The Theoretical Responsibility of Historical Materialism

Since the advent of Marxism, whenever major events or changes have occurred in the course of world history, people have, to varying degrees, focused their attention on Marxism, striving to gain insight into the transformations of the times within Marxism or through it, and to seek reliable understanding and explanations. This is because Marxism has revealed the laws of development of human history, and contemporary society still lives within these laws of development. Derrida vividly highlighted the great significance of Marxism for contemporary life: telling the truth, issuing commands, exorcising demons, urging action, and so on, reminding people that not repeatedly reading and discussing Marx would be an error of the times.

马克思主义问世之后，世界历史进程但凡出现重大事件或变化，人们都不同程度地把视线聚焦于马克思主义，力求在马克思主义之中或者通过马克思主义来洞察时事变迁，寻找可靠的理解与解答。这是因为马克思主义揭示了人类历史的发展规律，当代社会仍然生活在这些发展规律之中。德里达曾形象生动地挑明马克思主义对于当代生活的重大意义：告知真相、发出指令、驱魔祛邪、敦促行动等，提醒人们不反复阅读和讨论马克思将是时代的错误。

*The German Ideology* was the first work to systematically expound the basic principles of historical materialism, and it is precisely a Marxist classic worthy of our repeated reading. Marx was well aware that “theory can convince the masses once it seizes them, and it can seize them once it is thorough. Thoroughness means grasping the root of the matter.” [1]1 Karl Marx, “A Contribution to the Critique of Hegel’s Philosophy of Right: Introduction,” in *Marx-Engels Collected Works*, vol. 3 (Moscow: Progress Publishers, 1975), p. 182. The circumstances of real life increasingly demonstrate the superiority and reliability of Marxism in terms of truth and morality. We should therefore be able, through reading *The German Ideology*, to deeply grasp the revolutionary transformation of historical materialism, to truly comprehend its theoretical thoroughness and principled heights, and to fully promote the fundamental spirit of historical materialism in guiding the world and human hearts.

《德意志意识形态》第一次比较系统地阐述了历史唯物主义的基本原理，正是值得我们反复阅读的马克思主义原典。马克思十分清楚，“理论只要说服人，就能掌握群众；而理论只要彻底，就能说服人。所谓彻底，就是抓住事物的根本”。现实生活境遇越来越频繁地呈现马克思主义在真理和道义方面的优越性与可靠性。我们理当能够通过阅读《德意志意识形态》，深刻把握历史唯物主义的革命性变革，真切领悟历史唯物主义的理论彻底性及其原则高度，充分弘扬历史唯物主义引领世道人心的基本精神。

Elevating Philosophical Ontology with the Principle of History

用历史原则提升哲学本体论

Historical materialism, as “the greatest achievement of scientific thought,” [2]2 V. I. Lenin, “The Three Sources and Three Component Parts of Marxism,” in *Lenin Collected Works*, vol. 19 (Moscow: Progress Publishers, 1968), p. 24. marks Marx’s achievement of an ontological creation in philosophy. Compared with previous philosophies that observed history from the standpoint of abstract reason, self-consciousness, or abstract matter external to humanity, historical materialism “proceeds from the material production of immediate life” [3]3 Karl Marx and Frederick Engels, *The German Ideology*, in *Marx-Engels Collected Works*, vol. 5 (Moscow: Progress Publishers, 1976), p. 53.—that is, from human sensuous activity—to examine people’s actual life processes and grasp the real driving forces of historical change.

历史唯物主义作为“科学思想中的最大成果”，标志着马克思实现了哲学上的存在论创制。与以往哲学从抽象理性、自我意识或者外在于人的抽象物质出发来观察历史相比，历史唯物主义“从直接生活的物质生产出发”亦即从人的感性活动出发，考察人们的实际生活过程，把握人类历史变迁的现实动因。

