The vast structural transformation of colonial society on the basis of the commodity-form culminated in enduring impasses regarding the conceptualization of identity and the organization of community at various scales of collective experience.  This presentation on the writings of Muhammad Iqbal (1877-1938) concentrates on what has been dubbed the “Nietzschean Moment” of Indian intellectual history.  It surveys the complications wrought by Iqbal’s extensive engagement with German thought, especially with regard to notions of selfhood and ideals of community in two lengthy, exhortative poems composed in Persian, The Secrets of the Self (Asrar-e Khudi, 1915) and The Mysteries of Selflessness(Rumuz-e Bekhudi, 1918).  What ideas regarding the self, community, and society did Iqbal derive from German thinkers such as Goethe and Nietzsche, and what impact did they have on the evolution of his poetic themes and forms?  How did notions of the will, power, and world-affirmation get thrust into the fray of political contestations regarding the making of new subjects and the founding of new social orders?  These are just two of the key questions addressed in this investigation into the contradictions of identity in the work of Muhammad Iqbal.