Frederick J. Adelmann S.J. (Auth.)-From Dialogue to Epilogue Marxism and Catholicism...

8/17/2019 Frederick J. Adelmann S.J. (Auth.)-From Dialogue to Epilogue Marxism and Catholicism Tomorrow-Springer Netherla…

1/98

FROM DIALOGUE

TO

EPILOGUE

MARXISM AND

CATHOLICISM TOMORROW


2/98

ROMDIALOGUE TO EPILOGUE

MARXISM AND CATHOLICISM

TOMORROW

y

FREDERICK J.

ADELMANN,

S.J .

•

ARTINUS NUHOFF / THE

HAGUE

/ 1968


3/98

ISBN 978·94·011·8401·4 ISBN

978·94-011·9108-1 (eBook)

00110.1007/978·94-011·9108·1

o 1968 by Martinus Nijhoff, The Hague, Netherlands

Softcover reprint

of

he hardcoo·er

I t

edition

1968

All

rights reserl'fd, including Ihe right

/0

translate or to

reproduce this book or parts thereof in any form.


4/98

To

my

Mother and Father

in appreciation


5/98

Pour celie derniere etude, tu sais que mes idees etaient

absolument pretes. La dite etude ne sera pas longue, -

mais claire et substantielle.

Teilhard de Chardin


6/98

THE

COMMUNIST

CREED

I believe in Matter the omnipotent creator of heaven and earth, and in man

its only begotten son, our master which is conceived of the evolutionary

process, born of the qualitative leap and the dialectic process, suffered

under the antithetical bourgeoisie, was crucified in the revolution, died and

was buried, descended to the proletariat and in the October Revolution

rose again from the dead in the synthesis of the "Aufgehoben" and ascend

ed into the classless society of the Communist State and sits as the synthesis

of matter, father almighty; and from thence Humanity will come to judge

the living and the dead. I believe in the Dialectic, the holy Communist

Party, the communion of comrades, the remission of exploitation, the evo

lution of the body and life in the classless society forever, Amen.


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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I would like to express my gratitude to the following publishers for per

mission to quote from various appropriate works during the course of this

study:

George Allen & Unwin, Ltd., for Hegel, The Phenomenology of Mind

(tr. J.

B

Baille; The Guild Press, Association Press, America Press, Herder

and Herder and copyrighted in 1966 by the America Press for excerpts

from

The Documents

of

the Second Vatican Council,

(W. M. Abbot, S.J.

(ed.), (tr. J. Gallagher); Benziger Co. and Johannes Verlag for Hans Urs

von Balthasar,

Glaubhaft ist nur Liebe;

George Braziller, Inc. for G.

Szczensy, The Future of Unbelief; Columbia University Press for V. V.

Zenkovsky, A History of Russian Philosophy; Herder

&

Co. for Branco

Bosnjak, "Zum Sinn des Unglaubens" in

Marxistisches und Christliches

Weltverstiindnis;

Indiana University Press for F. H. Parker,

The Story

of

Western Philosophy; The Monthly Review Press for Adam Schaff, A Phi

losophy of Man;

Penguin Books, Ltd. for Yevtushenko,

Selected Poems;

and F. A. Praeger, Inc. for Gustav Wetter, Soviet Ideology Today.

Also, I am indebted to Professor Richardson of Harvard University for

reading the text and making valuable suggestions to me; and also to Mr.

Thomas Wall, my research assistant who helped in various details bother

some to the writer until youthful genius points out the proper solution.

Finally, I am grateful to Rev. Michael P. Walsh, president of Boston

College, for his encouragement and offer of a suitable leave that made this

volume possible.


8/98


9/98

FOREWORD

of dialogue, the way

is

now open to concord. t may not come in our time;

and we cannot yet imagine the conditions under which it might come; but

we tarry not;

we

are in via.

Finally, it is to the author's credit to have undertaken significant steps

toward revising our historical understanding of the origins and continuities

of both systems. Father Adelmann knows that all institutions tend to mis

read their history and, in their zeal for truth, sometimes misunderstand even

their own intentions. Hence, he has initiated, in a modest, though suggestive

way, a demythologizing of both Marxist and Catholic histories.

On the one

hand, he draws our attention to the personalism of the early Marx and, on

the other hand, he frankly acknowledges the diversities, even errors, in the

administration of authority within the Catholic Church. He writes here as

a Catholic speaking to Catholics - urging a more charitable judgment on

the stranger while requiring a yet harsher judgment on oneself. This is the

bias of humility, and such a bias is needed, I believe, to offset the tendency

to misrepresent historical confrontations in reverse terms- as

if

the stranger

were the sole fount of evil while from our own heart flows only good. I be

lieve that the tendency and effect of this book

is

a consistent expression of

the teaching of Pope John and the ecumenical counsels that are urged on

men today.

Herbert W. Richardson

Harvard Divinity School

Cambridge, Massachusetts, U.S.A.


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TABLE OF

CONTENTS

The Communist Creed

VII

Acknowledgements IX

FOREWORD

XI

PREFACE

1

INTRODUCTION

3

CHAPTER

I:

Marxism 11

The Person

11

The Dialectic

19

Freedom

29

CHAPTER II: Catholicism

37

The Person

39

Authority

46

The World

53

CHAPTER III: Coexistence

60

What the Marxists Must Do

67

What the Catholics Must Do

71

Epilogue

82

BIBLIOGRAPHY

84

INDEX

88


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PREFACE

The dialogue between Marxists and Catholics has been going on for some

time now, but it

is

important to inform people about this.

t

is also im

portant to point out the necessity for continuing this dialogue in order to

ensure the safety of man on this planet. However, we must also work to

include in future dialogue that other

part

of the world - namely, the non

Christian world embracing Africa and Eastern countries - or we will not be

truly following the principles of either Christianity or Marxism. This volume

has not been able to participate in this latter task,

but

I do realize its im

portance for the future of man. Very practically, I do hope that this work

will appeal to college students especially, but also to people of all faiths

who have an interest in the changes occurring within the Catholic Church

and Marxism. Some people, unfortunately, think that changes except on

the periphery of any situation, are destructive of what is essential. I think

that such an attitude stems from a static view of reality which has been

fostered by not widening one's intellectual horizons so as to encompass

contemporary insights. Although there is much truth resident in paying

heed to what classical physics or metaphysics has

had

to say, if such a

systematization of reality is continuously adopted as an absolute, it becomes

trivial for our day. And this would be so, it seems to me, because such a

posture misses the fluid process of life so often emphasized by great thinkers

and experienced by all of us.

To

retreat into the security of opposing

change is to miss the adventure of living as well as its challenge.

To

join

the vanguard of changers without studying its implications for the future is

liable to stifle the very exercise of freedom in practice. Process, itself, is

meaningless unless some abiding principle becomes discernible. f there is

to be a true evolution of dogma, then the discovery

of

permanent truth

must be realized and preserved in the midst of adjustments to the con

temporary scene.

What I say here about the old and the young mentality applies, too, to

the Marxists.

The

dogmatism among their tenets must evolve according to

its own principles.

To

oppose this development will stifle all personal cre

ativity. But in the long run for all of us, there

is

no substitute for dedicated


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2 PREFACE

intellectual effort; the work of challenging each statement made by any

author - including this one.

Even as I write these lines, I am mindful of some of the shortcomings

of this essay, but

if

one expects perfection in the sense of saying the last

word, then he has denied

all

that I say about change and evolution. Al

though the dialogue between Christians and Marxists has begun, yet its

advance has been restricted, not only due to a previous mistrust on both

sides but also because of the intellectual ferment currently going on within

both centers. If there are deficiencies in this exposition, these will be due

in part, at least to this crisis prevalent not only in the Church

but

through

out the world. As Father Martin D'Arcy once said: "let us remember that

the Bark of Peter is not sinking, it

is

only being buffeted."