Tracing the history of human understanding, we can find that the introduction of historical connection into philosophy first appeared in the Italian Vico’s assertion in *The New Science* that “truth is made.” Vico’s reflection on history, after being pondered and assimilated by Enlightenment thinkers concerning “human reason,” gave rise to the concept of “historical reason” in classical German philosophy, from which the flourishing of the philosophy of history emerged. Kant’s “Idea for a Universal History from a Cosmopolitan Point of View” emphasized the totality of human history, and especially by focusing on the actual unfolding of humanity’s “unsocial sociability,” revealed the secret of the unity of purposiveness and lawfulness in the movement of human history, advancing Vico’s concept of “eternal history” and highlighting those connections hidden behind the surface of human history that are universal and regular. This, to a certain extent, pointed to the “historical necessity” latent beneath the appearances of human history, which plays a dominant role in historical development. Hegel explicitly stated that the sole idea philosophy uses to observe history is the simple concept of “reason,” and that history is a rational process of development. Hegel further called absolute spirit and “human passion” the “warp and woof of world history.” [4]4 G. W. F. Hegel, *Lectures on the Philosophy of World History: Introduction*, trans. H. B. Nisbet (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1975), p. 73. By “passion” he meant human activity arising from private interests, particular purposes, or selfish intentions. While insisting on absolute spirit as the “principle,” Hegel, by focusing on the actual development of human passion and fervor in the life-world, revealed that human history is nothing but a series of performances of human passion and fervor, thereby demonstrating the process of absolute spirit’s “actualization” and “realization.” Hegel’s ingenious introduction of the factor of “human passion” into the framework of historical interpretation undoubtedly developed new elements and motivations for philosophy to emerge and persist in the real life-world. Hegel’s philosophy, based on a “tremendous sense of history,” [5]5 Frederick Engels, “Ludwig Feuerbach and the End of Classical German Philosophy,” in *Marx-Engels Collected Works*, vol. 26 (Moscow: Progress Publishers, 1990), p. 381. opened up a direction of inquiry that examined and advanced philosophical development from the perspective of historical connection.

追踪人类认识发展史，我们可以发现，把历史联系引进哲学，首见于意大利人维柯在《新科学》中提出的“真理即创造”的论断之中。维柯的历史之思经过启蒙思想家关于“人类理性”的沉思和涵化，引申出德国古典哲学的“历史理性”观念，由此出现了历史哲学研究的繁花盛开。康德的“普遍历史观念”强调人类历史的整体性，尤其是通过关注人类“非社会的社会性”品质的现实展开，揭示了人类历史运动之合目的性与合规律性相统一的秘密，推进了维柯“永恒的历史”之观念，凸显了隐藏在人们日常活动中具有普遍性与常规性的那些联系。这就在一定程度上点明了潜存于人类历史表象背后、对历史发展起着支配作用的“历史必然性”。黑格尔明确提出，哲学用以观察历史的唯一思想便是“理性”这个简单的概念，历史是合乎理性的发展过程。黑格尔进而把绝对精神和“人类的热情”并称为“世界历史的经纬线”。所谓热情，就是指从私人的利益、特殊的目的或利己的企图产生的人类活动。黑格尔在坚持绝对精神为“原则”的前提下，通过关注人类热情和激情在生活世界的现实开展，揭示人类历史不过是一幕幕人类热情和激情的表演，由此论证绝对精神的“实行”和“实现”的进程。黑格尔独具匠心地在历史阐释框架中引进“人类的热情”这一因素，毋庸置疑为哲学在现实生活世界中出场并能够持存开发了新的元素和动因。黑格尔哲学以“巨大的历史感”为基础，展开了从历史联系考察并推动哲学发展的思考方向。

Marx saw clearly the truth that Hegel’s “tremendous sense of history” ultimately served the movement of absolute spirit. He insisted that “life determines consciousness,” [6]6 Marx and Engels, *The German Ideology*, p. 37. reducing consciousness and its various forms to the “historical process of people’s life,” [7]7 Ibid., p. 36. identifying the essence of consciousness as the real life process of people that is conscious, and demonstrating that people’s living “sensuous activity” is the foundation of the entire existing sensuous world. This shows that Marx critically transformed and creatively converted Hegel’s ontological thinking, allowing the “sense of history” to break through the obscuration of logic, absorbing history as a principle into the construction of philosophical ontology, thereby advancing and enriching the content of philosophical ontology: previous philosophies, starting from consciousness or self-consciousness, understood and explained the relationship between humanity and the world, proving existence through the deduction of categories; historical materialism, based on real people and their historical development, “understands things in accordance with their actual state and their origin,” [8]8 Ibid., p. 37. confirming existence in real life. It is precisely by relying on this theoretical self-awareness at the level of fundamental principles that historical materialism does not seek some category in each epoch, but always stands firmly in the real life-world; it does not explain human sensuous activity—i.e., practice—from the perspective of ideas, but explains the formation of ideas from the perspective of human sensuous activity. Historical materialism put an end to the philosophical approach driven by conceptual deduction, returning philosophy to the real life-world and achieving its self-development and self-confirmation.

