Customer Reviews

The Essence of Christianity (Dover Philosophical Classics)

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In one of the most convincing theological arguments for athiesm of all time, The Essence of Christianity was written in a period of heavy religous tension in Germany. Through Fererbach's lengthy assertions and occaisonally flowery prose, the belief in a God seperate from man is systematically destroyed, albeit with occasionally thin argument. Feuerbach contends that religion is an expression of humanity, and that the collective potential for reason, affection, and will is the true essence of religion. He therefore does not contend with many of the main tenants of Lutheranism as they apply to the anthropological essence of religion. He argues that the belief in God is merely a misdirected belief in humankind. This work is an important historical and social one as the idea of human supremicy sets the stage for Frederick Engles and the Marxist era of Russia. It is interesting reading and creates for myriad new ways of percieving specific aspects of religion and humanity-- a must for anyone interested in any sort of theology.

I read this book in search of the philosophical roots of Max Stirner, author of The Ego and Its Own. For this purpose, the book is excellent; you can see where Max Stirner came from on a number of issues that had hitherto seemed a bit cloudy to me - both in what Stirner reacts to and what he has drawn on.

The book is, however, a very compelling read in its own right as well. Feuerbach takes us through literally the whole catalogue of Christian belief, and shows us how each item of belief is explained at least as well - or perhaps even better - as an anthropomorphism rather than as a supernatural manifestation. It must be said, though, that each single one of his arguments on their own do not lead to such a conviction. Just like you are not convinced that the dice are loaded by getting 6 once or twice, you will not be convinced if anthropomorphism fits the bill of Christianity in a few single instances. However - analogously with the dice - when you strike 6 nearly every time, you will be convinced that the dice are loaded.

If I have a criticism of Feuerbach, it is that after he has revealed the Essence of Christianity as being the worship of Man, he keeps the essence and only discards the accidental properties of Christianity, i.e. the supernaturalism. This was also what Max Stirner called him on. But my disagreement does not mean a disparagement of the value of the book. So I recommend it as a read.

"Conscousness of God is self-consciousness, knowledge of God is self-knowledge." wrote Ludwig Feuerbach (1804-1872) in his landmark text ESSENCE of CHRISTIANITY. Atheism had found its critical voice in a student of Hegel.

Feuerbach took on the task of showing that the antithesis of divine and human is altogether illusory, that it is nothing else than the antithesis between the human nature in general and the human individual; that, consequently, the object and contents of the Christian religion are altogether. God is a projection of the highest human values.

The ideal of humanity, realized collectively by the aggregate of all human experience, replaces a divine ideal. Feuerbach contends that the consciousness of God is nothing else than the concsiousness of the species; that man can and should raise himself only above the limits of his individuality, and not above the laws, the positive essential conditions of his species; that there is no other essence which man can think, dream of imagine, feel, believe in, wish for, love and adore as the absolute, than the essence of human nature itself.

Although he espouses a distorted and often inaccurate picture as a result of his completely arbitrary use of biblical and ecclesiastical texts and facts, Feuerbach addresses a very real problem with Christianity, specifically, and religion, in general. Namely, that a heavenly focus can sometimes be of no earthly value. Feuerbach saw the evil that persisted in the world exacerbated by the neglect fostered by religious institutions. But does Feuerbach offer anything more concrete when he speculates on an ideal of a collective humanity?

Karl Marx and Sigmund Freud were both greatly influenced by Feuerbach's work. Marx offered a socio-economic system of dialectical conflict. Marxist socio-economic solutions have shown themselves to be no more compassionate to the problems of humanity than the systems they tried to replace. Freud's psychoanalysis viewed religious ideas as the fulfillments of the oldest, strongest and most urgent wishes of mankind. This is quite true and the believer in God can say the same. Feuerbach's, and subsequently, Marx and Freud's, atheism turns out to be a hypothesis that has not been conclusively proved, nor disproved.

Herr Doktor Hans Küng in his landmark text _Does God Exist?_ identifies three points in Feuerbach's critique of religion that religious and spiritual people would do well to consider. _Have not Church and theology frequently defended God at the expense of man, the hereafter at the expense of the here and now?... Is it not clear at this point how close we are to atheism if we do not distinguish between theological and anthropological propositions, if we identify man's interest with God's, if we one-sidedly stress God's nonobjectivity, almost see God as absorbed in our neighbor and the mystery of being simply as the mystery of love?... The weaknesses in the first place are those of an all-too-naïve, anthropomorphic talk about God, his words and deeds, in metaphors, formulas predicates, that are actually more appropriate to the reality of man than to the reality of God... But the weaknesses are also those of philosophical-speculative talk about God..._

For my own spiritual relationship, I can accept Feuerbach's anthropological argument. Assigning God as the ideal of human values does not bring my spiritual relationship any closer to my individual experience. Instead, it tends to remove my commitment from the experiences of my life directly opposed to Feuerbach's intent. My spiritual relationship becomes yet one more humanist tool with which to navigate through the challenges of life. On the other hand, I find strength in my spiritual commiment when the circumstances of my life become opportunities of faith. When my own individuality, denied by both Feuerbach and Hegel, is acknowledged, I am not only more aware of my shortcomings but also, my own capacity for a spiritual relationship. Whether this is theology or anthropology, I encourage each reader to decide on their own.

