Marx’s Critique and Transcendence of Spinoza’s Rational Theology

I. Formulation of the Problem

一、问题的提出

Seventeenth-century rationalist philosophy focused its efforts on the critique of traditional religion and scholasticism, yet it was inevitably deeply influenced by religion, exhibiting a character of seeking balance between reason and faith. As the first person to propose interpreting the Bible with scientific reason, Spinoza replaced the pursuit of a false personal god with the pursuit of truth and wisdom. This was an expression of the rising bourgeoisie’s opposition to feudal autocratic rule through natural and scientific-technological reason, and it was epoch-making. Leibniz, Lessing, Kant, Schelling, Hegel, the Young Hegelians, and even Nietzsche, who came slightly later than Marx, all held Spinoza in high esteem. Marx’s thought on the critique of religion was also deeply influenced by Spinoza’s critical path. By the twentieth century, a contemporary Western radical left “Spinozist Marxism” had formed, from Althusser to Negri. Althusser even declared that, in a philosophical sense, Spinoza was Marx’s only “ancestor.”

17世纪的理性主义哲学着力于对传统宗教与经院哲学的批判,同时不可避免地深受宗教的影响,体现出在理性与信仰中寻求平衡的特点。作为首次提出以科学理性解释《圣经》的人,斯宾诺莎以对真理和智慧的追求替换对虚假人格神的追求,是新兴资产阶级以自然、科技理性反对封建专制统治的体现,具有划时代意义。莱布尼茨、莱辛、康德、谢林、黑格尔、青年黑格尔派,包括稍后于马克思的尼采都对斯宾诺莎十分推崇,马克思的宗教批判思想也深受其批判路径的影响。到20世纪,形成了从阿尔都塞到奈格里的当代西方激进左翼“斯宾诺莎主义的马克思主义”,阿尔都塞甚至宣称在哲学意义上斯宾诺莎是马克思唯一的“祖先”。

However, Spinoza’s use of static and abstract geometry to understand a moving and developing nature doomed his theory to contain inherent contradictions between the finite and the infinite, and between content and form. These contradictions led to a “struggle” over Spinoza between materialism and idealism.

但是,斯宾诺莎以静止和抽象特性的几何学去理解运动和发展的自然界,注定其理论中必然内含着有限与无限、内容与形式的矛盾,这些矛盾导致了唯物主义与唯心主义对斯宾诺莎的“争夺”。

During his lifetime, Christians called Spinoza “one who secretly peddles atheism,” and his *Ethics* was regarded as a “blasphemous” atheist book. After his death, as his thought spread across Europe, the identification of him as an “atheist” grew ever more common. The French materialist Diderot, in the *Encyclopédie*, regarded Spinoza as an “atheist,” and Holbach also called Spinoza’s philosophy an “atheistic system.” Pierre Bayle, from a skeptical perspective, refuted the speculative and metaphysical character of Spinoza’s philosophy and proclaimed the possibility of a society composed of atheists.

斯宾诺莎在世时,基督教徒称他“偷偷地贩卖无神论”,他的《伦理学》被视为“亵渎宗教”的无神论书籍。他去世后,伴随着他的思想在欧洲的传播,对他“无神论者”的身份认证越来越多。法国唯物主义者狄德罗在《百科全书》中将斯宾诺莎视为“无神论者”,霍尔巴赫也称斯宾诺莎的哲学为“无神论体系”。而皮埃尔.培尔则以怀疑论的视野对斯宾诺莎哲学的思辨与形而上学特质进行了驳斥,并宣告了由无神论者组成的社会存在的可能性。

At the end of the eighteenth century, beginning with the “Pantheism Controversy” [1]1 The Pantheism Controversy (Pantheismusstreit) was a German philosophical debate (1785–1789) sparked by Friedrich Heinrich Jacobi’s claim that Gotthold Ephraim Lessing had been a Spinozist, which at the time was equated with atheism. between Jacobi and Mendelssohn over whether Lessing was a “Spinozist,” Spinoza’s philosophy entered the field of vision of German theoretical circles. In the first half of the nineteenth century, Heine pointed out: “All our present-day philosophers see, perhaps often without knowing it, through the glasses that Baruch Spinoza ground.” [2]2 Heinrich Heine, *On the History of Religion and Philosophy in Germany* (1834). Hegel regarded Spinoza as the focal point of modern philosophy, holding that modern philosophy “is either Spinozism or it is not philosophy.” [3]3 G.W.F. Hegel, *Lectures on the History of Philosophy* (1805–1831).

18世纪末,以雅各比和门德尔松围绕莱辛是否是“斯宾诺莎主义者”引发的“泛神论之争”为开端,斯宾诺莎哲学进入德国理论界视野。19世纪上半叶,海涅指出:“所有我们今天的哲学家都是透过巴鲁赫.斯宾诺莎磨制的镜片在观看世界,也许他们常常并不知道这一点。”黑格尔将斯宾诺莎视为近代哲学的重点,认为近代哲学“要么是斯宾诺莎主义,要么不是哲学”。

When Schelling and Hegel unearthed Spinoza’s monism, which unifies thought and being through “God (substance),” German philosophy at the time was mired in the deepening predicament of the opposition between subject and object. The revival of Spinoza’s philosophy was timely. Schelling and Hegel misinterpreted Spinoza as a precursor of objective idealism, and they coincidentally proposed the feasibility of using Spinoza’s substance to resolve the problem of dualism. Yet they also recognized the fatal flaw in Spinoza’s philosophy—the static nature of substance. Their different methods of resolving this flaw led to their different understandings of spiritual unity. In Schelling’s view, Spinoza’s substance existed only as something rigid and static, lacking the process of how substance transitions from the infinite to the finite. This system closed in on itself was “a system without development.” [4]4 F.W.J. Schelling, *Philosophical Letters on Dogmatism and Criticism* (1795). He borrowed Fichte’s ego, attempting to transform it into a new “substance (God).” For Schelling, “God is nothing other than the absolute ego.” [5]5 F.W.J. Schelling, *System of Transcendental Idealism* (1800). He believed philosophy and religion were equally important, and in his later years he attempted to establish a “philosophy of religion.” Although Hegel highly praised Spinoza, he too saw the rigidity and static nature of Spinoza’s theory of substance, emphasizing the dynamic process of self-development, self-realization, and self-knowledge through which actual existence, by constantly knowing itself, ultimately returns to itself. For Hegel, philosophy became an existence higher than religion; religion became a stage in the development of philosophy. God, as a “concept,” was realized only as a moment of his highest Idea. Hegel replaced the worship of “God” with the worship of the “absolute spirit,” the essence of which was the worship of bourgeois ideology. Like Schelling, or even going further than Schelling, he used reason to complete the replacement of theology, only to make himself into theology. Feuerbach criticized him, saying that he “negated theology with philosophy, and then negated philosophy with theology,” [6]6 Ludwig Feuerbach, *Preliminary Theses for the Reform of Philosophy* (1842). making it the “last refuge and last theoretical pillar” [7]7 Ludwig Feuerbach, *Principles of the Philosophy of the Future* (1843). of religious theology.

