How Is Marx’s Critique of Fetishism Possible?

In recent years, Marx’s theory of the critique of fetishism has been a hot topic in Chinese academic circles, especially in the field of Marxist philosophy. Scholars have engaged in heated discussions on issues such as Marx’s theory of commodity fetishism, the doctrine of money fetishism, the critique of capital fetishism, and the relationship between the theory of alienation and the doctrine of fetishism. Rich achievements have been made in areas including the formation process, specific connotations, theoretical implications, practical significance of the critique of fetishism, and evaluations of foreign scholars’ research on the critique of fetishism. At present, research on Marx’s theory of the critique of fetishism still has aspects that need improvement: neglecting existing textual research findings on fetishism and related concepts, still understanding fetishism in the sense of “worship,” which deviates from the clear direction of Marx’s critique of fetishism and narrows the research perspective; paying insufficient attention to international academic developments concerning Marx’s critique of fetishism; neglecting close study of Marx’s *Capital* and its manuscripts; and a lack of mutual reference between research results on this issue in the Marxist philosophy and political economy circles. To further deepen research on the critique of fetishism, it is necessary, on the basis of clarifying what exactly Marx’s critique of fetishism refers to and why Marx moved toward the critique of fetishism, to explore the objective conditions, mode of thinking, and cognitive mechanism of fetishistic notions.

近年来，马克思拜物教批判理论是我国学界特别是马克思主义哲学界的研究热门。学者们就马克思的商品拜物教理论、货币拜物教学说、资本拜物教批判、异化理论与拜物教学说的关系等问题进行了热烈的讨论，关于拜物教批判理论的形成过程、具体内涵、理论意蕴、现实意义以及国外学者拜物教批判研究的评价等方面取得了丰富成果。当前，马克思拜物教批判理论的研究仍有需要改进之处：忽视对于已有的拜物教及相关概念的文本考辨研究成果，仍在“崇拜”的意义上理解拜物教，这偏离了马克思拜物教批判的明确指向，也缩小了研究视野；对国外关于马克思拜物教批判理论的学术动态关注较少；疏于对马克思《资本论》及其手稿的研读；马克思主义哲学界和政治经济学界对这一问题的研究成果缺少相互借鉴。继续深化拜物教批判理论的研究，需要在搞清楚马克思拜物教批判有何具体所指、马克思为何走向拜物教批判的基础上，探究拜物教批判的客观条件、思维方式和拜物教观念的认知机制。

I. Objective Mysterious Character and Subjective Misrecognition: The Specific Referent of Marx’s Critique of Fetishism

一、客观的神秘性质与主观的错认：马克思拜物教批判的具体所指

Marx’s theory of the critique of fetishism targets both the fetishistic character of commodities, money, and capital and fetishistic notions. Marx thoroughly analyzed the fetishistic character of commodities, holding that the mysterious character of commodities originates neither from their use-value nor from the content of the value determination, but from the commodity form itself. The commodity has a dual form, namely, the natural form and the value form. Among these, use-value is the natural form of the commodity; it is not unique to commodities. The value form is the distinctive form that makes a commodity a commodity.

马克思拜物教批判理论既指向商品、货币和资本的拜物教性质，又指向拜物教观念。马克思对商品的拜物教性质进行了透彻的剖析，认为商品的神秘性质既不是来源于商品的使用价值，也不是来源于价值规定的内容，而是来源于商品形式本身。商品具有二重的形式，即自然形式和价值形式。其中，使用价值是商品的自然形式，它不是商品独有的，价值形式才是商品之为商品的独特形式。

The semblance inherent in the commodity form develops further in the money form and the capital form. Gold and silver, as physical objects, seem naturally to be money, naturally possessing the attribute of being able to express the value of all other commodities—compared to the commodity fetish, the money fetish is even more dazzling. Money can transform into capital only within the relation of wage labor. However, the capitalist mode of production creates the following semblance: capital is an independent existence that can realize self-valorization apart from any relation. The fetishistic character of capital is related not only to commodity production but also to the concealment of the exploitative relation—the wage form obscures the distinction between necessary labor and surplus labor, paid labor and unpaid labor, making it appear as if all labor is paid labor, so that the relationship between the capitalist and the wage worker seems to be one of equivalent exchange, with no relation of exploitation.

商品形式上具有的假象，在货币形式和资本形式上有了进一步的发展。金银作为物，好像天然地就是货币，天然地具有能够表现其他一切商品的价值的属性——跟商品物神相比，货币物神更加耀眼了。货币只有在雇佣劳动的关系中才能转化为资本。资本主义生产方式却造成了如下假象：资本是可以脱离关系而实现自行增殖的独立化存在。资本的拜物教性质不仅与商品生产有关，而且与剥削关系的被遮蔽有关——工资的形式掩盖了必要劳动和剩余劳动、有酬劳动和无酬劳动的区分，好像全部劳动都是有酬劳动，从而资本家与雇佣工人之间看似是等价交换关系，并不存在剥削与被剥削的关系。

Commodities, money, and capital possess a fetishistic character. Once people are confused by this fetishistic character, they produce corresponding fetishistic notions. For example, some people believe that exchange-value is an attribute of things, while use-value is an attribute of human beings. In fact, use-value is an attribute that a thing possesses as a thing, while exchange-value is a social attribute that a thing acquires within the relations of commodity production and exchange, i.e., a determination of social form. Monetarists believe that gold and silver are naturally money, and that money is the sole form of wealth. Marx held that the monetarist “illusion” arises because they fail to see that gold and silver, as money, represent a social relation of production, albeit one that takes the form of a “natural object.” In the *Grundrisse*, Marx points out: “The economists’ crude materialism, which treats the social relations of production and the determinations acquired by things subject to these relations as natural properties of things, is an equally crude idealism, and even a fetishism, which attributes social relations to things as immanent determinations and thereby mystifies things.” [1]1 Karl Marx, *Grundrisse der Kritik der politischen Ökonomie* (1857–1858), in *Marx-Engels-Werke*, vol. 42, p. 24. (The English translation is adapted from the standard English edition.) The determination that a thing acquires within a specific social relation is a determination of social form, not a natural property of the thing. Attributing determinations of social form to the natural properties of things is a fetishism.

商品、货币和资本具有拜物教性质，人们一旦被拜物教性质迷惑了头脑就会产生相应的拜物教观念。比如，有人认为交换价值是物的属性，使用价值才是人的属性。其实，使用价值是物作为物就具有的属性，交换价值才是物在商品生产和交换关系中获得的社会属性，即社会形式规定性。货币主义者认为，金银天生就是货币，货币是财富的唯一形态。马克思认为，货币主义“幻觉”的产生是因为没有看出金银作为货币代表的是一种社会生产关系，只不过这种关系采取了一种“自然物的形式”。在《1857—1858年经济学手稿》中，马克思指出：“经济学家们把人们的社会生产关系和受这些关系支配的物所获得的规定性看作物的自然属性，这种粗俗的唯物主义，是一种同样粗俗的唯心主义，甚至是一种拜物教，它把社会关系作为物的内在规定归之于物，从而使物神秘化。”物在一定的社会关系中获得规定性是社会形式规定性，而不是物的自然属性。把社会形式规定性归之于物的自然属性是一种拜物教。

Understanding fetishism as a form of worship has long existed in academic circles. In 1923, Chen Duxiu, in his lecture “On the Question of Socialism,” said, “Capitalists blindly increase their products—that is, ‘commodities.’ Their super-rational worship of the omnipotence of ‘commodities’ is like the primitive worship of various strange objects in the religion of African natives, so Marx called it ‘commodity fetishism.’” [2]2 Chen Duxiu (1879–1942) was a co-founder of the Communist Party of China and its first General Secretary; this lecture was given in 1923 during the early years of the Party. In the 1930s, scholars such as Chen Baoyin, Shen Zhiyuan, and Li Da all understood commodity fetishism (commodity fetishism) as people’s “worship” of commodities. [3]3 Chen Baoyin (1891–1960), Shen Zhiyuan (1902–1965), and Li Da (1890–1966) were early Chinese Marxist scholars and translators who introduced Marxist economics to China. Even today, there are still phenomena of understanding fetishism as a kind of worship. In fact, fetishistic notions, as a specific form of misrecognition, are not equivalent to the worship of things or social relations. More importantly, analyzing a misrecognition requires explaining why and how A is mistaken for B, whereas explaining a “worship” merely requires pointing out that the object of “worship” is a “mysterious thing/event/relation” in the eyes of the “worshiper.”

