Socialism and Religion
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Author : Anton Pannekoek

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I

If we try to find a key for the mutual relation of socialism and
religion in the practical attitude of socialist speakers and writers and
religious spokesmen, we are easily led to believe, that the greatest
misunderstanding, confusion, and internal contradictions reign in this regard.
On one side we see that numerous laborers, when joining the ranks of the
socialists, also throw their theological faith overboard and often combat
religion fiercely; moreover, the teachings, which form the basis and strength of
present-day socialism, and which together form a entirely new world conception,
stand irreconcilably opposed to religious faith. On the other hand, we see
faithful adherents of Christianity, even priests, demanding socialism precisely
on account of their Christian teachings and gathering under the banner of the
labor movement. And all agitators, and, what is still more significant, all
programs of international socialist parties, unanimously declare religion to be
a private affair of individuals, in which others have no business to interfere.
Nevertheless most priests and official representatives of religion combat the
social democracy very zealously. They contend, that this movement aims merely to
exterminate faith, and they harp unctuously upon all statements of our great
champions Marx, Engels, Dietzgen, in which they make critical remarks about
religion and defend their own materialism as a scientific doctrine. This, again,
is opposed by comrades in our own ranks, who, relying upon the declaration of
neutrality toward religion in our party program, would prefer to forbid the
spreading of such statements, which hurt the feelings of religious people. They
say that the goal of our socialist movement is purely economic. In that respect
they are right, and we shall not fail to repeat this again and again in
refutation of the lies of the preachers. We do not wish to inoculate people with
a new faith, or an atheism, but we rather wish to bring about an economic
transformation of society. We desire to displace capitalist production by a
socialist one. Any one may realize the practicability of such a collective
production and its advantages over capitalist exploitation, for reasons which
have nothing at all to do with religion. To this end we want to secure the
political power for the working class, since it is indispensable as a means to
this end. The necessity, or at least the desirability, of this transfer of the
political power can be understood by any laborer from his political experience,
without any further ceremony, regardless of whether he is in matters of faith a
Protestant, a Catholic, a Jew, or a Freethinker without any religion. Our
propaganda, then, is to be exclusively devoted to the work of elucidating the
economic advantages of socialism, and everything is to be eschewed, which might
run counter to the prejudice of religious minds.

Evident as this conception may be, at least in its first part, yet it has its
drawback, and there will be few, who will agree with the ultimate conclusion. If
it were correct, and if it were our aim to preach the beauties of socialism to
all people, then we should naturally have to address ourselves to all classes of
society, and first of all to the most educated. But the history of socialism has
thoroughly disavowed the utopian sentimentalists who wanted to do this. It was
found, that the possessing classes did not care about these advantages, and that
the working class became more and more accessible to this understanding. This in
itself indicates that something more has to be considered than merely to prove
to people the practicability of an economic transformation of society. This
transformation, and its instrument, the conquest of political power by the
working class, can only be the outcome of a great class-struggle. But in order
to carry this class-struggle successfully to its conclusion, it is necessary to
organize the whole working class, to awaken its political intelligence, to endow
it with a thorough understanding of the internal forces which move the world. It
is furthermore necessary to be familiar with the strength and weakness of the
opponents of the working class, in order to make the best use of them, and in
order to be able to meet all influences energetically, which might weaken the
internal and external strength of the organized army of workers. Only a clear
grasp of all political and social phenomena can preserve the present leaders and
members of the socialist movement from missteps and mistakes, which might
seriously injure the propaganda among the still unenlightened masses. Only
profound knowledge will enable them to wrest ever new concessions from their
enemies by their tactics and to benefit the working class.

If it is a fact, that the greatest amount of knowledge and understanding is
required in our ranks for the purpose of waging our fight well, and if the
materialistic writings of our master minds tend to increase this intelligence,
then it would involve great disadvantages to try to conceal and suppress these
writings and conceptions for no other reason than that of avoiding a clash with
the prejudices of people of limited knowledge.

Our theory, the socialist science founded by Marx and Engels, was the first
to give us clear glimpses of the different social interrelations, which
influence our movement. It will, therefore, be necessary for us, to turn to this
science for a satisfactory answer to the question of the relation between
socialism and religion.

