‘The religious world is but the reflex of the real world.’
This, basically stated- is Marx’ contribution to the study and understanding of religion- religion can only be understood in relation to other social systems and the economic foundations of the society in which it occurs. According to Marx, religion is an expression of material realities and economic injustice. In the communist manifesto, Marx underlined a very clear picture of what he envisions as the perfect society for the future. Written at a time of upheaval in Europe when the political situation was uncertain, the communist manifesto was intended to outline the ideas and proposals of the communist parties sprouting across Europe at the time. When developing his own ideology Marx was heavily influenced by French socialists and the ideas of German philosopher Hegel and Marx’ communism is a modified form of socialism.
Marx views religion as simply a natural outcome of mans surroundings and circumstances, and is developed to fulfil material needs. Marx does not believe that God actually exists outside of our own thoughts; all of our gods are our own creations, made to suit the need of a particular society.
‘Man makes religion, religion does not make man’
Marx would say that even within the Bible, the figure of God or Jesus changes according to the need of the writers. Some writers were writing for gentiles to encourage them to convert to Christianity, while others were writing their works for Jewish people informing them of the coming judgement day.
According to Marx in order to get the best human life the problems of man at the present moment must be removed. Marx who was writing when industrialisation was blooming, believed the main source of discontent in humans was the inequality between bourgeois (upper class) and proletariat classes (working class). The bourgeois owning factories, benefited from the labour of the proletariat. In those times however there was a huge inequality in the distribution of wealth and over supply of labour.
‘The abolition of the religion as the illusory happiness of the people is required for their real happiness’
Marx felt the proletariats lack of property and command over their lives is reflected in their religious submissiveness. Marx said the bourgeoisie has ‘resolved personal worth into exchange value’ treating humans just as another resource to be exploited. From the worker becoming more productive they were only contributing to their own hard ship because of the increasing supply, contributes to the alienation present in society.
‘Through estrange, alienated labour then the worker produces the relationship of this labour of a man alien to labour and standing outside it’.
Another problem was that the age of mass production each worker in a factory only produces a small portion of the finished product. The worker does not see the product in its entirety and may not even enjoy what he is making. There is no possibility for him to be able to improve himself or pursue his own interests, as he can only do what he is told to, like a machine. This detachment from the fruits of their labour, combined with the inequality, contributes to an increasing alienation, whereby the working class conceives the products of a reality quite external to him, which he cannot control and to which he must submit, and in submitting a man loses his true humanity and loses touch with the real world. To Marx religion represents a protest against a dehumanising social world and human alienation; alienation is not fully overcome in these religious protests for they still believe in a God-given order of society, not a man made one. Religion leads people in a false direction and the hopes and solutions it promises are illusory.
‘ Religion is only the illusory sun that revolves around man so long as he does not revolve around himself ‘.
Marx points out ‘mans consciousness changes with every change in the conditions of his material existence, in his social relations and in his social life’. Which would suggest that gods are human construction and will change when our circumstances change. Marx’ idea is that the ideal society will let all of its subjects have free will and be able to produce what they desire, instead of producing what they simply need to survive. They will be able to think and believe in what they want, instead of what society has forced them to believe in.
Religion for Marx is a part of ideology, a systematised pattern of beliefs that obscures and distorts the true nature of reality in ways which benefit the ruling class. Marx considers religious belief to be the acceptance of dogmas and particular codes of behaviour as absolutely and ultimately true, and this is more typical of the exploited class than of their oppressors. His argument is that religion functions to maintain ruling class domination. Firstly because, religion distorts reality by encouraging the belief that people are dependant upon supernatural beings or sacred powers.
‘Man, who has found only the reflection of himself in the fatalistic reality of heaven, where he sought a supernatural being, will no longer be tempted to find the mere appearance of himself, a non-human being, where he seeks and must seek true reality’.
It therefore obscures the human authorship of, and responsibility for social inequality and there by discourages the realisation that working for social change may be possible and desirable. Secondly since, religion often appears to lend a sacred support to the social order and in doing so reinforces prohibitions against actions that would challenge those in power. According to Marx this is apparent in all epochs (error in history) of society.