把拜物教视为一种崇拜，这种理解方式在学术界存在已久。1923年，陈独秀在《关于社会主义问题》的讲演中说，“资本家盲目地增加他们的生产品——即‘商品’,他们这样超理性的崇拜‘商品’万能，好像非洲土人盲目崇拜各种异物的宗教，所以马克思把他叫作‘商品拜物教’”。20世纪30年代，陈豹隐、沈志远、李达等学者都曾把商品拜物教(商品拜物主义)理解为人们对商品的“崇拜”。当前，依然存在把拜物教理解为一种崇拜的现象。其实，拜物教观念作为一种特殊的错认，并不等同于对物或社会关系的崇拜。更为重要的是，剖析一种错认需要说明为何以及如何将A错认为B,而说明一种“崇拜”,指出被“崇拜”的对象在“崇拜者”那里是个“神秘的物/事/关系”就行了。

In the book *For a Critique of the Political Economy of the Sign*, the French scholar Jean Baudrillard, following the line of psychoanalysis, understands Marx’s concept of fetishism in the sense of “fetish.” He believes that “Marx used the concepts of commodity fetishism and money fetishism to describe the ideology of capitalist society, a mystified, captivating, psychological mode of submission.” [4]4 Jean Baudrillard, *For a Critique of the Political Economy of the Sign*, trans. Charles Levin (St. Louis: Telos Press, 1981), p. 89. In fact, there is a significant difference between the fetishism criticized by Marx and the fetish or fetishism of the psychoanalytic school: Marx discusses the social constitution and consequences of fetishism from the logic of commodity production, while the psychoanalytic school discusses the psychological mechanism and effects of fetishism from the operation of subjective desire; Marx’s concern is how things acquire mysteriousness, while the psychoanalytic school’s concern is why people develop an endless fascination with things. Baudrillard overlooks the essential difference in research perspective between Marx and the psychoanalytic school.

在《符号政治经济学批判》一书中，法国学者鲍德里亚沿着精神分析学的思路，在“物恋”的意义上来理解马克思的拜物教概念。他认为，“马克思用商品拜物教以及货币拜物教的概念描述了资本主义社会的意识形态，这是一种被神秘化了的、让人着迷的、心理学意义上的屈从模式”。其实，马克思所批判的拜物教与精神分析学派的物恋或恋物癖有重大差别：马克思是从商品生产的逻辑来讨论拜物教的社会构成及其后果，精神分析学派则是从主体欲望的运作来讨论恋物癖的心理机制及其效果；马克思关注的问题是物如何具有神秘性，精神分析学派关注的问题则是人何以对物产生无休止的迷恋。鲍德里亚忽视了马克思与精神分析学派在研究视角上的本质差别。

Marx’s critique of fetishism targets both the fetishistic character of commodities, money, and capital and fetishistic notions; the fetishistic character is an objective mysterious character, closely related to “the reification of social relations,” “the reification of determinations of social production,” and “the independence of relations of production vis-à-vis the agents of production”; fetishistic notions are neither worship nor fetish, but a specific misrecognition—taking the formal determinations that a thing acquires within a specific social relation as natural properties of the thing.

马克思的拜物教批判，既指向商品、货币和资本的拜物教性质，又指向拜物教观念；拜物教性质是一种客观的神秘性质，跟“社会关系的物化”“社会生产规定的物化”“生产关系对生产当事人的独立化”密切相关;拜物教观念既非崇拜，亦非物恋，而是一种特殊的错认——把物在一定的社会关系中获得的形式规定性视为物的自然属性。

II. Moving Toward the Critique of Fetishism: An Inherent Requirement of the Logic of Historical Materialism

二、走向拜物教批判：历史唯物主义逻辑的内在要求

Chinese academic circles have already explored the process of the generation and development of the theory of the critique of fetishism, but they have not yet fully revealed the internal logic between the critique of fetishism and historical materialism, particularly lacking a systematic demonstration of the necessity of Marx’s move toward the critique of fetishism.

我国学界已对拜物教批判理论的生成和发展历程有所探讨,但尚未充分揭示拜物教批判与历史唯物主义的内在逻辑，特别是缺少对马克思走向拜物教批判必然性的系统论证。

During his work at the *Rheinische Zeitung*, debates such as those on the “law on the theft of wood” directly addressed real problems, leading Marx to encounter the difficulty of expressing his views on material interests. A conflict arose between Marx’s original “faith in reason” and the real logic he discovered, in which material interests play a decisive role; this became an important turning point in Marx’s thought. Through his critique of Hegel’s philosophy of right, Marx reached the following conclusion: the family and civil society are the presupposition of the state, whereas Hegel’s philosophy of right had inverted all this. In the “Introduction to a Contribution to the Critique of Hegel’s Philosophy of Right,” Marx explicitly made it his main task to expose and critique secular estrangement and to expose self-estrangement in its unholy forms. The demand to give up the illusions about one’s condition is the demand to give up a condition that needs illusions; “The criticism of religion ends with the teaching that man is the highest essence for man, hence with the categorical imperative to overthrow all relations in which man is a debased, enslaved, forsaken, despicable being.” [5]5 Karl Marx, “Introduction to a Contribution to the Critique of Hegel’s Philosophy of Right,” in *Marx and Engels Collected Works*, vol. 3 (Moscow: Progress Publishers, 1975), p. 182. [Translator’s note: The Chinese text quotes a slightly different passage; the English translation follows the standard MECW version.] “The task of history, therefore, once the world beyond the truth has disappeared, is to establish the truth of this world. The immediate task of philosophy, which is at the service of history, once the holy form of human self-estrangement has been unmasked, is to unmask self-estrangement in its unholy forms.” [6]6 Ibid., p. 176. In his “Theses on Feuerbach,” Marx pointed out that although Feuerbach strove to “resolve the religious world into its secular basis,” the formation of the religious world “can only be explained by the self-cleavage and self-contradiction of this secular basis.” Therefore, “this secular basis must first be understood in its contradiction and then, by the removal of the contradiction, revolutionized in practice.” [7]7 Karl Marx, “Theses on Feuerbach,” in *Marx and Engels Collected Works*, vol. 5 (Moscow: Progress Publishers, 1976), p. 4. In this way, Marx’s thought moved toward an analysis of the self-contradiction of the secular basis.

马克思在《莱茵报》工作期间，关于“林木盗窃法”的辩论等直指现实问题的讨论，使马克思遇到了对物质利益发表意见的难事。马克思原有的“理性信仰”与其发现的物质利益起决定性作用的现实逻辑之间发生了冲突，这成为马克思思想转变的重要契机。通过对黑格尔法哲学的批判，马克思得出了以下结论：家庭和市民社会是国家的前提，而黑格尔法哲学却把这一切颠倒了。在《〈黑格尔法哲学批判〉导言》中，马克思把揭露和批判世俗异化、揭露具有非神圣形象的自我异化明确为自己的主要任务。要求抛弃关于人民处境的幻觉，就是要求抛弃那需要幻觉的处境；“人的自我异化的神圣形象被揭穿以后，揭露具有非神圣形象的自我异化，就成了为历史服务的哲学的迫切任务”。马克思在《关于费尔巴哈的提纲》中指出，虽然费尔巴哈致力于“把宗教世界归结于它的世俗基础”,但是，宗教世界的形成“只能用这个世俗基础的自我分裂和自我矛盾来说明”。因此，“对于这个世俗基础本身首先应当从它的矛盾中去理解，然后用消除矛盾的方法在实践中使之发生革命”。这样，马克思的思想就走向了对世俗基础的自我矛盾的剖析。

