Ruud Welten

From Marx to Christianity, and Back1

Michel Henrys Philosophy of Reality

!
!
!
!
Marx is one of the most important Christian thinkers in the West. (Michel Henry)
!

Recently, two volumes of miscellaneous articles and papers on politics and Christianity by
French philosopher Michel Henry (1922-2002) came out.2 Today, Henry is chiefly known for
his phenomenology of Christianity, but during the 1965-1975 period he closely and
exclusively focused on Marx. Such a careerfrom Marx to Christianitymight lead one to
imagine that the Montpellier philosopher and writer underwent some radical conversion
during the last ten years of his life. However, as I will demonstrate in this contribution
nothing is further from the truth and, on the contrary, Marx inspired Henrys philosophy of
Christianity which reveals an intrinsic bond between Marxism and Christianity.

When Michel Henry re-reads Karl Marx oeuvre in the 1970s, his approach is
phenomenological. That is to say, he brackets off all Marx dogmatism in order to reveal a
phenomenological foundation that is primordial all through Marx philosophy and that cannot
be reduced to mere theory or political ideology. The last sentence before the conclusion of
Henrys text reads: Marx is one of the most important Christian thinkers in the West.3 It is
therefore not a surprise, that Henry finds an identical primordial slant in Christian discourse at
his alleged turn to theology in the 1990s.4 Superficially, reading Henrys work might convey
the impression that this turn to theology was radical indeed: what bigger difference is there,
than the one between Marx atheist philosophy on the one hand, and Christianity on the other?

The philosophical implications of a study comparing Henrys Marx with his later
phenomenology of Christianity result in more than just a confidential academic representation
of the German philosopher. Such a study might be a useful introduction before re-reading and
re-appreciating Marx today. It might be used to parry all of the clichs about Marx so-called
atheism and his totalitarian idealism, and the fact that he was casually dismissed after the
collapse of Soviet communism in the early 1990s. And that is important because today,
capitalism and liberalism claim victory over the political left (theres no alternative!) while
there is no reason whatever to suppose that the basic motivation of Marx philosophy, the
need for social reform, has been superseded. Henry, however, does not approach Marx
1

As published in Bijdragen: International Journal for Philosophy and Theology. Volume 66, Issue 4, 2005

Michel Henry, Phnomnologie de la vie, volume III: De lart et du politique. Paris: Presses Universitaires de France
2004),[PV III]; and volume IV: Sur lthique de la religion. Paris: PUF 2004, [PV IV].
3
4

Michel Henry, Marx II. Une philosophie de lconomie. Paris: Gallimard 1976, [M II], p. 445.

Michel Henry, Cest moi la vrit. Pour une philosophie du christianisme. Paris, ditions du Seuil, 1996, [MV]/ I Am the
Truth: Toward a Philosophy of Christianity, (Stanford University Press, 2003), [IT].

politically. Later, at the time when the Soviet Union ceased to exist in the early 1990s, he
would say that neither communism nor capitalism had succeeded in understanding the
fundamentals of humanity.5 When they say that the so-called victory over communism is a
step forward for humanity, Westerners speak too soon, and they are wrong. Marx, who was
claimed as theirs by the communists for all the wrong reasons, writes about the basis of
humanity, which is life rather, than about political agenda items. In I am the truth Marx is
called, one of the greatest thinkers of all times: an early warning notice that in his later work
regarding Marx, Henry is not going to be detached at all.6

Marx, a Christian philosopher? Perhaps a matter of overzealous Christianisation? Perhaps a

desperate attempt to charge the now unemployed German philosopher with a duty in a society
that has stamped out communism, but has turned out ineradicably Christian in spite of many
prophecies about the death of God? How are we to understand Henrys remarkable
observations? In other words, what is the relation between the way Henry reads Marx and
Henrys phenomenology of Christianity? I would like to contribute to explaining that in his
Marx, Henry does not just apply his phenomenology to a randomly chosen author. On the
contrary: the entire blueprint of the phenomenology of life is set down in this meticulous
study on the German philosopher. If that is so, it implies that Henrys phenomenology of
Christianity does not result from his turn to theology in the 1990s: perhaps even, that there
actually has never been any tournant thologique franaise at all7. It would also imply that the
relation between Marx and Christianity is of a totally different nature. This relation, that 20th
century intellectual and political traditions have mostly ignored, offers two possibly prolific
perspectives: resuming Marx on the one hand, and resuming Christianity on the other. To
begin to understand their relationship, we must re-read Marx without the Marxism but also reread Christianity without the theologywhich neatly sums up the bulk of Henrys oeuvre.

