Christians and Marxists

Is any alliance possible between an atheistic, materialistic, despotic, and violent system and one which affirms God, the spiritual freedom, and suffering love? Clearly, many Americans perceive the relationship between Marxism and Christianity in such terms. For many, the word “Marxism” operates as an emotive signal, unleashing ghastly images of slave labor camps, secret police and robot populations. Calm discussion of the theories and movements the word denotes becomes impossible. Evidence that any “Christian” group is seriously studying Marx becomes proof positive of its apostasy.

Still, labor camps, secret police and suppressed peoples do exist under Marxist regimes mouthing glorious slogans of humanization and justice. Upon hearing that Latin America’s popular “liberation theologies” often urge cooperation with Marxists, most Americans are understandably perplexed. Is “liberation theology” just one more infamous example of Christendom adopting a secular ideology and “baptizing” it with a few scattered texts? Or might there be a genuine path from biblical revelation to at least some Marxist tenets? If so, how might committed Christians apply Marxist insights? These are our major questions.

Though many liberation theologians share its general perspective, Jose Miguez Bonino’s latest book wrestles more deeply and delicately with these issues than most. Essential to his treatment is his focus, not primarily on issues of theory--on Christianity and Marxism as doctrinal systems--but on those of practice--on possibilities and limits of cooperative action. Indeed, he tells us, in Latin America Christians and Marxists--to their mutual surprise--have found themselves working together to eliminate injustices. Dialogue and theoretical definitions have arisen from this cooperation. (This contrasts with Europe, where a “Christian-Marxist Dialogue” has preceded cooperative attempts.)

Nevertheless, practical questions engender questions of truth. Perhaps the key facilitating Miguez’s rapprochement between Christians and Marxists is his notion of “truth.”

We normally think that truth has to do with ideas or statements: a statement is true if it correctly describes a state of affairs or a proper course of action. Further, for the standard view, know ledge precedes action and is distinct from it. To act correctly, we must first know the truth. Then, in a second step, we may or may not apply it.

But for Miguez, active involvement in our world precedes knowledge. True knowledge must: 1) arise as reflection on action and 2) guide further action (or praxis). An idea is true if it leads to meaningful results. Truth does not mirror the world passively, but is an active force transforming it.

Miguez’s formulation is indebted to Marx. It has parallels in pragmatic, existential, process, and other philosophies. Does it, then, become a criterion for purging from scripture the things he dislikes and bludgeoning the remainder into Marxian conformity?

Miguez says no. For we know about God only through “specific manifestations and concrete demands in which God comes--and has come--to us.” Consequently, “we cannot evade the need to look carefully to particular Biblical passages because we have no other source of final knowledge of God that his own self-identification in Jesus Christ. And this knowledge is not available to us except in the witness of the Old and New Testaments.”

Thus Miguez turns to scripture (though his exegesis is indebted to Miranda’s Marx and the Bible). Examining such texts as Jeremiah 9:23, 22:16, Hosea 4:1-6 and Isaiah 11:9, Miguez concludes that, for the prophets, to know God is to practice justice and mercy. Turning to John, he argues that “new life in Christ” and obeying Christ’s commandments are nothing other than loving (cf. John 15:17). And John equates love and justice (I John 2:29, 3:10, 4:7).

Consequently, acting justly is no mere consequence of knowing God (as the traditional view, which separates the two and makes knowing prior, would have it). Rather, “obedience is our knowledge of God. There is not a separate noetic moment in our relationship to God.”

Let us evaluate this epistemology later. For now we observe that Miguez, by presenting Christianity as more nearly a pursuing of justice than a system of doctrine, has brought it closer to Marxist concerns. Now, with Miguez’s notion of truth, let us suppose that Marx’s theories themselves are inseparable from praxis. Then they must be seen “as an attempt to analyze the specific conditions and relations obtaining in a particular society and to abstract . . . a ‘theory’ which can and should be tested against other societies and epochs and, to the extent that it proves true, be used to guide and illuminate a course of action.. .” That is, Marx was developing not metaphysical dogma, but tentative, revisable analyses.

