Religious communism is a form of
communism
Communism () is a political sociology, sociopolitical, political philosophy, philosophical, and economic ideology, economic ideology within the history of socialism, socialist movement, whose goal is the creation of a communist society, a ...
that incorporates
religious
Religion is a range of social- cultural systems, including designated behaviors and practices, morals, beliefs, worldviews, texts, sanctified places, prophecies, ethics, or organizations, that generally relate humanity to supernatural ...
principles. Scholars have used the term to describe a variety of
social
Social organisms, including human(s), live collectively in interacting populations. This interaction is considered social whether they are aware of it or not, and whether the exchange is voluntary or not.
Etymology
The word "social" derives fro ...
or
religious movements throughout history that have favored the
common ownership
Common ownership refers to holding the assets of an organization, enterprise, or community indivisibly rather than in the names of the individual members or groups of members as common property. Forms of common ownership exist in every economi ...
of property.
[ There are many historical and ideological similarities between religious communism and Liberation Theology.
]
Overview
The term ''religious communism'' has been used to describe a variety of social or religious movements throughout history. The " commune of early christians at Jerusalem" has been described as a group that practiced religious communism. The teachings of Mazdak
Mazdak (, Middle Persian: 𐭬𐭦𐭣𐭪, also Mazdak the Younger; died c. 524 or 528) was an Iranian Zoroastrian '' mobad'' (priest) and religious reformer who gained influence during the reign of the Sasanian emperor Kavadh I. He claimed to ...
, a religious proto-socialist
Socialism is an economic ideology, economic and political philosophy encompassing diverse Economic system, economic and social systems characterised by social ownership of the means of production, as opposed to private ownership. It describes ...
Persian reformer, have also been referred to as early ''communism''. According to Ben Fowkes and Bulent Gokay, Bolshevik
The Bolsheviks, led by Vladimir Lenin, were a radical Faction (political), faction of the Marxist Russian Social Democratic Labour Party (RSDLP) which split with the Mensheviks at the 2nd Congress of the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party, ...
Mikhail Skachko stated at the Congress of the Peoples of the East that "the Muslim religion is rooted in principles of religious communism, by which no man may be a slave to another, and not a single piece of land may be privately owned."
Definition
T. M. Browning described religious communism as a form of communism
Communism () is a political sociology, sociopolitical, political philosophy, philosophical, and economic ideology, economic ideology within the history of socialism, socialist movement, whose goal is the creation of a communist society, a ...
that "springs directly from principles native to a religion", and Hans Hillerbrand defined religious communism as religious movements that advocated the "communal ownership of goods and the concomitant abrogation of private property". Browning and Hillerbrand distinguished ''religious communism'' from ''political communism'',[ as well as from ''economic socialism''.][ Additionally, Hillerbrand contrasts religious communism with ]Marxism
Marxism is a political philosophy and method of socioeconomic analysis. It uses a dialectical and materialist interpretation of historical development, better known as historical materialism, to analyse class relations, social conflict, ...
, which he describes as an ideology that called for eliminating religion.[ Donald Drew Egbert and Stow Persons argued that " ronologically, religious communism tended to precede secular ommunism" Other scholars suggested that the traditional ''political communism'', or Marxism, has always been a variety of ]religion
Religion is a range of social system, social-cultural systems, including designated religious behaviour, behaviors and practices, morals, beliefs, worldviews, religious text, texts, sanctified places, prophecies, ethics in religion, ethics, or ...
.
In Christian Europe
The terms Christendom or Christian world commonly refer to the global Christian community, Christian states, Christian-majority countries or countries in which Christianity is dominant or prevails.SeMerriam-Webster.com : dictionary, "Christen ...
, communists were believed to have adopted atheism
Atheism, in the broadest sense, is an absence of belief in the Existence of God, existence of Deity, deities. Less broadly, atheism is a rejection of the belief that any deities exist. In an even narrower sense, atheism is specifically the ...
. In Protestant England, ''communism'' was too close to the Catholic communion rite
Mass is the main Eucharistic liturgical service in many forms of Western Christianity. The term ''Mass'' is commonly used in the Catholic Church, Western Rite Orthodoxy, Old Catholicism, and Independent Catholicism. The term is also used in ma ...
, and ''socialist'' was the preferred term. Friedrich Engels
Friedrich Engels ( ;["Engels"](_blank)
''Random House Webster's Unabridged Dictionary''.[The Communist Manifesto
''The Communist Manifesto'' (), originally the ''Manifesto of the Communist Party'' (), is a political pamphlet written by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, commissioned by the Communist League and originally published in London in 1848. The ...]
