Faith and Reality: Marx’s Understanding of an Ontological Argument in Reference to Kant

Abstract

In the Appendix to his dissertation, with respect to Kant, Marx provided an in-depth analysis of the ontological proof of the existence of God. Here, we explore this analysis in detail. Firstly, we argue that “faith” (Glaube) is the foundation of Marx’s interpretation of the ontological proof of God and its difference from that of Kant. On one hand, Marx’s understanding of the ontological argument can be called the “Realization of Belief” (RB). The object of faith is, for the believer, endowed with some kind of real power; that is to say, the object is real for the believer who has faith in it. This line of argument differs from the Kantian Hypostatization of Idea (HI), which attempts to prove the transcendental God as an a priori concept that implies itself as an empirical being or a posteriori phenomenon. On the other hand, “faith” was also the foundation upon which Marx based his interpretation of Kant. Subsequently, in the context of Marx’s dissertation, we clarify the connotations of “reality”, “belief”, and “faith”. “Reality” refers to objects exerting a real force that works on those with faith in their imagination while not necessarily entailing that the imagined object of belief is an empirical one. “Belief” refers either to an opinion (doxa) based on “faith” or to an idea without necessity in the sense of David Hume’s philosophy. As for “faith”, Marx uses this term in the Protestant sense, meaning obedience to the object one believes in, where obedience refers to the absence of self-righteousness. In a state of “faith”, the faithful one possesses “the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen” (Heb. 11:1). Finally, on the basis of these two considerations, we reflect on the existing academic interpretations of the theme of this article and highlight some differences between these interpretations and the present article. We show that existing interpretations of Marx’s summary either conflate the two theories of the HI and RB or miss the importance of “faith” in Marx’s arguments. We conclude that Marx, at the time of his dissertation, interpreted the ontological argument by way of the RB, which was based on the concept of “faith”, and that his critical understanding of Kant’s refutation of the ontological proof was founded on the same interpretation.