Roland Boer

Criticism of Religion

[Criticism of Religion asks why and how some of the leading Marxist critics deal with the question of religion and theology. It offers a spirited critical commentary on the work of Lucien Goldmann, Fredric Jameson, Rosa Luxemburg, Karl Kautsky, Julia Kristeva, Alain Badiou, Giorgio Agamben, Georg Lukacs, and Raymond Williams, Criticism of Religion asks why and how some of the leading Marxist critics deal with the question of religion and theology. It offers a spirited critical commentary on the work of Lucien Goldmann, Fredric Jameson, Rosa Luxemburg, Karl Kautsky, Julia Kristeva, Alain Badiou, Giorgio Agamben, Georg Lukacs, and Raymond Williams]

Revolution in the event: the problem of kairós

This article undertakes a dual task. The first is to argue that the various positions of major Marxist thinkers on revolution may be gathered under the common framework of kairós, understood as a resolutely temporal term relating to the critical time, the opportune moment that appears unexpectedly and must be seized. The second task is to question the nature of kairós in terms of its biblical, class and economic residues. An investigation of the use of the term in classical Greece reveals that it refers to both time and place, designating primarily what is in the right time and correct place. Given the class identifications of the Greek writers who deal with kairós and their subtle defences of their propertied, ruling class status, the term becomes problematic in light of these associations that trail behind it. In response, I seek to develop the political implications of the true opposite of kairós, namely ákairos, what is ill-timed and in the wrong place.

Lenin, religion, and theology

1. Introduction 2. Spiritual Booze and Freedom of Religion 3. Gospels and Parables 4. Christian Revolutionaries and God-Builders 5. Returning to Hegel: Revolution, Idealism and God 6. Miracles Can Happen 7. Venerating Lenin 8. Conclusion

The Leading Article in No. 179 of the Kölnische Zeitung

This article offers a critical exegesis of an early and neglected text by Marx called “The Leading Article in No. 179 of the Kolnische Zeitung” (from 1842). It is of interest since it offers one of Marx’s most sustained engagements with theology, especially in the context of the dominant theological mode of public debate in Germany at the time, a context which is outlined briefly. Here we find Marx responding to that debate and seeking to extract himself from its terms. Some of his formulations are problematic, such as the assumption that theology is purely other-worldly (leading him to argue for the separation of theology and philosophy in this light and for the separation of church and state). But others are full of promise, such as, (1) one of the first uses of his famous materialist inversion, here on the question of history and religion; (2) an introduction to the immensely fruitful idea of fetishism that would reverberate and mutate throughout his work until the well-known formulations in Capital; and (3) an argument to which this essay by Marx provides an initial glimmer, namely, that the secular state is the dialectical outcome of the Christian state and thereby no solution to the contradictions of the latter. Needless to say, the latter is extremely pertinent in today’s geopolitical climate.

How can mainstream approaches become more critical

Since our launch, we have received a number of submissions that follow what we consider to be ‘‘mainstream’’ approaches in the study of religion. We think that all of these approaches have the potential to be critical, but in many cases, those who employ them do not take the additional steps necessary to make their scholarship a critical contribution. This suggests that a discussion of pathways between (to borrow Max Horkheimer’s terms) traditional and critical approaches may be helpful to both readers and potential contributors. Some of the comments below reiterate and expand on our inaugural editorial. We will begin our discussion with religious studies, where to a considerable extent, critical approaches have in fact become normative. While there is much work to be done, the inherently interdisciplinary nature of religious studies makes it a useful guide to the study of religion from particular disciplinary perspectives. Our discussion will continue with theology, biblical criticism, and the relationship between the two. In the sociology of religion, which has much to learn from religious studies and biblical criticism, we would characterize mainstream approaches as those belonging to the other major paradigms including interpretive sociology, comparative-historical sociology, positivism, functionalism, social constructionism (phenomenology) or rational choice. While some of the work within some of these paradigms has been critical, too much of it has not. The fields on which we concentrate in this editorial are intended as models for a more comprehensive discussion. In this editorial, we will make suggestions as to how the scholarship in each of these fields can become

Criticism of Theology: On Marxism and Theology III

Through a lively and thorough critical commentary, Criticism of Theology engages with some of the most significant Marxists who are fascinated by religion: Max Horkheimer, E.P. Thompson, G.E.M. de Ste. Croix, Michael Lowy, Roland Barthes, Gilles Deleuze, Felix Guattari and Antonio Negri.