Back to Marx
Henrys Marx - two volumes filling over 900 pages - was published in 1976, when interest in
Marx was dwindling. They are not studies on Marxism: that is a term that Henry actually
uses to refer to the sum of misinterpretations about the German philosopher.8 Nothing we
thought we knew about Marx seems to be correct. Henry brackets off the immense Marxist
tradition from Lenin to Althusser. This so-called Marxism, says Henry, has developed
without any awareness of crucial Marx texts like the Manuscripts of 1844 or the German
Ideology, because these have only been available since the early 1930s.9 Furthermore,
philosophers such as Althusser have severely underestimated the significance of these texts
while others have understood Marx to be a political ideologist, sociologist or economist. In
many respects, Back to Marx means re-valuating Marx: instead of getting lost in the jungle
of 20th century Marxist debate, Henry returns to the source text to discover a so far

Michel Henry, Du communisme au capitalisme. Thorie dune catastrophe. Paris: ditions Odile Jacob, 1990, [CC].

MV 304/IT 244, Cf. CC 25.

Dominique Janicaud, Le tournant thologique de la phnomnologie franaise. Paris: Combas, 1991.

Michel Henry, Marx I. Une philosophie de la ralit, p. 9. Paris: Gallimard 1976, [M I].

M I, 12.

undisclosed reality that, according to Henry, constitutes the very root of Marx. The latters
comments on Hegel, Bauer, Stirner, the new-hegelians and many others, disclose a deeper
reality10, an original domain of experience that is called Life.11

In his earlier The Essence of Manifestation, Henry showed how Western philosophy always
took phenomenological distance to be constitutive of essential phenomenality or
manifestation. Manifestation is possible only, because the subject distances itself from the
object.12 That which distances itself, only becomes manifest as a result of the distance, or it
might even integrate and disappear, which is what happens in Sartres description of
consciousness as a nant.13 This quite definitely means that manifestation can only be
understood indirectly. Henry now asks himself the question whether there can be knowledge
that cannot be reduced to knowledge of something or knowledge that is only possible given
a distance. From the point of view of the majority of Western philosophers, such knowledge
remains shrouded in mystery because of the lack of distance. The difference involves an
opposition that we find in many of Henrys writings: the opposition between this original
knowledge which we need to specify further and the reflective knowledge that depends on
it. This very same difference is the basis of Marx entire oeuvre, and it recurs in Henrys work
on Christianity.

Labour
The contrast between original knowledge and knowledge presupposing distance characterizes
the two volumes of Marx: part one is called: a philosophy of reality while part two is called:
a philosophy of economics. Superficially, the two volumes follow Marx development
historically. However, the analysis is not historical: the two titles indicate a fundamental
difference between reality and economy, the former preceding and being prerequisite for the
latter. They are not actually two separate, different domains of knowledge or action but rather
one domain: reality and its tributary economy. The feasibility of economy is based upon a
domain Henry calls reality, as is reflected by the title of Volume 1 (Une philosophie de la
ralit). Marx himself clearly uses this distinction, when he separates real labour (or konkrete
Arbeit) from abstract labour (abstrakte Arbeit).14 Real labour first and foremost involves
physical effort. Marx reality is therefore not primarily philosophical. His reality consists of a
life that continually experiences and generates itself, phrased in terms of labour. Marx is a
reformer of the subjectivity notion, rather than a philosopher who thinks that labour is about a
regional ontology. Labour refers to the direct experience of toiling and sweating, getting
tired, hungry, thirsty. First and foremost, labour is subjective. Henry: It is a concept that does
not mean anything but to feel one-self, which is what life is. All life is subjective.15 So, life
10

CC 27.

