Editor's note: In his Introduction to the Critique of Hegel's Philosophy of Law, Marx pointed out the social roots of the emergence of false consciousness of a religious nature, and pointed out a realistic path to completely complete the task of religious criticism. To truly accomplish the task of religious criticism and truly liberate people from the state of alienation, the most fundamental thing is to solve the real problems of religious believers. The criticism of changing reality inevitably resorts to revolutionary practice, and naturally it is inseparable from the main body of practice. The interests of the proletariat are fundamentally identical to those of the whole social community. Therefore, the religious critique of the complete emancipation of man must be implemented in the German context as an alliance of philosophy and the proletariat, with the religious critique of the spirit of thorough criticism as the starting point, with the revolutionary practice of the proletariat as the intermediary, and in the social revolution with the reform of private property as the main content, the return of the essence of man to the realization.
The < Introduction to the Critique of Hegel's Philosophy of Law > profoundly points out that the real significance of religious criticism lies in the fact that it makes up for the shortcomings of political criticism in a roundabout way, opening up a path that can truly solve the German problem. At the same time, the limitations of religious criticism itself make the necessity of political criticism and legal philosophy criticism manifest. "As far as Germany is concerned, the critique of religion is basically over; the critique of religion is the premise of all other critiques." Since 1843, Marx has consciously parted ways with the religious criticism of the young Hegelians, but this does not mean that he has abandoned the path of religious criticism. Marx was criticizing an abstract critique of religion itself, because this abstract critique, like the religion he critiqued, played the function of obscuring social reality. Thus, as far as the social roots of his criticism are derived by pointing the spearhead of criticism at false consciousness of a religious nature, it is precisely Marx who has found a realistic way to solve the religious problem. It was in his critique of the religious criticism of the young Hegelians that Marx opened the path of a philosophical revolution that transcended classical German philosophy. For neither the old Hegelians nor the young Hegelians have merely inherited hegel's mantle one-sidedly, and whether it is Spinoza, Leibniz or Hegel, "the ideas of their minds, such as 'eternal' and 'absolute,' derive more or less from the argument for God." Therefore, in order to transcend conservative German thought, to detach it from its religious nature and truly touch social reality, it is necessary to open up a new philosophical paradigm different from classical German philosophy.
First, a thorough religious critique points to the social roots of false consciousness
(i) The dual nature of religious illusions
Marx said in his Introduction to the Critique > < Hegel's Philosophy of Law: "Suffering in religion is both a manifestation of the suffering of reality and a protest against the suffering of this reality. Religion is the sigh of oppressed beings, the emotion of a ruthless world, just as it is the spirit of an institution without spiritual vitality. Religion is the opium of the people. "From this passage of Marx's discourse, we can see that the harm of religion lies not only in the abstract God's obscuration of the sensible man, but also in the fact that religion has been accepted by many people in social life as an ideology with a specific social function." The suffering of reality " is the root cause of the emergence of religion, and therefore religion cannot be examined abstractly by isolating reality. As far as its "opium of the people" is concerned, religion has the function of preserving existing social realities. Religion causes "oppressed beings" to have spiritual hallucinations and comforts, to feel "emotion" in the "heartless world", and to feel "spirit" in "institutions without spiritual vitality". Marx's critique of religion identifies abstract God as obscuring the perceptual man, and in this respect is the inheritance of Feuerbach's ideas. But Marx did not stop there, he identified the obscuration of religion from the essence of man, and further pointed out that religion is also the manifestation of the actual suffering of man. That is to say, religion is both a defense of an irrational social reality and an indictment of this irrational social reality. This contradictory nature of religion means that the critique of religion may go in two very different directions: either to replace Christianity with a new abstract philosophy and continue to exercise the social function of religion; or to touch the social roots of religion with a thorough critical spirit.