Analyzing the self-contradiction of the secular basis means stepping out of the “pure realm of thought” and moving toward “changing the world.” In *The German Ideology*, Marx and Engels wrote mockingly, “As the German ideologists announce, Germany has in the last few years undergone a revolution of unprecedented magnitude… a revolution beside which the French Revolution is child’s play, a world struggle beside which the struggles of the Diadochi are insignificant… All this, it is said, took place in the pure realm of thought.” [8]8 Karl Marx and Frederick Engels, *The German Ideology*, in *Marx and Engels Collected Works*, vol. 5 (Moscow: Progress Publishers, 1976), p. 28. Marx and Engels believed that the Young Hegelians only carried out theoretical critique in the “pure realm of thought”; although they constantly spoke of “world-shattering” phrases, they were the greatest conservatives, because this demand to change consciousness was a demand to interpret what exists in a different way—that is, to acknowledge it by means of a different interpretation. “If they oppose only the phrases of this world, they are in no way opposing the real, existing world.” [9]9 Ibid., p. 30. Using only phrases to oppose phrases, acknowledging the existing world by means of a different interpretation—this is precisely what Marx criticized in the “Theses on Feuerbach” as “only interpreting the world in different ways.” Unlike the Young Hegelians, Marx stepped out of the “pure realm of thought” and devoted himself to “changing the world.” Marx and Engels examined the question “which not one of these philosophers thought of asking”—“the question of the connection between German philosophy and German reality, the connection between their criticism and their own material environment.” [10]10 Ibid., p. 28. Through their investigation of the above questions, Marx and Engels founded the materialist conception of history and reached the following conclusion: “All forms and products of consciousness cannot be dissolved by mental criticism… but only by the practical overthrow of the actual social relations which gave rise to these idealistic humbugs; the driving force of history, and of religion, philosophy, and any other theory, is revolution, not criticism.” [11]11 Ibid., p. 54. This is what Marx and Engels meant by the following assertion: “Real liberation is only possible in the real world and by real means”; “‘Liberation’ is a historical act, not a mental act.” [12]12 Ibid., p. 38. To conduct a meticulous theoretical analysis of the inner contradictions of the secular basis, and to practically transform this secular basis in the real world and by real means—this is the true meaning of Marx’s stance of “changing the world.”

对世俗基础的自我矛盾进行剖析，意味着要走出“纯粹的思想领域”,走向“改变世界”。在《德意志意识形态》中，马克思恩格斯以嘲讽的口吻写道，“正如德意志意识形态家们所宣告的，德国在最近几年里经历了一次空前的变革……这是一次革命，法国革命同它相比只不过是儿戏；这是一次世界斗争，狄亚多希的斗争在它面前简直微不足道……据说这一切都是在纯粹的思想领域中发生的”。马克思恩格斯认为，青年黑格尔派只是在“纯粹的思想领域”开展理论的批判，他们尽管满口讲的都是所谓震撼世界的词句，却是最大的保守派，因为这种改变意识的要求，就是要求用另一种方式来解释存在的东西，也就是说，借助于另外的解释来承认它。“仅仅反对这个世界的词句，那么他们就绝对不是反对现实的现存世界”。只是用词句来反对词句，借助于另外的解释来承认现存世界，这就是马克思在《关于费尔巴哈的提纲》中所批判的“只是用不同的方式解释世界”。与青年黑格尔派不同，马克思走出了“纯粹的思想领域”,致力于“改变世界”。马克思恩格斯考察了“这些哲学家没有一个想到要提出”的问题——“关于德国哲学和德国现实之间的联系问题，关于他们所作的批判和他们自身的物质环境之间的联系问题”。通过对上述问题的考察，马克思恩格斯创立了唯物主义历史观并得出了如下结论，“意识的一切形式和产物不是可以通过精神的批判来消灭的……而只有通过实际地推翻这一切唯心主义谬论所由产生的现实的社会关系，才能把它们消灭；历史的动力以及宗教、哲学和任何其他理论的动力是革命，而不是批判”。这就是马克思恩格斯的下述论断所表达的意思，“只有在现实的世界中并使用现实的手段才能实现真正的解放”,“‘解放’是一种历史活动，不是思想活动”。对世俗基础的内在矛盾进行细致的理论剖析，在现实的世界中并使用现实的手段对这个世俗基础进行实践改造——这是马克思“改变世界”的立场的真谛所在。

Marx, who was committed to “changing the world,” inevitably moved toward a critique of political economy, toward a critical analysis of the capitalist mode of production. Even while writing *The German Ideology*, Marx and Engels had the following theoretical awareness: “We must begin from the material production of immediate life, and from this we must explain the real process of production… civil society is understood as the foundation of all history… from civil society we must explain all the various theoretical products and forms of consciousness, such as religion, philosophy, morality… we must not explain practice from ideas, but explain the formation of ideas from material practice.” [13]13 Ibid., pp. 36-37. Civil society is the foundation of all history, and the anatomy of civil society is to be sought in political economy. Engels made a similar point in *Anti-Dühring*: “The ultimate causes of all social changes and political revolutions are to be sought, not in the minds of men, not in men’s increasing insight into eternal truth and justice, but in changes in the mode of production and exchange; they are to be sought, not in the philosophy, but in the economics of the epoch concerned.” [14]14 Frederick Engels, *Anti-Dühring*, in *Marx and Engels Collected Works*, vol. 25 (Moscow: Progress Publishers, 1987), p. 264. This requires focusing research on the analysis of the capitalist mode of production and the relations of production and exchange corresponding to it.

致力于“改变世界”的马克思，必然走向政治经济学批判，走向对资本主义生产方式的批判性剖析。还在写作《德意志意识形态》时，马克思恩格斯就有了如下理论自觉，“从直接生活的物质生产出发阐述现实的生产过程……市民社会理解为整个历史的基础……从市民社会出发阐明意识的所有各种不同的理论产物和形式，如宗教、哲学、道德等等……不是从观念出发来解释实践，而是从物质实践出发来解释各种观念形态”。市民社会是整个历史的基础，而对市民社会的解剖应该到政治经济学中去寻求。恩格斯在《反杜林论》中也有类似的说法，“一切社会变迁和政治变革的终极原因，不应当到人们的头脑中，到人们对永恒的真理和正义的日益增进的认识中去寻找，而应当到生产方式和交换方式的变更中去寻找；不应当到有关时代的哲学中去寻找，而应当到有关时代的经济中去寻找”。这就要求把研究的重点放在资本主义生产方式以及与之相适应的生产关系和交换关系的剖析上。

The capitalist mode of production has a fetishistic character, requiring a theory of the critique of fetishism to reveal the secret of this mode of production. We can illustrate this through a comparative analysis of corvée labor and wage labor. Marx pointed out, “In corvée labor, the labor of the serf for himself and his forced labor for the landlord are clearly separated in space and time… In wage labor, even surplus labor, or unpaid labor, appears as paid labor.” [15]15 Karl Marx, *Capital*, vol. 1, in *Marx and Engels Collected Works*, vol. 35 (Moscow: Progress Publishers, 1996), p. 539. Because the serf’s necessary labor for himself and his surplus labor for the landlord are clearly separated, the exploitation in feudal society is obvious; the wage worker’s labor for the capitalist also appears as his own labor, and the capitalist’s exploitation of the wage worker is concealed by the illusion of equal exchange. Exposing the secret of capitalist exploitation requires us to break through the interference of various illusions. At this point, the theory of the critique of fetishism enters the stage. Thus, moving toward the critique of fetishism is an inherent requirement of the logic of historical materialism.

