The God in Communism: Karl Marx religious?

[Mike the Progressive]

I think people follow ideas and do horrible things in their name, whether that idea be Christ is the son of God, Allah is the one true god, or the communist state must be ahcieved at all costs.

[Dogmeat]

Did the God of Communism raise this thread from the Grave?

[Free Arabian Nation]

Did the God of Communism raise this thread from the Grave?

God made a mistake

[Genivaria]

(Image)

Now this might sound like complete heresy but I personally think that Marx was extremely religious at one point and something happened to him which cause him to hate god (maybe a family death?) ...........

What do you guys think?

Why you think so?!!

1 post grave-digger begone!

[John1565]

May be he was religious, may be not. But there's no doubt that communism doesn't support religions. And, may be Marx did some wrong in his theory, but his way of approaching a problem is becoming popular day by day. You can see curiosity about Marx is not declining over the last 5 years from trend.google.com data as this screenshot says... oops! I can't find any way to put image. You can check or see from here http://prntscr.com/jgwpqh If interested, you can see wikitour on Marx to learn more about him quickly.

[Venetorria]

He did believe at one point or his morals wouldn't ally so closely to Christianity

He. Was. JEWISH. I don't know if he ever believed in a God or not, but if he had, it wouldn't have been the Christian one.

As for your claim that his "morals closely ally Christianity:" I just systematically demolished that argument.

At this point you are being willfully ignorant.

You are the one being ignorant, he might be of Jewish origin, but his father became a Lutheran, and Marx himself was raised a Lutheran. In fact, some of his sayings border on anti-Semitism (plus others which have a high dose of ethnic chauvinism and bigotry).

The only parallel to be drawn between Communism and Abrahamic religions is moral absolutism. In the mainstream monotesitic faiths of the world we have a clear cut line between god and evil, with God, angels and heaven on one side, and the devil, demons, and hell on the other. Marx, while not so direct, tried to simplify the world, where he tried to present all capitalists, regardless of how decent, hardworking or overqualified, as evil, while any worker, be they lazy, wicked or worse, as good.
Then again, capitalism in those days was far from perfect, but people who follow his teachings to this day forget that modern capitalism is worlds apart from the one Marx used to criticize. While not so harsh in moral absolutism, modern followers of his still apply a black and white "exploiter vs expolited" view to things.

[Thanatttynia]

He. Was. JEWISH. I don't know if he ever believed in a God or not, but if he had, it wouldn't have been the Christian one.

As for your claim that his "morals closely ally Christianity:" I just systematically demolished that argument.

At this point you are being willfully ignorant.

You are the one being ignorant, he might be of Jewish origin, but his father became a Lutheran, and Marx himself was raised a Lutheran. In fact, some of his sayings border on anti-Semitism (plus others which have a high dose of ethnic chauvinism and bigotry).

The only parallel to be drawn between Communism and Abrahamic religions is moral absolutism. In the mainstream monotesitic faiths of the world we have a clear cut line between god and evil, with God, angels and heaven on one side, and the devil, demons, and hell on the other. Marx, while not so direct, tried to simplify the world, where he tried to present all capitalists, regardless of how decent, hardworking or overqualified, as evil, while any worker, be they lazy, wicked or worse, as good.
Then again, capitalism in those days was far from perfect, but people who follow his teachings to this day forget that modern capitalism is worlds apart from the one Marx used to criticize. While not so harsh in moral absolutism, modern followers of his still apply a black and white "exploiter vs expolited" view to things.

Marx's criticisms of capitalism were inspired by the rampant abuses of it going on in 19th century Europe, but they fit as well today as they ever did. Exploitation is the basis of capitalism - without making a moral judgment on whether it's good or bad, it simply is. Workers don't get to keep 100% of what they produce, therefore they are being exploited.