斯宾诺莎以“神(实体)”统一思维与存在的一元论思想被谢林和黑格尔发掘时,当时的德国哲学正深陷不断加深的主体与客体对立的困境之中,斯宾诺莎哲学的复兴恰逢其时。谢林和黑格尔将斯宾诺莎曲解为客观唯心主义的先驱,不约而同地提出以斯宾诺莎的实体解决二元论问题的可行性,但他们也意识到斯宾诺莎哲学的致命缺陷—实体的静止性,对这一缺陷的不同解决方法导致了谢林和黑格尔对精神性统一问题的不同理解。在谢林看来,斯宾诺莎的实体只是僵化而静止地存在着,缺失了实体是如何从无限过渡到有限的过程,这种封闭自身的体系是“一个没有展开的体系”。他借用了费希特的自我,试图将其改造为新的“实体(神)”,在谢林这里“上帝无非就是绝对的自我”,他认为哲学和宗教同等重要,晚年试图建立“哲学的宗教”。黑格尔虽然对斯宾诺莎给予了高度赞扬,但他同样看到了斯宾诺莎实体说的死板性、静止性,强调现实存在通过不断地认识自己最终返回自身的自我发展、自我实现、自我认识的动态过程。在黑格尔这里,哲学成为高于宗教的存在,宗教成为哲学的发展阶段,上帝作为一种“概念”也只是作为他的最高理念的一个环节而实现。黑格尔以对“绝对精神”的崇拜代替了对“上帝”的崇拜,其实质是资产阶级意识形态的崇拜,他和谢林一样,或者说比谢林更进一步以理性完成了对神学的替代,又使自身成为神学。费尔巴哈批判他说,“用哲学否定了神学,然后又用神学否定了哲学”,是宗教神学“最后的避难所和最后的理论支柱”。

Feuerbach defined Spinoza’s philosophy within the category of “speculative philosophy,” holding that “the secret of speculative philosophy is theology.” [8]8 Ludwig Feuerbach, *Preliminary Theses for the Reform of Philosophy* (1842). In modern times, it was founded by Spinoza, revived by Schelling, and completed by Hegel. It actualized and made immanent the divine entity that ordinary theology, out of fear and ignorance, had placed in the transcendent world, bringing it into the immanent world. This was the inevitable result of theology developing to its completion. In Feuerbach’s view, this act of “making the independent entities of polytheism into the predicates and attributes of a single independent entity” [9]9 Ludwig Feuerbach, *Principles of the Philosophy of the Future* (1843). was in essence “the negation of theology from the standpoint of theology,” [10]10 Ibid. because these so-called “predicates and attributes of a single independent entity” were still the entity itself. Therefore, only by inverting this speculative logic, by “making the predicate into the subject, and making the subject into the object and principle,” [11]11 Ludwig Feuerbach, *Preliminary Theses for the Reform of Philosophy* (1842). could clear truth be obtained. Consequently, “‘atheism’ is ‘pantheism’ turned upside down,” [12]12 Ludwig Feuerbach, *Principles of the Philosophy of the Future* (1843). the necessary conclusion of this thoroughgoing “pantheism.”

费尔巴哈将斯宾诺莎的哲学界定为“思辨哲学”范畴,认为这种“思辨哲学的秘密是神学”,它在近代由斯宾诺莎创立,经谢林复兴,由黑格尔完成,它将普通神学由于恐惧和无知而放置于彼岸世界的神圣实体现实化、实在化到此岸世界,是神学发展到彻底的必然结果。在费尔巴哈看来,这种“将多神教的那些独立的实体当作一个独立的实体的宾词和属性”的行为,实质上是“站在神学立场上对于神学的否定”,因为这种所谓的“独立的实体的宾词和属性”还是实体自身。因此,只有这种思辨逻辑颠倒过来,将“宾词当做主词,将主体变为客体和原则”,才能得到明确的真理。由此,“‘无神论’是颠倒过来的‘泛神论’”,是这种彻底的“泛神论”的必然结论。

From the perspective of the critique of religion, eighteenth- and nineteenth-century German classical philosophy completed the inheritance of Spinoza’s rationalist philosophy and, on this basis, achieved a critique and transcendence of Spinoza. By the time of Feuerbach, the theological character of rationalist philosophy since Spinoza was gradually revealed. This provided an important intellectual source for Marx to rethink and inherit the spirit of rational critique since Spinoza, to achieve a thorough critique and sublation of the theological essence of rationalist philosophy, and to complete the turn toward a new philosophy. As Marx later evaluated, “what Spinoza regards as the cornerstone of his system and what actually constitutes this cornerstone are two completely different things.” [13]13 Karl Marx, *The Holy Family* (1845). On the one hand, Marx absorbed the spirit of religious critique from Spinoza and his successors; on the other hand, with a deeper historical insight, he criticized the rational theological system and mode constructed by Spinoza and the “Spinozists.” However, how to further clarify Spinoza’s rational theological system, to unfold the study of Marx’s critique and transcendence of Spinoza’s rational theology from the perspective of the critique of religion, so that Marx is not confined to the quagmire of Spinozism—this is a direction we urgently need to consider in the contemporary era.

从宗教批判视野来看,18—19世纪德国古典哲学完成了对斯宾诺莎理性主义哲学的继承,并在此基础上实现了对斯宾诺莎的批判与超越。到费尔巴哈这里,逐步揭示了斯宾诺莎以来理性主义哲学的神学特质,为马克思重新反思与承继斯宾诺莎以来的理性批判精神,实现对理性主义哲学神学实质的彻底批判与扬弃、完成新哲学转向提供了重要思想来源。正如马克思后来评价的那样,“斯宾诺莎视为自己体系的基石的东西和实际上构成这种基石的东西,两者完全不同”,马克思一方面吸收了斯宾诺莎及后来者的宗教批判精神,另一方面以更深刻的历史洞察批判了斯宾诺莎及“斯宾诺莎主义者”构建的理性神学体系和样式。然而,如何进一步厘清斯宾诺莎的理性神学体系,从宗教批判视野展开马克思对斯宾诺莎理性神学的批判与超越的研究,使马克思不被囿于斯宾诺莎主义的泥淖,是我们在当代急需思考的方向。

II. The Rational Theological Essence of Spinoza’s Critique of Religion

二、斯宾诺莎宗教批判的理性神学实质

Descartes, as the starting point of rationalism, was the first to replace a personal God with a metaphysical God. Spinoza was deeply influenced by Descartes, but unlike Descartes, who proceeded from the mind, Spinoza proceeded from “God.” He attempted to construct a “true religion” and a “true God” on the basis of his critique of revealed religion and the personal God, and replaced the “first substance” and the personal God with a single substance possessing the attribute of self-causation, profoundly advancing the critique of faith by reason.