11

M I, 55.

12

Cf. Michel Henry, LEssence de la manifestation. Paris: Presses Universitaires de France 1963/902, [EM], 9.

13

Jean-Paul Sartre, Ltre et le nant. Paris: Gallimard, 1943.

14M
15

II, 138-175. Cf. Karl Marx, Werke Band 42, (Grundrisse ). Berlin: Dietz, 2005.

CC 29. concept qui ne vise rien dautre que le fait de se sentir soi-mme, cest--dire prcisment la vie.
Tout vie est subjective.

experiences itself. Second, life is a force, a productive force: not because labouring away life
is productive, but because it brings forth itself: life creates itself. Third, life is always concrete
and of a material nature. The fact that life labours to re-produce itself implies that it is
physical. Reality is thus reality of life and it is precisely this kind of reality that is
contained in the notion labour.

Western economics theorizes the material subjective life experience that is the basis of
humanity. Thus, a derivative notion of truth is created, which is alienated from live labour.
Western type labour does not express itself in procreation or self-generation, effort or fatigue,
but through the working hours and the economic system of values linked to them. Economic
working hours no longer represent a physical experience: they are transformed into pay. Time
spent labouring, however, is directly experienced as physical fatigue. So spending time is a
direct experience.16 Moreover, it is the personal, singular experience of an individual, every
single time. By contrast, abstract labour transforms this spending time into economic terms.
Measurable time takes the place of individual effort. Spent time means: the amount of
economically qualified time that is spent.17 In his earlier work especially, for instance in the
Manuscripts of 1844, Marx continues to emphasize the essential and detrimental separation
between worker and capitalist.18 The worker labours, experiences and lives while the capitalist
calculates. He turns the worker into an object, alienated from the work.

Life as a labour process is not really a notion, but rather pure experience. At work, labour first
of all perceives itself. Economy, however, reduces labour to a product, for in trade, the labour
itself is not the issue: only its revenues are. But even before labour is reduced to a mere
product or valued by means of its perceptible manifestation, it creates itself. Living labour
(Marx words) is self-generative: producing itself by labour and perceiving itself. Labour is
the manifestation of life itself: not of the life of something else, a product, but of itself.
Originally then, labour is physical and personal. That is why initially, Marx joins up with
Feuerbach, who described the body as the basis of personality.19 According to Henry, Marx is
a philosopher that considers human subjectivity to be more than just sheer spirituality. Marx
implicit ideas on effort are close to the descriptions of Henrys philosophy in his early
Philosophy and phenomenology of the body, in which he explains Maine de Biran. Labour
bears all the characteristics of the effort: As far as labour is living, individual and real, it is
nothing but an enduring effort.20 Both Maine de Biran and Marx claim that the subject
includes the living body and subjectivity, which Henry calls une subjectivit pathtique.21

16

Michel Henry Philosophie et phnomnologie du corps. Essai sur lontologie biranienne, Paris, PUF, 1965/20014. Cf. M I,
342 on Biran and Marx.
17

M II, 161ev.; Cf. M I, 460.

18

Karl Marx, konomisch-philosopische Manuskripte, Leipzig: Reclam 1974, [pM], (Economic and Philosophical
Manuscripts of 1844), I/15, (translations taken from www.marxists.org).
19

M I, 72.

20

Michel Henry, Auto-donation: entretiens et confrences. Montpellier: Prtentaine 2002, p. 27. Dans la mesure o il
est vivant, individuel et rel, le travail nest rien dautre quun effort souffrant.
21

Ibidem.

