Karl Marx is known for his presentation of the concept of Communism which has been an important part of political organization in Europe and around the world. Marx is known for writing the Communist Manifesto alongside Friedrich Engels which has been quoted extensively for an alternative form of governance based on socialism. The purpose of this paper is to analyze the biography and political thought of Karl Marx as a philosopher who influenced western thought in a significant way. This will lead to the critique of the Communist Manifesto and how it influenced modern political thought. This paper builds on the syllogism that (P1) Marx believed that there was a class struggle between rich and powerful elites and the poor masses (P2) the poor were made to accept their situation through religion and laws made by the upper class and this must be handled by a revolution (C) Marx therefore presents a dogma that sowed a seed of conflict and tension in western societies, but his theory of Communism has failed in many ways to bring happiness to all the people.
Life of Karl Marx
Karl Marx was born on 5th May, 1818 in Trier, Prussia (now part of Germany) to Jewish parents who were both descendants of families that had a long history of rabbinical achievements. However, Marx’s father converted from Judaism to Lutheranism before he was born. Many authors claim he did that because he sought better opportunities in life as a lawyer because in 1800s Europe, Jews were discriminated against and the laws prevented them from achieving results as professionals.
The father of Marx was not very religious save for the minimal activities he needed to engage in to prove his devotion to Lutheranism. However, he devoted most of his energy to secular education which included the introduction of young Karl Marx to philosophers like Voltaire who had lived in the century before them. These philosophers questioned the divine rights of kings and the nature of nobility and laid the foundation for human rights and the creation of a more viable and inclusive social order. This influenced Karl Marx significantly. Marx’s father’s influence over his life was that he gave him the impression that religion could be used opportunistically and had no direct relevance to this world. This caused Marx to grow up seeing God and religion in a rather secular light which diminished the importance of spirituality to the modern man in his writings. This supports the position that Marx viewed religion as nothing but an opportunistic tool.
Marx married his wife, Jenny in 1836 in a Lutheran Church. Another indication that he saw the Church as an institution for the regularization of marriage and other social interactions. However, they remained secular in outlook. He studied in the University of Bonn but transferred to University of Berlin where his father insisted he studied Law. Although Marx studied Law, he was fascinated by Philosophy which he viewed as a tool for the organization and possible reorganization of society. He therefore built an interest in the study of the works of Hegel which were growing in prominence in most European academic discussions and debates.
Hegel laid the foundation for an analytical tradition of philosophy. And this included the presentation of a subject and object as a separate means of thinking and analyzing information in order to draw logical conclusions. This was at odds at the time when the society was based on absolute truths and people had to accept certain things and ideologies without questioning them because they were believed to be divine truths. The teachings of Hegel presented a framework for debating in secular knowledge that survives to this day. It includes the presentation of information in the form of thesis and antithesis in order to analyze by creating a synthesis to draw the best conclusion on a given subject. This made it possible for philosophers to come up with new ideas and theories explaining phenomenon outside religion and based on logic and rationalism.
Karl Marx studied this approach to philosophy and became a major student of Hegel and applied his theories throughout life. Marx took to writing in various forms. Many of his writings were controversial so they were banned by the dominant authorities of his homeland. He continued to write presenting information about Socialism and the need for the creation of economies that will help to further the needs of people in the early 1840s. This was considered offensive by many right-wing governments in Europe who banned Marx’s works. He moved to France in 1843 where he started writing about the utopian of a socialist nation. However, he was banned and expelled from France.
He moved to Belgium where he had to sign a bond acknowledging that he will not publish anything in Belgium that will jeopardize the government. In Belgium, his longtime friend, Frederic Engels joined him in 1845 and they found Britain to be a good destination to pursue their scholarly ambitions. So they moved to England where Karl Marx spent the rest of his life.
Karl Marx is viewed by many scholars as an atheist. Marx personally did not believe in God, but he seemed to view God as a means to an earthly end. So like Voltaire and other philosophers who lived before him, he only saw religion as a system through which people can achieve their goals. Marx thought that religion was addictive. He is known for spreading the view that religion is constantly abused by the ruling elite to maintain their position at the top of the social ladder. Therefore, the masses must rise up and question the abuse of religion to make them accept a lower quality of life as they served the interests of the ruling elite. Therefore, Marx sought to mobilize the masses by asking them to rise up and start a revolution of sorts through which they would question the power of the ruling class and use religion only if it helped to achieve this goal or end.
