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Critique Of Hegel 's Philosophy Of Right

Decent Essays

According to Marx “we do not attempt dogmatically to prefigure the future, but want to find the new world only through criticism of the old” (MER 13). Criticism is an active practice that involves gaining a knowledge and understanding of the past to improve its problems. A problem Marx sees in his time is the passive dogmatists that deal with abstractions such as idealism, or religion. He instead wants to offer a solution through the concrete: history and criticism, particularly that of religion, philosophy, and political economy. Beginning with Marx’s Contribution to the Critique of Hegel’s Philosophy of Right, is the critique of religion. He states that the basis of religious criticism is that “man makes religion; religion does not make man” (53). In a religious society man has lost himself in an abstraction, marveling in the very God he created, which he states is an “inverted world conscious” (53). By criticizing religion it allows man to regain reason and create his own reality rather than focusing on the abstract such as heaven. Once we have criticized religion and removed ourselves from the illusions of religion, the criticism will then lead into a progression of criticism leading into politics, “the criticism of religion into the criticism of law, and the criticism of theology into the criticism of politics” (54). Marx then leads in to the criticism of history, where criticism of the past will then bring us an understanding to better criticize the present, and

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