笛卡尔作为理性主义的起点,第一次以形而上学的上帝代替人格化的上帝。斯宾诺莎深受笛卡尔的影响,但又不同于从心灵出发的笛卡尔,斯宾诺莎从“神”出发,尝试在对启示宗教及人格化的上帝批判的基础上构建“真正的宗教”和“上帝”,并以具有自因属性的唯一实体代替了“第一实体”和人格化的上帝,深刻推动了理性对信仰的批判。

(A) Substance Monism with Divine Necessity as Its Starting Point

(一)以神圣必然性为起点的实体一元论

The core thesis of Spinoza’s rational theological system is that “God is Nature” and is the “only substance.” Spinoza defines “God” as follows: “By God I understand a being absolutely infinite, i.e., a substance consisting of an infinity of attributes, of which each one expresses an eternal and infinite essence.” [14]14 Baruch Spinoza, *Ethics*, Part I, Definition VI. “Besides God no substance can be or be conceived.” [15]15 Baruch Spinoza, *Ethics*, Part I, Proposition XIV. “Substance” for Spinoza is “that which is in itself and is conceived through itself.” [16]16 Baruch Spinoza, *Ethics*, Part I, Definition III. Spinoza used the concept of “self-causation” to demonstrate the necessary existence of substance. This method of explaining the world from the world itself was praised by Engels as “the highest honor of philosophy at that time.” [17]17 Friedrich Engels, *Dialectics of Nature* (1873–1883).

斯宾诺莎理性神学体系的核心观点是“神即自然”且是“唯一的实体”。对于“神”,斯宾诺莎是这样界定的:“神,我理解为绝对无限的存在,亦即具有无限‘多’属性的实体,其中每一属性各表示永恒无限的本质。”“除了神以外,不能有任何实体,也不能设想任何实体。”“实体”在斯宾诺莎这里是“在自身内并通过自身而被认识的东西”。斯宾诺莎借用“自因”这一概念论证了实体必然存在,这种从世界本身说明世界的方法被恩格斯赞为“当时哲学的最高荣誉”。

Proceeding from the nature that substance necessarily exists, Spinoza deduces six attributes of “God”: “God necessarily exists; God is one; God exists and acts solely from the necessity of His own nature; God is the free cause of all things, and in what manner God is the free cause of all things; all things are in God and depend on God, so that without God they can neither exist nor be conceived; all things are predetermined by God—not by God’s free will or absolute caprice, but by God’s absolute nature or infinite power.” He accomplishes two negations. The first is a negation of previous philosophers’ view of God as a “final cause” or “eminent cause”; “God” is endowed with the definitions of “cause of itself” and “immanent cause,” shifting from being above nature to being identical with nature, and the existence of “God” thereby acquires a “sufficient reason.” The second is a negation of the contingency of revealed religion; the activity of “God” proceeds from causal necessity, and those contingencies such as miracles, prophecies, prophets, and the chosen people are merely a collection of theologians’ imaginings. All things, including “God,” are situated within the chain of natural causality, and the personal God no longer exists here.

从实体必然存在这一本性出发,斯宾诺莎推演出“神”的六个特质:“神必然存在;神是唯一的;神只是由它的本性的必然性而存在和动作;神是万物的自由因,以及神在什么方式下是万物的自由因;万物都在神之内,都依靠神,因而没有神就既不能存在,也不能被理解;万物都预先为神所决定—并不是为神的自由意志或绝对任性所决定,而是为神的绝对本性或无限力量所决定。”他完成了两个否定,一是对以往哲学家视神为“目的因”或“卓越因”的否定,“神”被赋予“自因”“内在因”的定义,从超于自然之上变为同一于自然,“神”的存在也有了“充足理由”;二是对启示宗教偶然论的否定,“神”的活动出自因果必然性,那些奇迹、预言、先知、选民等偶然性只是神学家想象的合集,万事万物包括“神”都处在自然因果链条中,人格神在这里不复存在。

Spinoza borrows Thomas Aquinas’s viewpoint but distinguishes himself from Aquinas’s analytical method, which, based on the nature of things and human everyday experience, provides reasons for the existence of a personified God. He divides “nature” into “natura naturans” and “natura naturata,” thereby explaining how God is identical with nature. The former, as the cause of “nature,” refers to the infinite attributes of the essence of “God” (substance); the latter, as the effect of “nature,” refers to “all the modes of God’s attributes.” “God” (substance), as the “thing-in-itself,” exists and acts according to the necessity of its own nature. “Things could not have been produced by God in any other way or in any other order than that in which they have been produced,” and “there is nothing contingent in nature”; all things can be known only through “God” (substance). In this way, Spinoza transforms the “God” emphasized by traditional revealed religion as transcendent over all things, making “God” identical with nature itself, which contains all things. “God,” as “cause of itself” and “the one substance,” is both the creator itself and the result of creation, replacing the personal God of traditional religion with the God of “nature” that exists as the immanent cause of all things.

斯宾诺莎借用托马斯·阿奎那的观点,但又区别于他基于事物和人的日常经验的本性而为人格化上帝的存在说明理由的分析方式,将“自然”区分为“产生自然的自然”和“被自然产生的自然”,以此说明神是如何同一于自然的。前者作为“自然”的原因,是指“神” (实体)的无限多的本质属性,后者则是“自然”的结果,指“神的属性的全部样式”。“神”(实体)作为“自在之物”,是依据它的本性的必然性而存在和行动,“万物除了在已经被产生的状态或秩序中外,不能在其他状态或秩序中被神所产生”,“自然中没有任何偶然的东西”,万物只能通过“神”(实体)被认识。这样,斯宾诺莎改变了传统启示宗教所强调的超然于万物的“神”,将“神”作为包含万物的自然本身,“神”作为“自因”和“唯一实体”既是创造者本身,也是创造的结果,以作为万物内因存在的“自然”的神代替了传统宗教的人格神。

Spinoza identifies the three concepts of “God,” “nature,” and “substance” as one, but with different emphases in their use. Leon Roth, in his book *Spinoza*, describes it thus: “When Spinoza is thinking of origin, he seems to use ‘God’; when he is thinking of structure, he seems to use ‘Nature’; when he is thinking of stuff, he seems to use ‘Substance.’ They are quite the same thing, though regarded from different points of view.” This indicates the diversity of sources of Spinoza’s thought: “God” comes from the theological domain, used to eliminate theological teleology and explain the cause of the world; “nature” comes from the domain of natural science, used to illustrate the dynamism of “God” and prevent his causal system from falling into a dead state; “substance” is taken from the domain of metaphysics, used to demonstrate the necessary existence of “God” and thereby escape the personified God. The mutual constraint and mutual supplementation of these three terms in Spinoza’s thought form a “trinitarian” conceptual system of rational God.

斯宾诺莎将“神”“自然”和“实体”三个概念同一,但在使用中各有侧重。莱昂·罗斯在《斯宾诺莎》一书中这样描述:“当斯宾诺莎考虑到起源时,他似乎使用‘上帝’,当他考虑到结构时,似乎使用‘自然’,当他考虑到材料时,似乎使用‘实体’,它们完全是同一个东西,尽管是从不同的观点来考察的。”这表明了斯宾诺莎思想来源的多样性:“神”来自神学领域,用来消除神学目的论,解释世界的原因;“自然”来自自然科学领域,是为了说明“神”的能动性,避免他的因果体系陷入僵死的状态;“实体”则取自形而上学领域,是为了论证“神”的必然存在,以此摆脱人格化的上帝。三个名词在斯宾诺莎这里的相互制约和相互补充,形成了“三位一体”的理性神概念体系。

(II) The Theological Attribute of the Conception of “True Religion” Based on the Critique of Traditional Religious “Superstition”

(二)基于对传统宗教“迷信”批判的“真正的宗教”构想的神学属性

By constructing his own concept of “God,” Spinoza holds that the essence of traditional revealed religion is “superstition.” “Superstition” has the following notable characteristics.