马克思明察黑格尔“巨大的历史感”最终服务于绝对精神运动的真相，坚持“生活决定意识”，把意识及其各种形式还原到“人们生活的历史过程”之中，标明意识的本质是被意识到了的人们的现实生活过程，论证人们活生生的“感性活动”是整个现存的感性世界的基础。这表明，马克思批判地改造和创造性地转化黑格尔哲学的本体论思考，让“历史感”冲破逻辑遮蔽，把历史作为原则吸收到哲学本体论建设之中，推进和丰富了哲学本体论的内涵：以往哲学从意识或自我意识出发，理解和阐释人与世界，在范畴推演中证明存在；历史唯物主义立足现实的人及其历史发展，“按照事物的真实面目及其产生情况来理解事物”，在现实生活中确证存在。正是依赖基本原则高度的理论自觉，历史唯物主义不是在每个时代中寻找某种范畴，而是始终立足现实生活世界；不是从观念出发来解释人的感性活动即实践，而是从人的感性活动出发来解释观念的形成。历史唯物主义终结了以概念演绎为动力机制的哲学进路，使哲学回到现实生活世界而实现自我发展与自我确证。

Penetrating the Real Life Process

深入现实生活过程

Implementing the “principle of history” and deeply comprehending the historicity of human existence, Marx naturally took the real problems of the real world as the foundation for philosophy’s existence. In the history of thought, since Hegel proposed and actually resolved the “reconciliation of reason with reality,” any practice that alienates philosophy from reality would lead to civilizational disorder or commit an error of the times. Marx discerned the immense wealth contained in Hegel’s philosophical legacy and devoted his life to advancing philosophy’s contact and interaction with the real world of its own time. Historical materialism realizes its ontological concern by participating in and grasping the real life-world.

贯彻“历史原则”，深刻领悟人类生存的历史性，马克思理所当然把关注现实世界的现实问题当作哲学安身立命的基础。在思想史上，自黑格尔提出并实际解决“理性与现实的和解”之后，让哲学疏离现实的任何做法，都将导致文明的错乱或犯下时代的错误。马克思洞悉黑格尔哲学遗产所蕴含的巨大财富，毕生致力于推进哲学同自己时代的现实世界接触并相互作用。历史唯物主义通过参与和把握现实生活世界而实现自己的存在论关切。

Although engaging with actual life is not unique to historical materialism, but is a general requirement for philosophy as philosophy, the crux of the issue lies in where and how to begin. Marx, with his unique insight, seized upon “real people”—that is, people who are in real social relations, can be observed empirically, and engage in actual activities. As long as “conscious individuals” are reduced to “real individuals,” and “real individuals” are reduced to “their real life process,” [9]9 Ibid., p. 36. the derivative nature of conscious phenomena becomes clear, the various ideological illusions shrouding the life-world naturally come to light, and the various fabrications about human problems collapse of their own accord. Historical materialism, by fully focusing on the actual process of human self-generation and self-projection based on sensuous activity, and by attaching great importance to the full significance and full scope of this fundamental fact, revealed for the first time in history the “true theme of history” and the “real driving forces of the age.” [10]10 Karl Marx, “The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte,” in *Marx-Engels Collected Works*, vol. 11 (Moscow: Progress Publishers, 1979), p. 103. On this basis, historical materialism opened up a feasible direction for philosophy to maintain its vitality and relevance: to exalt the “subjective nature of humanity’s objective essential forces” [11]11 Karl Marx, “Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts of 1844,” in *Marx-Engels Collected Works*, vol. 3 (Moscow: Progress Publishers, 1975), p. 337. and to narrate the story of “living individuals” caring for their own existence.