Karl Marx can be said to present the following arguments in his philosophical view in relation to God and religion:
The world is based on what people wish and desire to do and the state must be secular in order to achieve this end;
There are different groups that strive to protect their interest in nations and religion is used by such persons to further their goals;
The belief in God must not be abolished. Religion is important to some people. So let such persons pursue their religion, but let the society’s demands of creating a community based on shared interests and goals be put ahead of religion;
Religion has been abused in the past by the ruling elites who are themselves atheist. Therefore, it is important to guard against that upper class;
The upper class are made up of people who are suspicious. They will always utilize religion to further their demands and expectations. So a Communist system must be set up that will moderate the abuse of religion;
Communist Manifesto & the Suffering of the Masses
Marx developed his philosophy at a time when nationalism was rising in Europe to challenge states which were at that time legitimized by the Catholic Church and Rome or in the case of northern European nations, Protestant Churches attached to governance. The American and French Revolution had already taken place in lands east of the German states – France and the United States. These Revolutions led to the formation of republics where the citizens had a secular constitution and the rule of law was instituted to protect human rights and civil liberties of the citizens. However, in Germanic states and other monarchies, there were absolute rulers who were backed by religious groupings. Some of the states lived on the basis of governments that had power to determine and do whatever they wanted. On the other hand, the Church was used to keep the people within their social classes and religion was mainly something that strongly supported the classes in society. Therefore, Marx’s work was naturally at odds with religion and it was a natural part of the system that he sought to abolish with his ideologies and views.
Prussia where Marx was born was made up of a harsh regime that had extremely harsh rules and regulations which were legitimized by principles of Christianity. There were censorship and other things that only protected the ruling class and the rich and powerful people in the nation. The poor and peasants had no rights and they were exploited significantly. This was a practice that was common throughout Europe and the rich and upper class gained power and authority and they established an absolute power and sovereign authority to dominate and dictate trends for the poor lower class citizens. Prussia used church and religious orders to guide and promote the best interest and desires of people. Prussian Christians had no choice but to stay within the social pyramid that was created. Therefore, Marx viewed this as an opportunity to attack religious thought and use the promise of a paradise on earth – a utopia to attract people to forsake religion and the promise of a better afterlife in favor of a society where exploitation could be eliminated.
As Marx learnt and wrote about philosophy, he sought to formulate a theory about how a proper society, economy and political system could be created. He concluded that human societies always culminated in classes. There was always the formulation of classes that were used to dictate the distribution of power and resources in states around the world. This was outside the normal scope of a society where education and ideal form of upbringing was one that was steeped in religiosity. Therefore, by default, Marx was turned against the Church and the religious structures and he sought to pursue the secular worldview of philosophy as a means of pursuing his own ends of presenting his ideology.
Marx stated that there was a constant conflict between the ruling class or bourgeoisie who controlled the economy and the means of production by virtue of the fact that they had power over land. This was an earthly struggle that he believed people had to view and prioritize in order to change the world. This was contrary to other prior period religions where people were to live a godly life, and die and go to heaven. To Marx, this was a deception that was abused by the ruling elite and the bourgeoisie class who were always willing to use any means – including religion to pursue their quest of making money and protecting their interest.
On the other hand, the working class who he labeled as the proletariat had to survive by selling their labor in exchange for wages and survival. These poor working class people eventually had to pay for their survival by paying wages to the rich and upper class who owned land and property. The poor had been told in Churches and other spiritual orders to accept their fate and have long-suffering. This was something that Marx viewed as retrogressive. Rather, Marx presented an alternative of standing up and fighting for a better world without having to suffer with the hope of dying to get a better world in the afterlife.
Thus, in effect, Marx identified that a Capitalist society was an unjust one because there were numerous ways through which the peasant and working class would always give back everything they earned to the rich and ruling class. There were numerous systems of alienation and land control that created a system through which the working class only existed to serve the means of the bourgeoisie who had the power and authority to change the law into their favor. Therefore, in the views of Marx, Capitalism only led to inequality and exploitation of the poor working class. This is through the control of land and commodification of the economy and the continuous sale of things to the poor who had nothing but to just continue working to enrich the rich class of citizens.