II

If we wish to decide upon our attitude towards religion, it will
first be necessary for our science to enlighten us concerning the origin, the
nature and the future of religion, and this enlightenment, like every science,
must be based upon experience and facts. Now we find in all countries with a
strongly developed socialist movement, that the mass of class-conscious workers
are without religion, that is, they do not believe in any religious doctrines
and do not adhere to any of them. This seems at first sight all the more
peculiar, as this mass has generally received but little schooling. On the other
hand, the “educated” classes, that is, the bourgeoisie, return more
and more to faith, although there was at one time a strong anti-religious
movement among them. It seems, then, that belief or unbelief are not primarily a
result of culture, of a certain degree of knowledge and enlightenment. The
socialist workers are the first among whom irreligion appears as a social mass
phenomenon. There must be some definite cause for this, and if this does not
prove to be merely a transient fact, it must necessarily result in a greater and
greater restriction of the field of religion by socialism.

Now the partisans of religion contend that this is not the case, for
religion, according to them, is something more and higher than a mere
theological faith. The devotion to an ideal, the willingness to make sacrifices
for a great cause, the faith in the final victory of the Good — all this
is said to be also religion. In this sense the socialist movement must even be
called deeply religious. Of course, we are not going to split hairs about words.
We will merely say, therefore, that this meaning of the term religion is not the
customary one. We know very well that the socialist working people are filled
with a great and high idealism, but with them this is not allied to a belief in
any supernatural power, which is supposed to rule the world and guide the fates
of men. We use the term religion only in this last meaning, that is, as a belief
in a god.

Now let us ask ourselves whence this faith comes, and what it signifies. It
is obvious, that the faith in a supernatural power, which rules men and the
world, can exist only to the extent that the actual forces controlling the
processes in nature and in the human world are unknown. A Kaffir, who serves as
porter in a South African railway station and who suddenly hears the Morse
apparatus starting to give signals, believes that a god is concealed in it. He
bows deeply before the apparatus and says reverently: “I will at once
inform the boss” (the telegraph operator). This conception of the
untutored man is quite intelligible, and so is the fact that the primitive
people believed the nature around them to be filled with all sorts of mysterious
spirits. In their economy they depend wholly upon nature. Many natural forces
and unknown powers threaten their lives and their work, while others are
favorable, useful, benefiting to them. They have no means of knowing and
controlling those powers. These appear to them as supernatural, manlike, forces
with independent wills, and they seek to influence them with the means of their
limited mental horizon, with prayers, sacrifices, or, perhaps, threats. The
little general knowledge required for their economy is intimately connected with
their religious conceptions. The priests owe their great influence precisely to
the fact, that they are the mental directors of production. Just as in their
conception of the forces of nature elementary and crude empirical knowledge is
mixed with fantastic superstition, so their religious ceremonies form a mixture
of actions necessary in production and of actions wholly superstitious and
useless.

Civilized people are no longer influenced so overwhelmingly by the forces of
nature. Although it would not do to say, that they are scientifically understood
in the beginning of civilization, yet men are more out of reach of their direct
influence. Their methods of production and of labor have become so developed,
that men feel more independent of natural events and are not so helpless against
them as savages. When we come to a later stage of civilization, to the age of
capitalism, then we meet with a rapidly developing natural science, which
investigates the forces and effects of nature systematically and uncovers their
secrets. By the application of this science in technique, the forces of nature
are even made subject to the production of the necessities of life. For the
modern civilized man, then, nature holds no more mysterious powers, which might
induce him to believe in supernatural forces. These spirits of the past are
tamed and pressed into his service as ordinary forces of nature, whose laws and
processes are known to him.

Nevertheless we find that the class, in which this culture and this supremacy
over nature are incarnated, has remained, or has again become, religious for the
greater part, with the exception of a strong temporary current, of bourgeois
materialism in the nineteenth century. Why is that so? What reason have they for
assuming the existence of a supernatural ruler of the fates of mankind? In other
words, what forces are there that still strongly affect the existence of the
bourgeoisie, and that are still unknown in their origin and nature and therefore
may still be regarded by them as mysterious and natural forces? These forces are
derived from the social order. The adage says, indeed, that every one is the
captain of his own soul, but in practice most of the capitalists find out that
this is not true.

