"Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature
By Nikos Mottas*.
A
few days ago, during
an
interview for the documentary Valaam an excerpt of which was
broadcast on Russia 1 TV
channel, Russian President Vladimir Putin likened communism to
christianity and Vladimir I. Lenin's mausoleum to the veneration of
the relics of saints.
More
specifically, Putin said: “First
of all, faith has always accompanied us, becoming stronger every time
our country, our people, have been through hard times.
There
were those years of militant atheism when priests were eradicated,
churches destroyed, but at the same time a new religion was being
created. Communist ideology is very similar to Christianity, in fact:
freedom, equality, brotherhood, justice – everything is laid out in
the Holy Scripture, it’s all there. And the code of the builder of
communism? This is sublimation, it’s just such a primitive excerpt
from the Bible, nothing new was invented.”
As
for V.I.Lenin, he pointed out: “Look,
Lenin was put in a mausoleum. How is this different from the relics
of saints for Orthodox Christians and just for Christians? When they
say that there’s no such tradition in Christianity, well, how come,
go to Athos and take a look, there are relics of the saints there,
and we have holy relics here”.
The
above statements of President Putin come just three months before the
elections of March 18th.
Being an intelligent bourgeois politician, Putin will make any
communicative effort to flatter the ears of large parts of the
voters, including of course communists and people of left ideology.
However, no communist in Russia, or anywhere else, must fall victim
of Putin's communicative propaganda.
Despite
the seemingly flattering
words
(“freedom”, “equality”, “justice” etc), President Putin's
effort to present communism as similar with christianity actually
downgrades the marxist-leninist worldview. Contrary to Putin's
arguments, socialism-communism has nothing to do with religion. While
communism consists a scientifically documented worldview,
christianity – like all religions- is based on metaphysics.
In
response to Mr.Putin's statements, we remind the simple truth: The
christian faith, like every religious belief (despite their varieties
and differences), teaches the restoration of justice in “another
life”. The christian doctrines of “turning the other cheak” and
“posthumous reward” consists one of the best justification of the
exploitation of man by man: Why should the victims of exploitation
react, as long as- according to christianity- they will take their
“revenge” on heaven?
Vladimir Lenin-
whose legacy still makes Putin, the Russian bourgeoisie and the deeply reactionary Russian Orthodox Church trembling-
was writing: “...those
who live by the labour of others are taught by religion to practise
charity while on earth, thus offering them a very cheap way of
justifying their entire existence as exploiters and selling them at a
moderate price tickets to well-being in heaven.”[2]
Contrary
to religions, the communist ideology does not exploit people's
metaphysical concerns and fears and does not offer posthumous
“rewards”. Marxism-Leninism refers to the- one and only- earthly
life, which interprets and addresses through the prism of dialectical
materialism, promoting the class struggle for the ultimate abolition
of exploitation of man by man. This is our answer to Mr. Putin.
A
century after the 1917 Great October Socialist Revolution and almost
27 years since the prevalence of counterrevolution in the Soviet
Union, the spectre of socialism-communism continues to haunt the
bourgeoisie in Russia and the world. That is why they make every
effort to vilify communism, by distorting the truth. However, no
matter how much anti-communist poison they pour, history will move
forward.
[1] K.Marx, A Contribution to the Critique of Hegel's Philosophy of Right, 1844.
[2] V.I.Lenin, Socialism and Religion, 1905: From Lenin Collected Works, Progress Publishers, 1965, Moscow, Volume 10, pages 83-87.
* Nikos Mottas is the Editor-in-Chief of 'In Defense of Communism'.