虽说切入实际生活并非历史唯物主义所独有，而是哲学之为哲学的一般性要求，但问题的关键在于从何处以及如何上手。马克思独具慧眼，抓住“现实的人”，亦即处在现实社会关系之中、可以通过经验观察到的、从事实际活动的人。只要把“有意识的个人”归结为“现实中的个人”，把“现实中的个人”归结为“他们的现实生活过程”，意识现象的派生性就昭然若揭，笼罩在生活世界的各种意识形态幻象自然真相大白，关于人的问题的各种现实的臆造也就不攻自破。历史唯物主义正是充分关注人类基于感性活动的自我生成与自我筹划的实际过程，高度重视这一基本事实的全部意义和全部范围，史无前例地揭示了“真正的历史主题”和“时代的现实动因”。基于此，历史唯物主义为哲学永葆活力和生命力开启了切实可行的方向：高扬人的“对象性的本质力量的主体性”，道说“有生命的个人”自己操心自己生存的故事。

As a “new worldview,” historical materialism does not stop at the speculative requirement of constructing a set of theoretical principles; rather, it transforms principled philosophical reflection into a “lightning bolt of thought” [12]12 Karl Marx, “A Contribution to the Critique of Hegel’s Philosophy of Right: Introduction,” p. 182. that cuts into the problems of the age and into a desire that guides the times. Historical materialism consistently maintains that the decisive factor in the historical process is, in the final analysis, the production and reproduction of real life, that the socio-economic structure of each epoch forms the real basis of social life, and that the ultimate causes of all social changes and political upheavals should be sought in the economy of the relevant epoch. The “new principles” expounded by historical materialism unswervingly take participation in the movement of real life as their ultimate aim.

历史唯物主义作为“新世界观”，并不停留于构造一个理论原理的思辨要求上，而是把原理化的哲学思考转变成切入时代问题的“思想的闪电”和引导时代的愿望。历史唯物主义一以贯之地主张，历史过程中的决定性因素归根到底是现实生活的生产和再生产，每一时代的社会经济结构形成社会生活的现实基础，一切社会变迁和政治变革的终极原因应当到有关时代的经济中去寻找。历史唯物主义阐发的“新原理”，义无反顾地以参与现实生活运动为旨归。

Revealing the Dialectical Movement of Modern Society

揭示现代社会的辩证运动

Starting from the process of real life, people can perceive the social relations and social life constituted by the "common activity of many individuals." The social connections formed in human perceptual activity are no more mysterious than "human beings themselves have as long a history." Moreover, as people's "mode of common activity," although it indeed possesses a complexity that is constantly renewed, it without exception constitutes a living perceptual reality that people can experience and observe at every moment. Historical materialism emphasizes that humans are social beings, that the expression of human life is the expression and confirmation of social life, and that individuals in reality are "engaged in activity, engaged in material production, and thus active under definite material limits, presuppositions, and conditions that are not subject to their arbitrary control." [13]13 Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, *The German Ideology* (1845-1846), in *Marx-Engels Collected Works*, vol. 5 (Moscow: Progress Publishers, 1976), p. 37. Believing in and exalting the "social character" of human activity—this is another fundamental principle at the ontological level constructed by historical materialism.

从现实生活过程出发，人们能够感受到由“许多个人的共同活动”所构成的社会关系和社会生活。在人的感性活动中形成的社会联系与“人本身有同样长久的历史”一点也不神秘。而且，作为人们的“共同活动方式”，虽说确有不断更新的复杂性，但毫无例外地构成了人们时时刻刻皆能体验和观察到的活生生的感性现实。历史唯物主义强调人是社会存在物，人的生命表现是社会生活的表现和确证，现实中的个人是“从事活动的，进行物质生产的，因而是在一定的物质的、不受他们任意支配的界限、前提和条件下活动着的”。坚信并高扬人类活动的“社会性质”，这是历史唯物主义所建构的又一个存在论意义上的基本原则。

Marx pointed out: "People have no intention of establishing a society, but their actions are precisely what cause society to develop, because they always seek to develop themselves as isolated individuals, and therefore they can only obtain their own development in society and through society." [14]14 Karl Marx, "Comments on James Mill," in *Marx-Engels Collected Works*, vol. 3 (Moscow: Progress Publishers, 1975), p. 217. This indicates that the social character of individual activity is not an occasional configuration that appears and disappears, but an inherent necessity. Therefore, only in a community can individuals obtain the means to fully develop their capacities, and only then can they have individual freedom. Only by reducing the facts of social life to a definite overall connection can people truly understand these isolated individual facts.

