the word “true” with falsehood and nonexistence, narrowing its meaning too much. The wording itself is precise enough; it’s the assumptions we bring to it that distort its meaning.
“Everything Is Permitted” literally means that everything is allowed. But the word “permitted” already presupposes a framework: if something can be permitted or forbidden, there must be something that governs that distinction. Without rules, the concept of permission becomes meaningless. It’s like talking about walking through a wall when there is no wall to begin with.
So “Everything Is Permitted” cannot possibly mean that there are absolutely no constraints. Quite the opposite: it implicitly assumes the existence of a framework within which things can be allowed or forbidden.
But what is that framework?
I don’t think it’s external. It’s not the law, God, or the judgment of other people. All these external frameworks can be circumvented, overthrown, or ignored. The only framework that can truly permit you to do anything, in the sense I’m talking about, must be internal:
Your own moral framework. Your own character.
Taking this a step further, I believe that the more you want to do whatever you please, the less you can afford to act on every whim.
Someone who genuinely wants to be free to do whatever they choose must first possess an exceptionally strong degree of self-mastery. Otherwise, they’re merely being pushed around by impulses, desires, and other people. That’s not doing whatever you want. That’s letting your desires do whatever they want with you.
True freedom isn’t about letting yourself run wild. It’s about becoming internally strong enough that you no longer need external rules to keep yourself in check, because you have become your own rule.
So “Everything Is Permitted” doesn’t mean there are no constraints. It means those constraints have been completely internalized. Everything you do is “permitted,” not because there are no rules, but because you are the one who establishes them.
Using this phrase as an excuse to do whatever you want is the most fundamental misreading of it. What it actually demands is the opposite: radical intellectual honesty with yourself.
Who built your framework of understanding? Did you arrive at it through your own reflection? Was it imposed on you by others? Or did you simply accept it because you never bothered to question it?
Nothing Is True: Even your own beliefs have no fixed, unquestionable essence. They, too, must be examined.
Everything Is Permitted: No external authority can make your moral judgments for you. You must build your own framework, and then take responsibility for it.
Historically, this phrase has been attributed to Hassan-i Sabbah, the founder of the Assassin order in 11th-century Persia. He was a deeply devout and ascetic religious figure. Yet he almost certainly never uttered these words, because he believed in the existence of absolute truth.
The phrase first appeared in Nietzsche’s writings. It was later developed into a maxim in the 1938 Slovenian novel Alamut, before entering popular culture through Assassin’s Creed. As it spread, its original meaning was gradually diluted.
One detail worth noting is that when a character utters this phrase in Nietzsche’s work, the reaction isn’t one of exhilaration or liberation, but of shock and trembling. The version in Alamut also contains an additional word that often disappears from later, more popular translations: “Nothing is absolutely true, everything is permitted.”
The difference is just one word, but the meaning changes considerably.
From the very beginning, this phrase was never meant to be a manifesto for unrestrained indulgence. It was later popularization that turned it into what sounds like a cool, nihilistic slogan.