Is modern capitalism really so far from what was around in Marx's day? In the West, sure, we've used socialist ideas to get to a 'nicer'/more presentable form of it (though the basic problems remain the same), but I'd suggest you try telling a six-year-old in Bangladesh making clothes for GAP or w/e that people in 19th century Europe had it way worse than them.

[Venetorria]

Marx's criticisms of capitalism were inspired by the rampant abuses of it going on in 19th century Europe, but they fit as well today as they ever did. Exploitation is the basis of capitalism - without making a moral judgment on whether it's good or bad, it simply is. Workers don't get to keep 100% of what they produce, therefore they are being exploited.

Is modern capitalism really so far from what was around in Marx's day? In the West, sure, we've used socialist ideas to get to a 'nicer'/more presentable form of it (though the basic problems remain the same), but I'd suggest you try telling a six-year-old in Bangladesh making clothes for GAP or w/e that people in 19th century Europe had it way worse than them.

I wish to clarify that I am arguing in regards to Western capitalism and the standard of working there. Hopefully, as those other places develop, the problems they have will vanish.

Yet the workers enter the process without a risk on their part. For instance, even if the company would fail, the worker will not lose anything (aside the job of course), being in demand, the worker could find new employment quite quickly, where as the investor or owner would stand to lose parts of their own fortune, which they had previously injected into the business.
It is not the workers that pay for the workspace, machines, tools and other things used to do the job.

Another thing which is wastly different than it was in the times of Marx is the share of working sectors. The primary and secondary sectors dominated the job sphere, but today, it is no longer so.
It would be easily to calculate how much a miner or industry worker produce, but, how much does the teacher, the doctor, the manager, and such, produce?
Labor assosiation is performed on a voluntary basis, no one forces you to take or keep a job you are not happy with, if able to, you are free to find a better contract.

I will also address a major perk capitalism has over any other form, you can model your own company as you see fit (without infringing on your worker's, or the market's, rights and laws). You are free to make a company where you let workers "keep 100% of their labor". Structure your company as you see fit, but, and which is the best part of it, you are not able to force that model upon others.

[Thanatttynia]

Marx's criticisms of capitalism were inspired by the rampant abuses of it going on in 19th century Europe, but they fit as well today as they ever did. Exploitation is the basis of capitalism - without making a moral judgment on whether it's good or bad, it simply is. Workers don't get to keep 100% of what they produce, therefore they are being exploited.

Is modern capitalism really so far from what was around in Marx's day? In the West, sure, we've used socialist ideas to get to a 'nicer'/more presentable form of it (though the basic problems remain the same), but I'd suggest you try telling a six-year-old in Bangladesh making clothes for GAP or w/e that people in 19th century Europe had it way worse than them.

I wish to clarify that I am arguing in regards to Western capitalism and the standard of working there. Hopefully, as those other places develop, the problems they have will vanish.

Yet the workers enter the process without a risk on their part. For instance, even if the company would fail, the worker will not lose anything (aside the job of course), being in demand, the worker could find new employment quite quickly, where as the investor or owner would stand to lose parts of their own fortune, which they had previously injected into the business.
It is not the workers that pay for the workspace, machines, tools and other things used to do the job.

Another thing which is wastly different than it was in the times of Marx is the share of working sectors. The primary and secondary sectors dominated the job sphere, but today, it is no longer so.
It would be easily to calculate how much a miner or industry worker produce, but, how much does the teacher, the doctor, the manager, and such, produce?
Labor assosiation is performed on a voluntary basis, no one forces you to take or keep a job you are not happy with, if able to, you are free to find a better contract.

I will also address a major perk capitalism has over any other form, you can model your own company as you see fit (without infringing on your worker's, or the market's, rights and laws). You are free to make a company where you let workers "keep 100% of their labor". Structure your company as you see fit, but, and which is the best part of it, you are not able to force that model upon others.

For what it's worth, I don't agree with Marx's suggestions on what we should replace capitalism with; I just think his criticisms of capitalism are spot on.