通过构建自己心中的“神”的概念,斯宾诺莎认为传统启示宗教的本质是“迷信”。“迷信”有以下几个显著特点。

First, “superstition” fabricates “God.” In Spinoza’s view, traditional revealed religion is merely a “counterfeit” of human wisdom, exploiting the ignorance of the masses, imposing human attributes onto “God,” and creating a personal God with “human nature.” The so-called supernatural God is but the subjective imagination and mental phantom of theologians; such things as prophecies and miracles are “superstitious” preachments used by theologians to deceive the masses. “Superstition” is contrary to reason: “Superstition teaches men to despise reason and nature, and whatever is contrary to these, superstition advocates, worships, and reveres.” Spinoza argues that we should not regard the prejudices and commentaries produced by theologians out of passion as “sacred scripture.” Instead, we should interpret the Bible from a rational and historical perspective, taking into account the historical background, personal biographies, linguistic characteristics, and historical fortunes of the authors of each book of the Bible, and point out the contradictions and obscurities in the Bible—such as chronological inaccuracies, contradictory statements, and factual inconsistencies. This is “the most accurate method of ascertaining the true meaning of the Bible.”

第一,“迷信”对“神”进行了虚构。在斯宾诺莎看来,传统启示宗教不过是人类智慧的“假冒”,利用了大众的无知,将人的属性强加给“上帝”,创造出了具有“人性”的人格神。所谓超自然的上帝乃是神学家们主观的想象、心造的幻影,诸如预言、奇迹等都是神学家欺骗大众的“迷信”说教。“迷信”与理性相悖,“迷信教人蔑视理智和自然,凡与此二者相背的,迷信都加以提倡、崇拜和尊仰”。斯宾诺莎认为,我们不能将神学家出于激情创造的偏见和注释视为“圣书”,而应当结合《圣经》各卷作者身处的历史背景、个人生平、语言特点和书籍的历史遭遇,从理性的、历史的角度解释《圣经》,点明《圣经》中的矛盾和晦涩,例如年代失真、语句矛盾、事实不符等问题,这是“考求《圣经》真意的最准确的方法”。

Second, “superstition” is born of fear. Spinoza believes that “superstition is born of fear, and is maintained and fostered by fear.” Superstition does not originate from reason, but from the vicissitudes of strong emotions derived from hope, hatred, anger, and deception; it is fear of the path ahead arising from ignorance of the causal necessity of nature, and a longing for novelty born of the pain and unbearable nature of suffering. Traditional revealed religion exploits and amplifies this, confusing people’s minds with various rituals and dogmas. Under this deception, people gradually become objects of religious enslavement and, under despotic rule, completely lose their freedom, leading to “the light of reason being not only despised, but even cursed by many as a source of impiety.” Hence, Spinoza advocates establishing a democratic polity that guarantees freedom of belief and freedom of speech. In his view, “the ultimate purpose of government is not to rule or constrain by terror, nor to enforce obedience; on the contrary, it is to free men from fear.” Such a rational state must be established, ensuring that people can freely use their reason to think, so that people exist as masters of their own thoughts.

第二,“迷信”生于恐惧。斯宾诺莎认为“迷信是由恐惧而生,由恐惧维系和助长的”,迷信不是来源于理智,而是希望、憎恨、愤怒与欺骗所衍生的强烈情绪的变迁,是由于对自然界因果必然性的无知而产生的对前路的恐惧,是对苦难的悲痛与不堪忍受而诞生的对新奇事物的渴望。传统启示宗教利用并放大了这一点,以各种仪式和教条迷惑人心,人们在这种欺骗下逐渐沦为宗教奴役的对象,并在专制统治下彻底丧失了自由,导致“理性的光明不但为人所藐视,许多人甚至咒骂它,以为是对神不敬的源泉”。由此,斯宾诺莎提倡建立保障信仰自由和言论自由的民主政体。在他看来,“政府最终的目的不是用恐怖来统治或约束,也不是强制使人服从,恰恰相反,而是使人免于恐惧”,必须建立这样的理性国度,保障人可以自由运用理智思考,使人作为自己思想的主人而存在。

Third, “superstition” seeks to meddle with knowledge. Spinoza criticizes the tendency of Scholastic philosophers since the Middle Ages to subordinate Greek philosophy to theology, arguing that this essentially harms both. He clearly states, “The aim of philosophy is solely truth; the aim of religious faith, as we have sufficiently demonstrated, is solely obedience and piety.” “Theology is not the handmaid of reason, nor is reason the handmaid of theology.” From a metaphysical perspective, Spinoza redefines religion: “When we have the idea of God, or when we know God, all our desires and actions, insofar as we ourselves are their cause, I consider to constitute religion.” Spinoza divides “true religion” into two parts. One is “universal religion” or “moral religion,” which guides the masses toward goodness and does not provide theoretical knowledge. The other is the religion of the few, that is, the religion of philosophers, a realm inaccessible to ordinary people, where knowledge is the object of study. Grounded in rationalism, Spinoza classifies knowledge into three types: sensory knowledge (based on vague experience, hearsay, opinion, and imagination), indirect rational knowledge (based on reasoning and demonstration), and intuitive knowledge (based on the adequate idea of the attributes of God). He designates the latter two types as true knowledge, arguing that they can teach us to distinguish truth from the errors produced by the first type of knowledge, and generate a correct cognition of “God,” i.e., an adequate idea. Spinoza emphasizes that “true religion” should focus on the observance of divine law and the cultivation of virtue, whereas traditional revealed religion, rooted in superstition, confines itself to false rituals, regarding prayer and sacrifice as the standard for defining faith, and neglects that “the highest good of the mind is the knowledge of God, and the highest virtue of the mind is to know God.”

