Is Marxism a Religion?

If it's a religion, it's one where some of it's most vocal adherents, instead of reading the Bible, or the Torah or the Koran, just snag a Christianity/Judaism/Islam for Beginners book from Borders then join the closest mad sect they can find.

Yes I'd say Orthodox Marxism is decidely "religious". It has many of the characteristics of a dogmatic utopian belief-system, and for some is a direct extension of Judeo-Christian saviourism, totalism and relience on expert opinion.

As human beings dogma almost inevitably plays a part in how we view the world, but not all philosophical positions are as centred on the close-minded ideas many Marxists display. Most Marxists accept hierarchy, most recognise the need for a vanguard, a Party or a number of enlightened revolutionaries to lead the rest of us to a fair and equal society. Most see history as developing in a series of stages and accept an almost unquestionable analysis of the world. Because of it's political acceptance of leaders and led, dogma is not only inevitable it is essential. Then again...

[*]Does Libertarian forms of Marxism come under the same criticisms?

[*]When did "Marxism" first appear on the scene?

[*]Why did you omit Leninism? Is that "religious"?

In Marxism and Bolshevism, Karl Kautsky said,

"Every form of doctrinaire fanaticism, every attempt to turn Marxism into an unalterable dogma is contrary to Marxist thought, which recognizes no absolute truth but only relative truth. This is not scepticism, which denies the very possibility of absolute perception of the world, but only a recognition of the limitations of our perception. All the truths which we recognize are not truths in themselves, independent of time and place, but truths only as far as we are concerned, valid only for us, for our time, for the space in which we live. Every such truth must govern our actions until more advanced perception has exposed and removed the bit of error residing in the previously accepted truth.

There was nothing that Marx feared so much as the degeneration of his school into a rigid sect. The same fear was entertained by Engels, whose scientific work is indissolubly linked with that of his friend Marx, so that we always keep in mind both Marx and Engels whenever we speak of the Marxist theory.

The worst reproach that Engels could make against the first English Marxists was that they were applying Marxism in a sectarian spirit. What would he have said, had he lived to see it, about a school of Marxists who after succeeding in capturing the state power proceeded to make a state religion of Marxism, a religion whose articles of faith and their interpretation are watched over by the government, a religion, the criticism of which, nay, the slightest deviation from which, is sternly punished by the State; a Marxism ruling by the methods of the Spanish Inquisition, propagated with fire and sword, practicing a theatrical ritual, as illustrated by the embalmed body of Lenin: a Marxism reduced to the status not only of a state religion but of a medieval or oriental faith? Such a Marxism may indeed be called a doctrinaire fanaticism."

Yes I think Marx and Engels were authoritarian dickheads, "their" "scientific approach" itself was significantly dependent upon the dogma and power institutions of the time and, in many ways, the "Marxism" that followed them was more than a little their fault. But when I'm talking of Marxism it's the statist tradition coming after them, which I believe includes 90% of Marxists...Karl Kautsky sums them up well.

STI, I take you're a Lib Marxist?

Well said STI. Belated welcome to the boards if I haven't done so already!

"Leninists", be they neo-Stalinists or Trotskyists of some sect or another make up quuuuuite a big proportion of Marxism. So you're just picking at my comments to be a blanket "All Marxism is Religion", which I've never said but rather I treat Libertarian Marxism differenty -I'll come on to that. Similarly when Marx said, "the emancipation of the proletariat must be the work of the proletarians themselves" he was only echoing the socialist movement of the time (the slogan itself being formed years earlier by socialists and anarchists). He did not mean the same thing as Bakunin, say, who meant that the revolutionary must come from below, directly and without any leaders or revolutionary party. Interestingly the slogan is used still by Trots. who likewise see no problem in calling their ideology a "Socialism from Below" even though it means nothing like what anarchists and libertarian advocate.

*cough*

Marx-ism. No I think LibMarxists by and large, are pretty decent allies, but there's a few things which can be worrying. Namely that there's still often an authority reference to Marx and Engels. Quotes from them are used again and again to "justify" a person's arguments. "Marx's" theories are treated not only as valuable, but central to a political position and that can mean that Marx is not just an interesting contributor to an on-going revolutionary process but the main figure in some sordid personality cult. It needn't follow however, some [Lib]"Marxists" may not see this dead white man as the be-all-and-end-all but then again, it's the same with many person-isms.

pre-defined stages. And no, it doesn't.

Scientifically nothing is "unquestionable", but a basic approach to reality can be gained through testing and re-testing your environment. Then again there's a difference between basic assumptions and ideological dogma.

I'd agree, not most criticisms.

Indeed much of modern day Darwinism contains ideas Darwin himself never dreamt of. Ideas, infact, which contradict some of his own theories. If you're "Marxism" is, like Darwinism, merely the name to describe a series of theories none of which are without question, none of which depend up the founder then I have little problem with that. However it rarely means that. Today, Darwin is largely unimportant to evolutionary theory but the same cannot be said for those wishing to change society for the better coming from Marx's political position

The trouble is, I'm not an authoritarian dickhead whereas Marx was *shrugs*. I dont see the need for the existence of a state, hierarchy, party and I dont screw my maid (I dont even have one). Nor am I bourgeois, elitist or wish to manouevre myself to a position of power.

