SCM Core Text Sociology of Religion. Andrew Dawson
Conflictual society
The second of Marx’s formative insights concerns his conflictual view of society. As seen above, Marx believes human history to comprise the successive appearance of different kinds of society whose structures and processes are informed by the particular means of production from which they spring. Marx complements this portrayal of historical development by arguing that the different groups populating society do not enjoy equal access to the dominant means of production upon which their particular society is founded. The three most important things which flow from this assertion are: first, all societies in history have hitherto been unequal; second, society is characterized by different groups vying for access to and control over the prevailing means of production; and third, those groups in control of the means of production wield power and influence in ways which – as unintended consequences – result in society working to their benefit and to the detriment of others. Just as feudal society was characterized by a landed aristocracy whose control of the agricultural means production was transposed into political, social and cultural dominance over other groups (such as serfs and artisans), so capitalist society is characterized by a business- owning (bourgeois) elite whose control of the industrial means of production is transposed into dominance over other classes such as the proletariat and the petty-bourgeoisie.
Although not all sociologists accept Marx’s assertion that the ‘history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles’ (McLellan, 1977, p. 222), many accept the basic contention that society is an unequal arena whose structures and processes serve the interests of some groups and work to the detriment of others. As will be seen in Chapter 6, Marx employs the notion of ‘ideology’ to explain how dominant groups not only wield and justify their influence but also manage to persuade dominated groups both to accept this influence and to act in ways which are not in their own best interests. Albeit by virtue of being subject to ideological domination, the oppressed are nevertheless complicit in their own subjugation. While Marx identifies a broad range of ideological currents, he regards religion as both a form of ideology par excellence and an ideal medium for the ideological machinations of the dominant elite. Believing religious ideas to originate in the material conditions of existence, Marx views the ideological unmasking of religion as a form of social critique. ‘The criticism of heaven is thus transformed into the criticism of earth, the criticism of religion into the criticism of law, and the criticism of theology into the criticism of politics’ (McLellan, 1977, p. 64).
Religious critique
In respect of religion’s origins, Marx adopts a theory which had been around for some time and to which a number of his German idealist contemporaries (for example Ludwig Feuerbach) subscribed. Here, religion is held to originate through primitive humanity’s projection of personal characteristics onto otherwise impersonal natural forces which come eventually to be regarded as divine (that is, ‘God’) (Feuerbach, 1957). Understood as an attempt to render nature amenable to human persuasion (for example through prayer, sacrifice and thanksgiving), this act of projection is said to result in the eventual denigration of humankind. This is the case, it is argued, because all that is good about humanity is projected onto nature – now divinized and understood as infinite, omnipotent, omnibenevolent etc. – while humankind, in comparison, regards itself as corrupt and sinful. Humanity has thereby purchased leverage upon nature with its own self-abasement; the consequences being ‘the more man puts into God, the less he retains in himself’ (McLellan, 1977, p. 79). In effect, religion is ‘the holy form of human self-alienation’ (McLellan, 1977, p. 63).
Originating through the alienating processes of projection, religion is treated by Marx as inherently mystifying. For Marx, the act of ‘mystification’ involves the misrecognition of a thing as something else (McLellan, 1977, p. 511). Mystification is important because it represents a distortion of relations which allows for people and things – by virtue of their misrecognition – to be treated in ways in which they should not. For example, the opinion that society is both unchanging and hierarchically ordered by God-given nature is an act of misrecognition which both justifies (through ‘moral sanction’) unequal structures and imbues the downtrodden with an air of resignation and passivity. As a result, religious duty is portrayed as wilful obedience to one’s betters for which one receives immaterial consolation through the assurance of eternal blessedness. Criticism of religion, then, involves the unmasking of its mystifying nature and starts with the assertion that ‘man makes religion, religion does not make man’ (McLellan, 1977, p. 63).
Marx’s understanding of religion as ideology is not, however, purely abstract. In contrast to the likes of Feuerbach, Marx claims, he fully appreciates the fact ‘that the “religious sentiment” is itself a social product’ (McLellan, 1977, p. 157). In his most famous assertion in respect of religion, Marx states that:
Religious suffering is at the same time an expression of real suffering and a protest against real suffering. Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the feeling of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless circumstances. It is the opium of the people. (McLellan, 1977, p. 64)
Mindful of the horrendous living conditions under which the urban poor were suffering, and despite its mystifying and alienating character, religion is recognized by Marx as at least providing some degree of ‘consolation’ and ‘happiness’ – however misplaced – for those at the rough end of the nascent capitalist system. Faced with the realities of social injustice, Marx criticizes established religious institutions for their alliance with the prevailing elite and ongoing refusal to address the real causes of social inequality. Arguing that ‘the parson has ever gone hand in hand with the landlord’, Marx is scathing of purportedly progressive religious movements such as Christian Socialism, which he maintains ‘is but the holy water with which the priest consecrates the heart-burnings of the aristocrat’ (McLellan, 1977, p. 239). A beneficiary of its long-standing integration within dominant economic-political systems, the ‘Established English Church’, Marx says, ‘will more readily pardon an attack on 38 of its 39 articles than on 1/39th of its income’. Indeed, such is its investment in the status quo that ‘compared with criticism of existing property relations’, the church regards atheism as but a ‘minor fault’ (McLellan, 1977, p. 417).
Religious mystification and ideological sanction
Marx’s critique of religion can be said to be twofold. On the one hand, religion contributes to humankind’s inability to perceive itself as an active agent of historical change. By virtue of its mystifying and alienating origins, religion instead identifies humanity as the passive object of supernaturally determined social structures and processes. By no means the only ideological culprit, as a form of ideology par excellence, religion is nevertheless a key part of the problem. On the other hand, religious institutions are integral to upholding prevailing systems of inequality. By virtue of its alliance with and dependence upon the status quo, established religion works hand-in-glove with the ruling elite. While not the only source of ‘moral sanction’ and ‘justification’ of dominant modes of societal reproduction, established religion nevertheless provides an important roadblock to social transformation. In combination, the inherent nature of religiosity and the concrete practices of religious institutions make religion both unable and unwilling to contribute to radical social transformation. Furthermore, its alienating character and privileged institutional status leads religion – both unwittingly and intentionally – to agitate against such change ever taking place. On both counts, then, religion is an enemy of those in need of change.
Although engaged by both Durkheim and Weber, Marx’s work became something of a niche interest until its later translation and subsequent mainstreaming at the hands of left-leaning academics and successive emancipatory movements which emerged in Europe and the USA in the 1960s. On the one hand, the unsystematic character of Marx’s work and its overly deterministic readings of historical development and economic causality have limited its appeal to social theorists. On the other, Marx’s egalitarian concerns, reflections upon the unequal nature of society and the relationship between knowledge and social location have proved inspirational to those theoretically and practically committed