第三,“迷信”企图染指知识。斯宾诺莎批判了中世纪以来经院哲学家使希腊哲学滑向神学的倾向,认为这在实质上对二者都造成了伤害。他明确指出,“哲学的目的只在求真理,宗教的信仰我们已充分地证明,只在寻求顺从与虔敬”,“神学不是理智的婢女,理智也不是神学的婢女”。斯宾诺莎在形而上学视阈下重新定义了宗教:“当我们具有神的观念或当我们认识神的时候,我们一切的欲望和行为,皆以我们自己为原因,我认为这就算是宗教。”斯宾诺莎把“真正的宗教”划分为两个部分,一是“普遍的宗教”或“道德的宗教”,引导大众向善,并不提供理论知识;二是少数人的宗教,即哲学家的宗教,这是普通大众无法理解的领域,在这里知识是研究对象。斯宾诺莎立足于理性主义,将知识分为三类:感性知识(基于泛泛经验、传闻、意见和想象)、间接理性知识(基于推理和论证)、直观知识(基于神的属性的正确观念),并将后两类知识称之为真知识,认为它们能教导我们辨别真理和第一类知识导致的错误,产生对“神”的正确认知即真观念。斯宾诺莎强调,“真正的宗教”应注重对神律的遵行、德行的修养,而立足于迷信的传统启示宗教却局限于虚假的仪式,将祷告和祭祀视为定义信仰的标准,忽视了“心灵的最高的善是对神的知识,心灵的最高的德性是认识神”。

For Spinoza, reason and faith, philosophy and theology, are both separate and united. Their separation is manifested in that “the sphere of reason is truth and wisdom; the sphere of theology is piety and obedience.” Their unity is manifested in three aspects: only a religion founded on reason is “true religion”; to better understand religious revelation, one must rely on the power of reason; reason is not omnipotent, and faith is needed to supplement it. Reason and faith are integrated into a unified whole, forming a typical rational theology.

在斯宾诺莎这里,理性与信仰、哲学与神学是分离而又相合的。二者的分离体现为,“理智的范围是真理与智慧,神学的范围是虔敬与服从”。二者的相合体现在三个方面:只有建立在理性基础上的宗教才是“真正的宗教”;要更好地理解宗教启示,还需依靠理性的力量;理性不是万能的,还需要信仰来弥补。理性与信仰被整合成为一个统一体,形成了典型的理性神学思想。

III. Marx’s Thorough Critique and Transcendence of Spinoza’s Rational Theology

三、马克思对斯宾诺莎理性神学的彻底批判与超越

Marx’s critique and transcendence of Spinoza’s rational theology is built on the foundation of the inheritance, critique, and sublation of Spinoza by European deism, atheism, and idealist philosophy from the 17th to the 19th centuries. This transcendence is a dynamic one that follows the course of Marx’s own intellectual development, gradually enriching itself as his thought transforms, and can be divided into three stages. In the first stage, Marx viewed Spinoza’s system of rational theology through a “Hegelian” lens, discovering in Spinoza’s thought a theological-critical and political-critical dimension that implicitly echoed ancient Greek philosophers, especially the Epicurean school. In the second stage, Marx, standing on the ground of Feuerbach’s materialism, negated Spinoza as a representative of metaphysics, gradually breaking away from speculation and moving toward reality. In the third stage, Marx, standing on the ground of a new worldview, carried out a thorough “liquidation” of all old materialism and idealism, especially the modern rationalism since Spinoza, dissolving the “abstract world” and “mystical reason” constructed by the bourgeoisie on the basis of idealist conceptions of history into the practice of real human beings and the secular society in which they live. Marx’s ultimate goal was to break out of the “cage” of rationalism, no longer falling into the vicious circle of “criticizing reason with reason,” and to provide a new answer to the contradictions between reason and faith, thought and being, spirit and nature.

马克思对斯宾诺莎理性神学的批判与超越,是建立在17—19世纪欧洲自然神论、无神论、唯心论哲学对斯宾诺莎的继承、批判与扬弃的基础上的。这种超越是紧随马克思思想发展历程的动态超越,随着其自身的思想转变而逐渐丰盈,可将之分为三个阶段。在第一阶段,马克思是以“黑格尔式”的眼光来看待斯宾诺莎的理性神学体系的,发现了斯宾诺莎思想中暗含的可与古希腊哲学家尤其是伊壁鸠鲁学派遥相呼应的神学批判和政治批判色彩。第二阶段,马克思立足于费尔巴哈唯物主义的立场,将斯宾诺莎视为形而上学的代表进行了否定,逐渐脱离思辨走向现实。第三阶段,马克思站在新世界观的立场上,对一切旧唯物主义和唯心主义哲学,特别是对斯宾诺莎以来的近代理性主义进行了彻底“清算”,使资产阶级以唯心史观构建的“抽象世界”和“神秘理性”消解于现实的人的实践及人所生活的世俗社会。马克思的最终目的是跳出理性主义的“囚笼”,不再陷入“以理性批判理性”的思维怪圈,为解决理性与信仰、思维与存在、精神与自然的矛盾提供新的答案。

(I) First Stage: Absorption and Critique of Spinoza’s Rational Theology

(一)第一阶段:对斯宾诺莎理性神学思想的吸收与批判

Marx’s reading of Spinoza’s thought was concentrated in the period of preparing and writing his doctoral dissertation from 1839 to 1841, during which he completed excerpts from Spinoza’s *Theological-Political Treatise*. Judging from the order of Marx’s excerpts of this work in the Berlin Notebooks, Marx first excerpted Chapter Six, “On Miracles,” which is Spinoza’s critique of the presuppositions of revealed religion and his negation of contingency, as well as his exposure of theologians who, based on passion and imagination, create “miracles” to deceive ignorant believers. Second, Marx excerpted Chapters Fourteen through Twenty. In Marx’s view, freedom of thought and democratic government should not be treated as conclusions but as premises for unfolding a critique of revealed theology and the Bible. His excerpts of statements such as “the true purpose of politics is freedom” and “among all forms of government, democracy is the most natural and the one most compatible with individual freedom” reflect Marx’s radical political tendency at this time. Third, Marx excerpted Chapters Seven through Thirteen. In these chapters, Spinoza, through an examination of the historical and linguistic background of the Bible, points out various errors and omissions in the Bible, especially concluding that the Jewish classic the *Pentateuch* was not written by Moses but by later authors. Marx greatly admired Spinoza’s rational thinking and realist attitude based on empirical investigation. Finally, Marx excerpted Chapters One through Five. In this way, Spinoza’s critique of concepts such as prophecy, prophets, the chosen people, divine law, and ritual, developed through his critique of the Bible, became the conclusion of his religious critique.

马克思对斯宾诺莎思想的阅读集中于1839—1841年博士论文准备与写作期间,完成了对斯宾诺莎《神学政治论》的摘录。从马克思在柏林笔记群中对此书的摘录顺序看,马克思首先摘抄了第六章“论奇迹”,这是斯宾诺莎对启示宗教前提的批判和偶然论的否定,也是他对神学家基于激情和想象创造“神迹”蒙骗无知信众行为的揭露。其次,马克思摘录了第十四到二十章,在马克思看来,思想自由和民主政体不应作为结论而应作为前提去展开对启示神学和《圣经》的批判,对“政治的真正目的是自由”“在所有政体之中,民主政治是最自然、与个人自由最相合的政体”等表述的摘录体现了马克思此时激进的政治倾向。再次,马克思摘录了第七到十三章。在这几章中,斯宾诺莎通过对《圣经》历史背景和语言背景的考察指出了《圣经》的种种错漏,特别是得出犹太人的经典《摩西五书》不是由摩西所写而是后人所著的结论,马克思对斯宾诺莎这种基于实证和考察的理性思维和现实主义态度大为赞赏。最后,马克思摘录了第一到第五章,这样,斯宾诺莎根据《圣经》批判所展开的对启示神学如预言、先知、选民、神律、仪式等观念的批判部分就成为宗教批判的结论而存在。

