Marx and Religion

Marx attributed the creation of religion to the domination of the proletariat by the bourgeoisie. He saw it as a product of what he called social alienation. He understood the entire existence of humanity as being “divided against itself by the social-class cleavages of society.” He therefore saw religion as a means to comfort the lower classes and keep them docile. In terms of capitalist societies he understood religion as a way to control labor by providing some kind of reward in the after life for living such an unbearable existence here on earth.

Marx thought that by removing industrial capitalism we could eliminate any comforting illusions religion had provided to the proletariat. This to me seems unlikely since religion is the product of broader human emotions. There are example of religion and spirituality in societies that had no large class structure. In small Native American tribes in which a real class system did not exist and resembled more of a commune style of self governing we see evidence in art, and in the accounts of European settlers of the Natives exhibiting some concept of divinity and a basic understanding of a supreme being. Religion may be a coping mechanism, but I don’t feel you can entirely attribute it to being a latent function of class warfare.

Putting my personal religious beliefs aside, and trying to understand it from a