Yes Leninism, Social Democracy, English Marxism, French Marxism bla bla pretty much nearly always being characteristed by statism. By the way, you speak of finding vanguardism in Marx's own writings. Why does his writings matter so much? Since I'm playing your game I'll simply say that frankly he (and especially Engels) constantly speak for the need of Parties, the capturing of State power, minority rule and political hierarchy. Leninists' vanguard is an interpretation of Marx's original writings, but it's not a massive leap.

I disagree. Marx is typical of the statist tradition, and Marxism today is nearly always concerned with state power. I really dont see how things have improved greatly, but if Marxists do decide to ditch much of what Marx and Marxists' statism and religious dogma then I wont complain.

Comrade,

I disagree with your analisys that Marxism is ideological in the true sense that religion could be classed. For one thing in it is essentiallially materialitsic. However, you may have a point on it's Aristotelian and telelogical roots, but this still does not make it ideological in the true sense. Nevertheless, it could be argued that the 'closed system' teleology of Aristotle is not automatically seen in Marx's vision - though clearly Lenin didn't bother bother with such bothersome details

Cage11[/code]

Dialectical materialism most definately comes across like fire n brimstone christianity,

ie "one day the productive process will outgrow the social relations that grow from it, the proletariat will rise up like a morning sun and rid the world of the plague of capitalists who have sewed their own death and the fetters that have for so long enchained them" blah etc blah.

But i even know of a lot of trots n leninists who dont even believe that dialectical materialism crap and actually 'support' the notion that only through conscious class struggle can the revolution will be brought about.

On the title front? A lot of the interpreters of marx would look good hanging from a cross, if that's any help.

Well its hardly surprising, early marxism and scientific socialism inherited a lot from radical forms of christianity even if it made the break with utopian socialism.

Looking at the IWW for example, they were probably one of the most millenarian scientific socialist organisations and it had huge religious influences, very interesting really.

Hello Clifford

He meant the opposite. Marx may not have explicitly discussed a vanguard, but he certainly didn't dismiss the idea either. His attitudes and authoritarian nature on the First International was evident. His intentions for a Communist Party were to have a strong centralised political authority, whether this is a contradiction to his original statement or something Lib Marxists take out of context, who knows?

If Marx truely wanted to have the workers emancipate themselves, he'd have been an anarchist.

His materialist anaylsis of history and capitalism are still valid but his theories about revolutionary struggle are by no way "correct." In fact, history has shown that his theories about state transition are invariably wrong.

He wasn't just the "President", he was the political and administrative dictater of all and everything. That's how he wanted it and that's what he expected of a revolutionary organisation.

fuck STI, do I have to reply to all of that?!

Hmm, did I really say that? I'm sure I stated in Veganarchy, "I would say that nearly every secular "post-religion" philosophy [humanism, marxism, fundamentalist atheism] has infact been a rebirth of much of the ideas of religion" and here, "Yes I'd say Orthodox Marxism is decidely "religious"." Not precisely that Marxism is a religion, especially all of it. However I do completely stand by what I actually said!

He didn't mean it in anywhere near the same sense that anarchists did and still do. For example, we dont just mean that all proletarians and people must work together to build a new world being led by "fellow proletarians", we mean that everyone must play an active role in what their future looks like, how it is run and made. Marx certainly never displayed any libertarian sentiments to that degree, and the whole dispute between Bakunin and Marx is testament to that. I mentioned the contemporary Trotskyist use of the phrase because that is an example of "Socialism from Below" where it means something completely contradictory to an anarchist's socialism from below. We do not believe that a "Proletarian Party" can in any way mean coming from below. Where there is any semblance of hierarchy there is by necessity a top-down structure and direction from above. Although you'd certainly disagree with vanguardism etc. IMO it's not far off what Marx was on about.

If you dont need to do it -great! But from personal experience, or you can just google Left Communist, Libertarian Marxist propaganda etc. that is very much the case.

There are trends and patterns in history but overall I quite reject the idea that their is some kind of historical Progress, that economic and political stages can be accurately predicted by any person and that yes, nature contains a fair bit of chaos. Saying that I'm not at odds with the "feeling" of socialist historical materialism, it contains some elements of truth but I wouldn't hold to it dogmatically.

Are you aware of the whole First International conflict? Have you read the Manifesto of the Communist Party? You yourself mentioned his commitment to "bourgeois democracy", what does that involve?

"political power, properly called, is merely the instrument of one class for oppressing another"

"[The workers] must employ forcible means hence governmental means"

Ofcourse Marx was quite inconsistent, sometimes he was more liberal than at other times. Apologists usually like to bring up the Paris Commune and his half-hearted appraisel for it in the Civil War in France. Someone I know wrote an essay on that; Paris Commune; Myth Vs. Reality

“The Commune,” he said, “was the true representative of all the healthy elements of French society, and therefore the truly national government.”

His whole ideas on the Dictatorship of the Proletariat are also interesting, though we could debate to what extent that would be in line with more recent interpretations.