Posted by Bill Scaife on August 09, 19102 at 23:23:57:
In Reply to: The Opiate of the Masses posted by KT on August 09, 19102 at 22:24:39:
KT,
Very good exposition! But allow me to interject (after all, internet bulletin boards are largely interjection ;) ).
: First, let's be clear that, while Marx may have been an atheist, he didn't say that "God" is the opiate of the masses. He said that "religion" is the opiate of the masses. Religion is not God. It is man's attempt to understand and relate to God.
Indeed - "religion is not God." Amen.
: Second, consider the word "opiate." An opiate is a narcotic. It is a drug used to dull the mind and the senses. It's the morphine prescribed for patients recovering from surgery, and the heroin addicts use to mask the pain of their own existence.
No argument here.
: Finally, remember that Marx wrote about the conditions of European industrial workers in the mid-nineteenth century, before legislation and collective bargaining guaranteed a living wage and safe working conditions. Their lives were, in fact, quite miserable. And conditions were no better in the United States.
Here we diverge. I would direct you to Jacob Bronowski's famous PBS series, "The Ascent of Man." Working conditions in the early English Industrial Revolution were appalling by modern standards. BUT, they were liberating to the unlanded agrarian individuals who migrated to Manchester, Birmingham, Liverpool. The standard for comparison can only be looking back from the point of participation. Overlaying current sensibilities can only lead to erroneous understanding.
Similarly, the American Industrial Revolution, found quintessentially in the Lowell, Massachusetts, mills, and other New England places brought unprecedented freedom and relative wealth to even the lowest paid workers - as compared to the family farm that they left behind.
The labor movements brought increased civility and decency to the Industrial Revolution. But in my view, they are a refinement from an essentially positive move to higher ground.
Marx's greatest negative impact is the idea that Industrialization was inherently evil. I reject this as untruth. I would never hope to live in a pre-Industrial world, with its concommitant subsistence lifestyle for the majority of humanity.
: With these points in mind, it is obvious that Marx was absolutely correct. It was to the advantage of the wealthy classes if the workers concentrated on the glory of the future world instead of the misery of the present one. What's a little poverty now compared to an eternity in paradise? Or, to borrow a line from an old Righteous Brothers song, "If you believe in forever, then life is just a one-night stand." In fact, owners of Appalachian coal mines often hired preachers to deliver this message on a regular basis, in the expectation that miners and their families would be more willing to settle for less. Of course, the wealthy didn't let their belief in the world to come detract from their own luxurious existence, but that's another story.
I believe that Marx was a keen observer of his time, but a poor analyzer of trends. He failed utterly to see how industrialization could lead to individual freedom - and was probably frightened at that prospect.
: The world has changed a lot since Marx's time, but millions of people still follow a religion oriented to the afterlife instead of the present life. Whatever one's beliefs about the world to come, we cannot ignore the here and now. When Ralph Waldo Emerson was asked about the next world, he replied, "One world at a time, fellows, one world at a time." Religion should never cloud the mind and dull the senses. Rather, it should engage the mind and sharpen the senses, and lead to a greater realization of who we are and what we are called to do.
Here we converge somewhat. Organized religion can be an opiate. The discrepant economic growth in Europe over the post-Reformation centuries between the Mediterranean (largely Roman Catholic) regions and the Northern (largely Protestant) regions has been documented extensively. Why venture now, if the reward afterward is insured? This circumstance was the present for Marx.
However, if one accepts the previous comments that Marx failed to correctly compare his present with the trend-line from the past, then a different issue arises.
A peculiarity of Christianity and Judaism (as compared to other contempary religions) is a linear concept of the utility of time. Humans move forward - and upward (or downward) as their lives progress. The end game is improvement in this life, and a better beyond.
This compares radically with animistic, polytheistic, Hindu, etc, competitive traditions. In all other cases, time was viewed as circular and recurring. Reincarnation is the most obvious result of this world view.
Marx's views are more akin the the circular tradition: Conditions do not get better; only some people (the elect, or superior) get better, and get off the carousel.
: When Jesus told his audience that the Kingdom of God was among them, he wasn't talking about some time in the distant future. He was speaking in the present tense, two thousand years ago. The Kingdom of God is still among us today. Let us work for peace and justice, and bring it forth.
The Kingdom of God is not just among us, we are born with it in our essential being. We are called to allow it to blossom and be seen. Leadership by example is the way of Jesus.
Tahnks again for a stimulating post, KT.
Best regards,
Bill Scaife