Marx’s deep concern, says Miguez, was the development of human creative potential through meaningful work. But capitalism’s goal was to increase production and profits. Thus human energies were diverted, and often stifled, by goals measured in dollars. As its chief value, money became the god this system worshiped; one which enslaved and dehumanized its devotees. Marx saw formal religion reinforce this: by justifying the status quo and promising obedient workers a heavenly compensation for unjust, earthly misery.

However, seen in this context, Marx’s “atheism” does not primarily criticize religious beliefs, but oppressive religion’s functions. Similarly, his “materialism” was largely a functional criticism of metaphysical idealism. In these senses, Christians can accept Marx’s “atheism” and “materialism.” (How ever, Marx’s critique of capitalism is not modified: for Miguez capitalism inevitably places dollars above people.)

Thus, Miguez’s view of truth has opened a path from Christianity to Marxism, and back. Yet, as we have seen, Miguez intends to ground his position not on tricky philosophical compromises, but on God’s self-revelation, far beyond philosophy’s reach.

What, more precisely, does revelation say? First, that God himself is a community, a Trinity: “In God, to have one’s being in the relation to the other is not a diminution of being but the plenitude of reality . . . The ultimate basis of power is absolute solidarity and mutual sharing.”

This shared loving activity--God--calls people into covenants--relationships of trust, justice and self-giving with God and each other. The goal of such covenant is to establish God’s kingdom, or “God’s ultimate peace--his shalom--. . . which embraces the total welfare of the individual and community: health, abundance, just relations, prosperity, harmonious family relations, personal fulfillment, faithfulness to God, a just government.” Sin, however, is the breaking of the covenant: an effort to be independent from God (Adam and Eve) and from loving relationships with each other (Cain and Abel). (Miguez adds, not incidentally, that a selfish quest for profits undergirds capitalism.)

Christ appeared to rescue humanity from its strife-filled, miserable situation--but not primarily by transferring individuals to an otherworldly realm. Rather, redemption involves restoring the relations intended at creation. Conversion involves turning from selfish individualism towards communal “solidarity.”

Yet, salvation is more than individual forgiveness. It “is man’s participation by faith and love into the new realm opened by the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ--the new life that moves towards its consummation in . . . God’s new creation.”

Does this gospel display similarities with Marxism? First, Miguez declares, both view history as the realm where humankind comes to self-realization by transforming the world through work. Both see history moving towards a goal, a just and fraternal society.

Second, both agree on humanity’s solidarity: “ ‘man’ is not the single individual but a communal unity” who exists “in the context of a net of interconnecting relationships which embraces the whole of society. . .“ For Marxists, this “solidarity” is so influential in shaping individuals that meaningful change is seldom thought possible apart from total social trans formation.

Third, both agree concerning history’s conflictive nature: revolutions occur only through struggles of oppressed classes. Revolutions involve violence. Christians must look for means to minimize it, but they cannot avoid involvement in movements which bring about “the lesser evil.” In general, Christians may occasionally form with Marxists “a ‘strategic alliance’ in which there is a common immediate--though limited--goal.”

Fourth, although participation in the kingdom means working for justice, biblical revelation offers little concrete guidance. Its precepts derive from an age too distant for direct application. Moreover, in scripture, truth is so closely intertwined with praxis that “love, justice or freedom are never extolled or required as general values or ideal norms but always embodied in concrete relationships .

Here Marxism has much to offer: a set of “scientific” tools for social analysis and projection of strategy. Here many liberation theologians distinguish (though Miguez feels they oversimplify it): between Marxism as scientific analysis, with its own autonomy and objectivity, and as a metaphysical system. Christians may accept the first aspect (as a functional tool) while objecting to the second.

But can Marxist analysis really be “objective”? Since it arises out of praxis and is designed to guide it, such analysis cannot exist apart from value judgments as to what must be changed and what kind of society is desired. But these (even if they be vaguely conscious) are inseparable from philosophical or religious beliefs (perhaps also semi-conscious) about human nature and the forces governing nature and history.