Chestnut Hill, 1968

Frederick J. Adelmann, S.J.


13/98

INTRODUCTION

When I was an undergraduate at Boston College in 1937, I wrote an article

for the college literary publication entitled "Dialectical Materialism." I still

remember my analysis of the Hegelian Dialectic in terms of thesis, anti

thesis and synthesis and my fears about the inroads of communism into the

life of America in those depression years. I likened communism to the

great impersonal chain stores then reaching their maturity and foreboding

what I thought would result in the monopoly of one of them. Across the

Charles River some of my friends were actively joining left wing organi

zations that were, in a strange destiny, to encroach on their later political

and professional careers in the face of Senator Joseph McCarthy. It

is

sig

nificant that our lives were to take such disparate paths for so many years

because of our college milieu.

At

Boston College in those days we were

strongly committed to the Catholic side of things. Our philosophy courses

were a basis for the defense of the faith and we were proud of them. At

least we were taught committed positions and our commitment was to the

faith. The result, of course, in hidden providential ways of grace led me

into the Jesuit Order where I felt that I could speak the truth and concern

myself with eschatological things. My college classmates later were swoop

ed up into a World War that even now they do not like to talk about but,

nonetheless, the philosophy of their early days served as a motivating force

in their valiant efforts both for God and country.

But the years have wrought many changes and that communism that I

despised and feared has reared a more friendly and powerful head over the

globe. Basically my animosity was centered on its atheism; it was God's

enemy and hence mine. This situation prevailed until very recent times in

my mind. And then something happened. From my studies and its example,

I began to see that communism was doing some good things for life and

for men. Its progress appeared as an answer to the quest of the ordinary

man in the face of exploitation. Of course, never for a moment was I blind

to the exploitation of communism itself. Communism until very recently

meant to me totalitarian force, Siberian labor camps, the October Bloody

Revolution, brain-washing and the "WalJ." But this was Stalin's commu-


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4

INTRODUCTION

nism. Stalin, to my way of thinking never smiled

but

when Krushchev came

to America, he did. And despite the cold reception we gave him and his

antics

at

the U.N., nevertheless he did talk about peaceful coexistence. But

then he seemed to take it all back when he said, We shall bury you."

However, for one studying Marxism new currents were flowing in the

stream of all we knew of it hitherto,

and

1 refer to the beginnings of the

intellectual stirrings of the Marxists themselves and the breakdown of re

straint on their burgeoning ideas. This was the real breakthrough for me.

Then, 1 suppose for the first time, it dawned on me that it was possible for

a Catholic

to

talk with communists

and

work toward a dialogue. This

possibility congealed

at

a meeting in 1964 of the American Philosophical

Association in Washington, D.C. Through an

odd

set of circumstances 1

found myself invited to sit

at

the same table

at

the

banquet

with two

Marxist philosophers from the Soviet Union and their embassy interpreter.

1

broke

the initial frigidity of the atmosphere by discussing the virtue of

caviar, especially of Beluga and then we went on to discuss the writings of

Fr.

Gustav Wetter, a Jesuit who

had

written on Dialectical Materialism.

My

Russian colleagues knew him well and

had

in fact exchanged New

Year's

cards with each other.

Then

suddenly the name of

Pope John XXIII

came up and one of the Marxist professors said: I met him when he was

the

Cardinal of Venice, he welcomed us there to a philosophy convention

and

we have also exchanged New Year's cards."

The

ice melted and from

that moment

on, something affected me and 1 knew that 1 as a Jesuit and

Catholic priest could really understand them because as

our

conversation

progressed, 1 realized

that

we

had

a philosophical link in realism. Often 1

had

felt miles

apart

from the positivism of the language analysts, although

today I think a dialogue here

is

also in the offing. But, in general, a kind

of crass materialism was prevalent among most of my colleagues at this

meeting.

At

a meeting of this same Association several years later in New

York

one of the Catholic representatives

at

a panel discussion of the Association

for

the

Study of Marxism was unable to

be

present and my friend Professor

John

Somerville of

Hunter

College asked

if

I would substitute.

In

the

course of my remarks I mentioned my philosophical kinship with the

Marxists

on

the basis of realism and my

hope

for further dialogue. After

the

meeting I was besieged

by

delegates from various liberal movements

to

lend my name

to their causes. I begged off because they were alien to my

true

interest.

But

at

a subsequent convention in Boston I

had an

interesting

dialogue with several new delegates from the Soviet Union and prodded

them

on

the notion of existence that resulted in a sympathetic hearing of

my position.

In the

fall of 1966 I

went on

sabbatical leave

to

Munich, Germany

where I attended the lectures of Karl

Rahner

on the role of the Church

in

the

modem

world. I travelled through Communist

East Germany to

Berlin


15/98

INTRODUCTION 5

and visited in the communist sector of

East

Berlin. I was able too, to learn

much from the recent travels of Fr. Huber in Russia and spoke with some

who

had been at the Paulus-Gesellschaft meetings on a Catholic-Marxist

Dialogue

at

Chiem see in Germany. This volume is the result of reflecting

on all these experiences and

it is

a pledge of my interest in furthering such

a dialogue.

Naturally, in writing a book of this kind one must consider the reader.

t is geared for the contemporary undergraduate college student. t does

not probe deeply either into the philosophy of Marxism

or

the theology of

Catholicism. But it presupposes that today the ordinary interested college

student has some basic knowledge of both without being necessarily either

a Marxist or a Catholic. Hence, I have not presented either a catechism of

Catholicism or a primer of Marxism

but

rather a documented study of

what I think are the key points in each as they face one another in an age

of dialogue. I take full responsibility for any errors of judgment or inno

vations and with a kind of Marxian notion of freedom in mind I humbly

submit that what I say n:ay be only the first word on the matter. My

purpose here is neither to win popularity in either arena nor to attain an

already too long delayed academic promotion.

t

is rather to create that

objective work - personally - that Karl

Marx

realized is in each of us and

the fulfillment of which is so necessary to make us real persons; and also

to use my talents for the greater glory of God which is a Jesuit's motto and

the pledge of an eternal reward. I do not expect to be around long enough

to witness actual co-existence but I do hope to see a continued furthering

of the dialogue and hope that this "opus minor" plays its role in that neces

sary and valuable venture.

One thing that I have learned over the years

is

that it is well nigh

im-

possible for a philosopher

to

sell his birthright. Here the phenomenologists

seem to be on the right track when they speak of the reservoir of past

experiences in one's life that colors all they

do

and say.

t

is for this very

reason that so many Catholics today are finding it difficult to accept the

new liturgy and other changes. "But

it

just doesn't seem right," many avow,

to

eat meat on Friday." So too, having been brought up on an intellectual

pabulum of Thomism for so many years, I do not think that I'll ever be

de-thomized despite the current upheaval going on in Catholic intellectual

circles. As modem as we think we are, we just aren't. A scholastic at the

Jesuit seminary in Pullach said something similar about one of his pro

fessors.

He

intimated that the old boy was trying very

hard

to be broad

minded but the student realized that he was always working from a strictly

Thomistic background. This is interesting and of course the basic question

is, ought we to make the breakthrough? Is Thomism so outmoded? I shall

go further into this point

but

I warn the reader what to expect. But by the

same token, this habitual set of epistemological coordinates holds for al

most everyone else doing philosophy including the Marxists.


16/98

6

INTRODUCTION

There are two possibilities of avoiding the difficulty to a degree. The

first is to try to get a whole new perspective. This means not setting up the

questions but trying to ask intelligent questions within a new framework.

