The German Ideology

Marx and Engels turn to Bruno Bauer. Specifically, they analyze his debate with Feuerbach. Marx and Engels dismiss the importance of Bauer’s intervention, writing that the main debate was between Feuerbach and Stirner. Bauer’s “stale, soured criticism” (105) was forgotten by history. Marx and Engels write that rather than refuting their arguments himself, Bauer confronts Feuerbach with Stirner’s concept of the “unique” and Stirner with Feuerbach’s concept of “man.” Bauer concludes by calling them both dogmatic.

Bauer advanced a theory of infinite self-consciousness that focused on rational autonomy and historical progress. The core concept in Bauer’s work is “self-consciousness,” which he uses to explore larger societal conflicts of the present day. Bauer’s philosophy is derivative of both Hegel and Stirner. In particular, he paraphrases key concepts from Stirner. Bauer reduces idealist philosophy to an “abstraction of abstraction” (109). He believes that a shift in consciousness can transform the world. He argues that an “independent intellectual expression of the existing world” is “the basis of this existing world” (108). He argues that socialism does not adequately address human individualism. Marx and Engels are particularly dismissive of his philosophy.

Bauer attacks Feuerbach for his “sensuousness” (111), or his attention to materialism. In contrast, Bauer believes that religion has its own essence, and by extension, its own truth. Bauer writes, “Truth which is never of itself encountered as a ready-made object and which develops itself and reaches unity only in the unfolding of personality” (112). Bauer argues that innocence and spirituality surface even during sin. The spirit will triumph over flesh and desire. In contrast, Marx and Engels argue that Feuerbach doesn’t engage enough with the sensuousness world. They mock Bauer for his pious distrust of the material world.

Of materialists, Bauer writes, “The materialist recognises only the existing, actual being, matter […] and recognises it as actively extending and realising itself in multiplicity, nature” (115). This prompts commentary from Marx and Engels, who point out that by definition, all matter is existing. Bauer implies that is “as though man with all his attributes, including thought, were not an ‘existing, actual being’” (115).

Marx and Engels then address Bauer’s criticism of their writing (mainly Die Heilige Familie, The Holy Family in English, published in 1845). Bauer responds that German communists have misunderstood his philosophies. Bauer defends the role of the critic in social transformation, writing that “criticism and the critics hold power in their hands, because strength is in their consciousness” (109). For Bauer, the critic derives power from the critic themselves. Marx and Engels retort that deriving power from criticism has yet to be proven. Bauer responds to Marx and Engels on the basis of concepts that are not actually in Die Heilige Familie but from a “confused review, teeming with misunderstandings” (122). Bauer is criticized for not engaging with the actual text.

The authors include a quote from Bauer that says, “what Engels and Marx could not yet do, M. Hess has accomplished” (123), referring to French Jewish philosopher Moses Hess (1812-1875). The “what” that Bauer describes is a critique of Stirner. Marx and Engels point out that Stirner’s book was not released when they wrote Die Heilige Familie. Bauer quotes Hess at length, but Marx and Engels conclude that Bauer adds little to his analysis.