The young Hegelians took the former path, while Marx really developed religious criticism into a thorough critique in the latter. Religion as illusory consciousness can paralyze people, but the illusory consciousness that can paralyze people is not only religion. Without a critique of the roots of illusory consciousness, then it is impossible to truly solve the problem. The root cause of the emergence of religion lies in the irrationality of the real world itself, so on the basis of completing the criticism of religion, it is necessary to criticize the reality itself. This critique points to the actual political system and the various schools of theory that defend it. Between 1843 and 1848 Marx engaged in polemics with different philosophical schools, but these controversies were no longer polemics in the classical German philosophical sense. If theoretical activity remains within the paradigm of classical philosophy, then even if Marx can gain the upper hand in the debate of individual theoretical views, in the final analysis it is only a logical criticism in the mind, so that although these criticisms are "full of words and phrases that shake the world", they will still be homogenized by the speculative system of abstract concepts, then in essence they will not jump out of the trap of German classical philosophy. Marx's critique of speculative philosophy, represented by the young Hegelians, is thorough, because it criticizes not only individual philosophical assertions, but the premise of speculative philosophy as a whole. But if this premise is only a logical premise of speculation, then this critique is not really thorough, and it will still be homogenized by abstract concepts. A truly thorough critique cannot be carried out only in the mind, but must point to the source of reality at which the ideas in the mind can arise; only in this way will theoretical polemics have a common empirically testable criterion of reality and will not be reduced to a game of pure concepts. It is precisely for this reason that Marx's critique does not stop at the criticism of the fundamental premises of speculative philosophy, but further criticizes the social reality foundations that enabled this speculative philosophy to emerge. In this way, it is not necessary to refute the specific discourses of idealistic philosophy one by one to uproot them all.
(ii) The critique of religion is a necessary condition for the awakening of man's true self-consciousness
The most fundamental reason for the existence of religion and people who believe in religion lies in the defects of real life. Therefore, the critique of religion must not only be directed at the abstract other world, but more importantly, it must see the suffering of real people presented in religious phenomena. The suffering of real life reflected by religion is the explosive point where religion can die, and the energy to change reality is contained in the indictment of real life. In this sense, religious criticism can only occupy the moral high ground by exposing the suffering of real society. Marx pointed out: "The basis of the anti-religious critique is that man creates religion, not religion creates man. That is to say, religion is the self-consciousness and self-perception of people who have not yet acquired themselves or have lost themselves again. But man is not an abstract being who dwells outside the world. Man is the world of man, the country, the society. Here, Marx's critique of religion is intended to identify the obscuration of the relationship between God and man from the relationship between the state and civil society. Therefore, to lift this veil, it is necessary to extend the critique of religion to the critique of Hegel's philosophy of law. Once the illusion of Christianity is exposed, not only the mystique of God disappears, but so does the mystique of the Prussian state, which is the supreme representative of reason. "The problem is not to allow the Germans a moment to delude themselves and obey orders. Those oppressed by reality should be made aware of oppression, thus making the oppression of reality heavier; "Self-deception" and "obedience" mark two ways in which illusory consciousness can paralyze the Germans, and "self-deception" emphasizes the spontaneity of illusory consciousness, which genuinely feels the suffering of reality, but rejects it because of their religious beliefs and regards the suffering of this world as illusory. The emphasis of "obedience" is that people maintain a passive and submissive attitude towards the difficulties imposed on them. The object of "not allowing" and "should" is German, so what is the main word? It is the person who engages in criticism. The critics here are different from those who are merely engaged in philosophical criticism, and the scholars represented by Powell have not noticed the intrinsic relationship between philosophy and reality, so their criticism is only pure speculation, and their theories are only the products of their own minds. True criticism is devoted to decontaminating all kinds of false consciousnesses, to truly revealing social reality, to making man's consciousness truly become conscious of reality. Of course, this kind of consciousness begins with an awareness of the oppression and shame of oneself.
As Feuerbach said, "The personality of God is in itself nothing more than the alienated, objectified personality of man." The finite man in reality objects his essence to create an infinite image of "God." In this way, the difficult problems that cannot be solved in reality because they are subject to finiteness are solved in the infinite concept of "God". Religious believers are immersed in the illusory content of consciousness, intuitively identifying themselves in the perfect other world, and thus unaware of "oppression" and "shame." Once the illusion of religion is pierced, people will understand that their previous understanding and experience of life is distorted by religion. Once religion is identified as a false consciousness, the illusory world on the other side disappears. Once one becomes aware that God is nothing more than the result of man's self-alienation, then the true man's sense of self begins to appear. When Germans are immersed in illusory religious consciousness, the true self tends to withdraw from the experience and disappear into obscurity, replaced by an illusory self bathed in divine grace, and the social oppression endured by the true self is selectively forgotten in self-consolation. But when the religious illusion is revealed, the ego becomes the focus of consciousness, and people really feel the mental and physical suffering they are suffering. In other words, once religion is exposed as illusory consciousness, the untangled reality of life is presented in human consciousness in a present state. "The consciousness of God is man's self-consciousness; the knowledge of God is man's self-knowledge." Since the abstract God that Protestants face directly within themselves disappears, they no longer rely on the mirror image of God for self-knowledge, but are truly aware of their actual existence. It can be seen that the self-consciousness of a true person is the consciousness of being aware of the true reality in which he finds himself. When they realize that the reality in which they live is an irrational reality, the person who can no longer endure unreasonable suffering will demand that the irrational reality be changed.