Furthermore, in the article “The Difference Between the Democritean and Epicurean Philosophy of Nature,” Marx appropriated Spinoza’s view that “ignorance is no argument” to exalt the Epicurean school’s critical spirit against fear and superstition, arriving at his own atheistic conclusions. In “Comments on the Latest Prussian Censorship Instruction,” by highly evaluating Spinoza and others, he exposed the reactionary nature of the new censorship instruction, which attempted to “turn the inner universal essence of morality into an appendage of religion” and to conflate politics with religion, pointing out that “according to this censorship instruction, the censorship should exclude such intellectual giants in the moral sphere as Kant, Fichte, and Spinoza, because they do not believe in religion and would harm propriety, custom, and outward politeness.” In “The Leading Article in No. 179 of the *Kölnische Zeitung*,” Marx again mentioned Spinoza, stating that “first Machiavelli, Campanella, then Hobbes, Spinoza, Hugo Grotius, down to Rousseau, Fichte, Hegel, have already begun to view the state with human eyes, and they expounded the natural laws of the state from reason and experience, not from theology,” clearly expressing his own rationalist spirit.

此外,在《德谟克利特的自然哲学和伊壁鸠鲁的自然哲学的差别》一文中,马克思化用斯宾诺莎的“无知不是论据”观点,来高扬伊壁鸠鲁学派对恐惧和迷信的批判精神,得出自身关于无神论的论断;在《评普鲁士最近的书报检查令》中,他借着对斯宾诺莎等人的高度评价披露了新书报检查令试图“把道德的内在的普遍本质说成是宗教的附属物”、将政治与宗教混淆的反动属性,指出“根据这一检查令,书报检查应该排斥像康德、费希特和斯宾诺莎这样一些道德领域内的思想巨人,因为他们不信仰宗教,并且要损害礼仪、习俗和外表礼貌”;在《〈科隆日报〉第179号的评论》中,马克思再次提及斯宾诺莎,指出“先是马基雅弗利、康帕内拉,后是霍布斯、斯宾诺莎、许霍.格劳秀斯,直至卢梭、费希特、黑格尔则已经开始用人的眼光来观察国家了,他们从理性和经验出发,而不是从神学出发来阐明国家的自然规律”,旗帜鲜明地表达了自己的理性主义精神。

At this time, Marx was deeply influenced by the Young Hegelians. For him, Spinoza was an advanced representative who expounded the natural laws of the state from reason rather than theology. But even in this period, Marx had already surpassed Spinoza and his era. Spinoza reserved space for faith, acknowledging the moral edifying function of the Bible. For Marx, this kind of moral authority based on religious faith no longer existed. In his doctoral dissertation, he explicitly expressed an atheistic position, completely opposing philosophy to religion, tearing away the veil of Spinoza’s pantheism.

这时的马克思深受青年黑格尔派的影响,斯宾诺莎在他这里是从理性而非神学出发去阐明国家的自然规律的先进代表,但是马克思在这一时期已经超出了斯宾诺莎和他的时代。斯宾诺莎为信仰保留了空间,认可《圣经》的道德教化作用。在马克思这里,这种基于宗教信仰的道德权威不复存在,他在博士论文中明确表达了无神论的立场,将哲学与宗教彻底对立起来,扯下了斯宾诺莎泛神论的遮羞布。

(II) Second Stage: Critique and Transcendence of Spinoza’s Metaphysical Theory of Substance

(二)第二阶段:对斯宾诺莎形而上学实体论的批判与超越

With the widespread discussion sparked by Feuerbach’s works such as *The Essence of Christianity*, *Principles of the Philosophy of the Future*, and *Provisional Theses for the Reform of Philosophy*, which criticized pantheism and speculative philosophy, Marx, under their influence, gradually broke away from idealism and rational theology. As Engels said: “Germany’s recent critique of pantheism is so exhaustive that there is hardly anything to add. The theses published by Feuerbach in the *Anekdota* and the works of Bruno Bauer contain everything relevant to this question.” Therefore, Marx directed his critical spearhead at the representatives of speculative philosophy prevalent in Germany after Spinoza—Hegel and the core figure of the Young Hegelians, Bruno Bauer.

随着费尔巴哈《基督教的本质》《未来哲学原理》《关于哲学改造的临时纲要》等著作关于对泛神论和思辨哲学的批判所引发的广泛讨论,马克思在其影响下逐渐摆脱唯心主义和理性神学立场。正如恩格斯所说:“德国最近对泛神论的批判非常详尽,简直没有什么可以补充的了。费尔巴哈在《轶文集》中发表的纲要和布·鲍威尔的著作,包含了与这个问题有关的一切。”因此,马克思将批判的矛头指向斯宾诺莎之后在德国当时盛行的思辨哲学代表—黑格尔及青年黑格尔派核心人物布鲁诺·鲍威尔。

In *Critique of Hegel’s Philosophy of Right*, Marx realized that he should treat “theological questions” as “secular questions,” holding that “logical, pantheistic mysticism is already clearly revealed here,” and that “the idea becomes the subject, while the real relation of the family and civil society to the state is understood as the inner imaginary activity of the idea.” In *The Holy Family*, Marx argued that Bauer simplistically understood French Enlightenment philosophy as a dispute between the “two factions” of Spinozism—materialism and deism—over the “true meaning,” and regarded French materialism as an idealist product of the alienation of self-consciousness that would ultimately be eliminated by self-consciousness. This was a double misreading of both French materialism and Spinoza. Therefore, Marx reorganized the history of Enlightenment philosophy, emphasizing the characteristic of 18th-century French materialism in opposing the existing political system, religion, and theology. He pointed out that, just as Feuerbach opposed Hegel’s “drunken speculation” with “sober philosophy,” the French Enlightenment was “an open, flagrant struggle against the metaphysics of the 17th century and against all metaphysics, especially against the metaphysics of Descartes, Malebranche, Spinoza, and Leibniz.” This metaphysics, however, experienced a “restoration” in 19th-century German speculative philosophy, and in Hegel it formed an “all-embracing kingdom of metaphysics.” Marx explicitly stated that “this metaphysics will forever yield to the materialism that is now perfected by the activity of speculation itself and coincides with humanism,” that is, the materialism embodied theoretically by Feuerbach and practically by English and French utopian socialism. Thus, Marx refuted the fate of materialism as proclaimed by Bauer. In his view, “Hegel’s *History of Philosophy* treats French materialism as the realization of Spinoza’s substance; this is in any case far more sensible than treating it as the ‘French Spinozist school,’” since Hegel at least regarded French Enlightenment philosophy as two different interpretations of substance, or absolute essence, starting from two different points of departure: spirit and matter.