Thus it might mean starting with a concrete problem and letting matters go

where they will. In

the final analysis it probably comes down to some

things that Wittgenstein has to say about the neuroticism

or

worse of the

philosopher who begins by thinking that something is wrong. Hence the

solution might be to begin by thinking that things are after all pretty normal

and this means starting with common sense. The second possibility

is

to

ask ultimate questions so as to reduce the presuppositions; maybe then

we

can even agree on a "point de depart." But at least I hope you see the

problem.

There are several other problems only touched on in the course of this

present work. First the need for some new formulations for the proofs of

God's existence which will analyze what is meant by saying something

is

real. f that aspect of things which energizes and permeates them is seen as

coming ultimately from the outside of the whole experienced world, and so

beyond the mere formation of the world, as to be unanalyzable except in

relation to God, then we have made a start in a very important direction

and in a far more important matter. Secondly, to do this we must dis

tinguish carefully between the knowledge

we

make and the knowledge that

comes to us willy-nilly, viz., between the areas of constructural knowledge

and existential knowledge.

A further study should be made on the notion of the person in its his

torical development. When we start to push the idea of "person" back

through history along the lines of development from person to individual

to substance to mask, I think that we are only getting a part of the story.

Such a historical retracing

is

interesting from the purely theological aspect,

but I think that our new idea that a person is self-conscious spirit, and thus

free, has emanated from a different lineage. Only in our day has this notion

come fully into philosophy especially through phenomenology and existent

ialism. But Hegel saw the genealogy when he wrote:

In

Stoicism, self-consciousness is the bare and simple freedom of itself. In Sceptic

ism, it realizes itself, negates the other side of determinate existence, but, in so doing.

really doubles itself, and is itself now a duality. In this way the duplication, which

previously was divided between two individuals, the lord and the bondsman, is con

centrated into one. Thus we have here that dualizing of self-consciousness within it

self, which lies essentially within the notion

of

mind; but the unity of the two elements

is not yet present. Hence Unhappy Consciousness, the Alienated Soul which is the

consciousness of self as a divided nature, a doubled and merely contradictory being.

1

1 The quotation given above from Hegel is to be found in The Phenomenology of

Mind, trans. by J. B. Baille, 2nd ed. (London: George Allen Unwin Ltd.,

1949),

pp. 250-251.


17/98

INTRODUCTION

7

Cartesian dualism set up another barrier toward arnvmg at the true

notion of the person which, I think, led to a root difficulty in Kant.

In

this

day and age of respect for the body, especially under the influence of

Merleau-Ponty,

we recall that the philosopher who wrote the Critique of

Pure Reason

made the body a wall between reason and the world.

In

this

sense he estranged man's spirit more than his predecessors.

And

when the

whole culture loses its vision of the world as penneated with spirit, it falls

into more anguish and alienation. These ideas are involved in any study of

Marxism or Catholicism but the history of the person has not yet been

adequately studied.

It

is interesting to note that in the

Syntopicon

where

the great ideas are summed up in their historical lineage, no topic on the

"person" is offered.

Yet when all that the philosopher can say is said there still remain in

soluble problems because there is resident in men a latent ignorance and a

latent violence.

For

the first, there

is

some hope of eradication in the mil

lennia to come. But, as one associates daily not only in the groves of aca

deme but more especially in the streets and on the comers everywhere, one

can not

but feel that the project is disheartening. This means that men and

women by the circumstances of their lives and the indolence of nature

make it easy for some other power to direct them. And, in fact, the second

state of affairs is even worse. The latent violence in men and women and

even in children is

not

due simply to lack of knowledge.

t

is due to their

incarnation and thus the violence and greed and dishonesty is part and

parcel of their nature that can only be overcome by virtue and by grace.

And

this requires among other things will power not just knowledge. Still,

today the world is concentrating on a different exercise of will power.

Virtue and grace should really mean self-control and restraint over man's

animal inclinations, which are good "in se"

but

in man require control

or

else there simply is no man. The world's type of will power is the will to

do what I want in the sense of what I feel, and this is really at times simply

an animal drive. Today this kind of will power, as self-control, is being

weakened by a denial of it and by supplying the incentives of a purely

material culture all across the world. Pope Paul's recent encyclical

Popu

forum Progressio

is aimed

at

this situation, so too, in a way was Karl

Marx's

Das Kapital.

And I suppose this is one reason why the Wall Street

Journal referred to the recent encyclical as "warmed over Marxism."

One way to find out what is really bothering contemporary western man

is to talk to bright young college students. There one will find that today

the key problems about life have moved to an interior tunnoil within man's

soul.

Modem

youth, believe it or not, is simply

not

going to get excited

about war, they no longer care about this problem, it is not radical enough.

The

fear about an all out nuclear explosion belongs to the middle age

bracket of mankind; such talk is irrelevant and distracting

to

the thoughts

of the young.

So

too, the war against poverty does not really bother a


18/98

8

INTRODUCTION

generation of hippies that goes around in grubby attire and wonders

if

working for a living is, after all, very important. Thus we begin to see that

the problems have moved from an exterior challenge to utter interiority

because the notion of final cause

or

goals of life has died and this

is

probably

what

is

really meant

by

saying

that God

is

dead. The current joke

among collegians that

God

is not really dead

but

that He just doesn't want

to get involved, typifies the way things are going. This attitude is due in

great part to crass materialism encouraged by modern technocracy with its

emphasis

on

techniques,

that is,

on formal causality. How to get more and

more

things done, to make more money, to have more fun is the basic

philosophy of the generation in command.

And

it

is

against this that the

rebellion is aimed.

But

because there

is

as yet no realization

or

reincarnat

ing of final causality, the future looks bleak.

Nonetheless, the new persons have their problems and they are the same

old

problems that we all have about the real meaning of life and death and

freedom.

But

now freedom revolves not about goals but about free-wheel

ing through life.

f

you tell your child, do this

or

you may do this and this

and

that

but

not this, the child will simply turn toward what

is

forbidden.

The

same holds for college students and adults. There is a deep down

tendency or awareness of freedom that rebels against frustration. But to

be

human

is to reason

about

a situation and, in the final analysis, to learn how

to control it. Modern youth, however, handles this problem, it seems to

me, in one of two ways. Either they seek an escape from these interior

problems of existence, death and freedom

by

taking a trip on LSD or by

becoming immersed in the practical affairs of their own personal life along

the lines of the simple "know how" of formal causality. They strive com

petitively in the creative

or

academic spheres

or

even in the area of animal

pleasure so as to distract themselves from the real challenge.

At root

the new humanism with all its interest in music and art and

learning is a de-humanization. It is such because it is materialism and has

forgotten final causality

or

consideration of the goals of life.

An

interior

ization of problems to the extent of cutting off goals of life results in ego

centricity. This selfishness unconsciously

has

resulted in a social disease,

the symptoms of which can be detected in such reactions as hatred of

parents, a revolt and revulsion at being called

my

son or

my

daughter

as if the child were owned

by

the parents and used merely as tools for the

pride

or

pleasure of parents. The sickness

is

detected in a concentration on

animal living and the resuLutions of moral problems in a sub-moral way.

A basic intolerance arises

that

sees no good

or

value in the old - either old

people

or

old ways of doing things. Catholicism of the past is considered as

a

sham

existence and the young can see no saints produced

nor

any asceti

cism practised although both were there. Thus, they are against the "es

tablishment," be it the government, the hierarchy

or

the college adminis

tration.

And

the worst

part

of the apparent dialogue is that the establish-


19/98

INTRODUCTION

9

Plent tries to sympathize without really seeing the roots of the problem.

Hence, when the college administrator tries to be liberal the student sees

that what is happening

is

that the so-called liberal really hasn't given up

any of his positions but thinks that he can win over the opposition by

compromise, patience and liberal words. They are often wise enough to

note that the same holds for the student groups too. They, too, want to

convert the adtr.inistration without thinking out the consequences.