资本主义生产方式具有拜物教性质，需要拜物教批判理论揭示这种生产方式的秘密。我们可以通过对徭役劳动和雇佣劳动进行比较分析来说明这一点。马克思指出，“在徭役劳动下，服徭役者为自己的劳动和为地主的强制劳动在空间上和时间上都是明显地分开的……在雇佣劳动下，甚至剩余劳动或无酬劳动也表现为有酬劳动”。因为服徭役者为自己的必要劳动和为地主的剩余劳动是明显分开的，所以封建社会的剥削是显而易见的；雇佣劳动者为资本家的劳动也表现为自己的劳动，资本家对雇佣劳动者的剥削被平等交换的假象掩盖了。揭露资本主义剥削的秘密，需要我们破除种种假象的干扰。此时拜物教批判理论出场了。由此可见，走向拜物教批判是历史唯物主义逻辑的内在要求。

III. The Universalization of Commodity Production: The Objective Condition for the Critique of Fetishism

三、商品生产的普遍化：拜物教批判的客观条件

In Chapter 1 of Volume I of *Capital*, Marx points out, “As soon as products become commodities, they take on a fetishistic character; therefore, fetishism is inseparable from commodity production.” [16]16 Ibid., p. 82. “Fetishism is inseparable from commodity production” means that without commodity production, there would be no fetishism. Commodity production did not exist from the very beginning, nor will it exist eternally; the same is true of fetishism. Fetishism already existed in simple commodity production; it did not first appear in capitalist society. However, the conditions for the existence of the fetishistic phenomenon are not the same as the conditions for revealing the secret of the fetishistic character. To clarify this issue, it is necessary to briefly review the history of the development of human labor and the history of human understanding of labor, as well as the history of the development of human commodity production and the history of human understanding of commodity production.

在《资本论》第一卷第一章中，马克思指出，“劳动产品一旦作为商品来生产，就带上拜物教性质，因此拜物教是同商品生产分不开的”。“拜物教同商品生产分不开”意味着，没有商品生产也就没有拜物教。商品生产不是从一开始就有的，也不会永恒地存在下去，拜物教亦是如此。在简单商品生产中就已经有了拜物教，拜物教不是到了资本主义社会才出现的。不过，拜物教现象存在的条件，跟揭示拜物教性质之秘密的条件不是一回事。为了说明这一问题，我们有必要简要回顾人类劳动的发展史与人类对劳动的认识史、人类商品生产的发展史与人类对商品生产的认识史。

Labor runs through the entire process of the development of human society. However, before capitalist society, generations engaged in a certain type of labor, such as agricultural labor; in the stage of capitalist development, labor has achieved full development, individuals can easily shift from one type of labor to another, and no specific type of labor is any longer the dominant one. Labor, rather than a particular type of labor, becomes the “general means of creating wealth.” [17]17 Karl Marx, *Grundrisse*, in *Marx and Engels Collected Works*, vol. 28 (Moscow: Progress Publishers, 1986), p. 41. This is the history of the development of human labor.

劳动贯穿人类社会发展过程的始终。不过，在资本主义社会之前，祖祖辈辈从事某种劳动，比如农业劳动；在资本主义发展阶段，劳动获得了充分发展，个人很容易从一种劳动转到另一种劳动，任何一种具体劳动都不再是支配一切的劳动。劳动，而不是某种劳动，成为“创造财富一般的手段”。这是人类劳动的发展史。

People once recognized the productiveness of labor only in some particular form of labor. For example, the physiocrats held that agricultural labor alone was the labor that creates wealth, that only agricultural labor was productive. Later, Adam Smith cast aside all determinate characteristics of the activity that creates wealth and regarded labor as the activity that creates wealth; people achieved “an equal regard for any kind of labor,” and labor, or labor in general, became “the starting point of modern economics.” This is the history of human understanding of labor.

人们曾经只是在劳动的某种特殊形式上认识劳动的生产性，比如，重农学派认为农业劳动才是创造财富的劳动，只有农业劳动才是生产的;后来，亚当·斯密抛开了创造财富的活动的一切规定性，把劳动视为创造财富的活动，人们实现了“对任何种类劳动的同样看待”,劳动或者劳动一般才成为“现代经济学的起点”。这是人类对劳动的认识史。

Commodity production already existed in slave society and feudal society, but it occupied a subordinate position. “Only on the basis of capitalist production does the commodity become in fact the general elementary form of wealth.” “Once production by means of wage-labour becomes general, commodity production is bound to become the general form of production.” With the generalization of commodity production, all commodity production gradually transforms into capitalist commodity production. Only in capitalist society does the commodity become the dominant form of wealth. This is the history of the development of human commodity production.

商品生产在奴隶社会、封建社会已经存在，但尚处于从属地位；“只有在资本主义生产的基础上，商品才在事实上成为财富的一般元素形式”;“一旦依靠雇佣劳动进行的生产普遍化，商品生产就必然成为生产的普遍形式”,随着商品生产的普遍化，一切商品生产会逐步转化为资本主义的商品生产；只有在资本主义社会，商品才成为占统治地位的财富形式。这是人类商品生产的发展史。

Marx held that Aristotle was unable “to see that, in the form of the value of commodities, all labour is expressed as equal human labour and therefore as labour of equal validity” because “Greek society was founded on the labour of slaves, hence it had as its natural basis the inequality of men and of their labour-powers,” and the lack of a concept of value further prevented Aristotle from conducting a deeper analysis of commodity exchange. “The secret of the expression of value, namely the equality and equivalence of all kinds of labour because and in so far as they are human labour in general” can be revealed only in a society “where the commodity-form is the universal form of the product of labour, hence the dominant social relation is the relation between men as possessors of commodities.” That is to say, under conditions of simple commodity production, it is impossible to reveal “the secret of the expression of value”; it can be revealed only under capitalist commodity production, the advanced stage of commodity production. This is the history of human understanding of commodity production.

马克思认为，亚里士多德之所以“没有能从价值形式本身看出，在商品价值形式中，一切劳动都表现为等同的人类劳动，因而是同等意义的劳动”,乃是因为“希腊社会是建立在奴隶劳动的基础上的，因而是以人们之间以及他们的劳动力之间的不平等为自然基础的”,而缺乏价值概念又阻碍了亚里士多德对商品交换作进一步的分析。“价值表现的秘密，即一切劳动由于而且只是由于都是一般人类劳动而具有的等同性和同等意义”,只有在“商品形式成为劳动产品的一般形式，从而人们彼此作为商品占有者的关系成为占统治地位的社会关系”的社会中，才能被揭示出来。也就是说，在简单商品生产条件下，是不可能揭示“价值表现的秘密”的；只有在资本主义商品生产这一商品生产的高级发展阶段才能揭示“价值表现的秘密”。这是人类对商品生产的认识史。

Only in capitalist society does labor—not some particular labor—become the general means of creating wealth, and only then does humanity achieve an equal regard for any kind of labor. Only when the commodity becomes the dominant form of wealth can humanity reveal the secret of the expression of value. In capitalist society, both human labor and commodity production achieve unprecedented development, and humanity’s understanding of labor and of commodity production reaches an unprecedented height. This is the determining effect of the development of socio-economic conditions on economic thought.

只有在资本主义社会，是劳动，而不是某种劳动，成为创造财富一般的手段，人类才实现了对任何种类劳动的同样看待；只有当商品成为占统治地位的财富形式，人类才能揭示价值表现的秘密。在资本主义社会，人类劳动、商品生产都获得了空前的发展，人类对劳动的认识、对商品生产的认识也达到了前所未有的高度。这是社会经济条件的发展对经济思想的决定作用。

The conditions for the existence of commodity production and for the generalization of commodity production differ from the conditions for revealing the secret of the expression of value. The expression of value existed before capitalist society, but it achieved generalization only in capitalist society. Labor is expressed as value before capitalism, but humanity can reveal the secret of the expression of value only in capitalist society. All commodity production possesses a fetishistic character, but the secret of that fetishistic character can be revealed only under conditions of capitalist commodity production.