在《黑格尔法哲学批判》中,马克思意识到要将“神学问题”化为“世俗问题”来看待,认为“逻辑的、泛神论的神秘主义在这里已经很清楚地显露出来”,“观念变成了主体,而家庭和市民社会对国家的现实的关系被理解为观念的内在想象活动”。在《神圣家族》中,马克思认为,鲍威尔将法国的启蒙哲学简单理解为斯宾诺莎主义的“两个派别”即唯物主义和自然神论对“真谛”的争辩,并将法国唯物主义视为自我意识异化并最终由自我意识消除的唯心主义产物,这是对法国唯物主义和斯宾诺莎的双重误读。因此,马克思对启蒙哲学史重新进行了梳理,强调18世纪法国唯物主义反对现存政治制度、宗教、神学的特质。他指出,就像费尔巴哈以“清醒的哲学”反对黑格尔“醉醺醺的思辨”一样,法国启蒙运动是“反对17世纪的形而上学和反对一切形而上学,特别是反对笛卡儿、马勒伯朗士、斯宾诺莎和莱布尼茨的形而上学的公开的、旗帜鲜明的斗争”,这种形而上学却在19世纪的德国思辨哲学迎来了“复辟”,并在黑格尔这里形成了一个“形而上学的包罗万象的王国”。马克思旗帜鲜明地指出,“这种形而上学将永远屈服于现在为思辨本身的活动所完善化并和人道主义相吻合的唯物主义”,即在理论上体现为费尔巴哈、在实践上体现为英法空想社会主义的唯物主义。由此,马克思对鲍威尔所宣称的唯物主义的命运进行了反驳。在他看来,“黑格尔的《哲学史》把法国唯物主义说成斯宾诺莎的实体的实现,这无论如何总比把它说成是‘法国的斯宾诺莎学派’明智得多”,黑格尔至少是将法国启蒙哲学视为从精神和物质两个不同出发点进行的对实体即绝对本质的不同解释来看待的。

Marx, starting from his critique of the Hegelian philosophy, also criticized Spinoza’s “substance,” regarding it as one of the three elements of the Hegelian system, whose essence was “metaphysically travestied nature separated from man.” [20]20 The reference is to the young Hegelian David Friedrich Strauss, whose *The Life of Jesus Critically Examined* (1835) applied Hegelian categories to biblical criticism, and to Bruno Bauer, another young Hegelian who emphasized self-consciousness in a Fichtean vein. Strauss, precisely on the basis of this view, together with his companion Bauer, who stood on Fichteanism and emphasized “spirit separated from nature,” developed their respective elements one-sidedly, thereby going beyond Hegel while at the same time “thoroughly carrying through the Hegelian system within the domain of theology,” the result being the restoration of the Christian doctrine of creation in the speculative Hegelian form. In Marx’s view, “only Feuerbach, by taking his stand on Hegel’s point of view, ended and criticized the Hegelian system, for Feuerbach dissolved the metaphysical absolute spirit and turned it into ‘real man based on nature.’” Feuerbach essentially eliminated the “truth of the beyond” with materialism, exposed the “sacred image of man’s self-alienation,” and thereby brought about the basic “conclusion” of German religious criticism. Marx held that Feuerbach did not take the most important next step, and that the next step should be the critique of the “this-worldly realm,” i.e., the earthly world in which man lives. Marx then set out to find the “path from the abstract kingdom which he himself so intensely detested to the living, real world” that Feuerbach had not found.

马克思从批判黑格尔哲学入手,对斯宾诺莎“实体”同时进行了批判,认为其作为黑格尔体系的三个要素之一,其实质是“形而上学地改了装的、同人分离的自然”。施特劳斯正是立足于这一观点,同他那位立足于费希特主义、强调“与自然分离的精神”的同伴鲍威尔一样,片面发展了各自的要素,从而在超出黑格尔的同时又“在神学的领域内彻底地贯彻黑格尔体系”,其结果就是以思辨的黑格尔的形式恢复基督教的创世说。在马克思看来,“只有费尔巴哈才立足于黑格尔的观点之上而结束和批判了黑格尔的体系,因为费尔巴哈消解了形而上学的绝对精神,使之变为‘以自然为基础的现实的人’”,费尔巴哈实质上是以唯物主义消除了“真理的彼岸世界”,揭穿了“人的自我异化的神圣形象”,就此促使了德国宗教批判的基本“结束”。马克思认为,费尔巴哈没有进行最重要的下一步工作,而下一步就应当是对“此岸世界”即人所生活的尘世的批判。马克思随即开始致力于费尔巴哈没有找到的“从他自己所极端憎恶的抽象王国通向活生生的现实世界的道路”。

(III) The Third Stage: Sublating Rational Theology through History, Reality, and Social Practice

(三)第三阶段:以历史、现实与社会实践扬弃理性神学

After 1845, with the formation of Marx’s practical philosophy, Marx came to recognize the one-sidedness of his earlier Feuerbachian stage, in which he had simply defined Spinoza’s philosophy as metaphysics; the abstract essence of Feuerbach’s philosophy gradually emerged. He attempted to negate all old philosophy, including Feuerbach’s, with a new practical world outlook, and to rethink the essence of the rational-critical spirit common to both modern old materialism and idealism, thereby completing the unity of sensibility and rationality, subject and object, and idea and reality.

1845年之后,伴随着马克思实践哲学的成型,马克思已经认识到自己在“费尔巴哈”阶段将斯宾诺莎哲学简单定义为形而上学的片面性,费尔巴哈哲学的抽象本质逐渐呈现出来。他尝试以一种全新的实践世界观对包括费尔巴哈在内的一切旧哲学进行否定,并重新反思近代旧唯物主义和唯心主义共同具有的理性批判精神本质,从而完成了感性与理性、主体与客体、观念与现实的统一。

In Marx’s view, the essence of Spinoza’s rational theology was that it used the rational subject to invert the relationship between subject and object, thought and being, and idea and reality. Although Feuerbach turned this inverted relationship back around, he thought from the standpoint of the rational-critical spirit rather than from history and reality, and ultimately could only achieve the substitution of an abstract concept of “sensibility” for an abstract concept of “rationality.” This rational-critical spirit, as a tradition of modern philosophy, confined modern philosophy, especially German philosophy, to the realm of pure abstract speculation: “They set up their relations according to their ideas of God, of the normal man, etc. The products of their brains got the better of them. They, the creators, bowed down before their creations.”

在马克思看来,斯宾诺莎理性神学的本质是以理性主体造成了主体与客体、思维与存在、观念与现实的关系颠倒,费尔巴哈虽然将这种颠倒关系又颠倒过来,但他从理性批判精神出发而不是从历史与现实出发进行思考,最终只能实现抽象的“感性”概念对抽象的“理性”概念的替代。这种理性批判精神作为近代哲学的传统,使近代哲学特别是德国哲学都限制在了纯粹的抽象思辨领域,“他们按照自己关于神、关于标准人等等观念来建立自己的关系。他们头脑的产物不受他们支配。他们这些创造者屈从于自己的创造物”。

Marx pointed out that this rationalist inversion of idea and reality was rooted in the inversion of the logic of capitalist production. In the capitalist production process, “the commodity form reflects for men the social character of their own labor as objective characters of the labor products themselves, as the natural social properties of these things, and thereby also reflects the social relation of the producers to the total labor as a social relation between things, existing outside the producers.” Through this transformation, the product of labor becomes a thing that is at once sensuous and supersensuous (the commodity), and the social relation between men assumes the fantastic form of a relation between things. Marx used religion as an analogy, arguing that just as in the “beyond” “the products of the human brain appear as autonomous figures endowed with a life of their own, which enter into relations both with each other and with the human race,” so in the world of commodities, the “thing,” as a product of man, also appears as a mysterious, absolute being that dominates commodity production and is worshipped and fetishized by man — this is fetishism. Marx held that fetishism, as one of the primitive forms of religious belief, developed through various forms — commodity fetishism, money fetishism, capital fetishism — with the development of the private ownership economy, ultimately turning capitalist society into an inverted world. This inversion, in the spiritual sphere, manifested itself as the rule of abstract rationality over reality.

