Essentially, what Karl Marx tried to teach the world was the importance and necessity of seeing God in others. This was what Jesus Christ, Swami Vivekananda, and Mahatma Gandhi, in their different ways, preached and practised. To a certain extent, the Marxian ideology influenced me in developing a socialist and humanitarian outlook.
Communists do not say there is no such thing as God. Instead, they say that their concept of God is different from that of Mar Chrysostum. There are certain common elements in the Christian and Communist thinking. Jesus Christ himself was a socialist who provided a philosophy for the welfare of humanity and the whole world.
"Most Christians are not socialists"
We should bear in mind that most Christians are not socialists and that most socialists were not Christians. That way, Christ who himself was a socialist, was not a Christian. Swami Vivekananda unambiguously stated, Let new India arise out of the peasants’ cottage, grasping the plough, out of the huts of fishermen, the cobbler, and the sweeper.’’
This was what Karl Marx too tried to propagate and preach to the world, in a different way. Jesus was not the leader of a religion. Though his own religion denounced him, he never denounced the Jewish people or Judaism. Christ could see the presence of God in all human beings and this is all religions, and even Karl Marx, professed. The problem with our society is our lack of understanding or rather misunderstanding of God. Nobody can understand God completely. The philosophy preached by Christ, Swami Vivekananda, Mahatma Gandhi and Karl Marx was to see God in the other man. But, the fault with us is that we, somehow, fail to follow or properly understand their words.
Once my uncle asked the veteran Communist leader P.T. Punnose why he was denouncing God. His reply was: “I do so because God exists only because of me, and vice-versa. Both Gandhi and Marx believed in a classless and Stateless society for the emancipation of mankind. The former professed moral individualism while the latter professed scientific socialism. Gandhi and Marx were opposed to exploitation and capitalism. But, they pursued the non-violent and violent means to remove it.
I had recently interacted with CPI(M) general secretary Sitaram Yechury. I told him that I would tell my people in Kerala that I have converted Yechury to Christianity. To that Yechury said, Tirumeni, I will be visiting Kerala tomorrow, much before you reach the State, and tell the people there that I have converted Mar Chrysostum to Communism. Both of us were correct in a philosophical sense. A human being becomes a human being only in this world and not in any other world. Sri Rama became Sri Rama only in this world. We have to see God in our fellow-beings and nowhere else. That is what Karl Marx, Gandhi and Swami Vivekananda have taught me.
The author is Metropolitan Emeritus, Malankara Mar Thoma Syrian Church of Malabar.
(As told to Radhakrishnan Kuttoor)