If you are interested in the origins of atheism, the development of western philosophy or in challenging your spiritual assumptions, this book may be interesting to you.

PEACE

Catrina

This book needs to be back on College Philosophy and Religion reading lists! Never before have I read such a clear and obvious explanation of the religious mind. Wonderful translation and editing work by George Eliot makes this a revolutionary work of religious philosophy. I'm a wife, mother, English Literature graduate and a spiritual seeker whose life was changed by reading Feuerbach's analysis of God as our subjective projection as Other. Please don't let your questing mind miss this one.

Most of the positive reviews of this title seem to be responding to the work itself: i.e. the text of the translation of the book by Ludwig Feuerbach. With that assessment, I would concur. He had an obvious and explicit impact on the thinking of Marx and other post-Hegelian thinkers and is an interesting thinker in his own right (more than he is given credit for).

However, this is a TERRIBLE edition of the work. The text is not well-edited: there are clear typos, missing or erroneous punctuation, etc. There is none of the standard bibliographical information: place, publisher, date. They don't even give credit to the translator of the work.

I think these various problems are related: it looks like a sloppy job of OCR scanning of an out-of-copyright work for which there is still a small, but ongoing demand by university students by some kind of on-demand publishing outfit. It's a shame they didn't do a decent job of preparing a proper book for publication.

I recommend looking for a used copy of one of the older editions, such as that with the essays by Barth and Niebuhr.

This edition does a great disservice to a valuable work of philosophy. The edition lacks any of the normal publication information (translator, publisher, date, etc.), lacks page numbers (!) for the author's Intro, and has typographical errors throughout. It is totally unacceptable as an edition of a scholarly work. There are many better alternatives -- indeed, it would be difficult to find a worse edition.

This copy of Feuerbach's The Essence of Christianity is extremely suspicious. Not only is there no publisher information, but the text is also replete with orthographic errors. For instance, rather than "I," one finds "1"; many words that should be capitalized are not; and there are many punctuation errors. It really is incredible, and makes me very suspicious of this copy and its legality (could it be an illegal copy?).

In any case, if such things as described above don't bother you, it's great for the price. But those things do bother, I'd go elsewhere for my copy.

Do not buy this edition; there is no bibliographic information in the text, no mention of who the translator or publisher of the work is. Throughout there are glaring typographical mistakes, in which 'I' has been replaced with '1', and other issues. These issues make it seem as though this was a scan-to-text that was not carefully edited. I'm not even sure this is a legal printing of the work.

Here's a fine, legitimate edition of the book: The Essence of Christianity (Great Books in Philosophy).

I read this book in search of the philosophical roots of Max Stirner, author of The Ego and Its Own. For this purpose, the book is excellent; you can see where Max Stirner came from on a number of issues that had hitherto seemed a bit cloudy to me - both in what Stirner reacts to and what he has drawn on.

The book is, however, a very compelling read in its own right as well. Feuerbach takes us through literally the whole catalogue of Christian belief, and shows us how each item of belief is explained at least as well - or perhaps even better - as an anthropomorphism rather than as a supernatural manifestation. It must be said, though, that each single one of his arguments on their own do not lead to such a conviction. Just like you are not convinced that the dice are loaded by getting 6 once or twice, you will not be convinced if anthropomorphism fits the bill of Christianity in a few single instances. However - analogously with the dice - when you strike 6 nearly every time, you will be convinced that the dice are loaded.

If I have a criticism of Feuerbach, it is that after he has revealed the Essence of Christianity as being the worship of Man, he keeps the essence and only discards the accidental properties of Christianity, i.e. the supernaturalism. This was also what Max Stirner called him on. But my disagreement does not mean a disparagement of the value of the book. So I recommend it as a read.

"I DO NOT GENERATE THE OBJECT FROM THE THOUGHT, BUT THE THOUGHT FROM THE OBJECT" - Ludwig Andreas Feuerbach

From all the books I read so far, this one has touched me the most. Feuerbach's way of theorising is totally compelling and his words are completly overpowering. This is the MOST BEAUTIFUL, MOST POWERFUL AND MOST HUMANE piece of literature I've ever come across!!!