商品生产的存在条件和商品生产普遍化的条件不同于揭示价值表现的秘密的条件。价值表现在资本主义社会之前就已存在，但价值表现在资本主义社会才实现了普遍化；劳动表现为价值出现于资本主义之前，但人类在资本主义社会才能揭示价值表现的秘密；一切商品生产都具有拜物教性质，但在资本主义商品生产条件下才能揭示拜物教性质的秘密。

Under the capitalist mode of production, commodity production is generalized, providing the objective conditions for unveiling the secret of the fetishistic character, while at the same time there exists the possibility of being captured by fetishistic conceptions. Therefore, it is necessary for us to investigate what mode of thinking Marx employed to make the critique of fetishism possible.

在资本主义生产方式下，商品生产普遍化了，具备揭秘拜物教性质的客观条件，同时也存在被拜物教观念俘获头脑的可能性。因此，我们有必要探究马克思运用怎样的思维方式使得拜物教批判成为可能。

IV. Historical Consciousness and the Distinction between Material Elements and Social Forms: The Mode of Thinking in the Critique of Fetishism

四、历史性自觉、物质要素与社会形式的区分：拜物教批判的思维方式

Based on the mature theory of the critique of fetishism in *Capital* and the manuscripts of that period, and looking back at Marx’s intellectual journey toward the critique of fetishism, it is not difficult to see that a clear distinction between material elements and social forms, combined with the maintenance of historical consciousness, is a necessary prerequisite for constructing the theory of the critique of fetishism.

立足于《资本论》及其手稿时期的成熟的拜物教批判理论，回顾马克思走向拜物教批判的思想历程，我们不难发现，明晰地区分物质要素与社会形式，并秉持历史性自觉，是建构拜物教批判理论的必要前提。

In his letter to Annenkov, Marx wrote a thought-provoking passage: “Men never relinquish what they have won, but this does not mean that they never relinquish the social form in which they have acquired certain productive forces. On the contrary. In order not to be deprived of the result attained, in order not to lose the fruits of civilization, they are obliged, when the mode of their intercourse no longer corresponds to the acquired productive forces, to change all their inherited social forms… The economic forms under which men produce, consume, and exchange are transitory and historical forms. With the acquisition of new productive forces, men change their mode of production, and with the change of the mode of production they change all the economic relations which are merely the necessary relations of this particular mode of production.” Two core ideas in this passage deserve attention: first, the distinction between “productive forces” and “the social form in which they have acquired certain productive forces”; second, the affirmation of the historical transitoriness of social forms, economic forms, modes of production, and economic relations—although men never relinquish the productive forces they have already acquired, they do change all the social forms, modes of production, and economic relations they have inherited; these are all “transitory and historical forms.” Social forms are “historical forms” acquired within specific relations. On this point, Marx clearly stated in *Wage Labour and Capital*: “A Negro is a Negro. He only becomes a slave in certain relations. A cotton-spinning jenny is a machine for spinning cotton. It becomes capital only in certain relations. Torn from these relations, it is no more capital than gold itself is money or sugar is the price of sugar.” Slaves, capital, money, prices, etc., are all social forms; they are social forms that exist only within specific relations. Torn from those relations, a Negro is not a slave, a spinning jenny is not capital, gold is not money, and sugar has no price.

马克思在给安年科夫的信中写下了一段发人深省的文字，“人们永远不会放弃他们已经获得的东西，然而这并不是说，他们永远不会放弃他们在其中获得一定生产力的那种社会形式。恰恰相反。为了不致丧失已经取得的成果，为了不致失掉文明的果实，人们在他们的交往[commerce]方式不再适合于既得的生产力时，就不得不改变他们继承下来的一切社会形式……人们借以进行生产、消费和交换的经济形式是暂时的和历史性的形式。随着新的生产力的获得，人们便改变自己的生产方式，而随着生产方式的改变，他们便改变所有不过是这一特定生产方式的必然关系的经济关系”。这段话有两个核心思想值得关注：第一，对“生产力”与人们“在其中获得一定生产力的那种社会形式”进行区分;第二，明确社会形式、经济形式、生产方式、经济关系的历史暂时性——虽然人们永远不会放弃他们已经获得的生产力，但是人们会改变他们继承下来的一切社会形式、生产方式、经济关系，它们都是“暂时的和历史性的形式”。社会形式都是在一定的关系中获得的“历史性的形式”。对此，马克思在《雇佣劳动与资本》中明确指出：“黑人就是黑人。只有在一定的关系下，他才成为奴隶。纺纱机是纺棉花的机器。只有在一定的关系下，它才成为资本。脱离了这种关系，它也就不是资本了，就像黄金本身并不是货币，砂糖并不是砂糖的价格一样。”奴隶、资本、货币、价格等，都是社会形式，是在一定的关系中才具有的社会形式，脱离了一定的关系，黑人就不是奴隶，纺纱机就不是资本，黄金就不是货币，砂糖就没有价格。

Distinguishing material elements from social forms and possessing historical consciousness are necessary but still insufficient for constructing the theory of the critique of fetishism. Constructing the theory of the critique of fetishism requires a thorough analysis of the fetishistic character of capital and a systematic critique of the fetishistic conceptions of bourgeois economists. This necessitates grasping the specificity of the value-form, the money-form, and the capital-form.

区分了物质要素与社会形式，具备了历史性自觉，对于建构拜物教批判理论是必要的，但还是不够的。建构拜物教批判理论，需要透彻剖析资本的拜物教性质、系统批判资产阶级经济学家的拜物教观念。这就需要把握价值形式、货币形式、资本形式的特殊性。

In *Capital*, Marx takes the commodity as the starting point for his exposition and analysis. The commodity is a contradictory unity of use-value and exchange-value. Marx points out: “It is not enough to reduce the commodity to ‘labour’; it must be reduced to labour in a twofold form: on the one hand, as concrete labour it is manifested in the use-value of the commodity; on the other hand, as socially necessary labour it is calculated by exchange-value.” On this basis, Marx uses the dual character of labour to explain the two factors of the commodity: labour as abstract labour forms the value of the commodity; labour as concrete labour produces the use-value of the commodity. However, abstract labour as the substance of value cannot explain the difference between “non-commodity” labour products and commodities; the real difference between the two lies in the fact that “private labour is actually confirmed as a part of the total social labour only through exchange, which brings the products of labour and thus the producers into relation with one another.” The private labour that produces commodities is not directly “a part of the total social labour”; it can only confirm itself as “a part of the total social labour” through exchange. The abstract labour congealed in the commodity is not directly measured by labour time but must be expressed through a certain quantity of use-value of another commodity—the value-form is the circuitous form of expression of abstract labour. Moreover, Marx, by pursuing a question that previous political economy had never raised—“Why does labour manifest itself as value, and the measure of labour by its duration as the magnitude of the value of the product?”—highlights the specificity and historicity of the value-form: not all labour manifests itself as value. For example, in the dark Middle Ages of Europe, labour services and payments in kind did not assume a fantastical form different from their actual existence; the social relations of people in their labour did not put on the cloak of social relations between things. In a collective society based on public ownership of the means of production, producers do not exchange their products, and labour does not manifest itself as the value of the product of labour. By analysing the specificity and historicity of the value-form, the secret of the fetishistic character of the commodity is thereby revealed.

