Karl Marx’ – “A Contribution to the Critique of Hegel’s Philosophy of Right”Deutsch-Französische Jahrbücher, published in Paris on the 7 & 10 February 1844.
.. Religion is the general theory of this world, its encyclopaedic compendium, its logic in popular form, its spiritual point d’honneur, its enthusiasm, its moral sanction, its solemn complement, and its universal basis of consolation and justification. It is the fantastic realization of the human essence since the human essence has not acquired any true reality. The struggle against religion is, therefore, indirectly the struggle against that world whose spiritual aroma is religion.
Religious suffering is, at one and the same time, the expression of real suffering and a protest against real suffering. Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people.
The abolition of religion as the illusory happiness of the people is the demand for their real happiness. To call on them to give up their illusions about their condition is to call on them to give up a condition that requires illusions. The criticism of religion is, therefore, in embryo, the criticism of that vale of tears of which religion is the halo.
Criticism has plucked the imaginary flowers on the chain not in order that man shall continue to bear that chain without fantasy or consolation, but so that he shall throw off the chain and pluck the living flower. The criticism of religion disillusions man, so that he will think, act, and fashion his reality like a man who has discarded his illusions and regained his senses, so that he will move around himself as his own true Sun”. . .
References
[1] Adams, N. (1855). A Smith of view of slavery. New York: Pittman.
[2] Baer, H.A., & Singer (1992). African-American religion in the twenty century. Knox Ville: University of Tennessee Press.
[3] Beecroft, F. (1931). Slave trading in the old south. Baltimore: J/H. Hems.
[4] Billingsley, A. (1999). Mighty like a river: The black church and social reforms. New York: Oxford University Press.
[5] Blassingame, J. W. (1973). Black New Orleans 1860-1890. Chicago: Chicago University Press.
[6] Blassingame, J. W. (1998). The slave community (revised ed.). Mary Knoll: Charity Books.
[7] Cade, J. B. (1935). Out of the mouths of the ex-slaves. Journal of Negroes History, 20, 394-337. doi:10.2307/2714721
[8] Christian, K. J. (2008). Sociology of religion and contemporary development. Lamlam, MD: Rowman and Littlefield Publishers.
[9] Cobb, T. R. R. (1858). An Inquiry into the law of slavery in United States of America. Philadelphia: J. J. W. Johnson.
[10] Elkins, S. M. (1959). Slavery: A problem in American institutional and intellectual life. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
[11] Elkins, S. M. (nd). Slavery in capitalist and non-capitalist cultures. In L. Foner, & E. D. Genovese (Eds.), Slavery in the New World. Englewood Cliffs: N. J Princeton Hall Inc.
[12] Goodell, W. (1853). The American slave code in theory and practice. New York: America and Foreign Anti-Slavery Society
[13] Harura, J. (1910). The negro in the new world. London: Methuen.
[14] Hurd, S. G. (1851). The law of freedom and bondage. New York: Harpers Brothers.
[15] Jernegam, M. W. (1916). Slavery and conversion in American colonies. America Historical Review, 21, 504-527. doi:10.2307/1835009
[16] Logsdon, J. (1969). Diary of slave recollection and property. Seven on Black: Reflection of Noges. Philadelphia: J. B. Lepinccott.
[17] Lone, J. H. (1970). Black consciousness and the black church: A historical theological interpretation. The Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Sciences, 23.
[18] Mellowes, M. (2010). God in American: The black church. http://www.pbs.org.
[19] Miller, R. M. (1998). Religion and American Civil War. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
[20] Munford, B. B (1909). Virginia’s attitude towards slavery and secession: New York: Longman.
[21] Noll, M. (2006). The civil war as a theological crises. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina.
[22] Raboteau, A. J. (1978). Slave religion: The invisible institutions in the antiebellum south. Glasgow: Oxford University
[23] Randall, M. M., Stout, H. S., & Charles, R. (Eds.) (1998). Religion and the American Civil War. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
[24] Reek, G. R. (1982). Black radical consciousness and black Christian experience. Sociological Analysis, 43, 153-169.
[25] Scheiner, S. M. (1969). The church and the north city 1890-1930. In W. Shade, & R. C. Herenkohl (Eds.), Seven on Black: Reflections on the Negro Experience in America. Philadelphia: J. B Lippincott Company.
[26] Shade, W. G., & Herrenkohl, R. C. (1969). Seven on black: Reflections on the negro experience in America. Philadelphia: J. B Lippincott Company.
[27] Shagor, H. (2005). Marx and religion: A brief study. New York: Orbiss Books.
[28] Swatos, W. (2011). Encyclopedia of religion and society. Hartford: Institute for Research, Hartford Seminary.
[29] Townsley, J. (2004) Marx, Webber and Durkheim on religion. New York: Orbiss Books.
[30] Uchegbue, C. (1997). Karl Marx Theory of Religion. In G. O. Ozumba (Ed.), The Great Philosophers (Vol. 2). Aba: Vitalis Books.
[31] Ulrich, P. B. (1999). A documentary history of American industrial society. Cleverland: Aunther H. Clark.
[32] Wilmore, G. S. (1983). Black religion and black radicalism. New York: Mary Knoll.
[33] Wilmore, G. S. (1973). Black religion and black radicalism: An examination of the black experience in religion. New York: Anchor Books.