Here critical interaction with Miguez can begin. Even if knowledge be inseparable from praxis, knowledge can hardly guide action unless it involve criteria for evaluating action. Thus, to define knowledge of God simply as obedience, following Miguez, can be misleading. For obedience is action in line with criteria clarified in those covenants Miguez stresses--though, of course, obedience surpasses mere adherence to norms.

Now, if biblical criteria exist for delineating normative human nature and the end of history, this vision of the goal will guide a Christian’s use of any “analytical tools.” Let us therefore ask Miguez: to what extent do biblical criteria control your application of Marxist analyses, and to what degree does a Marxist outlook control you approach to scripture?

Miguez’s biblical perspective facilitates insightful criticisms of Marxism’s metaphysical materialism. For in stance, by grounding evil merely in economic malarrangements, Marxism underestimates sin’s depth. Full liberation requires more than economic readjustment. But what? Evangelicals might ask whether this lies in the personal sphere. Miguez agrees that individuals are indeed freed from fear of death in a way Marxism cannot achieve with “a simple appeal to the welfare of future generation, or to the solidarity of the species . . .” Further, justification by faith frees one who may suffer persecution from fearing loss of self-image or status.

Of course, by emphasizing redemption’s social aspects, Miguez says less about personal salvation or eternal destiny than some would like. But unless this emphasis is taken as exclusive, a biblical view of the latter might possibly--though not certainly--be compatible with his thought.

Further, Christians expect the kingdom’s final coming only through “...God’s own sovereign and final act of redemption, the coming of ‘that same Jesus’ in judgment and fulfillment.” This vision of the end affects praxis. Our efforts are only penultimate. We cannot coldly sacrifice individuals or generations to the historical struggle. Recognition of everyone’s value must influence our search for “the lesser evil.”

Still, for Miguez the lesser evil will involve violent, innocent deaths. So let us ask: are specific biblical criteria, inadequately consulted by Miguez, available here? Miguez often asserts that Jesus is normative for our vision of the New Man. Why, then, did suffering and nonviolent love pervade his behavior? To help us minimize and humanize our violence? Or does Christ forbid violence?

Secondly, what does Miguez mean by the final “coming of ‘that same Jesus’. .”? Is it, as for many liberals and liberation theologians, simply a symbolic affirmation that God’s historical influence goes beyond ours? Yet, isn’t any more “literal” interpretation hopelessly naive? Or might the relevant biblical texts yield a serious, realistic under standing of history, like the following?

Perhaps God’s kingdom is indeed present today, but also awaits future consummation. However, its present operation is quite unlike any discernible, universal pattern (such as class struggle). It is present more nearly in called-out communities. Evil so pervades history’s general course that--even should the lesser evil triumph--violence will beget horrors wholly unlike the kingdom.

Consequently, if evil is inextricable from present historic existence, and yet the kingdom is also a future historic hope, the latter cannot fully appear except for 1) a unique, revolutionary act of God, and 2) a negative judgment on many individuals and movements--including some with humanistic aims. Guided by this understanding, called-out communities will not directly enter the violent struggle to control history. They will seek to live out and witness to the kingdom, knowing this may well have profound social effects and will lead--with God’s timing and strategy--to the kingdom’s final coming.

How might Marxist analyses function within this perspective? “Solidarity” as a slogan for universal, violent structural change will be suspect. But as a perspective opening our eyes to the reciprocal influences of all peoples and all spheres of existence, it will be most helpful.

Marxist analysis challenges the individualism of American Christians, probes their deepest economic and social assumptions, and opens their eyes to the Third World’s misery. Insofar as capitalism is founded on selfish individualism and monetary motives, Marxist critiques can help flesh out, in economic and social terms, biblical indignation against these things. Marxist analysis, understood in the light of scripture and Christian praxis, can help shake one lose from the idolatries of one’s culture. It can help forge a true revolutionary--not of Marxist vintage, but one challenging that primal struggle for power and control pervading Marxism and capitalism alike.

When this article appeared, Dr. Thomas Finger was assistant professor of systematic theology at Northern Baptist Theological Seminary, Chicago. He and his family were also intentional neighbors of the Austin Community Fellowship at the time. His article, “Reformed Anabaptist conversation: Jesus as ethical norm,” appeared in the December 1976 issue.