马克思指出,理性主义这种对观念与现实的颠倒根源于资本主义生产逻辑的颠倒。在资本主义生产过程中,“商品形式在人们面前把人们本身劳动的社会性质反映成劳动产品本身的物的性质,反映成这些物的天然的社会属性,从而把生产者同总劳动的社会关系反映成存在于生产者之外的物与物之间的社会关系”。由于这种转换,劳动产品成为可感觉而又超感觉的物(商品),人与人之间的社会关系表现为物与物的关系的虚幻形式。马克思以宗教进行比喻,认为就像在“彼岸世界”中“人脑的产物表现为赋有生命的、彼此发生关系并同人发生关系的独立存在的东西”一样,在商品世界里,“物”作为人的产物也表现为一种神秘化的、主宰商品生产的绝对存在并为人所崇拜和迷信,此即拜物教。马克思认为,拜物教作为宗教信仰的原始形式之一,随着私有制经济的发展经历了商品拜物教、货币拜物教、资本拜物教等多种发展形式，最终使资本主义社会成为一个颠倒的世界，这种颠倒在精神领域便体现为抽象理性对现实的统治。

“The productive forces, the state of society and the forms of intercourse which each individual and each generation finds existing as something given, are the real basis of what the philosophers have conceived as ‘substance’ and ‘essence of man,’ and what they have deified and attacked.” [21]21 This is a paraphrase by Marx and Engels in *The German Ideology* (1845–46) of their own materialist conception of history. Through his excavation of the essence of the rational-critical spirit and his investigation of its real roots, Marx ultimately made clear that the ills of modern rational metaphysics could not be eliminated by purely spiritual critique alone. Only by proceeding from the material production of men’s immediate life, by taking one’s stand on the real history of each different stage, and by testing the truth and reality of thought in practical activity, could sensibility and rationality, subject and object, and idea and reality truly achieve unity in the subject “man.”

“每个个人和每一代当作现成的东西承受下来的生产力、资金和社会交往形式的总和，是哲学家们想象为‘实体’和‘人的本质’的东西的现实基础，是他们加以神化并与之斗争的东西的现实基础。”马克思通过对理性抵制精神实质的挖掘以及对现实根源的探究，最终明确了只靠纯粹的精神批判是无法消除近代理性形而上学的弊病的，只有从人们直接生活的物质生产出发，立足各个不同阶段的现实的历史，在实践活动中检验思维的真理性、现实性，这样感性与理性、主体与客体、观念与现实才真正在主体“人”这里实现统一。

IV. Conclusion

四、结语

In Spinoza’s era, the bourgeoisie, as an emerging force, was the main army resisting feudal oppression, and philosophy, as a weapon of the bourgeoisie, urgently needed to shake off the yoke of theology. Therefore, Spinoza regarded human freedom as “the intellectual love of God,” attempting to elevate the status of philosophy, holding that “that thing is called free which exists from the necessity of its own nature alone and is determined to action by itself alone.” Such freedom could be realized only through rational contemplation, because apart from reason, every other state was necessarily bound by external things. Consequently, Spinoza naturally put forward the demand for the establishment of a bourgeois democratic polity; such a democratic political state would necessarily realize man’s freedom of thought, enabling man to possess the capacity for rational thinking and free judgment, thereby avoiding falling into the vortex of “superstition.” The limitations of his age led him to regard political emancipation as spiritual emancipation, to see shaking off the rule of the religious kingdom as the first priority, and to be full of confidence in the main army, the bourgeoisie, thus forming a path of rational theology suited to that era.

斯宾诺莎所处的时代，资产阶级作为新兴力量是反抗封建压迫的主力军，哲学作为资产阶级的武器正急需摆脱神学压制。因此，斯宾诺莎将人的自由视为“对神的理智之爱”，试图抬高哲学的地位，认为“凡是仅仅由自身本性的必然性而存在、其行为仅仅由它自身决定的东西叫做自由”,而这种自由只有理性的沉思才能够实现，因为除理性之外，其他任何状态都必然受到外在事物的束缚。于是，斯宾诺莎理所当然地提出了建立资产阶级民主政体的要求，这样的民主政治国家必然能实现人的思想自由，使人拥有理性思考和自由判断的能力，从而避免陷入“迷信”的漩涡。时代的局限性使他将政治解放视为精神解放，将摆脱宗教王国的统治视为第一要务，并对主力军资产阶级充满信心，形成了适合那个时代的理性神学路径。

By Marx’s time, the bourgeoisie had successively established political states, but the beautiful blueprint Spinoza had depicted was not realized. Marx recognized the theoretical contradictions and epochal limitations of Spinoza and gained a deeper understanding of human emancipation. The inequality between the bourgeois political state and civil society, and the oppression of the proletariat by the bourgeoisie, demonstrated the incompleteness of political emancipation. The answer to freedom was not to be sought in changes in the form of the state, but in the economy and society.

到马克思的时代，资产阶级已经陆续建立政治国家，斯宾诺莎描绘的美好蓝图却并未实现，马克思认识到斯宾诺莎的理论矛盾及时代局限，对人类解放有了更深入的理解。资产阶级的政治国家和市民社会的不对等、资产阶级对无产阶级的压迫说明了政治解放的不彻底性，自由的答案也不应从国家政体的变化中寻找，而应从经济和社会中寻找。

Unlike Spinoza, who sought freedom in the love of God, Marx, from the perspective of historical materialism, pointed out the true meaning of human emancipation — namely, the free and all-round development of man and the restoration of man’s essence. He held that only by abolishing exploitation and oppression, abolishing all appropriation of the labor of others, so that man is no longer controlled by alien forces and can master his own destiny, is true emancipation and freedom achieved.

不同于斯宾诺莎在对神的爱中寻找自由，马克思以历史唯物主义视角指明了人类解放的真正含义即人的自由而全面的发展和人的本质的复归，认为只有消灭剥削和压迫，消灭一切对他人劳动的占有，使人不再被异己力量所控制，能掌握自己的命运，才是真正的解放与自由。

(About the authors: Cai Jiangfan, Associate Professor, School of Political Science and Law, Xinjiang Normal University; Chai Qianyu, Master’s student in Religious Studies, School of Political Science and Law, Xinjiang Normal University)

（作者简介：蔡江帆,新疆师范大学政法学院副教授;柴千雨,新疆师范大学政法学院宗教学专业硕士研究生）

Online editor: Tongxin

网络编辑：同心