'' was published, socialism was respectable in Europe while communism was not. The Owenites in England and the Fourierists in France were considered respectable socialists, while working-class movements that "proclaimed the necessity of total social change" denoted themselves as ''communists''. This branch of socialism produced the communist work of Étienne Cabet
Étienne Cabet (; January 1, 1788 – November 9, 1856) was a philosopher and utopian socialist who founded the Icarian movement. Cabet became the most popular socialist advocate of his day, with a special appeal to artisans who were being under ...
in France and Wilhelm Weitling in Germany.
History
Some scholars have used ''religious communism'' to describe some 17th-century Protestant
Protestantism is a branch of Christianity that emphasizes Justification (theology), justification of sinners Sola fide, through faith alone, the teaching that Salvation in Christianity, salvation comes by unmerited Grace in Christianity, divin ...
movements that "disavow dpersonal property". Bhabagrahi Misra and James Preston described the "religious communism of the Shakers
The United Society of Believers in Christ's Second Appearing, more commonly known as the Shakers, are a Millenarianism, millenarian Restorationism, restorationist Christianity, Christian sect founded in England and then organized in the Unit ...
" as a "community in which all goods are held in common". Larry Arnhart described "religious communism in the Oneida Community
The Oneida Community ( ) was a Christian perfection, perfectionist religious communal society founded by John Humphrey Noyes and his followers in 1848 near Oneida, New York. The community believed that Jesus had Hyper-preterism, already return ...
" as a system where " cept for a few personal items, they shared all their property". Albert Fried wrote that "American religious communism reached its apogee" in the 1850s " th the rise of the Oneida community".
According to Rod Janzen and Max Stanton, the Hutterites
Hutterites (; ), also called Hutterian Brethren (German: ), are a communal ethnoreligious group, ethnoreligious branch of Anabaptism, Anabaptists, who, like the Amish and Mennonites, trace their roots to the Radical Reformation of the early 16 ...
believed in strict adherence to biblical principles and "church discipline" and practiced a form of communism. The Hutterites "established in their communities a rigorous system of Ordnungen, which were codes of rules and regulations that governed all aspects of life and ensured a unified perspective. As an economic system, Christian communism was attractive to many of the peasants who supported social revolution in sixteenth century central Europe" such as the German Peasants' War
The German Peasants' War, Great Peasants' War or Great Peasants' Revolt () was a widespread popular revolt in some German-speaking areas in Central Europe from 1524 to 1525. It was Europe's largest and most widespread popular uprising befor ...
and "Friedrich Engels
Friedrich Engels ( ;["Engels"](_blank)
''Random House Webster's Unabridged Dictionary''.[Anabaptists
Anabaptism (from Neo-Latin , from the Greek : 're-' and 'baptism'; , earlier also )Since the middle of the 20th century, the German-speaking world no longer uses the term (translation: "Re-baptizers"), considering it biased. The term (tra ...]
as proto-Communists".
Other scholars have used the term ''religious communism'' to describe a communist social movement that developed in Paris in the 1840s, which was organized by "foreign-born, primarily German-speaking, journeyman-artisans who had settled there". In the early 20th century, before the rise of Bolshevism in Russia, some intellectuals advocated for implementing a form of communism that incorporated Christian ideology "as an alternative to Marxism". Additionally, some Catholic theologians organized groups in the late 20th century to create a dialogue between the Catholic Church
The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwid ...
and the Communist Party of Italy
The Italian Communist Party (, PCI) was a communist and democratic socialist political party in Italy. It was established in Livorno as the Communist Party of Italy (, PCd'I) on 21 January 1921, when it seceded from the Italian Socialist Part ...
.
Christian communism
The teachings of Jesus
Jesus (AD 30 or 33), also referred to as Jesus Christ, Jesus of Nazareth, and many Names and titles of Jesus in the New Testament, other names and titles, was a 1st-century Jewish preacher and religious leader. He is the Jesus in Chris ...
are frequently described as communist by religious Christian communists and other communists. records that the early church in Jerusalem
Jerusalem is a city in the Southern Levant, on a plateau in the Judaean Mountains between the Mediterranean Sea, Mediterranean and the Dead Sea. It is one of the List of oldest continuously inhabited cities, oldest cities in the world, and ...
, " one claimed that any of their possessions was their own"; the pattern would later disappear from church history
Church history or ecclesiastical history as an academic discipline studies the history of Christianity and the way the Christian Church has developed since its inception.
