Abstract: Nietzsche defined the spiritual situation caused by “the death of God” as nihilism.According to him, nihilism was the destruction of value, and he tried to repulse it with aestheticism.While Heidegger argued that aestheticism did not help in extricating people from the predicament of nihilism;and aestheticism would be deconstructed by nihilism on the contrary.Only when people shake off the shackles of metaphysics and acknowledge receptivity toward the being itself could they embark on "returning".

Key words: Nietzsche, aestheticism, Heidegger, receptivity