(iii) The thorough solution of religious problems must be aimed at changing irrational realities
The task of ideas with the power to transform reality should not be limited to the critique of religion, the false consciousness, nor should the critique be confined to the mind itself. The meaning of a critique that is truly devoted to liberating man from the bondage of religion is to serve the concrete unfolding of the actual history. Thus the revelation of the nature of Christian anthropology is not the end of the critique, but, on the contrary, the real beginning of the critique. It is true that the religious criticism of the young Hegelians, represented by Feuerbach, is necessary, but they do not accomplish the task that religious criticism seeks to accomplish. Religious criticism does require criticism of religion, but this is only the first step in completing the historical task of religious criticism. Although religion is created by man, man lives in the real world, and it is precisely because there are fundamental defects in this shore world that cannot be solved by practical means, so people living in the world need to create a complete other world. Therefore, to truly accomplish the task of religious criticism, to truly liberate people from the state of self-alienation, the most fundamental thing is to solve the real problems of religious believers. In this way, the solution of the religious problem cannot be accomplished in one battle, but must resort to the practice of changing the world. If it is the flaws of the real world itself that lead to the emergence of religion, then to truly solve the problem of religion, it is necessary to change the irrational social reality. In this sense, religious criticism, as a transformative force in social reality, is also involved in the generation of history. In other words, philosophy with a spirit of thorough criticism serves the development of history, and only in this way can such a philosophy truly achieve the goal of restoring the essence of man that religious criticism strives to strive for. Man is the purpose of historical development, and in order to realize the return of man's essence, it is necessary to carry out structural changes in the real society. In this way, the unfolding of the path of religious criticism ultimately points to a social revolution that transforms reality.
Second, true criticism is the unity of subject and object on the basis of practice
(1) The root of man is man himself
To accomplish the task of religious criticism thoroughly, to truly make man human, it is necessary to criticize the social realities that led to the emergence of religion. The critique of social reality is committed to the change of reality, and therefore this critique appeals directly to the revolutionary practice of materiality. Marx said in the Introduction to the Critique of < Hegel's Philosophy of Law >: "Of course, the weapon of criticism cannot replace the criticism of weapons, and material forces can only be destroyed by material forces; but once the theory has mastered the masses, it will also become material forces." Theory can control the masses as long as it convinces [ad hominem]; theory can persuade people [ad hominem] as long as it is thorough. The so-called thoroughness is to grasp the essence of things. And the root of man is man himself. The proof of the thoroughness of German theory, i.e., of its practical capacity, lies in the fact that German theory proceeds from the resolute and active abolition of religion. The critique of religion boils down to the doctrine that man is the highest essence of man, and thus to an absolute command that all relations that make man an insult, an enslaved, an abandoned, and despised must be overthrown."
The words "The root of man is man himself", "man is the highest essence of man" and "this is an absolute command" remind people of the vocabulary of Kant's philosophy, but we encounter problems when we try to understand it Ascanized. For the "ontology" in Kant is divided into "transcendental" and "transcendental". "Transzendent" in Kant refers to something beyond the realm of human experience, beyond the boundaries of "intellectual." "Transzendental," on the other hand, "does not mean anything beyond all experience, but something that, though prior to experience (innate), is said only for the purpose of making empirical knowledge possible." Under this distinction, two different "ontology" inevitably appear, the ontology in the sense of "transcendence" is the "thing itself", while the "ontology" in the sense of "a priori" is the "subject", that is, the "I think" in the Cartesian sense. So is Marx's "man himself" and "the highest essence of man" here in the sense of "transcendental" or "a priori"? Obviously neither. For if this division is made, it will fall into the division caused by Kant's division. Kant's "ontology" in the first sense preserves the territory of the moral and religious sphere of the human mind, while "ontology" in the second sense is a condition for the universal necessity of empirical knowledge. "Here Kant leaves behind a divisive situation: the 'ontology' is divided (i.e., the 'ontology' as the 'transcendental self' and the 'ontology' as the 'rational idea'), the 'phenomenon' and the 'ontology' are split, the 'self' or 'subject' itself is divided (the self of knowledge and the self of practice), and the epistemology and metaphysics are divided."