In

the dialectical process which seems to be at work here, one must re

member that as the thesis A and the antithesis B move toward the synthe

sis,

nothing of either A or B will remain after the "Aufgehoben." But, and

here is a very important point, both A and B are needed in order to have

the new synthesis. The modern world of the establishment forgets the first

fact and youth forgets the second. Instead of a humanism that is really no

humanism at all because it shows up on analysis as only materialism, we

need a hominisation, in the sense of reintroducing final causality and an

efficient causality. This means that man must realize that God is working

both purposively and dynamically in the world and in men's souls. The

Greek idea of the holiness of matter must be restored and the secular

transformed into the sacral. But this means that men must be able to

realize that some things are real even though not measurable. Instead of

materialism we must have a revival of mysticism which means, precisely,

that features of reality exist that cannot be proven or observed sensibly but

are nonetheless necessarily present in the cosmos and working in men.

Only then will men reflect on existence, death and freedom. Only then will

they solve freedom in terms of final and efficient causality. Only then, will

they respect the true power of will and also the need of God's grace. As a

result there will be a rebirth of faith and of the humility to pray once again.

The value of this book, then, should be to offer the key themes stirring

in each of these movements on the contemporary scene. While

we

are often

dismayed by the happenings we read about in the newspapers, we can take

hope from what is occurring behind the scenes in intellectual circles, both

Marxist and Christian. These thinkers faced with the same problems, and

taking advantage of the insights evolving about the "person," will hopefully

press on toward that dialogue that is our one assurance of peace on earth.

Other books have dealt with either Marxism or Catholicism, but here I

have tried to combine the busy lanes of thought into a throughway.


20/98

CHAPTER I

MARXISM

The Person

Marxism is the philosophy behind communism. Marxism is speculative,

communism practical. This

is

not to say that Marxism is not concerned

with "praxis"; it

is

rather to say that it

is

concerned with ideas and hence

when one gets involved in a discussion of Marxism, one can rise above

geography, nationality and political emotions. Every communist is a Marx

ist, but not every Marxist is a communist.

The

reason is that some Marxists

are simply theoreticians, some might say dreamers. One might work

out

a

peaceful co-existence with the communists that would really

be

only a

practical accomodation for the time being, but this would not necessarily

imply a dialogue or a change in anyone's ideas. But to work

out

a true

"modus vivendi"

with Marxism is something more radical for it implies an

exchange and a change of ideas on the level of philosophy.

It

would be a

true

"aggiornamento."

Karl Marx was the founder of Marxism; he was not the founder of

communism. The Twelve Apostles have as much claim to this title as does

Marx. Incidentally, Karl

Marx

was a German, a Protestant of Jewish

ancestry on his father's side and never set foot on Russian soil where his

ideas took their most vital root.

And

although it

is

quite necessary for the

student of communism to know Russian, it

is

sufficient for the Marxist

scholar to know German. In his early writings Karl Marx was quite philo

sophical

but as the movement grew he concentrated on economics and

history and getting things done. His sincerity and self-sacrifice for the cause

were genuine and remarkable. His personal and family sufferings in poverty

and illness kept his mind on this world which makes him quite different

from many other philosophers.

A concern for this world has marked the communist movement over the

past seventy-five years and has always been a pledge to the masses of the

sincerity of the system. Even in the early history of the movement, di

vergent groups developed, some holding for a non-revolutionary imple

mentation like the Mensheviki and others like Lenin who moved into


21/98

12

MARXISM

the revolutionary camp. In Russia a dispute had arisen between these two

groups and we know from history

that

the Bolsheviki won out.

I

There

are

many

Marxists around the world today who although thcy

mayor may not be card-carrying party members, seem to be more con

cerned with the philosophy of Marxism than with allegiance to any political

faction. Thus, there are British Marxists like

John

Lewis, and Frenchmen

like Sartre and Germans like Bloch who are far more concerned with inter

national peace than they

are

with the communistic revolution. After Stalin's

death and the stabilization of communism in the satellite countries, the

intellectual life of Marxists began to

break out

into the open. This was due

in part to contact with philosophical and literary ideas from the non

communist world

and

the courage to speak out according to existentialist

ideas -

no matter

what the cost. Furthermore, the philosophical idea of the

person

as developed by the phenomenologists and the existentialists has

made

a deep impression on Marxists.

The

notion of the

person

though

was somehow native to the East Europeans for their own Dostoyevsky had

said

that

if

God

does not exist, all will become mine

and

everything

is

permitted.

But

for forty years in Russia there was a festering wound of

freedom

that

Krushchev was to lance. In a highly monitored science, only

competition with the west allowed the beginnings of secret unorthodox

ideas

about quantum

mechanics and Einstein to burgeon forth into a new

scientific liberalism. This revolution nurtured new ideas paralleled among

other

intellectuals in regard to the person that has resulted in a "revision"

within Marxism itself.2

Just as a new phenomenon has arisen in the Catholic Church because

Vatican Council

II

has brought to the fore the notion of the "person"; so

too, in the philosophy of Marxism, a kind of ecumenism

is

occurring in

which the idea of the person is undergoing a new evolution. Marxist intel

lectuals in recent years have started to

probe

anew into the writings of the

young

Marx

and we find here a kind of spiritual diary in which the empha

sis is

on

the human individual as a person who has suffered alienation not

only by the economic forces of capitalism

but

also by

man's

own attitude

toward his environment. 3 Here the seeds are sown for a new notion that

man

is autonomous

and

should not be used as a thing

or

object or

part

in

the process of his temporal development. Marx believed that through labor

a

man

makes his own world, i.e. a person actually creates the world by the

selections he makes of career and materials and by his interacting with

1

G. A. Wetter, Dialectical Materialism (trans.

Peter

Heath, New York: Frederick

A. Praeger, 1958), p. 72. Also A.

James

Gregor, A

Survey of Marxism

(New York:

Random

House, 1965), pp. 119-120.

2

G.

A. Wetter,

Soviet Ideology Today

(New York: Frederick A. Praeger, 1966),

pp. 15-29.

3

N.

Lobkowicz,

Karl

Marx's Attitude

toward

Religion" in

The Review of

Poli

tics, University

of Notre Dame,

vol. 26,

No.3

(July 1964), pp.

319-352.


22/98

MARXISM

13

others; in other words, man really creates according to Marx.4 Man is no

longer to be looked on as a mere individual, as a machine or a chunk of

matter nor is he to be treated

in

abstracto. When man is called a person,

he is really called, "called" by a name, and regarded as a concrete spiritual

being with powers of reflection and self-consciousness. He is consequently

free and responsible for his choices; he

is

sacred and precious to the extent

that the world must respect his isolation. In other words he

is

the center

of the universe and with other men must not function as a "part" for the

good of the whole but the whole human society must be alerted to his

dignity as a deciding autonomy who is different from other ponderables.

t may seem strange for them to root the importance of the person in his

spiritual nature but this is precisely what the Marxists are doing. They are not

vulgar materialists who place

n ~ a n

simply as another material thing in the

world. Marxists do not think that man's spirit was created by God or that

it will live forever in another life, but they do recognize that he is different.

And this difference resides in his power to realize that he is above all other

things; that he can reflect on his situation; that he can transcend even him

self in his consciousness and that he

is

free to make many internal decisions

regardless of outside forces.