在《资本论》中，马克思是以商品作为起点展开自己的叙述和分析的。商品是使用价值和交换价值的矛盾统一体。马克思指出：“把商品归结为‘劳动’是不够的，而是应当归结为具有二重形式的劳动：它一方面作为具体劳动表现在商品的使用价值中，另一方面作为社会必要劳动以交换价值进行计算。”基于此，马克思用劳动的二重性来说明商品的二因素：劳动作为抽象劳动，形成商品的价值；劳动作为具体劳动，生产商品的使用价值。不过，抽象劳动作为价值实体，并不能解释“非商品”的劳动产品与商品的差别，二者的真正差别在于，“私人劳动在事实上证实为社会总劳动的一部分，只是由于交换使劳动产品之间、从而使生产者之间发生了关系”。生产商品的私人劳动并不直接地就是“社会总劳动的一部分”,只有通过交换才能证实自身是“社会总劳动的一部分”;凝结在商品中的抽象劳动不是直接以劳动时间来计量，而是必须以另一种商品的一定量的使用价值来表现——价值形式就是抽象劳动的迂回的表现形式。不仅如此，马克思还通过追问以往政治经济学从来没有提出过的问题，“为什么劳动表现为价值，用劳动时间计算的劳动量表现为劳动产品的价值量呢”,这凸显了价值形式的特殊性、历史性——不是一切劳动都表现为价值。例如，在欧洲昏暗的中世纪，劳役和实物贡赋都没有采取与它们的实际存在不同的虚幻形式，人们在劳动中的社会关系没有披上物之间的社会关系的外衣;在一个集体的、以生产资料公有为基础的社会中，生产者不交换自己的产品，劳动也不表现为劳动产品的价值。分析了价值形式的特殊性、历史性，也就揭示了商品的拜物教性质的秘密。

Regarding the money-form, Marx did what “bourgeois economics had never attempted to do”—“to trace the origin of this money-form, that is, to explore how the expression of value contained in the commodity value-relation develops from its simplest, most inconspicuous form to the dazzling money-form.” By tracing the origin of the money-form and examining the historical development of the exchange process, Marx revealed that money is the necessary product of the further development of the contradiction between use-value and exchange-value contained in the commodity—the internal opposition between use-value and value manifests itself as the external opposition between commodity and money. In this way, Marx conducted a thorough analysis of the fetishistic character of money.

对于货币形式，马克思做了“资产阶级经济学从来没有打算做的事情”——“指明这种货币形式的起源，就是说，探讨商品价值关系中包含的价值表现，怎样从最简单的最不显眼的样子一直发展到炫目的货币形式”。通过追溯货币形式的起源、考察交换过程的历史发展，马克思揭示了货币是商品中包含的使用价值和交换价值的矛盾进一步发展的必然产物——使用价值和价值之间的内在对立，表现为商品与货币的外部对立。这样，马克思就对货币的拜物教性质进行了透彻分析。

Revealing the fetishistic character of capital requires dispelling many illusions, such as the idea that capital can valorise itself. In response to the illusion that capital can valorise itself, Marx constructed the theory of the commodity labour-power, pointing out that labour-power becoming a commodity is a prerequisite for the valorisation of capital—the value created by the use of labour-power is greater than the value of labour-power itself, and the difference is surplus-value, thereby demonstrating that valorisation occurs within the exploitative relationship between capital and wage-labour. In response to the illusion created by the form of wages, which eliminates “all traces of the division of the working day into necessary labour and surplus labour, into paid labour and unpaid labour,” so that “all labour appears as paid labour,” Marx revealed how the value and price of labour conceal the value and price of labour-power. In response to the illusion that surplus-value originates in the sphere of circulation, Marx pointed out that the changes occurring in the circulation process—the transformation of commodities into money and money into commodities—are changes of form, and the labour expended in the circulation process “merely mediates the change of form of value” and does not create value. In response to the many illusions that commercial profit and profit from the money-dealing business seem to arise entirely from circulation, that interest-bearing capital appears as a “fetish” capable of self-valorisation, that interest “appears merely as a relation between one capitalist and another,” rather than a relation between capitalist and worker, and that rent seems to arise from the command of “a natural force that can be monopolised and is limited in quantity,” and so on.

揭示资本的拜物教性质，需要破除资本可以自行增殖等诸多假象。针对资本可以自行增殖的假象，马克思建构了劳动力商品理论，指出了劳动力成为商品之于资本增殖的前提性意义——劳动力的使用所创造的价值大于劳动力价值，其差额是剩余价值，从而论证了增殖是在资本与雇佣劳动之间的剥削与被剥削关系中发生的。针对工资的形式所带来的“工作日分为必要劳动和剩余劳动、分为有酬劳动和无酬劳动的一切痕迹”被消灭，从而“全部劳动都表现为有酬劳动”的假象，马克思揭示了劳动的价值和价格是如何掩盖劳动力的价值和价格的。针对剩余价值来源于流通领域的假象，马克思指出流通过程中发生的由商品转化为货币和由货币转化为商品的变化属于形式变换，投入流通过程的劳动“只是为价值的形式变换作中介的劳动”,并不创造价值。针对商业利润和货币经营业利润好像完全是从流通中产生的，生息资本好像是一个能够自行增殖的“物神”,利息好像“只是表现为一个资本家对另一个资本家的关系”,而不是资本家和工人之间的关系，地租好像是由于支配了一种“可以垄断并且数量有限的自然力而产生”等诸多假象。

Faced with the “trinity formula” of capital—interest, land—rent, labour—wages, Marx points out: “Value does not arise from its conversion into revenue; it must already exist before it can be converted into revenue, before it can assume this form.” Value must first be created before it can be divided, and only then can it be converted into various forms of revenue. Surplus-value is created by the surplus labour of wage-workers; the process of converting and dividing surplus-value does not increase surplus-value by a single iota. Therefore, one must first examine surplus-value itself, and only then examine its various specific converted forms.

面对资本—利息，土地—地租，劳动—工资的“三位一体的公式”,马克思指出，“价值并不是因它转化为收入而产生的，它在能够转化为收入，能够取得这种形式以前，必须已经存在”。必须先把价值创造出来，才能对价值进行分割，从而才能转化为各种收入。剩余价值是由雇佣工人的剩余劳动创造的，剩余价值的转化与分割过程并未使剩余价值增加分毫，因而必须首先考察剩余价值，而后再来考察剩余价值的各种具体转化形式。

Understanding this principle allows us to grasp the profound meaning of this comment in the opening part of the “Theories of Surplus-Value” in the *Economic Manuscripts of 1861–1863*: “All economists share the error of examining surplus-value not in its pure form, but in the particular forms of profit and rent.” By examining only the particular forms of profit and rent, without examining surplus-value itself, one cannot know the conditions under which surplus-value is converted into profit and rent, and one easily regards profit and rent as eternal entities. Marx examined the direct production process of capital, the circulation process, and the various specific forms of the total process of capitalist production, dispelling the cognitive fog brought about by various illusions. By narrating the process of the production, realisation, conversion, and division of surplus-value, he revealed the fetishistic character of capital.

明白了这个道理，我们才能够理解《1861—1863年经济学手稿》中“剩余价值理论”开头部分这段评论的深意：“所有经济学家都犯了一个错误：他们不是纯粹地就剩余价值本身，而是在利润和地租这些特殊形式上来考察剩余价值。”只是考察利润和地租等特殊形式，而不考察剩余价值本身，就无法知晓剩余价值转化为利润、地租的条件，容易把利润、地租视为永恒的存在物。马克思考察了资本的直接生产过程、流通过程和资本主义生产总过程的各种具体形式，驱散了各种假象带来的认识迷雾，通过叙述剩余价值的生产、实现、转化和分割过程，揭示了资本的拜物教性质。

To grasp Marx’s critique of fetishism, special attention must be paid to Marx’s use of terms such as “become” and “convert into”: the product of labour becomes a commodity, labour-power becomes a commodity, means of production and means of subsistence become capital, labour becomes wage-labour; the commodity is converted into money, money is converted into capital, labour is converted into wage-labour, surplus-value is converted into profit, profit is converted into average profit, a part of profit is converted into interest, surplus profit is converted into rent; and so on. “Become” and “convert into” are all conditional; they are all realised only within specific social relations, and are therefore all historical. Expressions such as “become” and “convert into” embody Marx’s historical consciousness.

把握马克思的拜物教批判要特别留意马克思的“成为”和“转化为”等用法：劳动产品成为商品，劳动力成为商品，生产资料、生活资料成为资本，劳动成为雇佣劳动；商品转化为货币，货币转化为资本，劳动转化为雇佣劳动，剩余价值转化为利润，利润转化为平均利润，利润的一部分转化为利息，超额利润转化为地租；等等。“成为”和“转化为”都是有条件的，都是在一定的社会关系中才实现的，因而都是历史的。“成为”和“转化为”之类的表述，蕴含着马克思的历史性自觉。

From the above, it can be seen that the unique mode of thinking in Marx’s critique of fetishism lies in this: upholding historical consciousness, clearly distinguishing the material elements of the production process from its social form, thereby highlighting the specificity and historical transience of the value-form, the money-form, and the capital-form.