‘The ideas of the ruling class are in every epoch the ruling ideas’
For example, in medieval Europe, the church taught that the unequal ‘estates of the realm’ were Gods creation. This meant that attempts to change the social order would have been not merely acts of treason against the monarch but also a blasphemous rejection of god’s plan, punishable by eternal damnation. Marx is certain that in this world, religion will have a diminishing role in people’s lives. Marx denies that the ruling class is truly religious they only practice the religion to keep the faith alive in the lower classes. He claimed the power of science would remove the power of religious practice.
The most famous quote form the work of Karl Marx is his assertion that religion ‘is the opium of the people’ This to the point comment is certainly a good outline of Marx’ straightforward assessment of religion, which he said ‘eased pain even as it created fantasies’ for those masses of oppressed workers suffering at the hands of a powerful few. Marx insisted that religion does not exist independently but only operates ‘to satisfy other needs or conditions’. He was convinced that ‘religion is so fully determined by economics that it is pointless to consider any of its doctrines or beliefs on their own merits’. For Marx, religion serves to psychologicaly comfort and conciliate the poor and desolate, it is a compensation for the misery of their alienation. Faith legitimises the economic and political order that keeps the working class in
subjection, and offers compensation for their deprivations. In the monotheistic religions they are promised heavenly rewards. They are taught that you can achieve the best life by letting go of your physical body. By this they mean you must distribute your wealth among the poor, give up expensive clothes and food, and generally discard material wealth instead of celebrating it. Even your spiritual soul must be pure in order for you to have a happy after life. ‘According to the Bible ‘many are invited, but few are chosen’ only those that devote themselves completely to following god and are pure in mind and body will be able to succeed.
‘Blessed are the poor in spirit; the kingdom of heaven is theirs’
While at the same time religion is justifying and protecting the privilege of those in control, and therefore it ‘should not only be dismissed, but dismissed with scorn’. The problem lies in the obvious fact that an opiate drug fails to fix a physical injury- it merely helps you forget your pain and suffering. This may be fine up to a point, but only as long as you are also actively trying to solve the underlying problems causing the pain in the first place. Similarly, religion also does not fix the underlying causes of people’s pain and suffering - instead, it helps them forget why they are suffering and get them to look forward to an imaginary future when the pain will cease instead of working to change circumstances now.
‘The struggle against religion, is therefore, indirectly the struggle against that world whose spiritual aroma is religion’.
The same oppressors who are ultimately accountable for the pain and suffering in the first place are administering this “drug” of religion. Religion is a representation of a more important unhappiness and a symptom of more fundamental and harsh economic realities. Marx hopes that humans would one day create a society in which the economic conditions causing so much pain and suffering would be eliminated and, therefore, the need for soothing drugs like religion would cease. However for Marx, such a turn of events isn't simply to be ‘hoped for’ - in his view, human history was leading inevitably towards it. He believed hard necessity will force the workers to give up their religious beliefs and this retreat from all religions is a sign of the growth of a revolutionary class-consciousness. After the revolution there would be no need for religions, as all religions are false representations of reality because they underestimate human powers of creation, they can never be the vehicles of social revolutions. Man will one-day cure himself of this religious addiction.
‘The abolition of religion as the illusory happiness of the people is the demand for their happiness. To call them to give up their illusions about their condition is to call them to give up a condition that requires illusions’.
Karl Marx, a political scientist, came up with the idea of the so-called perfect society, where everybody shared everything they had: money, property, jewels, and e.t.c. In this society class differences would disappear and humankind would live in harmony- communism. In modern usage the word communism is applied to the movement that aims to overthrow the capitalist order by revolutionary means and to establish a classless society in which all goods will be socially owned. Political movement of the 20th century have tried to accomplish communism. The most-known country to use this idea was the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. The idea went wrong and the government of the USSR became rich, the military took power, and civilians lived in poverty.
In 1917 Lenin led a small party of professional revolutionaries, the Bolsheviks, to take power after the Tsar was overthrown. To achieve the transition from Capitalism to socialism and finally communism, Lenin used Marx's theory of "Dictatorship of the Proletariat". The most politically advanced section of the proletariat would form the communist party and lead the rest of the country forward. Since the Bolsheviks totally represented the people, all other political parties were abolished. The party: tolerated no opposition, owned all industry and property, had a powerful secret police, kept strict control over all levels of education and barred all liberal literature and art from entering Russia; not unlike the regime that the Tsars ruled by. What became apparent after a few years was that power stemmed from the top, just like under the Tsars. For the average Russian the repression continued!