This means that there

is

a new law, a kind of jus humanum introduced

into human society, which results in the new Marxist humanism. Once

Marxism matured and freedom developed among the intellectuals, new

questions - human questions - began to arise and although the effects of

this humanism have not yet seeped down to the practical and political levels

to any significant degree, we can perceive the stirrings in what is called by

the Chinese "revisionism." Krushchev's reinterpretation of Lenin's idea of

peaceful co-existence, Liebermann's revival of competition and individual

initiative in economic policy, the use of idealistic physics - all of these are

revelations of the stirrings of the human spirit within the Marxist fold. And

the philosophers among them are beginning to ask hitherto unorthodox

questions about existence, the meaning of life and death and truth:

6

4

Roger Garaudy, "Vom Bannfluch zum Dialog" a chapter in Der Dialog (Ham

burg: Rowohlt, 1966), pp. 68-119. Also Karl Marx,

Economic and Philosophical

Manuscripts (edited by T. B. Bottomore). These appear in Erich Fromm's Marx's

Concept of Man (New York: Frederick

Ungar

Publishing Company, 1961). All later

references to the early manuscripts

of

Karl Marx will refer to this edition. On this

point see especially "Alienated Labor" pp. 93-107.

5 Karl Marx, Alienated Labor, pp. 102-103: "While, therefore, alienated labor

takes away the object of production from man, it also takes away his species-life,

his real objectivity as a species-being, and changes 111s advantage ~ v e r animals into

a disadvantage insofar as his inorganic body, nature, is taken from him." Also cf.

Lenin, Materialism and Empirio-Criticism (vol. XIV

of

the collected works

of

Lenin)

(Moscow, 1952), p. 249 et seq.

6 Adam Schaff, A Philosophy of Man (New York: Monthly Review Press), pp.

34-35. Also G. A. Wetter, Dialectical Materialism, pp. 405-475. And in this con

nection let us remember that Professor Schaff is a Marxist


23/98

14

MARXISM

The traditional mystification

of

a problem does not abolish either the problem

or

the possibility of its scientific analysis. What is the meaning of life?" What is man's

place in the universe?" t seems difficult to express oneself scientifically

on

such hazy

topics.

And

yet if one should assert

ten

times over

that

these are typical pseudo

problems, problems would remain. Let us consider, therefore, what is behind the

haze.

'Vanity,

vanity, all is vanity " These words, repeated, in various forms in all phi

losophies

of

the East, seem to appeal to

many

who in old age begin to reflect

on

life

and death.

t

is possible to shrug this off with a compassionate smile as nonsense.

And yet the words echo a problem which cannot simply be ignored. Nor

can

the

questions "Why?" What for?" which force their way to the lips of people tired of

the diversities

and

illusions

of

life. This applies all the more to the compulsive

questions which come from reflection on death - why all this effort to stay alive if

we

are

going

to

die anyway? t is difficult

to

evade the feeling

that

death is senseless

- avoidable, accidental death especially.

Of

course, we

can

ask: senseless from what

point

of

view?

From

the point

of

view

of

the progression

of

nature death is entirely

sensible. But from the point of view of a given individual, death is senseless and

places

in

doubt everything he does. Religion has tried to counter this feeling

of

senselessness. The old and very wise religions

of

the East pointed to "nirvana" as the

final goal,

thus

giving death a clear meaning. Other more primitive religions instill

faith in a life after death. But what is to be done when religious belief itself loses all

sense?

A reflective Marxist, like any of us, thinks of death. The Marxists are

forever saying, like Nietzsche, that the healthy

man

does not think about

death. They think that the existentialists have made a fetish out of the idea

of death. But I think that, not unlike Lady Macbeth, they protest too much

because although they may say that they are not worried about dying, they

certainly are always talking about death even if

it

is to say that it ought

not

to be talked about. I read recently that Krushchev had been converted to

Christianity and whether this is true

or

not, I thought that perhaps the

former chairman got to thinking about death. I used to find

it

very difficult

to give the meditation on death to a group of healthy, robust college

students during retreats

but

as one travels the

road

a little further along,

one cannot help but pause on this trite, inevitable fact, if he is reflective.

A Marxist must read obituary notices with some of my feelings.

It

usually

happens this way.

The

obituary is brief, not too many details,

but

I recall

that the deceased was the principal of my high school.

He

was quite im

portant when I was a student there. I can see him now lounging about in the

same brown suit, ambitioning perhaps to become something more, interest

ed in local politics, and his family and friends. When his car stopped

at the

traffic light people looked up - until yesterday.

He

died and was buried

and has been removed from the vital statistics.

He

will walk those corridors

no more;

he

is

not

to be conjured with ever again. It's over for him.

He

has, as a conscious item, vanished.

This is death and as we ponder on how many people that we have

known, people who were somewhat important, this doctor, that teacher or

colleague, we realize that they have passed away as even the Christian


24/98

MARXISM

15

Scientists admit and we are faced with the inevitable fact of death, the fact

that I too must die. Everyone must think of this sometime

if

he is reflective.

One wonders, will I leave suddenly, consciously, asleep or awake, in pain

or in a sudden accident? Will it be

by

drowning in the swirling sea or burn

ing in a fiery plane or just falling off to sleep? Nonetheless its inevitability

will dawn

on

me because I am a person. But we keep pushing the thought

away from us; we push the very real possibility that it might happen in a

minute back to five minutes, back to tomorrow, next week, next year, to

sometime. This is the one time that the most existential person likes to talk

in such abstractions as "people die," "death is like taxes, inevitable,"

"death will even it all out," "the

paper

is full of death notices," "the deaths

in Vietnam are horrible," "deaths on the highway are mounting"; but never

is

it my death, that

I

must die.

Yet

this is the one event that we must go

through and go through alone; it's not a lottery and there are no substi

tution rules.

Still, in our infrequent musings, we ask is it the end? Is there a lethal

river to cross, a new and frightening and awesome experience to face? Will

we awaken to the really real? Or will it be the end and I, without knowing

it, will crumble into dust? And this dust awaits a new chemical generation

without me being conscious of the thing: these particles will organize them

selves again in the mineral or plant or animal world to form in the con

tinuous process of eternal evolution a "thou." Maybe this last is true.

But

maybe not, too. This by-myself-ness, this self-awareness that I now have is

at the apex of the current evolutionary process. I am said to be spiritual;

I am described by my difference from other things not self-conscious. I

know that I am free, even free to end it all right now if I want. Thus,

Camus thought that the only real problem for philosophers was suicide.

But yet, I've heard that I might live on, possibly never go out of existence,

that there is an Other Person, greater, waiting for me in a new life, the life

of the spirit. Great books have been written about this. Great minds have

accepted this. Even I myself often think of such a possibility and so tran

scend this life. And many, many people have and still do believe this,

people from different ages and lands and races and religions. The poets

sing of immortality, the philosophers demonstrate it; a Teilhard de Chardin

held it; and great theologians like a Rahner would die for it. There's a

mighty lot of evidence for the affirmation of the after-life.

Does it seem that this me can die really, totally?

I'm

beyond my body,

intimate me that it is; I am more than its matter and the material particles

all around me. I can stand apart as it were, and study them. I can pull my

self up to nobler values and ideals and ideas. I can even yearn for the

death of this body and sin, and yet not want to die. I can look back into

history and forward to the great beyond. I seem to transcend space and

time. I can talk and think about life and death, being and existence and the


25/98

16

MARXISM

causes and purposes and possibilities of all this. In the words of Rahner, I

can transcend to an absolute future.

In the evolutionary process does it seem possible that I who have arriv

ed with others to this point of perfection and development, could reverse

the process and fall back into nothingness, rendering all my labor and

efforts worthless? Are all my strivings to be left only to history?

In

the age

of the person, is it really so impersonal? Shall I never see the outcome of

all men's history and struggle? f so, why do I even now bother so much?

Is

it enough for me to end up as a mere name, a series of letters on the

printed page, to have done something good and to get no lasting personal

reward? Does

it

not contradict evolution culminating in the dignity of the

person to think that it can all end so suddenly, dismally and finally? Is

there no hope, no abiding love? No continuation of friendships, of spouses,

of loved ones?

