A Matter of Hope/Christian-Marxist Dialogue in Eastern Europe:
McGovern, Arthur F
Encountering Marxisms A MATTES OF HOPE A THEOLOGIAN'S REFLECTIONS ON THE THOUGHT OF KARL MARX Nicholas Lash Univ. of Notre Dame, $19.95, 312 pp. CHRISTIAN-MARXIST DIALOGUE IN EASTEBH...
...Redemption touches the whole of human life...
...And while I would agree that Marx's historical materialism does not entail metaphysical materialism, I think Lash overstates his case in saying that Marx himself "was not a materialist...
...But the book assumes familiarity with Marxism or the intelligence to plunge into complex issues without such background...
...Marx's atheism was rooted in a conviction that humans, not God, should control their own actions and destiny...
...The first several chapters of the book proved unrewarding, for me at least...
...By reducing real knowledge to scientific knowledge, Marxists fail to recognize a whole range of knowledge expressed in symbols as well as through ordinary experience, which is a prerequisite for scientific knowledge...
...Marx's economic theories and analyses of class struggle receive little attention...
...Readers familiar with Marxism may find few new discoveries...
...So, from Marx's perspective, one must do away with God, if humans are to be the true subjects of their own history...
...Moreover, if the central idea of historical materialism is the recognition of the influence of economic conditions on history and on our thinking, then a Christian "materialism" is indeed feasible...
...But Marx's own vision of the future was flawed, not so much by failures in his predictions about the triumph of socialism as by his over-optimism regarding human nature...
...He feels that even those theologians who appeal to Marxism have rarely studied Marx in any detail...
...He failed to recognize limits, most especially in respect to moral transformations that do not automatically follow upon economic changes...
...Some Christians have viewed God as acting separately from human actions...
...Materialism" has many meanings: cultural materialism (the pursuit of money and material possessions), epistemological materialism (which includes different types of realism...
...historical materialism (which stresses the influence of economic structures in history), and metaphysical or philosophical materialism (which rules out all but matter as the basic "stuff" of the universe...
...His study includes extensive use of Marxist scholars (E...
...It is also quite consistent with Christianity to consider the transformation of conditions which impede human growth as essential to the process of redemption, which too often has been viewed as affecting only the consciousness of individuals...
...Later chapters include studies of novel Marxist views on religion and changing Christian perceptions of socialism...
...Arthur F. McGovern NICHOLAS LASH wants theologians to "take Marx seriously," to engage in a serious study of Marx's own writings...
...Mojzes prefaces this history with chapters which include a statement of his own worldview, conditions for dialogue, motives for dialogue, etc...
...other readers would be better served by a simpler introduction to Marxism...
...Lash finds Marx's model of a superstructure in society built upon an economic base to be a "singularly inapt metaphor" for explaining historical reality...
...P. Thompson, Kolakowsky, Althusser and others...
...For the scholar interested in these dialogues in Eastern Europe, Mojzes's book will be indispensable...
...Once Lash moves into the question of Marx's "materialism" the book becomes much more enriching, and his chapter on "Christian Materialism" is especially valuable...
...Lash contends, correctly in my opinion, that Marx was arguing primarily for historical materialism, which does not presuppose or entail a monistic, metaphysical materialism...
...alienation and sin, the future, Jesus and Marx, the meaning of work...
...It generates significant insights, insights into the strengths and weaknesses of Marx's thought and insights into the implicaions of Marx's thought for Christian theology...
...At issue, says Lash, is what constitutes "real knowledge as opposed to "appearances...
...So Lash, a Cambridge University theologian, undertook an in-depth study of Marx's thought in order to explore its implications for theology...
...Christians can fail also by subscribing to an optimistic myth of human progress, or by rationalizing sufferings of the past and present in terms of God's providence...
...for those interested in the general topic of Christian-Marxist dialogue, the book will also prove quite useful.lso prove quite useful...
...For while given conditions do set limits on what can be changed, efforts to prove economic factors even "ultimately determinative" cannot succeed...
...But the true Christian vision, Lash concludes, is "a matter of hope" for humanity, built upon a recognition of limits but built also upon the unity of human ideals with reality which Jesus embodied...
...For the patient reader Lash's study will provide quite rewarding...
...This "God-or-man" dichotomy Marx based on his reading of Hegel, whom he took to be representative of Christianity...
...These first chapters deal with the issues of "continuity" between the young and the mature Marx, different meanings of Marxism, Marx's The German Ideology, his use of the dialectic, the meaning of history, and the meaning of truth...
...In particular, Marx and Marxists have failed to investigate the true nature of religion which, while it may "project" human needs and aspirations as Marxists claim, also attempts to express an experience of mystery discovered in reality...
...If Lash's study called for probing in depth, Paul Mojzes's book on Marxist-Christian dialogue in Eastern Europe involved a great breadth of research, the gathering together of a vast number of sources (one chapter alone has 405 end notes...
...The major and almost exclusive focus of Lash's inquiry is into the metaphysical and epistemological foundations of Marx's view of history...
...But if Marx was not a metaphysician, atheism and by implication philosophical materialism do seem central to Marx's historical materialism...
...Lash also concentrates most on the early writings of Marx...
...But Lash's endorsement of Christian materialism does not mean an acceptance of Marxist analysis...
...The final chapter explores a dozen major issues most often discussed in these dialogues (e.g...
...Mojzes divides his history according to six different types of encounter, ranging from total absence of dialogue in Albania to a level of involvement in Czechoslovakia and Yugoslavia which caused leading Marxist intellectuals to be ostracized...
...But one can also be a Christian and believe that God acts only in and through nature and human history, hence that God is not an alternate cause to human actions...
...Finally, in the last chapters of the book, Lash takes up the question of the future...
...Some critics will judge this narrow focus as a shortcoming, but it permits a depth of reflection which might have been lost in a book of wider scope...
...Reading Lash's book is much like mining for valuable ore: a not-too-rewarding labor at first, then the discovery of a nugget or two, and finally reaching a rich vein which made continuing on worthwhile...
...For Hegel spoke of history as if it were the product of "Mind" or God, with human initiatives only used by this Mind or God to fulfill its own purposes...
...CHRISTIAN-MARXIST DIALOGUE IN EASTEBH EUROPE Paul Mojzes Augsburg, $14.50, 336 pp...
...I would argue that Lash gives only one interpretation of Hegel, but he is right to the extent that it was Marx's reading of Hegel...
...Lash's response to this question is insightful...
...If God causes and controls history, humans do not...
...Marx was right in challenging a utopianism which merely holds out an ideal...
...Once conditions are present which allow social change to occur, Christians should be involved...
...The metaphor "reflection," to describe the relation of superstructure to base, likewise underestimates the relative automony of art, literature, and religion...
...The result is a very clearly written survey of dialogues in several countries over the past twenty or thirty years...
...Lash carries this insight about "God versus humans" into his important chapter on Christian materialism...
Vol. 110 • March 1983 • No. 5