由上可知，马克思拜物教批判的独特思维方式在于：秉持历史性自觉，明晰地区分生产过程的物质要素与社会形式,从而彰显价值形式、货币形式、资本形式的独特性和历史暂时性。

V. The Mode of Thinking and Class Standpoint That Lead to the Confusion of Material Elements with Social Form: The Cognitive Mechanism of Fetishistic Conceptions

五、导致物质要素与社会形式混淆的思维方式与阶级立场：拜物教观念的认知机制

In *Capital* and its manuscripts, Marx analyses the fetishistic conceptions of bourgeois economics, especially systematically criticising the “trinity formula.” We will take the “trinity formula” of capital—interest, land—rent, labour—wages as an example to dissect the cognitive mechanism underlying the formation of fetishistic conceptions.

在《资本论》及其手稿中，马克思对资产阶级经济学的拜物教观念进行了剖析，特别是对“三位一体的公式”进行了系统批判。我们将以资本—利息，土地—地租，劳动—工资“三位一体的公式”为例，剖析拜物教观念形成的认知机制。

Under the capitalist mode of production, capital, land, and labour annually provide profit, rent, and wages for the capitalist, the landowner, and the wage-labourer respectively, thereby forming the incomes of three distinct classes: the capitalist, the landowner, and the wage-labourer. To avoid misunderstanding, we must carefully savour Marx’s following assertion: “Landownership does not create that portion of value which is transformed into surplus-profit, but it merely enables the landowner, the owner of the waterfall, to pocket this surplus-profit from the pocket of the factory owner. It is not the cause of the creation of this surplus-profit, but the cause of its transformation into the form of ground-rent, i.e., the cause of this portion of profit, or of the commodity price, being appropriated by the land or waterfall owner.” Landownership does not create that portion of value which is transformed into surplus-profit; it merely causes it to be transformed into the form of ground-rent. However, bourgeois economics has its own superior “sleight of hand.” John Stuart Mill declares: “The requisites of production are two: labour, and appropriate natural objects.” Land and labour are indeed requisites of production, but capital is not a requisite of production; it is the social form of the production process. In John Stuart Mill’s mind, the material elements of the production process are confused with the social form of the production process. Through this confusion, bourgeois economists demonstrate the identity of labour with wage-labour, and of the means of production with capital: labour and wage-labour are conflated into one, and the definite social form that sets the conditions of labour in opposition to labour is conflated with the material existence of the conditions of labour; the means of production appear naturally to be capital, and land appears naturally to be land monopolised by a number of landowners. Thus, in the minds of bourgeois economists, the conditions of labour, like labour itself, become a true source of value. Moreover, through the aforementioned “sleight of hand,” the eternity of the capitalist mode of production, the notion that capital is an immortal natural element of human production itself, and the idea that the existence of capital is an eternal natural law of human production, are all “proved.”

在资本主义生产方式下，资本、土地、劳动逐年分别为资本家、土地所有者、雇佣工人提供利润、地租和工资，因而形成资本家、土地所有者和雇佣工人这三个不同阶级的收入。为避免误解，我们有必要仔细品味马克思的下述论断，“土地所有权并不创造那个转化为超额利润的价值部分，而只是使土地所有者，即瀑布的所有者，能够把这个超额利润从工厂主的口袋里拿过来装进自己的口袋。它不是使这个超额利润创造出来的原因，而是使它转化为地租形式的原因，也就是使这一部分利润或这一部分商品价格被土地或瀑布的所有者占有的原因”。土地所有权并不创造转化为超额利润的那个价值部分，而只是使它转化为地租形式。不过，资产阶级经济学自有其高超的“戏法”。约翰·斯图亚特·穆勒宣称：“生产过程的要素，归结到它的最一般的形式，就是土地、资本和劳动。”土地和劳动的确是生产过程的要素，但资本不是生产过程的要素，而是生产过程的社会形式。在约翰·斯图亚特·穆勒的头脑中，生产过程的物质要素与生产过程的社会形式被混淆了。通过这种混淆，资产阶级经济学家证明了劳动与雇佣劳动、生产资料与资本的同一性：劳动与雇佣劳动合而为一，使劳动条件跟劳动对立起来的一定的社会形式与劳动条件的物质存在合而为一;生产资料好像天然地是资本，土地好像天然地是若干土地所有者所垄断的土地。于是，在资产阶级经济学家的头脑中，劳动条件跟劳动一样，成为价值的真正的源泉。不仅如此，通过上述“戏法”,资本主义生产方式的永恒性、资本是人类生产本身不朽的自然要素、资本的存在是人类生产的永恒自然规律，也就被“证明”了。

Besides the confusion of the material elements of the production process (means of production, land, labour) with social forms (capital, land monopolised by a number of landowners, wage-labour) mentioned above, the “trinity formula” also contains the following inversions: first, the confusion of the elements of use-value production with the elements of value creation: land is an element of use-value production, not an element of value creation; second, the confusion of necessary labour with the social form of necessary labour: necessary labour does not necessarily take the form of wages, just as surplus labour does not necessarily manifest as surplus value; third, the inversion of the relationship between the creation of value and the division of value: the new value created by wage-labourers is divided into interest, rent, wages, and other parts, rather than these parts constituting value.

除了上文提到的混淆生产过程的物质要素(生产资料、土地、劳动)与社会形式(资本、若干土地所有者所垄断的土地、雇佣劳动)之外，“三位一体的公式”还存在如下颠倒：一是混淆使用价值生产的要素与价值创造的要素：土地是使用价值生产的要素，不是价值创造的要素；二是混淆必要劳动与必要劳动的社会形式：必要劳动不一定采取工资形式，正如剩余劳动不一定表现为剩余价值；三是颠倒价值的创造与价值的分割之间的关系：雇佣工人新创造的价值被分割为利息、地租、工资等部分，而不是这些部分构成价值。

Why are there so many confusions in the minds of bourgeois economists? This is related to their empiricist mode of thinking. Capitalist society is full of deceptive illusions; “the actual agents of production” deal daily with various forms of these illusions and act within them. If the observer’s mode of thinking is empiricist, they will be deceived by the illusions and produce misrecognitions such as fetishistic notions. In *Capital* and his manuscripts, Marx highly praised the great achievements of classical economics. However, the classical economists Adam Smith and David Ricardo were also more or less bound within the world of illusions, so they never discovered from the analysis of the commodity that very form of value which makes value into exchange-value; they sought the factors that determine the magnitude of value, rather than the cause of the existence of value; they sought only the factors that determine the magnitude of surplus value, rather than the cause of the existence of surplus value. The classical economists did not, as Marx did, ask “why labour is expressed in value,” nor did they examine the conditions under which “the conditions of labour are transformed into capital” and “labour is transformed into wage-labour.”

资产阶级经济学家的头脑中为何有如此多的混淆呢?这跟其经验主义思维方式有关。资本主义社会中充满着迷惑人的假象，“实际的生产当事人”每天都要和这些假象的各种形态打交道并在这些形态中活动，若观察者的思维方式是经验主义的，就会被假象迷惑，产生拜物教观念之类的错认。在《资本论》及其手稿中，马克思高度评价了古典经济学的伟大功绩。然而，古典经济学家亚当·斯密和大卫·李嘉图也还或多或少地被束缚在假象世界里，所以他们从来没有从商品的分析中发现那种正是使价值成为交换价值的价值形式；他们寻找的是决定价值量的因素，而不是寻找价值存在的原因；不是寻找剩余价值存在的原因，而只是寻找决定剩余价值量的原因。古典经济学家们没有像马克思那样追问“为什么劳动表现为价值”,没有考察“劳动条件转化为资本”和“劳动转化为雇佣劳动”的条件。

The empiricist mode of thinking is even more pronounced among vulgar economists. Marx believed that what vulgar economists do is in fact nothing more than interpreting, systematising, and defending the notions of the agents of production confined within bourgeois relations of production as dogma; “it is nothing but a didactic, more or less dogmatic, translation of the everyday notions of the actual agents of production, and a certain arrangement of them in a certain order.” Because of this empiricist mode of thinking, the everyday notions of the agents of capitalist production are systematised and theorised by bourgeois economists. As a science, Marx’s theory of the critique of fetishism must discard this empiricism and implement a concrete, historical mode of thinking. “If the appearance and the essence of things directly coincided, all science would be superfluous.” Marx’s statement is usually interpreted as a general philosophical judgment on the relationship between essence and appearance. In fact, Marx said this when criticising the “trinity formula.” Marx’s assertion indicates that in capitalist society, essence is manifested in an inverted form, rather than directly coinciding; the task of science is to reveal the essence of things through deceptive illusions.