Hegel criticized Kant for his complete disregard for the intrinsic connection between intellectual and rational, objective and subjective, finite and infinite, and forcing them to distinguish between them would make rational and infinite things abstract and incomprehensible. In order to avoid Kantist divisions, Hegel introduced a negative intermediary for the development of thought, reconciling the subjective consciousness and the objective spirit in a spiraling circle in the form of dialectics, and the origin of this movement, or the principle of the concept's own movement, is the contradiction that exists within the categories. It is "the prinzip of the soul of its own movement, the life of all nature and spirit". Unlike Kant, Hegel did not assert the innate structure and characteristics of thought, but saw them as revealed in the unfolding of logic. In his view, the real world is the result of spiritual development based on the externalization of self-consciousness and the overcoming of externalization, so that the subject and the entity are in agreement. "It is really a reality only if it is a movement that establishes itself, or only if it is an intermediary between its own transformation and its own self, or in other words, its existence is really a subject." In terms of its transcendence of the divided subject in the Kant sense, Marx's concept of "man" here is clearly influenced by Hegel, and more directly borrows from the "self-consciousness" of the young Hegelians. The young Hegelians emphasized more of the subjectivity aspect of Hegel's thought than the old Hegelians, a philosophical position embodied in political practice as an attempt to use spiritual freedom against religious oppression and prussian despotism. "Man" is both a subject and an entity, and the essence of man is realized in human activities. So can we equate "people" here with "self-awareness"? Obviously not. Hegel's philosophy reconciles thought and existence under the premise of absolutizing the spirit, and because the abstract absolute identity of its premises allows its theories to ignore the contradictions of reality and be all-encompassing, its system has become a conservative system for defending the existing system.
(ii) The realization of ideas is inseparable from those who use practical power
The young Hegelians appeared as leftists, and although they no longer dissolved irrational realities into an all-encompassing speculative system, their critique was merely a critique of theory because the "self-consciousness" used to emphasize the action of the subject was nothing more than a change in the terminology of Hegel's "absolute spirit." "Thought itself cannot achieve anything at all. For ideas to be realized, there must be people who use the power of practice. "In order to carry out the practice of changing reality, we must find the true subject of the historical development of human society. Hegel saw the subject as the unfolding of self-consciousness and the process of its realization, and thus history was nothing more than the unfolding of logic. The development of this theory is that the "masses" as "spiritual" antitheses are necessarily excluded from history, and this is embodied in the young Hegelians, represented by Bruno Powell. In contrast, Feuerbach, although criticizing Hegel's idealism, understood the subject only as a passive perceptual existence, so that the subject can only be a passive activist. It was precisely because of this conservatism of the young Hegelians that Marx emphasized that "the weapon of criticism can certainly not replace the criticism of weapons, and material forces can only be destroyed by material forces." The "weapon of criticism" reveals the picture of the rationalization of reality in a negative way while criticizing the irrationality of reality, that is to say, the principles of the future are revealed in the negative criticism of reality. The critique of reality by theory enables the masses to awaken, the awakened subject will use the "weapon of criticism" to carry out the "criticism of weapons", the future of history will be opened up in the practice of revolution, and the subject and history will achieve dialectical unity in practice. For any theory to be realized in the material world, it must be incarnated as a "material force", and it is inseparable from the practice of the subject who aims to realize the theory. The criterion for testing the scientific nature of theory is not the abstract concept in the mind, but the possibility of its incarnation into reality, and the possibility of historical development is contained in the consciousness of the historical subject for the laws of history. The unity of the "weapon of criticism" and the "criticism of weapons" in the revolutionary practice of the masses means that theoretical criticism cannot be regarded merely as work in the purely theoretical sphere, but as a link in revolutionary practice in the totality of the social reality in which it finds itself. In this way, the critique of false consciousness is directly transformed into a critique of the social totality that produces this false consciousness, then the critique is not only a theoretical critique of theoretical consciousness represented by German classical philosophy, but in its overall sense, it points to a change in the social reality that produces false consciousness such as German classical philosophy. It was in this sense that Marx embarked on a completely different path from pure speculative philosophy.