The Communist Manifesto was presented as a class struggle and a tool for revolution. Chapter 1 of the book state that Communism is a “scepter that haunts Europe”. In the second section of Communist Manifesto, Marx and Engels argue for the creation of a society that serves the best interest of the proletariats. This includes the abolishing of mechanisms that the rich use to stay on top of the social ladder – inheritance, regressive taxes and other systems. The third section of the book shows how Communism differs from other ideologies. The final section brings to bear contemporary issues that existed at the time the book was written.
Karl Marx and the Failures in the Communist Dogma
Marx presented a theory that was meant to solve the problem of humankind in his time. His view was steeped in the destruction of the existing social and national order and replacing it with one that provided citizens a common ownership of society and concepts. Obviously, this epistemology showed the problems of exploitation and disregard for the rights of masses. However, it has not been free from its issues.
The first truly Communist Revolution occurred in Russia in 1917 where a large peasant population had been oppressed for hundreds of years. This Revolution relied heavily on the dogma of Marx’s thoughts. However, it did not resolve all the problems and issues of the human race. There were numerous things that proved to be problematic.
First of all, the position of hard work in society was perceived to be inevitable. As George Orwell illustrated in Animal Farm, sacrifice and dedication always came with individual self-interest. Communism removed that desire and zeal to pursue one’s selfish goals and this meant that people only sought to do the minimum they were required to do in order to satisfy the demand of the state. Therefore, it turned out that the state was somewhat a burden to people. People only saw it as a necessary evil and they sought to do things that enabled them to achieve the highest personal happiness.
The limitation on hard work in a Communist society is linked to an inherent aspect of selfishness and self-love that everyone has for himself and his family. Therefore, Communism is highly flawed and limited in numerous ways and forms. People are self-serving and they therefore seek to do things that enables them to get their own personal level of happiness. Furthermore, individuals have changes in the definition of happiness. What will make a teenager happy is not necessarily the same as what will make a 50-year old person happy. Therefore, trying to create a system where the common happiness of people will be sought is highly limited and this makes the Communist Manifesto a theoretical and dogmatic tool that has little or no bearing to the reality.
Communism also sought to replace religion – which is called the “opium of the people” in Marxist parlance with a legal and secular order that enables people to get the highest level of happiness. However, the law that replaced the old religious order was always corrupt and was opened to scrutiny. Even in nations like China where there is a death penalty for breach of order, people find ways of bending the rules. There are millionaires in China. There are people with four children in a country where it is illegal to have more than one child. This shows that the law will always be used by some people to pursue their own ends. And every doctrine and dogma will always be abused to the favor of people. This concludes that the society we live in is destined to be structured. There must be classes in order to get a practical social order. The Communist party will have to get representatives who will be given more privileges than others. Some will be more equal than others. And this is evident in the fact that some people had to be sent off to labor camps to keep the economies for all Communist countries running. Therefore, a just and classless society is not practical.
Conclusion
This paper has proven the syllogism presented in the initial submissions of the paper. First of all, Marx grew up in a period where the divide rights of kings was heavily contested and this was at the height of class-struggles in history as such, he established in his writing that from inception, the rich and powerful elites who had power and legitimate authority to control means of production and land (P1). Therefore, he put forward one of the theories that critiqued such a social order and brings out an alternative to the existing social order.
Marx’s background indicate that religion has been misused and abused by the ruling elite who also use the law to their advantage to get the poor to accept their difficult life in this world (P2). This is shown in the fact that his father and education moved him towards secular thought that challenged the law and religious order and this appears throughout his writings and work. Therefore, he challenged the status quo and presented an alternative thesis that was to change the world. This was adopted in a manifesto that was dogmatic and provided a secular rational-based ideology of Communism that was to aid people to create a secular utopia under his recommendations. This was to incite revolutions throughout Europe and the world and get the masses to create a social and legal order free of land rights and property ownership.
Works Cited
Blumenberg, Werner. Karl Marx. London: Verso, 2000. Print.
Marx, Karl and Friedrich Engels. Karl Marx and Frederick Engels: Selected Works, Volume 1. Indianapolis, IN: Wildside Press, 2012. Print.
Sperber, Jonathan. Karl Marx: A Nineteenth-Century Life. New York: W W Norton Publishing, 2012. Print.
Vann, Daiane. How the Communist Manifesto of 1848 Blueprints the Actions of the Democratic. London: Author House, 2013. Print.