马克思指出：“人们丝毫没有建立一个社会的意图，但他们的所作所为正是使社会发展起来，因为他们总是想作为孤独的人发展自身，因此他们也就只有在社会中并通过社会来获得他们自己的发展。”这表明，个人活动的社会性质，不是时有时无的偶然配置，而是与生俱来的必然性。所以，个人只有在共同体中，才可能获得全面发展其才能的手段，才可能有个人自由。只有把社会生活中的事实归结于一定的总体联系，人们才能真正认识这些个别的孤立的事实。

Starting from the social character, Marx believed that the degree of liberation of each individual is consistent with the degree to which history has completely transformed into world history. Human history is nothing but the successive succession of generations; each generation utilizes the materials, funds, and productive forces left behind by previous generations. Although the legacies of the preceding generation are transformed and processed in a completely changed environment, the living conditions of the new generation are thereby predetermined. The contradictory movement between productive forces and the form of intercourse (relations of production) constitutes the substantive content and profound root of the development of human history. As *Capital* thoroughly demonstrates that the relationship between capital and labor is the axis around which the entire modern social system revolves, historical materialism incomparably penetrates the life movement and character of modern society. Precisely in this way, historical materialism not only constructs a rationally self-consistent principle of interpretation within itself, but also clarifies a problematic horizon that grasps the times and can provide substantive elucidation.

从社会性质出发，马克思认为，每一个单个人的解放程度是与历史完全转变为世界历史的程度一致的。人类历史不外是各个世代的依次交替，每一代都利用以前各代遗留下来的材料、资金和生产力，尽管前一代的遗留物在完全改变了的环境中被改造加工，但新一代的生活条件也就此受到预先的规定。生产力和交往形式（生产关系）之间的矛盾运动构成人类历史发展的实体内容和深刻根源。随着《资本论》透辟论证资本和劳动的关系是全部现代社会体系所围绕旋转的轴心，历史唯物主义无与伦比地洞悉现代社会的生活运动及其性质。正是这样，历史唯物主义不仅在自身建构了合理自洽的阐释原则，而且启示明确了一个把握时代且能够给予实质性阐发的问题视野。

In the era when the pursuit of a better life has gradually become a global consensus, if the development of modernity up to now has caused people to encounter the threat of "spiritual hunger" amidst abundant material enjoyment, then unless a spiritual home is rebuilt, this threat will not disappear. The spiritual armament and guidance of historical materialism come at the right time. Amidst fierce ideological collisions and struggles, Marx's genuine insights into how the capitalist mode of production is possible directly help people grasp the existential character and possible direction of today's logic of capital, making historical materialism a thought benchmark that people yearn for. This reality, stimulated by the transformation of the lifeworld, cannot be ignored. The excellent character arising from the interaction of three dimensions—historical principle, practical demands, and social movement—undoubtedly reveals the incomparable theoretical responsibility of historical materialism. This is the theoretical self-awareness that we must not lose when rereading *The German Ideology* today.

在追求美好生活逐渐成为全球共识的时代背景下，如果说现代性迄今的发展让人们在丰裕的物质享受中遭遇“精神饥饿”的威胁，那么，除非重建精神家园，否则这种威胁就不会消失。历史唯物主义的精神武装和指引正当其时。在激烈的思想碰撞和博弈中，马克思关于资本主义生产方式何以可能的真知灼见，直接有助于人们把握当今资本逻辑的存在性质及其可能走向，使得历史唯物主义成为人们心向往之的思想标杆。生活世界变迁所激发出来的这一实情不可漠视。历史原则、现实要求、社会运动三个维度交互作用而来的优秀品格，毋庸置疑展露了历史唯物主义无可比拟的理论担当。这是我们今天重读《德意志意识形态形态》不可失却的理论自觉。

Online editor: Paul

网络编辑：保罗