Twenty-five years of Marxist Biblical criticism

In the context of a renewed interest in Marxism outside biblical studies, this article surveys and critiques the background and current status of a similar renewal in biblical studies. It begins with a consideration of the background of current studies in liberation, materialist and political theologies, and moves on to note the division between literary and social scientific uses of Marxist theories. While those who used Marxist literary methods were initially inspired by Terry Eagleton and Fredric Jameson, more recent work has begun to make use of a whole tradition of Marxist literary criticism largely ignored in biblical studies. More consistent work, however, has taken place in the social sciences in both Hebrew Bible and New Testament studies. In Hebrew Bible studies, debates focus on the question of mode of production, especially the domestic or household mode of production, while in New Testament studies, the concerns have been with reconstructing the context of the Jesus movement and, more recently, the Pauline correspondence. I close with a number of questions concerning the division into different areas of what is really a holistic approach to texts and history.

Women first?: on the legacy of primitive communism

One of the most important contributions to the study of the Hebrew Bible in the last 25 years is the argument for a mode of production unique to early Israel. Variously called the communitarian (Norman Gottwald), household (Carol Meyers), domestic (David Jobling and Ronald Simkins), or familial (Gail Yee), such a mode of production urges a firm basis in the study of political economics or Marxism. However, another feature of these arguments (apart from Simkins) is that such a mode of production was at least comparatively better for women. The concern of this article is to trace such a motif back through the work of biblical scholars to Marshall Sahlins, the anthropologist who first proposed the domestic mode of production, and then to the crucial work of Friedrich Engels, Lewis Henry Morgan, and J.J. Bachofen. What this article finds is that primitive communism has a more durable legacy in biblical studies than may at first appear.

THE SECOND COMING: REPETITION AND INSATIABLE DESIRE IN THE SONG OF SONGS

How might Jacques Lacan and Slavoj´ i°ek read the Song of Songs? Perversely, I suggest. After determining the appropriateness of these two partners, particularly because of the importance of desire in Lacanian psychoanalysis, I tarry for a time with Lacan and ´ i°ek in order to identify the main features of Lacans thought on desire. It turns out that it is intimately connected with repetition, and, by investigating some of the major items of Lacanian theory- fortda , (M)Other, graph of desire, rim, Law, pain, jouissance , desire of desire-the relation between desire and repetition is established. Equipped with this distinctively perverse set of toys, I then read the Song itself in three stages. The triggers of desire are located in the function of edges, rims, Law, pain and the (M)Other. Repetition is investigated in terms of structure, phrases and words, descriptions, and content. Finally I ask the haunting question: che vuoi ? What do you really want?

Marxism, Religion and the Taiping Revolution

This study offers a specific interpretation of the Taiping Revolution in China in the mid-nineteenth century. It was not only the largest revolutionary movement in the world at the time, but also one that was inspired by Christianity. Indeed, it marks the moment when the revolutionary religious tradition arrived in China. My account of the revolution stresses the role of the Bible, its radical reinterpretation by the Taiping revolutionaries, and the role it played in their revolutionary acts and reconstruction of economic and social relations. After providing this account, I raise a number of implications for Marxist approaches to religion. These involve the revolutionary religious tradition, first identified by Engels and established by Karl Kautsky, the question of political ambivalence of a religion like Christianity, and the distinction between ontological and temporal transcendence.