After Lenin's death in the late 1920's, Josef Stalin took control of Russia. It was under Stalin's command that the terrible political purges in the 1930's took place. Until his death in 1953, this dictator showed what Marxism-Leninism could mean in practice, which is vastly different than in theory. For about 15 years after the revolution farmers continued to own their own farms, islands of private ownership in a sea of state owned property. Stalin, after a long and bloody battle with farmers, put into practice the collectivisation of agriculture. This meant that farmers would go and work on huge state owned farms to earn a wage. Theoretically these large farms would make better use of land and machinery, but in practice these farms were inefficient and unproductive.
The Bolshevik government actively discouraged all religious practice, handing out pamphlets and closing down churches. Schools were totally under the control of the communist party. Marxism was taught in schools like religion. At the conclusion of the Second World War Russian Forces pursued the last of the German troops into Germany and on their way occupied most of Eastern Europe. In these countries Stalin imposed communist regimes. These nations became known as the satellites of the USSR. Over the next 25 years there were many attempted revolutions that were ruthlessly crushed by the Soviet government. Gradually these countries became increasingly independent of the Soviet Union until its demise in 1993.
Marx’ arguments on religion present a number of problems; Marx is with his assessment that religion is entirely determined by material and economic realities. Not only is nothing else important enough to influence religion, but also influence can not run in the other direction, from religion to material and economic realities. This is not entirely true and obvious. Since if Marx were right, then for example capitalism would appear in countries prior to Protestantism since Protestantism is the religious system created by capitalism. But that is not what we find. Protestantism comes to 16th century Germany, which is still feudal in nature; absolute capitalism doesn't really appear until the 19th century. Europe demonstrated no clear connection between capitalistic economies appearing prior to Protestantism. Marx’ theory is oversimplified – religious faith is not necessarily a sign of entire acceptance or rebellion against a social order e.g. the catholic church, in some countries is drawn its strength from the bourgeoisie (France and Italy) while others from the peasants (England and Holland).
Marx doesn’t really spend much time looking at religion in general but instead the religion with which he is most familiar: Christianity. Despite the fact that his comments are the characteristics of the monotheistic religions they hold less merit than the do with Christianity. The religions with similar doctrines of a powerful god and happy afterlife, however with radically different religions this is not applicable, of which there are many. In ancient Greece and Rome, for example, a happy afterlife was reserved for heroes, while commoners could only look forward to a mere shadow of their earthly existence. Maybe he was influenced in this matter by Hegel, who thought that Christianity was the highest form of religion and that whatever was said about that also automatically applied to ‘lesser’ religions - but we cannot accept such a judgment.
Marx’ assertion that a proletariat revolution would bring about the demise of the capitalist state and that hard necessity will force the workers to give up their religious belief has no value, as was seen in the development of the 20th century communist movements that only brought about poverty. And eventually collapsed. So can his comment on religion be reversed ‘religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people, or in the case of communist Europe ‘communism is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people’.
Marx contention that the power of science would remove the power of religious practice is unable to have any merit in today’s societies, where science has received high recognition for it’s achievements which seem to disprove many of the basic beliefs in religions i.e. the big bang theory and Darwin’s theory of evolution. As in all religion the believers trust that god created everything and they adapt that to these theories disclosing that god went through these processes to create the world. In the USA -a major scientific society- religious practice has not and is not declining. For Marx, countries with similar levels of scientific achievement should show the same level of religion and irreligion, but it is observed that there is a persistence of greater degree of religious practice in the USA than England, and in Holland than in Sweden.
In spite of Marx’ obvious dislike of and anger towards religion, He did not make religion the primary enemy of workers and communists. Had Marx regarded religion as a more serious enemy, he certainly would have devoted more time to it in his writings. It must be remembered that for Marx for all its problems, religion really doesn’t matter very much - it is not the real problem. Religion is ideas, and ideas are just expressions of material realities. ‘It is a symptom of the disease, not the disease itself’. Marxist theory of perfect classless society seems to be a myth, unable of becoming a reality. As seen in the 20th century communist movement, where to the Russian worker, the oppression they received under the tsar’s was left unchanged. The only change was the master but the effect for many was the same.
