Marx on the Religious Illusion

Extract

Marx spent most of the years 1843 and 1844 in Paris, having been expelled from Germany. During this period he produced three essays, two on the Jewish question and one on Hegelian philosophy in Germany, as well as the more famous Paris Manuscripts. My aim in this essay is to present a puzzle which arises about the argument which Marx proposes in these writings as to the relation of religion and politics, and to suggest a possible partial explanation and some possible implications of the occurrence of this puzzle.

We may start by making clear Marx’s intention in the writings in question, particularly the three essays. He is concerned to warn the Jews against those who say: ‘Give up your religion, which marks you off from all of us; you cannot merit the privileges of modern political life unless you agree to shed your religious distinctiveness, at least where your politics is concerned.’ Marx tells the Jew to inquire carefully into the real conditions of life in modern society. If he does so he will see that shedding his distinct religion will in no way help him to overcome the defects of his real, concrete existence: he will still live a narrow, isolated life, in enmity rather than co-operation with his fellows. This sphere in which we live our concrete, day-to-day existence, Marx calls Civil Society, and he contrasts it with the State, or political sphere; together, the two spheres go to make up what I shall call ‘modern society’. This name refers not precisely to any actual historical society but to an ‘ideal type’ to which post-Revolution France and the post-Independence United States of America would be close empirical approximations.