(III) The practical relationship between subject and object is the basis of reality of historical occurrence
Compared with the theoretical criticism of the young Hegelians, the theory-practice connection revealed by Marx is a more realistic critical mechanism, the realistic basis for the realization of the purpose of criticism. Marx revealed that consciousness has its own bottom as pure passivity, as a pre-reflective social structure on which all consciousness arises, rather than pure consciousness as a reflective level. The mode of thinking of the theoretical criticism of the young Hegelians was born out of Hegel's philosophy, so the real opponent of the revolution of the critical paradigm achieved by Marx was Hegel. To understand this, let us first look at Heidegger's interpretation of Article XI of feuerbach's Theses" [Let's] examine the thesis: is there a real opposition between explaining the world and changing it?" Isn't every explanation of the world already a change in the world? Doesn't every interpretation of the world presuppose: Is explanation a true cause of thought? On the other hand, doesn't every change in the world presuppose a theoretical foresight as a tool? ...... What kind of world change is Marx talking about? It is a change in the relations of production. Where does production have its place? In practice. What is the practice prescribed through? Through a certain theory, this theory shapes the concept of production as the production of man (through himself). Thus Marx had a theoretical idea of man, a fairly precise idea, which was contained as a basis in Hegel's philosophy. In Heidegger's view, the understanding and division of practice itself is already a theoretical division, that is to say, there is a theoretical attitude before the binary division of theory and practice, and it is this theoretical tendency that makes the binary division of theory and practice possible, which is undoubtedly in line with Marx's original intention. But his view of attributing the basis of Marx's theory to Hegel is biased.
It is true that theoretical discussion has fundamentally pointed to the search for necessity, but marx is more profound than Heidegger in that he also saw that the explanatory activity of seeking necessity was already a theoretical tendency in itself, and the practical roots of this theoretical tendency were often obscured by various theoretical explanations, and heidegger's statement that "every explanation of the world is not already a change to the world" is precisely such a change in its practical sense. But Hayes himself cannot admit this, because in his eyes it is only a limited "Here-Here" (Dasein) that "explains the world", so the difference in "Explaining the World" lies in the different perspectives brought about by the different places where "Here-and-Now" stands. Heidegger's temporality and historicity are only related to the experience of life that has been thrown into the world by fate, while Marx thinks about the meaning of theory based on the historical process of reality. The philosophy of "explaining the world" does not necessarily change the world in the sense of historical progress, and the philosophy of "changing the world" must be the philosophy of "explaining the world". After understanding the fundamental difference between the practice of "changing the world" and the practice of interpretation, it is not difficult to find that heidegger's judgment that "Marx therefore has a theoretical idea of man, a fairly precise idea, which is contained as a basis in Hegel's philosophy" is also unfounded. Hegel's philosophy broke Kant's categorical distinction between phenomena and essence, and demonstrated the identity of spirit and world. But Marx's concept of practice is not to cling to this pure identity; on the contrary, it is a breakthrough in Hegel's abstract identity. Practice is not to argue for the identity of ideas and reality; on the contrary, the concrete practice of history implies the inconsistency between ideas and reality.
The proletariat is the subject of history in the true sense
(1) The practice of changing irrational reality needs subjects who can represent the interests of the entire social community
Religion is the alienation of the essence of man, and the reason for this alienation lies in the division within the real society. Therefore, in order to accomplish the historical task of abandoning religion, it is necessary to rely on a universal historical subject capable of bridging the contradictions within civil society. To find such a subject, it is necessary to criticize Hegel's philosophy of law on the basis of religious criticism. Hegel tried to bridge the internal contradictions of civil society with a universal state. In his case all reality and thought have the same general structure and characteristics, so logic, while grasping thought, reveals the general structure of reality. The general laws of thinking and the principles of unfolding revealed by logic are also the laws that must be followed and the principles of development and change. The object of logic is the mind itself, in which "the method is no different from its object and content", which is Hegel's dialectic. Hegel's dialectical principle "ultimately regards all kinds of real human societies, such as the state and civil society, as the stipulation of the inner principles of the mind." "The process of externalizing the absolute spiritual experience as the basis of the world returns to itself in time, and this process manifests itself in the unfolding of world history. In his view, the existential value of real history is determined by logical precedence, so that the antagonistic contradictions in reality are internalized into contradictions within the conceptual system, and this speculative philosophy that ignores reality is bound to manifest itself politically as extremely conservative and reactionary.