As an independent producer, the capitalist may do his best, he may attend
conscientiously and thriftily to his business, he may exploit his employes
thoroughly without any sentimentality, he may keep his own expenditures within a
decent limit, and nevertheless prices may fall, until he has to sell almost
without any profit, or even at a loss, and in spite of his efforts the evil
monster of failure creeps upon him. Or, his business may be doing well, and he
may be accumulating money at a fine rate, when all of a sudden a crisis
overtakes him and swallows his whole business. How does this happen? He does not
know. He lacks the knowledge of political economy, which might enlighten him
about the fact, that capitalism necessarily must produce such great social
forces, which may lift the individual to high prosperity, if he is lucky, but
which may also destroy him. The origin of these forces is to be sought in the
fact that production is indeed social, but only in the form and appearance of
production depending on private enterprise and control. The individual fancies
that he is working independently, but he must exchange his products with others,
and the conditions of exchange, the prices, and the possibility of exchanging at
all, are decided by the totality of social conditions. Production is not
consciously regulated by society. Its social character stands above the will of
mankind, the same as the forces of nature, and for this reason social laws face
the individual with the inevitability and cruel inexorableness of natural
forces. The laws of this artificial nature, of this process of production, are
unknown to him and for this reason he stands before them just as the savage
stands before the laws of nature. They bring destruction and misery in many
forms, occasionally also fortune. They rule his fate capriciously, but he does
not know and understand them.

The socialist proletariat stands before these forces with a different
attitude. It is precisely its oppressed condition which deprives it of all
interest in the preservation of capitalism and in the concealment of the truth
about this system. Thus the proletarian is enabled to study capitalism well, he
is compelled to make himself thoroughly familiar with his enemy. This is the
reason why the scientific analysis of capitalism given in Capital,
which is the life’s work of Karl Marx, met reluctance and little
understanding on the side of the bourgeois scientists, but was hailed with
enthusiastic appreciation by the proletariat. The proletarians find in this work
a revelation of the causes of their poverty. By its teaching they are enabled to
understand the whole history of the capitalist mode of production. They become
aware of the reasons, why it must inevitably be the fate of innumerable small
bourgeois to fail, why hunger, war, and the suffering incidental to crises must
necessarily follow from this production. But they also see, in what manner
capitalism must ruin itself by its own laws. The working class understand, why
by their insight and knowledge, they will be enabled to displace capitalism by a
consciously regulated social production, in which no mysterious forces can any
longer bring destruction to mankind. The socialist portion of the working class,
then, stands before the social forces just as intelligently and understandingly
as the educated bourgeois stands before the forces of nature.

Here, then, lies the cause of the irreligion of the modern class-conscious
socialist proletariat. It is not the product of any intentional anti-religious
propaganda. Nor is it the demand of any program. It comes rather gradually as a
consequence of the deeper social insight, which the working people acquire by
instruction on the field of political economy. The proletarian is not divorced
from his faith by any materialist doctrines, but by teaching which enables him
to see clearly and rationally through the conditions of society, and to the
extent that he grasps the fact that social forces are natural effects of known
causes, the old faith in miracles dies out in him.

III

In order to understand the nature of religion thoroughly —
and only a thorough understanding will enable us to grasp its effects in present
society — we must come to a clear conception of the nature of spiritual
things in general. It is in this respect that the philosophical writings of
Josef Dietzgen are so valuable, because they give us clearness about the nature
of the mind, of human thoughts, theories, doctrines, about ideas in general.
Only in this way do we fully realize our role in social life and in the present
struggle. Whatever is in the mind, is a reflection of the world outside of us.
It has arisen out of this world. Our conception of things true and real is
derived from our experience in the word, our conception of things good and holy
from our needs. But these mental reflections are not mere mirrored pictures,
which reproduce the object exactly as it is, while the mind plays a purely
passive role. No, the mind transforms everything, which it assimilates. Out of
the impressions and feelings, by which the material world exerts an influence
upon it, it makes mental conceptions and assumptions. Dietzgen has explained,
that the difference between world and mind, original and copy, is this, that the
infinitely varied, concrete, ever changing flow of phenomena, of which reality
consists, is turned by the mind into abstract, fixed, unchangeable, rigid
conceptions. In these conceptions the general, lasting, important, salient facts
are detached from the multicolored picture of phenomena and designated as the
nature of things. In the same way we spiritualize among the many things and
institutions necessary for our welfare those by terms good, moral, holy, which
are essential for satisfaction of our lasting, vital and general
requirements.