Is

there no order or orderer behind it all? I know that I can

not matter right now - at least in the ordinary sense - then does what I

have come to, end so suddenly?

Is there no embrace to receive me; no ultimate maker to satisfy me, no

real repose to rest me, no saviour to rescue me from this lame world with

all its frustrations and evils and meanness that we are all trying to over

come because

we

sense that

we

are above it? Even Camus saw that there

was some law there at the end of the road that we couldn't seem to wipe

away.

And

if

we

are honest as Sartre wants us to be, then

we

won't hold

onto a covert moral law, or customs, or proprieties but really fall into the

pit. In that moment at least history should rescue us, for history is that

outside series of causes and effects operating independently of us and yet

a phenomenon that

we

as persons can interfere with at times and control.

Dr. Salk did that. In my musings I have thought about these things and I

thank God that His grace has enabled me to hear His Word, the good

news, the message of hope. The Gospel is not only a message of ultimate

hope but also of proximate hope for those occasions when we fall. In the

midst of the evil and sufferings of this life, we can get up and begin over;

this is real Christian hope. Each day

we

hope to rise again and compete; to

weather the storm because we know that every sea has a coastline and our

haven is heaven. Believe me when I say that the Marxists are thinking

these same thoughts for as persons, as brothers of the same human family,

they must; and as orphans who do not know their Father, they are yet

ready for adoption. And since

we are free, we are free to become adopted

sons of God by His grace i f we hearken to His Word.

Yevtushenko, the contemporary Russian poet sounds the lament of the

human person when he writes these lines:

7 Yevtushenko, Selected Poems (translated by Peter Levi, S. J. and Robin Milner

Gulland, Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1962). All of the quotes of Yevtushenko used here

are taken from this volume.


26/98

MARXISM

"Nowadays,

he

said, we all behave

as if we were a sort of philosopher,

It's the times

that

we live in. People

are

thinking.

Where, what, how - the answers don't come running."

he

turns

me

over roughly without a

word

without a word - as

if

I weren't a person."

Don't

worry.

Yours

is

no

unique condition,

Your type of search and conflict and construction,

don't worry if you have no answer ready

to

the lasting question."

Fear hems me in

I am conscious that these minutes are short.

and that

the colors in my eyes will vanish

when

your face sets." (The sun)

PE O PL E

No people are uninteresting

Their

fate

is

like the chronicle of planets

Nothing in them is not particular

and

planet

is

dissimilar from planet.

And if a man lived in obscurity

making his friends in that obscurity

obscurity is not uninteresting.

To

each his world is private

and in that world one excellent minute.

And in that world one tragic minute

These are private

In any man who dies there dies with him

his first snow and kiss and fight,

It goes with him.

They are left books and bridges

and

printed canvas

and

machinery.

Whose fate

is

to survive.

But what has gone is also not nothing:

By the rule of the game something has gone.

Not people die but worlds die in them

And

the Yugoslav Marxist, Bosnjak writes:

8

17

Always, then,

that man

is mortal, introduces the question about life

and

the mean

ing of existence which is a problem for every man

Everyone, then, who believes in

God

believes this because he wishes for himself

immortality

f

human life were eternal then man would have once

more

a phi

losophy

and

a theology

There

shall always

remain another

question. Is man

master

of his being, i.e. is he the highest stuff?

f

man

is the highest

kind

of

being,

then

there is no

room

left for eschatology. But if he holds on to an eschatology, then

he recognizes beyond himself the existence of God

as

the highest essence.

S Branco Bosnjak. Zum Sinn des Unglaubens" a chapter in Marxistisches

und

ChristlicJles Weltverstiindnis

(Herausgegeben

von der

Arbeitsgemeinschaft WeItge

sprach) (Wien: Herder, 1966), pp. 44-45.


27/98

18

MARXISM

Running through the poetry of Yevtushenko and the writings of Bosnjak

and Schaff are themes that belong to contemporary Marxism. First, there

is the emphasis on the person - the concrete, existential human being

whose private life is never unimportant even though no other can ade

quately probe it. I can know you,

but

always as "other." Even when I re

gard you as a "thou," as another person, it is always a regard, never com

plete knowledge. This existentialism that gets into Marxism is due to a

rebellion against technocracy and conformity. Secondly, the Marxists are

inquiring about ultimates even though they have no answers to these

questions. Professor Adam Schaff of Warsaw thinks that the existentialists

have posed the correct questions but that only the Marxists will be able to

answer them. But all of this is a new phenomenon among Marxists: not the

having of these questions

or

of answers to them but the candid admission

of their perplexing presence.

To have openly posed these questions about existence and death is a

helpful sign in any intellectual culture. And, further, they are posed in a

tolerant frame of mind that hopes for answers someday. In fact things have

gone so far that some Marxists think that the new society will be different

from any

we

have

had

before and will

be

the society of freedom. Yet, as of

today, the Marxist character carries on,

it

faces the challenge of the only

life it knows, life on this earth. I frightened - don't feel like dancing, but

you can't not dance."

9

The Marxist faces the world in which he finds him

self with cool pride; he disdains weakness. The man who says, "God is in

His heaven, all's right with the world" is a fool. Rather the Marxist says

"there's much to be done, how much can I do?"

Professor Schaff

at

the end of the previous quote writes:

Attempts to ridicule all this do not help

at

all. The fact alone

of

some agnostics

undergoing death bed conversion gives much food for thought. Philosophy must take

the place of

religion here. t must tackle a number

of

diverse questions which have

remained from the wreck of the religious view of life - the senselessness of suffering,

of

broken lives,

of

death, and many, many other questions relating to the fate

of

living, struggling, suffering and dying individuals.

Can

this be done scientifically, that

is, in a way that is communicable and subject to some form of verification? It certainly

can. True, not by following the same methods as in physics or chemistry, for this is

not

a matter for physics

or

chemistry. This is why the Neo-Positivists are wrong

in

their sweeping verdict that these are empty pseudo-problems. And so are those Marx

ists who fail just as dismally to express themselves

on

these questions, and who cover

their scornful silence by concentrating attention exclusively

on

great social processes

and their laws of development. These are undoubtedly very important and socially

decisive matters. But they do not provide automatic solutions to problems relating to

individuals.

Across the belief

in

the perfectibility of human nature stream the

streaks of our frailty

that

beget a mild hopelessness and anguish. Over

against this the Marxist bolsters his bold stance with a love of nature and a

9 Yevtushenko, Selected Poems, p. 60.


28/98

MARXISM

19

faith in the Revolution. He laments destruction especially in human death

but he loves Man; he ends up with an agnostic declaration that we must

live it up because soon we shall be eaten up. But for our purposes it is also

necessary to understand the basic workings of the philosophy behind Marx

ism. We have seen its new emphasis on the person,

but

now let us consider

the methodology at work behind these ways of thinking.

The Dialectic

This is a philosophical discussion about Marxism and Catholicism. It is

not, therefore, concerned with politics or current strifes in the cold war; it

is rather a consideration of the relation of Marxism to the ideas that were

developed in Vatican Council II.

In

other words, it is speculative in the

popular sense of the word; it is impractical in a way. Yet it is not impracti

cal in another sense because what

is

said here

is

said by way of prophesy

and a hope for the future. I am often asked whether philosophy is practical

or not.

And

my answer

is

that although philosophy deals in the realm of

ideas and far away from the area of making and doing things, still the

doers and makers very often have imbibed their ideas from their philoso

phy professors and such ideas later on have their effect on the practical

scene.

For

exan1ple, a thinker like Martin Buber has had a lot to do with

college students demanding their personal freedoms; a man like Jaspers

has

had

a lot to do with young adults rebelling against conformity. Albert

Camus has made scholasticism wither quicker than the dry mentors of the

classroom. Professor Lasky helped to set the stage for a socialistic govern

ment in England and Hegel influenced Dewey among others who, in turn,

probably influenced many of my high school teachers.

The

decrees of Vatican Council

II

were

not

thought up

in

the Council

sessions

but

had been taught by Rahner and others for over twenty years.

Today's politicians were once students and some of the ideas of the pro

fessors do seep down into action. So, too, with businessmen. Plato

had

long

ago said that we would not have a good state until philosophers become

kings,

but

we all know this is a rarity. But philosophers have been king

makers; not in the sense that they propel them into office

but

that they

influence their thinking once there. And usually it is not the kings and

rulers and presidents that make policy

but rather the advisors and the

underlings who work close to government. This

is

one reason why philoso

phy is important and how it becomes practical.

As

we look back over Marxism as a philosophy we find certain themes

that characterize it. First of all, it

is

not just a materialism; it worships

matter. Thus all the omnipotent qualities accorded the deity in most other

philosophies, Marxism attributes to matter.

t

is

not

a pantheism, however,

because matter is mindless and unconscious as a unique being. This is im

portant because unlike Spinoza's philosophy or even Hegel's, it is godless.

This is relevant because it means that there is room for God to be incorpo-


29/98

20 MARXISM

rated into Marxism whereas there is no place for a transcendent God in

other pantheisms.

The second theme of Marxism as a philosophy is that it

is

concerned

with history. The Marxian notion of history is concerned with matter in a

cosmic sense on the evolutionary march, parading as it does with dialectic

steps through space and time. The two key ideas then are the Diamat, i.e.

the dialectic at work in all facets of matter and historical materialism.

10

In the light of these principles everything else

is

explained. Such a philoso

phy is realistic not idealistic, objective not purely subjective, independent

of n:en, purposive, necessary in its evolution and all-comprehensive in the

sense that there is only matter and outside of matter there is nothing.

Matter, then, is like God in that it is infinite, eternal, real, absolute and

omnipotent.

t

is unlike God in the sense that it is the world and so in this

sense limited, visible and measurable at least in its effects, impersonal and

unconscious as the cosmic process. The contradictions here are that there

is no original cause, no explanation for its orderly evolution, and no over

all cosmic purpose.

To

offset these short-comings, man gets involved. He is willful, knowing,

and in a sense something sacred. He must interfere with the determinism

of matter to bring about the classless society. The blot in the whole picture

is the tendency of willful man to selfishly struggle against his brothers to

bring about class warfare and the tool of such egoism is money and power

whereby some are oppressed and some are oppressors. The idea of the

oppressors and the oppressed introduces the sin of unfreedom, for to

oppress is to deny to persons their freedom. Man comes into the cosmolo

gical picture late both by evolution and the philosophical system itself.

Hence, if we were to compare Marxism with the old branches of philoso

phy devised by Christian Wolff, we could say that first there

is

an ontology

wherein being is matter, secondly, a cosmology which

is

cosmic history and

a logic of the dialectic. But the areas of psychology and anthropology and

ethics are secondary developments still weakly defined in the philosophy

of Marxism. Needless to say there is no theodicy.

Let us come back to its ontology wherein being is equated to matter.

Matter here is to be taken in the sense of "matter as such" something like

the old scholastic notion of "being as such." Yet in Marxism "matter as

such"

is

not intended as a simple abstraction but rather as the idea re

presenting all the concrete being there

is. In

this sense it is a concrete

universal idea. "Matter as such" then, encompasses the entire cosmos with

all its parts, its history and its potentialities. I t represents the one evolving

matter, unique, eternal and self-sufficient. t

includes the laws of physics as

10 I. M. Bochenski, Soviet Russia1l Dialectical Materialism (Dordrecht-Holland:

D. Reidel Publishing Company, 1963), pp. 57-83; 99-106. G. A. Wetter. Dialectical

Materialism, pp.

73-100;

280-355. Alsoo see Grundlagel der Marxistischen Philoso

phie (Berlin: Dietz Verlag, 1960), pp. 123-360.


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MARXISM

21

well as those of economics and hence man is a

part

of "matter as such." 1 t

Moreover, within "matter as such" there are two ontological sub-di

visions, matter and spirit. The former refers to spatio-temporal, measurable

matter that we experience and that scientists study. The latter is found ex

clusively in man as the result of evolution. Spirit, therefore, although im

material, is a species of "matter as such," a highly evolved segment of the

material universe. Yet, spirit is essentially different from and superior to

ordinary matter. Spirit has evolved from matter and

is consequent upon a

qualitative leap. Man's spirit localized in the brain makes him a person and

renders him capable of intellectual and voluntary operations. By virtue of

his spirit man

is

self-conscious, reflective

ar..d

free.

12

Man as a spiritual

person can interfere with the course of historical causes and effects and

perceiving the goal of humanity can hasten it on by revolution. The con

sequence of this struggle between the bourgeoisie and the proletariat will

eventuate in the classless society. Because he is free, man

is responsible

for his choices and his tasks. The effects of man's spiritual life are reflected

in culture, mores and the arts.

13

The Marxists regard the current western

ideas about man as representing a "vulgar materialism," i.e. a mechanistic

or narrowly materialistic notion of man that excludes spirit. Thus the

image of man in the United States today

is

fast becoming the "playboy"

type. Here man is simply a high class animal with no effort made to control

man's lower appetites

or

animal tendencies. Rather, sensual pleasure

is

be

coming the be-all and end-all of a man's life. Every month millions of

college students read magazines that portray this image of man.

t cannot

but become the American idea. Hence, when I speak about the possibility

of Marxism co-existing with Catholicism, do not misunderstand me, I am

not saying with Americanism. This possibility is far more remote.

There are many ways of analyzing reality. Aristotle had used the method

of act-potency relationships which he saw

at

work in all things. Thomas

Aquinas had used the same model. To use a different method does

not

mean that one or the other is false; rather it means that a philosopher or

scientist thinks that his particular method

is

the best for what

he

is trying

to do. Modern science has been using, generally, a method involving sta

tistics and probability theory. Analysts in philosophy have their roots in

mathematical logic and the methods of scientific verification as emanating

11

H. Palk, "Geist aus Materie" in Aktuelle Ostprobleme (Herausgegeben von

Akademie-Direktor Dr. Paul Hadrossek. Als Manuskript gedriickt bei Pallottiner

druck, Limburg/Lahn: 1966), p.

16:

"Von Moskau zurechtgewiesen, griff er zu der

verzweifelten Ausflucht, das Bewusstsein sei weder materiell noch immateriell. Auch

alle anderen uns bekannten Vertreter des Diamat hatten sich seit dieser Zeit

an

die

These der offiziellen Moskauer Lehrbiicher, das menschliche Bewusstsein sei imma

teriell."

12

G. A. Wetter, Soviet Ideology Today, pp. 40-51. Bochenski, Diamat, p. 111

and 161.

13 R. Garaudy, From Anathema to Dialogue (New York: Herder and Herder,

1966), pp. 74-75.


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22

MARXISM

from Ernst Mach and the Vienna Circle. I suppose that all explanations

participate in the idea of a "model" but there has been a shift over the

centuries as the model has less and less of a direct counterpart in reality.

When Aristotle

or

Thomas explained reality in terms of act and potency,

they meant that this was the way things really were. The mind could dis

cover a basis in reality for

so

distinguishing reality. When Newton said that

space and time were absolute, he really meant

it

and that is why Kant

corrected him by making them subjective. But today, due to the fact

that

scientists are probing into unobservable realities, they construct a theory

far removed from the real and then try to verify it in the experimental

order. The "model" then has become a mental construct with a basis or

origin in real data or observation and with an application later on back to

reality.

But

the theory

or

model is not "real"

but

only trying to say some

thing about reality. The theory of evolution is just such a model. And as a

mater of fact I think that it has served as a key model for all modern

scientists and even for sociologists and philosophers. We see this manifest

ed in the work of Teilhard de Chardin, in the scriptural research of Bult

mann and in Karl Marx. Behind the use of the evolutionary model is the

Hegelian Dialectic. Chardin was certainly influenced by it, as were Feuer

bach, Engels and Marx. Christian theologians like Karl Rahner have

threaded their intellectual needle with this dialectical strand. Hence, it

seems that social evolution is based more on the Hegelian dialectic than it

is on the physical theory of anthropological evolution which itself owes

much to Hegel.

I would like now to discuss in a somewhat non-technical fashion the

Hegelian dialectic and then to show it at work today in so many expla

nations of our world, especially among the Marxists.

14

In any problem be

fore us we can detect and name one pole as the thesis. This refers to what

we can positively affirm about the fact before us.

But

this fact before us is

always

on

the move in a never static world. Next we notice other aspects

of this fact before us that differ from what we first called the thesis. f we

limit our problem, and handle only one of these variant aspects at a time,

we call

it

a negation of the original thesis

or

the antithesis. We now have

before us a dynamic situation of polarity. The reason that this situation

represents a model is because we are limiting our problem and not directly

dealing with every aspect of the real situation. In other words we are deal

ing with one small segment of the total reality. Now the new insight of this

method is

that

we must realize that motion is operating in the situation so

that the polarity is constantly undergoing a tension and this tension brings

about changes in what we called

our

original thesis and antithesis with the

result that a new phenomenon is developing called the synthesis. Now we

14

Cf. G. W. Hegel, Science of Logic (Johnston-Struthers, I, 42-47; II, 39-43;

66-69; 227-229; 467-476.) Here the student of philosophy may obtain a more pre

cise analysis.


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MARXISM

23

can justifiably define these elements and give them names as long as we

realize that they are dynamic. They can be named in the midst of this

dynamism because there is a kind of constancy as long as the changes are

only quantitative, but this situation after a while bursts asunder and we

have a qualitative leap that begets an entirely new situation. However,

there is never a total destruction as a result of the change. This in itself is

a very profound and interesting philosophical problem. But the motion af

fects both poles in the tension and while some aspect of both the thesis and

the antithesis is preserved, the total situation is elevated. Whether or not

this change

is

always a development cannot be determined from within the

situation but only by moving in concentric circles beyond our original

problem. The opinion is generally held that a development and not a de

volution occurs.

The

great model here is, of course, man's evolution. Sever

al problems immediately arise for the philosopher: what is the original

cause of the whole business, and what is the explanation of its apparent

finality or purposiveness? The Marxists answer that the process is eternal

and hence has no first cause but they do not answer the second query.15

The above description is one of the Marxist's use of the Hegelian Dialectic.

For Hegel the purposiveness is explained by an evolving absolute Mind

which is God.

Significantly, one factor at work here is what Hegel referred to as the

"aufgehoben," a term that

is

hard to express adequately

but

which implies

a reconciliation and elevation, i.e. the motion within the polarity toward

the new synthesis. f we have carefully delimited our problem from the be

ginning we will observe that the synthesis can now become a new thesis in

some other moving relationship to give us further understanding of reality.

One can give a proximate explanation often in terms of one instance of the

dialectic

but

for one seeking more ultimate explanations or trying to de

termine whether or not the synthesis is a true evolution, then one must

move out in concentric circles to advance his knowledge.

16

The "aufge

hoben" is probably the most important and interesting aspect of the Dia

lectic.

I t

seems to be based

on

two factors: first, the ever-present motion

15 G.

A.

Wetter, Dialectical Materialism, p. 158 et seq. Bochenski, Soviet Russian

Dialectical Materialism,

pp.

74-82. Grundlagen der Marxistischen Philosoph ie,

pp.

123-159.

16

Karl

Marx, Private Property and Communism, p. 138: You

must

keep in mind

the 'circular movement' which is perceptible

in that

progression, according

to

which

man, in the

act

of generation reproduces himself; thus man always remains the

subject. But you will reply: I grant you this circular movement, but you must in turn

concede the progression which leads even

further

to the point where I ask:

who

created the first man and nature as a whole? I can only reply: your question is itself

a product of abstraction. Ask yourself how you arrive

at that

question. Ask yourself

whether your question does not arise

from

a point of view

to which

I cannot reply

because it is a perverted one. Ask yourself

whether that

progression exists as such for

rational thought.

f

you ask a question

about

the creation

of nature and

man, you

abstract from

nature and

man.

You

suppose them non-existent and you

want

me

to

demonstrate

that

they exist. I reply: give

up your

abstraction

and

at the same time

you abandon your question."


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~ R X I S M

and secondly two contents. The privation of the contents before us assures

us of a change because of

th.e d y n a ~ i c

relationship existing bctween the

two poles. Since there

is

no absolute destruction, the change can always be

regarc ed as a development. The thesis is not absolute or already perfect

and hence can both give something

up

and receive. The negative pole or

antithesis also has the qualities of l i n ~ i t a t i o n yet, like the positive, is power

ful under the internal dynan}ism of the situation. Hence, this antithesis can

lose something

or

acquire something within the total process. The result of

this intcraction is the new synthesis bearing something of each pole and yet

different from either. The synthesis is more perfect than the original poles

or polarity. Such a "model" is an analysis not of either pole in isolation

but rather of the process which must include simultaneously both poles.

Unless we begin with both the thesis and the antithesis, we are

not

using

the Dialectic. The "aufgehoben" then means an elevation, a self-surpassing

activity. Looked at as a potential development that passes

out

and up

through numerous concentric circles we finally come in the philosophy of

Hegel to the Absolute

or

God. With Teilhard we finally come to the

Omega point which is Christ. With the Marxists

we come either to the

perfect classless society of pure communism or according to some the

process is endless as it was beginningless.

The logic of Hegel is actually this dialectical method of analysis. t is

quite different from the logic of Aristotle. The logic of Hegel is his meta

physics. This is not true of Aristotle. His metaphysics is a metaphysics of

motion which is something operating in the real world. His logic is mental

as derived from the Greek word logos

(I,6yo.;)

which means idea.

It

is a

method of analysis and demonstration. t deals with what St. Thomas calls

"second intentions"

or

the level of the mind's ideas. Of course, our ideas

are radicated in reality but they are not tied down to a strict correspond

ence with concretions; they may also take the form of abstractions like

"happiness" or of constructs like geometry. The deductive method of

mathematical demonstration is closely allied to Aristotelian logic or vice

versa. But some other forms of mathematics such as set theory

or

topology

are close to the dialectic method ever moving outward, in an evolution to

ward greater perfection and development. An instance of what I mean by

this method is seen in a simple algebraic equation where we solve our

problem from inside and by gradually removing the parentheses, arrive at

a total outer solution. Perhaps the term "parentheses" could be used to

denote the entire dialectical process.

Modem man seems to prefer the dialectical model of Hegel,17 The de

scending vertical logic of Aristotle is a mature type of reasoning that is

deductive and has its place in certain areas of demonstration.

It

deals in

abstractions and begins by deducing from some general principle. The scho-

u Ignatius Lepp, Der Lebensstil des Intellektuellell (Wiirzburg: Arena Verlag Georg

Popp, 1966), p. 173

et

seq.


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25

las tics used this method in general and in moral science in particular where

they began with the

nature of man and then from this nature determined

his final purpose and followed the lines of a vertical descent to concrete

problems.

But

the way we really learn from childhood

is

not by way of this

vertical descent but according to the method of expanding

our

knowledge

from experience to experience, ever expanding through

more and

more

concentric circles.

One

begins even in life's ordinary tasks

Frederick J. Adelmann S.J. (Auth.)-From Dialogue to Epilogue Marxism and Catholicism...

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