经验主义思维方式在庸俗经济学家那里更为显著。马克思认为，庸俗经济学家所做的事情，实际上不过是把局限在资产阶级生产关系中的生产当事人的观念当作教义来加以解释、系统化和辩护；“无非是对实际的生产当事人的日常观念进行教学式的、或多或少教义式的翻译，把这些观念安排在某种有条理的秩序中”。因为上述经验主义思维方式，资本主义生产当事人的日常观念就被资产阶级经济学家系统化、理论化了。作为一种科学，马克思的拜物教批判理论必须摒弃这种经验主义，贯彻具体的、历史的思维方式。“如果事物的表现形式和事物的本质会直接合而为一，一切科学就都成为多余的了”,马克思的这句话通常被解读为论述本质与现象之间关系的一般哲学论断。其实，这是马克思在批判“三位一体的公式”时说的。马克思的这一论断说明，在资本主义社会中，本质以颠倒的形式表现出来，而不是直接合而为一；科学的任务在于透过迷惑人的假象揭示事物的本质。

Marx believed that there were even deeper reasons for the above theoretical limitations of bourgeois economics. “The value-form of the product of labour is the most abstract, but also the most general form of the bourgeois mode of production, which thereby becomes a special kind of social production, and at the same time has a historical character. If, therefore, the bourgeois mode of production is mistaken for the eternal natural form of social production, the specificity of the value-form is necessarily overlooked, and consequently the specificity of the commodity form and its further developments—the money form, the capital form, etc.” Mistaking the capitalist mode of production for the eternal natural form of social production—this is where the bourgeois standpoint comes into play. Marx believed that the “trinity formula” conforms to the interests of the bourgeoisie, because it preaches that the sources of income for the ruling class have natural necessity and eternal rationality, and elevates this view to dogma. Taking the bourgeois standpoint and employing the empiricist mode of thinking leads to overlooking the specificity of the value form, the money form, and the capital form, thereby eternalising the capitalist mode of production and falling into the quagmire of fetishistic notions.

马克思认为，造成资产阶级经济学上述理论局限的还有更深刻的原因。“劳动产品的价值形式是资产阶级生产方式的最抽象的，但也是最一般的形式，这就使资产阶级生产方式成为一种特殊的社会生产类型，因而同时具有历史的特征。因此，如果把资产阶级生产方式误认为是社会生产的永恒的自然形式，那就必然会忽略价值形式的特殊性，从而忽略商品形式及其进一步发展——货币形式、资本形式等等的特殊性。”把资本主义生产方式误认为社会生产的永恒的自然形式，这就是资产阶级立场在发挥作用了。马克思认为，“三位一体的公式”是符合资产阶级的利益的，因为它宣扬统治阶级的收入源泉具有自然的必然性和永恒的合理性，并把这个观点推崇为教条。站在资产阶级立场上，运用经验主义思维方式，就会忽略价值形式、货币形式、资本形式的特殊性，从而把资本主义生产方式永恒化，从而陷入拜物教观念的泥潭。

From the above, it can be seen that the “trinity formula” is the concentrated expression of fetishistic notions. The core logic of fetishistic notions lies in confusing the material elements of the production process with social forms, thereby abstracting and eternalising the capitalist mode of production. The reason bourgeois economics falls into fetishistic notions is related to its empiricist mode of thinking, and the bourgeois standpoint it upholds is an even deeper cause.

由上可知，“三位一体的公式”是拜物教观念的集中体现。拜物教观念的核心逻辑在于，混淆生产过程的物质要素与社会形式，从而把资本主义生产方式抽象化、永恒化。资产阶级经济学之所以陷入拜物教观念，跟其经验主义思维方式有关，而其秉持的资产阶级立场则是更深刻的原因。

Conclusion

结 语

Deepening the study of Marx’s critique of fetishism requires us, on the basis of clarifying what Marx’s critique of fetishism specifically refers to and why Marx moved towards the critique of fetishism, to ask and answer questions such as “under what objective conditions is the critique of fetishism possible,” “what mode of thinking makes the critique of fetishism possible,” and “why does bourgeois economics fall into ‘fetishistic notions’”—questions that belong to the problem of “how is Marx’s critique of fetishism possible.”

深化马克思拜物教批判理论研究，需要我们在搞清楚马克思拜物教批判有何具体所指、马克思为何走向拜物教批判的基础上，追问和回答“拜物教批判在怎样的客观条件下才是可能的”“运用怎样的思维方式才使拜物教批判成为可能”“资产阶级经济学为何陷入‘拜物教观念’”等属于“马克思的拜物教批判何以可能”的问题。

Marx’s critique of fetishism is directed both at the fetishistic character of commodities, money, and capital, and at fetishistic notions. In research, we especially need to avoid falling into the cognitive error of conflating fetishistic notions with “worship” or “fetishism.” Moving towards the critique of fetishism is an inherent requirement of the logic of historical materialism, because only by employing the theory of the critique of fetishism can the secrets of the capitalist mode of production, which has a fetishistic character, be revealed. Advancing along the path pointed out by Marx requires us to master and apply well Marx’s theory of the critique of fetishism, this sharp ideological weapon.

马克思的拜物教批判，既指向商品、货币和资本的拜物教性质，又指向拜物教观念。在研究中，我们尤其需要避免陷入将拜物教观念跟“崇拜”“物恋”混同起来的认识误区。走向拜物教批判是历史唯物主义逻辑的内在要求，因为只有运用拜物教批判理论才能揭示具有拜物教性质的资本主义生产方式的秘密。沿着马克思指引的道路前行，需要我们掌握好、运用好马克思拜物教批判理论这一锐利思想武器。

The conditions for the existence of fetishism and the conditions for exposing the fetishistic character are not the same thing. All commodity production possesses a fetishistic character, but only at the stage of social development where commodity production has become universalized are the objective conditions for exposing the fetishistic character present. The reason bourgeois economics falls into the quagmire of fetishistic conceptions is that the bourgeois standpoint and the empiricist mode of thinking lead it to confuse the material elements of the production process with its social form. Only by mastering the theoretical weapon of Marx’s critique of fetishism and clearly distinguishing the material elements of the production process from its social form can we avoid falling into the quagmire of fetishistic conceptions, and only then can we have a sober historical consciousness when confronting the value-form, the money-form, and the capital-form.

拜物教现象存在的条件与揭秘拜物教性质的条件不是一回事。一切商品生产都具有拜物教性质，但只有在商品生产普遍化的社会发展阶段才具备了揭秘拜物教性质的客观条件。资产阶级经济学之所以陷入拜物教观念的泥潭，乃是因为资产阶级立场、经验主义思维方式导致其混淆了生产过程的物质要素与社会形式。只有掌握马克思拜物教批判的理论武器，明晰地区分生产过程的物质要素与社会形式，我们才能避免陷入拜物教观念的泥潭，面对价值形式、货币形式、资本形式也才能有清醒的历史性自觉。

Author’s brief introduction: Liu Zhaofeng, Professor at the School of Marxism, Zhejiang University.

作者简介：刘召峰，浙江大学马克思主义学院教授。