It is inherent in this nature of mental concepts and assumptions, that
although they are derived from reality, yet they cannot immediately follow
reality in its ceaseless alterations. When a thing has once been gathered from
experience as a mental copy, it becomes fixed in the mind and remains there
enthroned as a recognized truth, while new experiences are crowding upon the
mind, to which this truth can no longer be reconciled. At first this truth
resists, but gradually it has to submit to modification, until finally, when the
new facts have been accumulated in crushing masses, it is overthrown, or
thoroughly understood and altered. This is the history of all scientific
theories. The place of the old is taken by a new theory, which then gives to the
entire store of material facts an abstract and systematic summarization.

We are not so much interested here in the scientific theories, as in the
general conceptions concerning the nature of the world and the position of man
in it, which are incorporated in the philosophies and religions. These are not
theories abstracted from the experiences and special observations of learned
explorers. The facts on which they are built up are rather the experiences and
feelings of whole nations or popular classes. They form their general ideas and
conceptions out of their experience concerning their own position in nature and
in social environments, particularly concerning the requirements of their life.
Wherever powerful unknown forces press upon them — as we have indicated
before — their conception of the world is dominated by supernatural
forces, and other conceptions are joined to this fundamental thought. This was
the case, until now, in almost the whole of history, with only a few exceptions.
In the religious doctrines, then, we find the general primitive conceptions
concerning the nature of the world and of the relations of man to those unknown
forces expressed in mystified forms. Everything required for the maintenance or
the interests of this class of people then assumes the form of a divine law.
When all hope of improvement by self-assertion is gone, as it was among the
ruined Roman proletarians of the first centuries of Christianity, then meek
suffering without resistance and inert waiting for supernatural salvation become
the highest virtue. But when an energetic preparation for war is required to
keep hold of a conquered country and is accomplished by success, as it was among
the Jews of the Old Testament, then Jehovah helps his chosen people and those
obey his laws who fight bravely. During the great class struggle in Europe,
called the Reformation, every one of the classes engaged in the fight regarded
as God’s will whatever agreed with its class interests, for each could
conceive only of those things as being absolutely good and necessary which were
vital for the existence of his class. For the followers of Luther, who loved to
serve a prince, God’s law, or God’s truth, demanded obedience to
authority; for the free bourgeoisie of the towns it demanded Calvinist equality
of individuals and selection by grace; for the rebellious peasants and
proletarians it demanded the communist equality of all mankind. The struggling
religions of that period may be compared in a general way with the political
parties of the present day. The members of the same class assembled in them, and
in their congresses (councils) they formed in the shape of confessions of faith
(we would say programs nowadays) their general conceptions of what they thought
to be true, good, and necessary, and what was consequently God’s truth and
God’s will. In those days religion was something living, deeply and
intimately connected with the whole life, and for this reason it happened
continually that people changed their religion. When a change of religion is
considered merely as a sort of violation of conventionality, as it is in our
day, it is an indication, that religion remains untouched by the great social
movement of modern times, by the struggles which stimulate men, and becomes a
mere dead husk.

With the development of society new classes and new class antagonisms have
arisen. Within the previously existing communities of the faithful different
classes, and antagonisms resulting from them, have grown up. From the same
stratum of small bourgeois, there have arisen great capitalists and
proletarians. The confession of faith, which was formerly an expression of a
living social conviction in a theological garb, becomes a rigid formula. The
community of faithful, formerly a community of interests, becomes a fossilized
thing. The mental conceptions persist by tradition as abstract theological
forms, so long as they are not shaken by the strong gale of a new class
struggle.

When this new class struggle comes, it finds the old traditional antagonisms
in its way, and then the fight between the traditional faith and the new reality
begins. The present actual class interests are identical for the working people
of different religious confessions, while a deep class antagonism exists between
laborers and capitalists of the same religious denomination. But the new reality
requires time to overcome the old traditions. From a time, in which a religious
community represented a living community of interests, the association of
members of the same faith has been transmitted as a tradition, and a sacred
tradition of that. Because this association is the mental image of a former
reality, it persists as a spiritual fact and attempts to maintain itself against
the onrush of the new facts, which influence the mind of the laborer by his own
experience and by socialist propaganda. In the end the old group of conceptions
and interests, which has become a dead husk, must yield to the new group based
on present class interests.

Religion is, therefore, only temporarily an obstacle for the advance of
socialism. By virtue of the sacredness attached to its doctrines and commands it
can maintain itself longer and more tenaciously than other bourgeois
conceptions, and this tenaciousness has sometimes created the impression that
the faithfulness of the religious laborers would be a bar to practical and a
refutation of theoretical socialism. But in the long run even this ideology
succumbs to the power of reality, as the Catholic laborers in Germany have
proved.