Henry Melvill Gwatkin defined church history as "the spiritual side of t ...
except within monasticism
Monasticism (; ), also called monachism or monkhood, is a religion, religious way of life in which one renounces world (theology), worldly pursuits to devote oneself fully to spiritual activities. Monastic life plays an important role in many Chr ...
. Christian communists view the early Christian Church
Early Christianity, otherwise called the Early Church or Paleo-Christianity, describes the historical era of the Christian religion up to the First Council of Nicaea in 325. Christianity spread from the Levant, across the Roman Empire, and bey ...
, as described in the Acts of the Apostles
The Acts of the Apostles (, ''Práxeis Apostólōn''; ) is the fifth book of the New Testament; it tells of the founding of the Christian Church and the spread of The gospel, its message to the Roman Empire.
Acts and the Gospel of Luke make u ...
, as an early form of communism and religious socialism
Religion is a range of social- cultural systems, including designated behaviors and practices, morals, beliefs, worldviews, texts, sanctified places, prophecies, ethics, or organizations, that generally relate humanity to supernatural, ...
. The view is that communism was just Christianity
Christianity is an Abrahamic monotheistic religion, which states that Jesus in Christianity, Jesus is the Son of God (Christianity), Son of God and Resurrection of Jesus, rose from the dead after his Crucifixion of Jesus, crucifixion, whose ...
in practice, and Jesus was the first communist. This link was highlighted in one of Karl Marx
Karl Marx (; 5 May 1818 – 14 March 1883) was a German philosopher, political theorist, economist, journalist, and revolutionary socialist. He is best-known for the 1848 pamphlet '' The Communist Manifesto'' (written with Friedrich Engels) ...
's early writings, which stated that " Christ is the intermediary unto whom man unburdens all his divinity, all his religious bonds, so the state is the mediator unto which he transfers all his Godlessness, all his human liberty." Thomas Müntzer led a significant Anabaptist
Anabaptism (from Neo-Latin , from the Greek language, Greek : 're-' and 'baptism'; , earlier also )Since the middle of the 20th century, the German-speaking world no longer uses the term (translation: "Re-baptizers"), considering it biased. ...
communist movement during the 16th-century German Peasants' War
The German Peasants' War, Great Peasants' War or Great Peasants' Revolt () was a widespread popular revolt in some German-speaking areas in Central Europe from 1524 to 1525. It was Europe's largest and most widespread popular uprising befor ...
, which Friedrich Engels
Friedrich Engels ( ;["Engels"](_blank)
''Random House Webster's Unabridged Dictionary''.[The Peasant War in Germany
''The Peasant War in Germany'' () by Friedrich Engels is a short account of the early-16th-century uprisings known as the German Peasants' War (1524–1525). It was written by Engels in London during the summer of 1850, following the revolution ...]
''. The Marxist ethos that aims for unity reflects the Christian universalist teaching that humankind is one and that there is only one god who does not discriminate among people.
Christian communism is an early form of socialism
Socialism is an economic ideology, economic and political philosophy encompassing diverse Economic system, economic and social systems characterised by social ownership of the means of production, as opposed to private ownership. It describes ...
and pre-Marxist communism based on Christianity. It is a theological and political theory based upon the view that the teachings of Jesus compel Christians
A Christian () is a person who follows or adheres to Christianity, a monotheistic Abrahamic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus Christ. Christians form the largest religious community in the world. The words '' Christ'' and ''C ...
to support communism
Communism () is a political sociology, sociopolitical, political philosophy, philosophical, and economic ideology, economic ideology within the history of socialism, socialist movement, whose goal is the creation of a communist society, a ...
as the ideal social system
In sociology, a social system is the patterned network of relationships constituting a coherent whole that exist between individuals, groups, and institutions. It is the formal Social structure, structure of role and status that can form in a smal ...
. Although there is no universal agreement on the exact date when Christian communism was founded, many Christian communists say that evidence from the Bible
The Bible is a collection of religious texts that are central to Christianity and Judaism, and esteemed in other Abrahamic religions such as Islam. The Bible is an anthology (a compilation of texts of a variety of forms) originally writt ...
suggests that the first Christians, including the Apostles in the New Testament
In Christian theology and ecclesiology, the apostles, particularly the Twelve Apostles (also known as the Twelve Disciples or simply the Twelve), were the primary Disciple (Christianity), disciples of Jesus according to the New Testament. Dur ...
