COMMUNISM AND CHRISTIANISM
a.n.a.lYZED AND CONTRASTED FROM THE MARXIAN AND DARWINIAN POINTS OF VIEW
PART II.
Christianism: A Supernaturalistic Other-worldly Gospel for the Pa.s.sing Age of Cla.s.s Inequality and Economic Slavery--An Open Letter to a Christian Theologian and Brother Churchman.
Revolutionize capitalism out of state and orthodoxy out of church.
FOREWORD[G]
The contradiction in terms known as the Christian Socialist is inevitably antagonistic to working-cla.s.s interests and the waging of the cla.s.s struggle. His policy (that of the Christian Socialist) is the conciliation of cla.s.ses, the fraternity of robber and robbed, not the end of cla.s.ses. His avowed object, indeed, is usually to purge the Socialist movement of its materialism, and this means to purge it of its Socialism and to divert it from its material aims to the fruitless chasing of spiritual will-o"-the-wisps. A Christian Socialist is, in fact, an anti-Socialist.
Clearly, then, the basis of Socialist philosophy is utterly incompatible with religious ideas; indeed, the latter have been reduced to their logical absurdity in what is called "Christian Science."
Moreover, the consistent Christian, if such exists, could look upon the existing world only as an essential part of G.o.d"s plan, to be accounted for only through G.o.d, and modified at G.o.d"s pleasure. He could regard those who sought the explanation of social conditions in purely natural causes, and who also sought to take advantage of economic development in order to turn this vale of tears into a pleasant garden, only as men who denied by their acts the very basis of his faith.
FOOTNOTES:
[G] From the Official Manifes...o...b.. the Socialist Party of Great Britain, showing the Antagonism between Socialism and Religion.
CHRISTIANISM: A SUPERNATURALISTIC OTHER-WORLDLY GOSPEL FOR THE Pa.s.sING AGE OF CLa.s.s INEQUALITY AND ECONOMIC SLAVERY.
Come over and help us. Abandon Reformatory for Revolutionary Socialism.
My Dear Brother:
Your letter (April 1st, 1920) enclosing an essay, ent.i.tled, Is There a G.o.d, came duly to hand and I thank you warmly for it. The essay is a masterpiece and I hope you can let me keep this copy, or make another for myself, for reference when I am writing or conversing on its lines, as is frequently the case.
I.
In the dispute between yourself and friend of which you speak, you are altogether right and he is entirely wrong. In the last a.n.a.lysis it is a disputation as to whether or not the Jewish-Christian bible contains an infallible revelation from an omniscient being, a triune G.o.d, Father, Son and Spirit. It does not.
As an objectivity there is no such divinity. He is a subjectivity existing in the imagination of orthodox Christians. You do not agree with me in this, but every day of thought and study deepens the conviction that it is true. None among the G.o.ds of the supernaturalistic interpretations of religion are objectivities. The lesser ones are generally ghosts of dead men, and the greater ones are as generally versions of the sun-myth.
The one G.o.d of the Jews and the triune G.o.d of the Christians, if taken seriously, are superst.i.tions; and the bible revelations of their willings and records of their doings, if taken literally, are lies.
Both the Old and New Testaments are utterly worthless as history. The twelve patriarchs of the Jewish G.o.d, Jehovah, are not historical personages, but myths, and this is true of the twelve apostles of the Christian G.o.d, Jesus.
Yes, the Old Testament is the Jewish version of the immemorial and universal sun-myth, rewritten several times for the purpose, not of telling any truth, but of imposing the fiction that Jehovah and his people const.i.tute the greatest procession that ever came down the pike of supernaturalism. The New Testament is the Christian version of the same myth, only with the view of showing that Jehovah and the Jews were not, but Jesus and Christians are, this procession.
In itself, the sun-myth, as symbolism, is not only poetically beautiful, but also scientifically true; yet, as literalism, it is in the case of the ignorant, superst.i.tion, and in the case of the educated, self-deception.
The sun is, in a very literal and real sense, the creator-G.o.d in whom this world lives, moves and has its being; and he is the saviour-G.o.d who was born of a virgin nebula, and every winter descends into h.e.l.l and rises from the dead (the southern solstice) by a new birth and ascends into heaven to be seated at the right hand of the father (the sky) at the northern solstice, and finally he is the illuminator G.o.d who lighteth every man that cometh into the world.