IV

The socialist teachings have inoculated the laboring class with
an entirely new conception of the world. The realization, that society is in a
process of continual transformation, and that misery, poverty, exploitation, and
all the suffering of the present are only temporary and will soon yield to an
order of society, to be inaugurated by his class, in which peace, abundance, and
fraternity shall reign, this realization must revolutionize the whole world
conception of the laborer from the ground up. The theory of socialism furnishes
the scientific foundation for this world conception. Political economy teaches
us to understand the internal laws, which move the capitalist process, while
historical materialism lays bare the effects of the economic revolution upon the
conceptions and actions of people. And this stands irreconcilably opposed, as a
materialistic doctrine, to religion. The socialist laborer who has recognized
his class interests and has thereby been inspired with enthusiasm for the great
aim of his class struggle, will then naturally desire to get a clear
understanding of the scientific foundations of his practical actions. To this
end he is acquainted with the materialistic doctrines of socialism. But it is
not merely on account of the satisfaction derived from a thorough understanding,
that is necessary for the socialist parties to promote a thorough understanding
of these teachings among their members. It is necessary rather because such an
understanding is indispensable for a vigorous pushing of our fight.

The actual state of affairs, then, is just the opposite of what the
theologians believe and proclaim. Our materialistic doctrines do not serve to
deprive the laborers of their religion. They approach our doctrines only after
their religion is already gone, and they come to us for a more profound and
uniform substantiation of their views. Religion does not flee, because we
propagate the doctrines of materialism, but because it is undermined by the
simple new gleanings on the field of economics, gathered by a careful
observation of the present world.

In declaring that religion is a private matter, we do not mean to say that it
is immaterial to us, what general conceptions our members hold. We prefer a
thorough scientific understanding to an unscientific religious faith. But we are
convinced, that the new conditions will of themselves alter the religious
conceptions, and that religious or anti-religious propaganda is unable to
accomplish or prevent this.

Here lies the crux of the difference between our conception and all former
ones, between the present proletarian movement and former class movements. Our
materialistic theory has uncovered for us the actual foundations of former
historical struggles. It has demonstrated, that it was always a question of
class-struggles and class interests whose goal was the transformation of
economic conditions. Men were not clearly aware of the material reasons for
their struggles. Their conceptions and aims were disguised by a mystic cover of
eternal truths and holy infinite aims. Their struggles were therefore carried on
as struggles between ideas, as struggles for divine truth in fulfillment of
God’s will. The struggles assumed the shape of religious wars. Later, when
religion no longer occupied first place, when the bourgeoisie, fancying that
they could grasp the whole world by reason, fought against the representatives
of the church and nobility, then this bourgeoisie imagined that they were waging
a fight for the ultimate rational, for eternal justice based upon reason. At
that period the bourgeoisie championed materialism. But as yet they understood
but little of the real nature of the struggle, and carried it on in that
juristic mystification, here and there as a struggle against religion. They did
not see, that this fight was nothing but a class struggle of the bourgeoisie
against the feudal classes, and had for its aim only the installation of the
capitalist mode of production.

In this respect our class struggle is different from all previous ones, for
by virtue of our materialist science we recognize it to be exactly what it is,
namely, a struggle for the economic transformation of society. Although we feel
the high importance of this struggle, and often express it in our writings, that
it shall bring freedom and brotherhood to mankind, realize the Christian ideals
of human love, and emancipate human thought from the oppression of superstition,
nevertheless we do not represent this struggle as an ethical one for a moral
ideal, as a juristic one for absolute liberty and justice, or as a spiritual one
against superstition. For we know, that it is waged in reality for the
revolution of the mode of production, for the requirements of production, and
all other things are but results flowing from this basis.

This clear grasp of the real nature of our struggle is expressed in the
declaration that religion is a private matter. There is no contradiction between
our materialist doctrine and this practical demand. They do not represent two
antagonistic points of view, which must be reconciled, in the way that
“considerations of practicability” must be reconciled with
“soundness of theoretical principle.” No, just as our so-called
considerations of practicability are everywhere results of a clearly understood
theory, so it is here, as the above statements show. The declaration that
religion is a private matter is therefore an expression of the clearly
scientific nature and aim of our struggle, a necessary consequence of our
materialist theory of history, and only our materialism is able to give a
scientific vindication of this demand.


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     Socialism and Religion -- Added : February 28, 2021

     Socialism and Religion -- Updated : January 08, 2022

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