The purpose of religious criticism is to liberate man from the domination of religion and religious-like abstract philosophies. To realize this demand, the new philosophy must reject the abstract speculative ways in which previous philosophers explained the world, and only in this way can the thought itself be realistically involved in the production of history through the practical activity of the subject. What kind of subject can shoulder this historical mission? This historical subject is universal in terms of its ability to represent the interests of society as a whole; it is concrete in terms of its ability to dynamically change reality. Therefore, such a historical subject must not be a spirit beyond history in the Hegelian sense. The subject that fundamentally changes social reality must be in the midst of historical generation and change, and being in history means that it is both a product of history and the creator of history. Philosophy, which does not aim to change the world, is merely a defense of the rationality of reality, and when a certain philosophy makes a demand for the transformation of reality, it already contains an awareness of the irrationality of reality. This philosophy will make the masses realize that reality is not as reasonable as previous theories explain, and at this time the subjective consciousness of the masses will awaken and they will devote themselves to the change of the world.
(ii) The proletariat represents the direction of historical progress
The historicity of the historical subject means that this subject cannot be an absolute spirit that transcends history, nor can it be the "first driving force" at the beginning of history, but can only be the subject of reality generated in the development of history. The political forces that can unfold the social revolution that transforms reality cannot be a hierarchy of special interests in civil society. The main body that changed German reality was naturally the Germans. But the so-called "Germans" here are in different social positions, and the starting point of the search for political emancipation of people in different social positions is often only to pursue the interests of the particular class or stratum in which they are located, in other words, the political emancipation of a certain class or stratum does not have a universal significance, and therefore is not considered the real emancipation of the Germans. The necessary condition for the possibility of universal emancipation is the finding of a class that represents the interests of society as a whole. If a class is to be able to become the true representative of the interests of society as a whole, it must have no special interests of its own, which can only be determined by its position. The proletariat arose in civil society, but there was a principled contradiction with civil society. Although the proletariat is also a class belonging to civil society, it has no special interests that can be realized in civil society because it has nothing. Capitalist society flaunts the principles of freedom and equality, but the tragic reality of proletarian life in fact proves the bankruptcy of the principles of freedom and equality. The proletariat is at the lowest level of civil society, bearing the suffering of the whole society, and it is impossible to achieve its own liberation without liberating the members of the whole society from the irrational system, and therefore the interests of the proletariat are fundamentally consistent with the interests of the whole social community. Religious criticism in search of the complete emancipation of man must be implemented in the German context as an alliance of philosophy and the proletariat. In other words, the german road to emancipation is based on religious criticism with a thorough critical spirit, mediated by the revolutionary practice of the proletariat, and the return of the essence of man in the complete negation of private property.
Feuerbach's alienation of religion as the humanoid essence profoundly reveals the anthropological roots of religion, but his rejection of religion is in fact the creation of a new godless religion. After all, simply reversing "God" and "man" is nothing more than replacing an abstract God with an abstract man. Marx's thought in 1843 still had a strong Feuerbachian humanistic color, but because he had keenly perceived the incompleteness of German religious criticism and began to pay attention to social reality, he in fact opened a way beyond Feuerbach's religious criticism. It can be said that religious criticism ran through the ideological development of Marx's life. After 1843, Marx's critical activities penetrated from the philosophy of law to civil society, and his "religious criticism was directly embodied in the early criticism of monetary fetishism and the late criticism of commodity fetishism", "he thought about the problem of the state and capital as a deformation of 'religious criticism', not just the Feuerbach theory of self-alienation, which had been abandoned soon after the application, but on the contrary, he persistently criticized 'religion' in the form of capital and the state." Thus, the understanding of Marx's religious critical thought in the < Hegel's Critique of the Philosophy of Law > Introduction should not stop merely within the text, but should be placed in the whole course of the development of Marx's thought; not only in the context of Germany in 1843, but in the historical process of capitalist development. Only in this way can we truly understand the historical significance of Marx's critical ideas on religion.
(Source: Science and Atheism, No. 5, 2021)