, established their small communist society in the years following Jesus' death and resurrection. While critics of socialism including Catholic social teaching
Catholic social teaching (CST) is an area of Catholic doctrine which is concerned with human dignity and the common good in society. It addresses oppression, the role of the state, subsidiarity, social organization, social justice, and w ...
propounded by several popes argue that Jesus was more communitarian
Communitarianism is a philosophy that emphasizes the connection between the individual and the community. Its overriding philosophy is based on the belief that a person's social identity and personality are largely molded by community relation ...
than communist, many advocates of Christian communism and other communists, including Karl Kautsky
Karl Johann Kautsky (; ; 16 October 1854 – 17 October 1938) was a Czech-Austrian Marxism, Marxist theorist. A leading theorist of the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD) and the Second International, Kautsky advocated orthodox Marxism, a ...
, argue that it was taught by Jesus and practiced by the apostles. Several independent historians have supported the latter view.
In the 16th century, English writer Thomas More
Sir Thomas More (7 February 1478 – 6 July 1535), venerated in the Catholic Church as Saint Thomas More, was an English lawyer, judge, social philosopher, author, statesman, theologian, and noted Renaissance humanist. He also served Henry VII ...
, venerated in the Catholic Church
The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwid ...
as a saint, portrayed a society based on common property ownership in his treatise ''Utopia
A utopia ( ) typically describes an imagined community or society that possesses highly desirable or near-perfect qualities for its members. It was coined by Sir Thomas More for his 1516 book ''Utopia (book), Utopia'', which describes a fictiona ...
'', whose leaders administered it through reason. Several groupings in the English Civil War
The English Civil War or Great Rebellion was a series of civil wars and political machinations between Cavaliers, Royalists and Roundhead, Parliamentarians in the Kingdom of England from 1642 to 1651. Part of the wider 1639 to 1653 Wars of th ...
supported this idea, especially the Diggers
The Diggers were a group of religious and political dissidents in England, associated with a political ideology and programme resembling what would later be called agrarian socialism.; ; ; Gerrard Winstanley and William Everard (Digger), Will ...
, who espoused clear communistic yet agrarian ideals. Oliver Cromwell
Oliver Cromwell (25 April 15993 September 1658) was an English statesman, politician and soldier, widely regarded as one of the most important figures in British history. He came to prominence during the Wars of the Three Kingdoms, initially ...
and the Grandees' attitude to these groups was, at best, ambivalent and often hostile. Criticism of the idea of private property
Private property is a legal designation for the ownership of property by non-governmental Capacity (law), legal entities. Private property is distinguishable from public property, which is owned by a state entity, and from Collective ownership ...
continued into the Enlightenment
The Age of Enlightenment (also the Age of Reason and the Enlightenment) was a European intellectual and philosophical movement active from the late 17th to early 19th century. Chiefly valuing knowledge gained through rationalism and empirici ...
era of the 18th century through such thinkers as the profoundly religious Jean-Jacques Rousseau
Jean-Jacques Rousseau (, ; ; 28 June 1712 – 2 July 1778) was a Republic of Geneva, Genevan philosopher (''philosophes, philosophe''), writer, and composer. His political philosophy influenced the progress of the Age of Enlightenment through ...
. Raised a Calvinist
Reformed Christianity, also called Calvinism, is a major branch of Protestantism that began during the 16th-century Protestant Reformation. In the modern day, it is largely represented by the Continental Reformed Protestantism, Continenta ...
, Rousseau was influenced by the Jansenist
Jansenism was a 17th- and 18th-century theological movement within Roman Catholicism, primarily active in France, which arose as an attempt to reconcile the theological concepts of free will and divine grace in response to certain development ...
movement within the Catholic Church. One of the main Jansenist aims was democratizing to stop the aristocratic corruption at the top of the Church hierarchy. The participants of the Taiping Rebellion
The Taiping Rebellion, also known as the Taiping Civil War or the Taiping Revolution, was a civil war in China between the Qing dynasty and the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom. The conflict lasted 14 years, from its outbreak in 1850 until the fall of ...
, who founded the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom
The Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, or the Heavenly Kingdom of Great Peace (1851–1864), was a theocratic monarchy which sought to overthrow the Qing dynasty. The Heavenly Kingdom, or Heavenly Dynasty, was led by Hong Xiuquan, a Hakka man from Guan ...
, a syncretic
Syncretism () is the practice of combining different beliefs and various schools of thought. Syncretism involves the merging or assimilation of several originally discrete traditions, especially in the theology and mythology of religion, thus ...
Christian- Shenic theocratic kingdom, are viewed by the Chinese Communist Party
The Communist Party of China (CPC), also translated into English as Chinese Communist Party (CCP), is the founding and One-party state, sole ruling party of the People's Republic of China (PRC). Founded in 1921, the CCP emerged victorious in the ...
as proto-communists.