Yes, it's going to be more difficult to calculate the economic value contributed by someone working in the services sector, but that doesn't mean they don't have any. And whilst it's true that employment is voluntary in theory, in practice it often isn't. If you don't live in a place with an adequate welfare state, your options are generally find employment, steal or starve.

That's not a benefit peculiar to capitalism, and I think 'leaving things to the market' in the off chance the basic psychology of humans changes and someone decides to start a company wherein workers keep 100% of their labour is a bit of a silly idea.

[Uinted Communist of Africa]

XD
who ever raised this thread had no life..

[Sovaal]

XD
who ever raised this thread had no life..

And you took the time to respond to it. So what does that make you?

[Uinted Communist of Africa]

XD
who ever raised this thread had no life..

And you took the time to respond to it. So what does that make you?

Its my thread....

[Sovaal]

And you took the time to respond to it. So what does that make you?

Its my thread....

We’ll I’ll be damned. Eh, shows me for being sleep deprived.

[Reikoku]

Now this might sound like complete heresy but I personally think that Marx was extremely religious at one point and something happened to him which cause him to hate god (maybe a family death?)

So basically, you're claiming that Marx's life was the plot of Kevin Sorbo's Let There Be Light? That's a pretty big claim to be made without evidence, especially considering we know about Marx's life, and there was never anything to suggest a violent apatheism. What you're suggesting is more what Christians think atheists think then how atheists actually think.

and when he published his manifesto he made sure some of it was dedicated to destroying god.

The role of atheism in Marx's thought was nowhere near as central and militant as it was in Soviet regimes. He believed that socialism would lead to religion dying out, not through force, but because it would no longer be needed to serve as an anesthetic for the toils of capitalism. Marx wasn't the only author of the Communist Manifesto either, poor Engels' contributions are often forgotten.

why else would Marx's works look so similar to Christianity? ....it just all adds up.

At most you could probably say Marx's thought kind of resembles liberal theology, but only because of the role of Neo-Hegelianism in the formation of his views.

[The Official United Nations]

As noted, Marx did draw on Christian thinkers like Hegel. That might be a matter of his Christian context.

However, that need not imply that he sought to 'destroy God.' Marx was atheistic, he was rarely keen to advocate conflict between spiritual beings. He wasn't even that keen to destroy religion, assuming that it would die out on its own. In his works, there was certainly little rush to promote some 'anti-God' agenda.

That said, works like Das Kapital often resemble economic or philosophical works rather than Christianity.

[Uinted Communist of Africa]

As noted, Marx did draw on Christian thinkers like Hegel. That might be a matter of his Christian context.

However, that need not imply that he sought to 'destroy God.' Marx was atheistic, he was rarely keen to advocate conflict between spiritual beings. He wasn't even that keen to destroy religion, assuming that it would die out on its own. In his works, there was certainly little rush to promote some 'anti-God' agenda.

That said, works like Das Kapital often resemble economic or philosophical works rather than Christianity.

yeah but the fact that he did does pose the question why did he......I still think my arguments sound.

[Constitutional Technocracy of Minecraft]

(Image)

Now this might sound like complete heresy but I personally think that Marx was extremely religious at one point and something happened to him which cause him to hate god (maybe a family death?) and when he published his manifesto he made sure some of it was dedicated to destroying god. I'm not saying his whole purpose of the manifesto was to destroy god....I'm just saying that he knew his works would be respected so why not push a few hidden agendas under it? why else would Marx's works look so similar to Christianity? ....it just all adds up.

What do you guys think?

sigh

A common misconception about atheists is that they all hate God due to personal trauma. That is not the case. While I strongly dislike the tyrannical God of the Bible (how TF can a god who condones genocide* be considered morally benevolent!?) and have experienced domestic abuse, my experiences have not made me one iota less religious.

*Deuteronomy 15-18: "of those cities that were within the Promised Land, however, everybody was to be killed."