And the apostles who preached the gospel of the redemption of the world are the twelve signs of the zodiac through which the sun apparently pa.s.ses in its annual ascension to the summer solstice and descension to the winter solstice.
Nor is this all: "the Lamb of G.o.d that taketh away the sins of the world" is the sign of the zodiac, Aries (sheep, ram) through which the sun pa.s.ses towards the end of March, when all the saviour-G.o.ds annually died and rose again. The rising symbolizes the return of the sun towards the northern solstice from the southern one, upon which return seed-time and harvest are dependent, without which the world would perish, not indeed by sin but by starvation.
Jehovah is the sun-myth rewritten to fit in with the ideals and hopes of the owning, master cla.s.s of the Jews.
Jesus is the sun-myth rewritten to fit in with the ideals and hopes of the owning master cla.s.s of the Christians.
The Christian G.o.d, Jesus, is an improvement upon the Jewish G.o.d, Jehovah, because of the division of labor. The task of the owning master cla.s.s is a twofold one, the robbing of the weak owners by the strong ones in wars, and the robbing of the slaves by the masters which under the capitalist system is done in surplus profits.
Jehovah serves Christians as the G.o.d of war. In his name they wage wars, either as groups within a nation having different commercial interests, as in the case of the Civil War of the United States, or as nations against nations with different commercial interests, as in the case of the Revolutionary war of the Colonies with England, or the World War of the Allied countries with the Central ones.
Jesus serves Christians as the G.o.d of slavery. When they have successfully waged a war of conquest, as the Pilgrim Fathers did against the Indians of America, or when they have appropriated all the means and machines of production, as the capitalists have everywhere, they reconcile the propertyless to a terrestrial h.e.l.l of toil, want, sorrow and slavery by preaching the Jesuine gospel of hope for a celestial heaven of eternal rest, joy, plenty and freedom.
"Some for the Glories of This World; and some Sigh for the Prophet"s Paradise to come; Ah, take the Cash, and let the Credit go, Nor heed the rumble of a distant Drum."
In remaking the Jewish G.o.d to suit their purposes of robbing and enslaving, the Christian owning master cla.s.s provided for a further division of his work by creating the Holy Ghost, who devotes himself to the giving of new revelations of the will of Jehovah and interpreting the earlier ones as they are recorded in the bible.
It is generally supposed that the masters are the strong people of the world, but they are not. Labor is really the giant, the Samson, and it would be impossible for the pigmy, capital, to rob him, but for his lack of knowledge. The Holy Ghost sees to it that the slave cla.s.s is kept in ignorance.
The English-German, or if you prefer, the German-English war has been an eye-opener to the giant, labor, and capital is ruined unless he can get him to sleep again.
Capital knows that Marx was right in characterizing the orthodox interpretations of religion, including the Christian one, and especially it, as a sleeping potion.
The churches were the dormitories in which the slaves slept through the night of the dark ages of traditionalism, but the light of the age of scientism is breaking upon the world and most of the slaves have left the churches and are now beyond the reach of their care-takers, the preachers.
When I wrote the Level Plan for Church Union, I believed that the coming together of the churches would prove to be a blessing to the world, but I am now persuaded that it would be a curse, because the league of churches would co-operate with the league of nations in its robbing and enslaving schemes, the churches doing the lying and the nations the coercing.
We are living in the age of scientism and, in the case of its true sons and daughters, only scientifically demonstrated facts count in any argumentation.
From the scientific point of view it is seen that there is but one universal Kingdom of Life, Nature. This kingdom may be divided into three, perhaps four, states const.i.tuting the United States of Life: the mineral, the vegetable, the animal and the human.
Beginning with the highest, each of these states, except the lowest, is dependent upon the next lower. The only independent autonomous state in the kingdom is the mineral. This is the greatest both as to its extent and importance. It is the common source of every supply of all the states of life, and the seat of each of their governments.
All theologians and some metaphysicians postulate a fifth state of life, the divine, placing it above the rest as their source.
Comte, who preceded Marx as a social philosopher, and who is the founder of modern socialism of the reformatory type, as Marx is of the revolutionary one, had this to say about the theologians, metaphysicians and scientists, and he was right: