Reykjavík Grapevine - 27.07.2007, Qupperneq 6

All too frequently Marxist enthusiasts argue over a ridicu-
lous question: Was Karl Marx an ordinary ‘philosopher’
or a divine ‘prophet’? The question itself is defective
because it demands that issue is taken with the terms
in which it is put and thus suggests a necessary split
between philosophers and prophets. Could Marx not
have been both?
Since this ‘prime-question’ immediately gives birth
to a problem – this ‘necessary split’ – it is important, at
the very beginning, to clarify the connotation which the
word ‘prophet’ carries. If a prophet is solely a person
who makes accurate predictions of future events, Marx
cannot be crowned a prophet as his ultimate predic-
tion of a stateless global communism has yet to come
true; although we have witnessed isolated showers of
perverted Marxist theories applied in individual cases of
regional governance, the global force of communism
has yet to storm the planet. In short: “working men of
all countries” have not united.
Since we, Marx’s readers, do not possess the pro-
phetic power of foretelling the future, we must accept
that the future is largely unknown to us – it is open,
undetermined – and therefore we are not in a position
to denounce Marx as a simple charlatan; his predictions
‘might’ be proven to be prophecies in the course of his-
tory.
Marx’s principal weapon which mediates the “light-
ning of thought [which strikes] deeply into [the] virgin
soil of the people [transforming them] into men,” is the
revolutionary and prophetic style of his prose, perhaps
at its most obvious in the Communist Manifesto where
he grasps the pen-pole with both hands as the words
soar from the pages like sparks when a sword is drawn.
The power and confidence of the text is twin to the en-
couragement of a general’s call of war as he rides before
his army and eggs on his soldiers in the moments before
the onset; the industrial armies of the bourgeoisie, i.e.
the proletarian labour-class, must be mobilised in the
echo of Marx’s communist call.
The purpose of the Communist Manifesto is to
orientate the reader towards a certain future. This is
manifested in Marx’s constant use of the tense of ab-
solute present – in which what is desired is presented as
if it were already the case in order that it might become
so; the edge of Marx’s argument would simply become
blunt and pointless if he were to sheathe it in a scabbard
of ‘maybes’, infect his manuscript with doubt, render
his radical assertions useless and poison the mind of his
followers with confusion and mistrust. The Communist
Manifesto was written as if its vision of the future is
assured, precisely because it is not.
A connection, between Marx’s revolutionary predic-
tions and his methodology for setting of a communist
revolution, has now been unveiled. In order to make
his future predictions accurate, i.e. in order to reach a
utopian communist state, Marx had to arm his proletarian
class of labourers with the arsenal to reach this utopia
– and in order to reach it, the proletariat must first be
aware of its possibility – the seed of the communist
vision must be planted in the seedbed of proletarian
understanding before it can bloom. “Clearly the weapon
of criticism cannot replace the criticism of weapons, and
material force must be overthrown by material force.
But theory also becomes a material force once it has
gripped the masses.”
In Concerning Feuerbach, Marx was infuriated by
Feuerbach’s assertion that materialism – an idea Marx
associated with human needs and interests and hence
with conflict and action – should only be ‘interpretive.’
If human activity is not considered ‘objective’ it has to
be considered static, stable and immune to the effect
of the Communist spirit. But just as the words of the
grey monk provoked the theological revolution of the
reformation, “so it is now the philosopher in whose
brain the revolution begins. “
In Concerning Feuerbach, Marx explained the philo-
sophical reasons which had induced him to give up
philosophy and dedicate himself to the study of capitalist
social order. He claims that “Feuerbach wants sensu-
ous objects, really distinct from thought objects but
[Feuerbach] does not conceive human activity itself as
‘objective’ activity. […] Hence, [he] regards the theoreti-
cal attitude as the only genuinely human attitude, while
practice is conceived and fixed only in its dirty-judicial
manifestation. Hence he does not grasp the significance
of ‘revolutionary’, of ‘practical-critical’ activity.”
“The philosophers have only ‘interpreted’ the world,
in various ways; the point is to ‘change’ it.” In the
Communist Manifesto, Marx therefore makes prophetic
philosophically founded predictions in his capacity as a
revolutionist – not as a philosopher.
For Marx, the future is rooted in the past. Just as we
know that the sun will rise tomorrow because it rose
yesterday, social classes will fight one another just as
they have done ever since natural wealth was originally
divided among them. Throughout history “[f]reeman and
slave, patrician and plebeian, lord and serf, guild master
and journeyman, in a word, oppressor and oppressed,
stood in constant opposition to one another, carried on
an uninterrupted, now hidden, now open fight, a fight
that each time ended either in a revolutionary reconsti-
tution of society at large or in the common ruin of the
contending classes.” This historical analysis of constant
and repetitive class-struggle is Marx’s window to the
future; since this conflict has always happened before,
it will continue to happen. Marx’s historical materialism
looks for the causes, developments and changes in hu-
man societies in the way in which humans collectively
make the means to life, thus giving an emphasis to his-
tory, economics and politics through empirical analysis.