Islamic communism
Researchers have commented on the communistic nature of the society built by the Qarmatians
The Qarmatians (; ) were a militant Isma'ili Shia movement centred in Al-Ahsa in Eastern Arabia, where they established a religious state in 899 CE. Its members were part of a movement that adhered to a syncretic branch of Sevener Ismaili ...
of the Ismaili
Ismailism () is a branch of Shia Islam. The Isma'ili () get their name from their acceptance of Imam Isma'il ibn Jafar as the appointed spiritual successor ( imām) to Ja'far al-Sadiq, wherein they differ from the Twelver Shia, who accept ...
around Al-Ahsa Oasis from the 9th to 10th centuries. Kenneth Rexroth describes their community as practicing "communism of the urban gang or the roving band of robbers", while Jacques Bidet states that communism is inherent to modernity, and so no example in antiquity or medieval times qualifies as true communism due to a lack of class consciousness
In Marxism, class consciousness is the set of beliefs that persons hold regarding their social class or economic rank in society, the structure of their class, and their common class interests. According to Karl Marx, class consciousness is an awa ...
in those eras.
Islamic Marxism attempts to apply Marxist
Marxism is a political philosophy and method of socioeconomic analysis. It uses a dialectical and materialist interpretation of historical development, better known as historical materialism, to analyse class relations, social conflic ...
economic, political, and social teachings within an Islamic framework. An affinity between Marxist and Islamic ideals of social justice has led some Muslims to embrace forms of Marxism since the 1940s. Islamic Marxists believe that Islam meets the needs of society and can accommodate or guide the social changes Marxism hopes to accomplish. Islamic Marxists are also dismissive of traditional Marxist views on materialism and religion.
See also
* Acts 4
Acts 4 is the fourth chapter of the Acts of the Apostles in the New Testament of the Christian Bible. The book containing this chapter is anonymous but early Christian tradition affirmed that Luke composed this book as well as the Gospel of Luke ...
* Anarchism and religion
* Buddhist socialism
* Christian anarchism
Christian anarchism is a Christian movement in political theology that claims anarchism is inherent in Christianity and the Gospels. It is grounded in the belief that there is only one source of authority to which Christians are ultimately answ ...
* Christian communism
* Christian socialism
Christian socialism is a Religious philosophy, religious and political philosophy that blends Christianity and socialism, endorsing socialist economics on the basis of the Bible and the teachings of Jesus. Many Christian socialists believe cap ...
* Diane Drufenbrock
* Ebionites
Ebionites (, derived from Hebrew , , meaning 'the poor' or 'poor ones') as a term refers to a Jewish Christian sect that existed during the early centuries of the Common Era.
Since historical records by the Ebionites are scarce, fragmentary and ...
* Hutterite
Hutterites (; ), also called Hutterian Brethren (German: ), are a communal ethnoreligious branch of Anabaptists, who, like the Amish and Mennonites, trace their roots to the Radical Reformation of the early 16th century and have formed intent ...
* Islamic socialism
Islamic socialism is a political philosophy that incorporates elements of Islam into a system of socialism. As a term, it was coined by various left-wing Muslim leaders to describe a more spiritual form of socialism. Islamic socialists believe ...
* Labor Zionism
Labor Zionism () or socialist Zionism () is the left-wing, socialist variant of Zionism. For many years, it was the most significant tendency among Zionists and Zionist organizations, and was seen as the Zionist faction of the historic Jewish ...
* Marxism and religion
* Mazdakism
Mazdakism ( Persian: مزدکیه) was an Iranian religion, which was an offshoot of Zoroastrianism.
The religion was founded in the early Sasanian Empire by Zaradust-e Khuragen, a Zoroastrian mobad who was a contemporary of Mani (d. 274) ...
* Religious socialism
Religion is a range of social- cultural systems, including designated behaviors and practices, morals, beliefs, worldviews, texts, sanctified places, prophecies, ethics, or organizations, that generally relate humanity to supernatural, ...
* Sabbath economics
* United Order
* Utopian socialism
Utopian socialism is the term often used to describe the first current of modern socialism and socialist thought as exemplified by the work of Henri de Saint-Simon, Charles Fourier, Étienne Cabet, and Robert Owen. Utopian socialism is often de ...
References
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{{communism
Communalism
Communism
Communism
Communism () is a political sociology, sociopolitical, political philosophy, philosophical, and economic ideology, economic ideology within the history of socialism, socialist movement, whose goal is the creation of a communist society, a ...