But if Marx’s descriptions of social conditions are only
applicable with regards to future circumstances in so far
as the basic social-structure of ‘ruler’ and ‘ruled’ does
not change, he can not be called a prophet and his
assertions must rather be considered sociological than
prophetic.
But according to Marx the class-fight is not lineal
throughout the eternity of time. At a point in history, in
the shadow of certain social circumstances “it becomes
evident that the bourgeoisie is unfit any longer to be
the ruling class of society and to impose its conditions
of existence upon society as an overriding law. It is unfit
to rule because it is incompetent to assure an existence
to its slave within his slavery, because it cannot help let-
ting him sink into such a state that it has to feed him,
instead of being fed by him.” This is the point when
the oppressed snatches the power from the hands of
his oppressor – the point when Marx makes prophetic
predictions.
But we have to take Marx’s claims about the necessity
of future events with a pinch of salt. Just as forecasts
of meteorologists and climatologists are always tested
in the ‘open’ future, Marx’s sociological and historical
predictions are predictions of times to come. The uni-
versal reign of communism may be realized tomorrow,
or in a thousand years, and if so, Marx travels from the
platform of a common sociological weather-forecaster
to the divine throne of a prophet. In short – his integrity
is protected by future eternity and thus we can never
allow ourselves the luxury of labelling him a charlatan.
One day objects will fall up instead of down. Prove
me wrong!
10_RVK_GV_11_007_OPINION
The Communist Manifesto was
written as if its vision of the
future is assured, precisely be-
cause it is not.”
On Karl Marx
– Until Eternity Proves Him Wrong
Text by Magnús Björn Ólafsson FESTIVAL OF SACRED ARTS
2 0 0 7
K I R K J U L I S TA H Á T Í Ð
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August 11−19th
w w w. k i r k j u l i s t a h a t i d . i s
MENNTAMÁLARÁÐUNEYTIÐ • DÓMS- OG KIRKJUMÁLARÁÐUNEYTIÐ • REYKJAVÍKURPRÓFASTSDÆMI EYSTRA OG VESTRA
MINNINGARSJÓÐUR MARGRÉTAR BJÖRGÓLFSDÓT TUR • KRISTNISJÓÐUR • HOLLENSKA SENDIRÁÐIÐ • ÞÝSKA SENDIRÁÐIÐ
main events:
MASS IN B-MINOR by JOHANN SEBASTIAN BACH
ISRAEL IN EGYPT by GEORGE FRIDERIC HANDEL
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also:
SCREENINGS in collaboration with
FEAST OF HYMNS
YOUNG ART - music, improvisation, performance, dance
ORGAN FIREWORKS
MESSA Í H-MOLL • JOHANN SEBASTIAN BACH • MONIKA
FRIMMER • GERD TÜRK • PETER KOOIJ • ALÞJÓÐLEGA
BAROKKSVEITIN Í DEN HAAG • MÓTETTUKÓR HALLGRÍMS-
KIRKJU • HÖRÐUR ÁSKELSSON • KLAUS PAULSEN • SVAVAR A.
JÓNSSON • SVAVA BJÖRNSDÓTTIR • LISTAVAKA UNGA
FÓLKSINS • NICO MUHLY • BEN FROST • BORGAR MAGNASON
• ELFA RÚN KRISTINSDÓTTIR • GUÐMUNDUR VIGNIR
KARLSSON • SIGRÍÐUR THORLACIUS • PÉTUR BEN •
VALGEIR SIGURÐSSON • DJASSTRÍÓIÐ BABAR • DIETRICH
BUXTEHUDE • ROBIN BLAZE • CHRISTOPHER HERRICK
• BJÖRN STEINAR SÓLBERGSSON • VIER MINUTEN
• JOHANNES BRAHMS • IAIN FARRINGTON • LOUIS VIERNE
• PETR EBEN • MARCEL DUPRÉ • WOLFGANG
AMADEUS MOZART • JOSEPH JONGEN • CARL THEODOR
DREYER • ÍSRAEL Í EGYPTALANDI • GEORGE FRIDERIC
HANDEL • KIRSTÍN ERNA BLÖNDAL • ELFA MARGRÉT
INGVADÓTTIR • BENEDIKT INGÓLFSSON • EYJÓLFUR
EYJÓLFSSON • HRÓLFUR SÆMUNDSSON • ALEX ASHWORTH
• SCHOLA CANTORUM • ÞÓRUNN VALA VALDIMARSDÓTTIR •
KARL SIGURBJÖRNSSON • JÓN DALBÚ HRÓBJARTSSON
• BJARNI ÞÓR BJARNASON • ÞORVALDUR KARL HELGASON
• MARÍA ÁGÚSTSDÓTTIR • MAGNEA SVERRISDÓTTIR •
DEUX EX CINEMA • JEANNE D’ARC • WILFRIED KAETZ
• SÁLMAFOSS • DRENGJAKÓR REYKJAVÍKUR • FRIÐRIK S.
KRISTINSSON • KÓR AKUREYRARKIRKJU • EYÞÓR INGI
JÓNSSON • HELGI HRAFN JÓNSSON • MARGRÉT
BJARNADÓTTIR • SAGA SIGURÐARDÓTTIR •
T
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