Praxis
The language of experience, is experience itself. The knowledge of experience is therefore
not the kind of knowledge we express in scientific or economic terms, as it is individual:
consisting only of life itself. In his early, pre-1845 work, Marx also uses the term praxis in its
original Aristotelian meaning: to describe living, true labour. Aristotle distinguishes between
praxis and poisis: the former refers to the activity towards a goal--like making music--the
latter refers to the goal as an external end product. Praxis is thus a sensory, self-expressive
activity, whereas poisis presupposes an externalisation.22 Because praxis manifests itself-and is thus independent of any transcendental constitution--Henry calls it a primary
immanence. Praxis is therefore not conceived as transcendent nor as a product set by
detachment, reflexion, visibility or calculability, but as life experiencing itself.23 The term
immanence indicates immediate [sensory] self-experience (preuve de soi) that fully
coincides with life. To Marx, praxis is neither thought nor a [vision unfolding in the
phenomenal world]. In this respect, says Henry, praxis does not set forth into the world.24
Praxis is an action relle.

According to traditional phenomenology, perception focuses on an object, intuition sees the

object, it discovers it and contemplates it. However, Henry goes on to say, action does not
do anything of the sort.25 Apparently, this notion of praxis flies in the face of the Leninist
interpretation of it, which is that actually, praxisin accordance with Marx famous eleventh
thesis on Feuerbachinvolves taking action in the world as opposed to mere thinking,
analysing or contemplating. To Henry however, praxis is precisely the subjective experience
of effort, in short: labour. The world we live in is an economy that equals our individual
experiences to the experiences of other people by economic conciliation. However, this world
attests to the initial truth of being. The category being is thus understood as a production
but not a production of something. Reducing this production to a product lands us deep in
economics, the initial ontology lost. It must be said that the interpretation of praxis implies
an overturning of the traditional concept of truth, says Henry,26for it implies disassociation
from theory: in favour of taking action. A theory of truth always uses the notion truth
predicative: truth is always truth of. Such an externalisation is not involved in this new
notion of praxis as truth. Praxis remains itself, praxis does not know but praxis acts. And
so, this self-experiencing [action] is what Marx called labour. Marx famous words on

22

Aristotle Ethica Nicomachea, First book.

23

M II, 152.

24

Cf. Michel Henry, Le concept de ltre comme production, in PV III, pp. 11-40[CEP], p. 30./ The Concept
of Being as Production, (translated by Pierre Adler), Graduate Faculty Philosophy Journal, Volume 10, Number 2,
pp. 3-28 [CBP], p. 19.
25
26

CEP 30/19. Elle dcouvre et le contemple, laction ne fait rien de tout cela.

CEP 38/26. Linterprtation de ltre comme praxis impliquenous devons le dire pour terminerun
renversement du concept traditionnel de la vrit.

labour: Sie wissen es nicht, aber sie tun es, which [Georg] Lukcs applied to the artist,
specifically express this sensory knowledge.27

Alienation
Economy is the science of trade. But trade is only possible when labour is theorised and
transformed into measurable units, so economic reality always remains indebted to an original
notion of labour. Marx economy is dual, says Henry: he first comments on economists such
as Ricardo and Smith and goes on to criticize the entire capitalist society. This Marx is the one
so prominent in Marxist tradition, but there is a second critical ploy: economy itself is
dependent and indebted to life. Marx himself speaks of economys fundamental
Unselbstndigkeit. Now the question arises: what exactly is the relation of the domain that
Henry (following a young Marx) describes as life, to the worldly domain that is secondary to
it? Henry takes this relation for completely and solely phenomenological. The former domain
is an preuve de soi without which there cannot be any phenomenological distance
(Husserlian intentionality or Heideggerian [ecstasy/eke-stasis] 28). This self-experience does
not reveal itself, does not appear the way the objects and phenomena do.

In his Manuscripts of 1844, Marx says: The more the worker exerts himself in his work, the
more powerful the alien, objective world becomes that he creates beside himself, the poorer
he and his inner world become, and the less they belong to him.29 This inner World is what
Marx calls life--which is the life of the worker. Alienation consist in labourers externalising
their life; transforming it into a Gegenstand: an object. The worker puts his life in the
object; it now no longer belongs to him, but to the object, says Marx.30 He has not created
himself, but he has produced a component part of economics, which is a transformation of
the experience of the worker into a computable product with market value. It is this particular
process that Marx calls externalisation, Enturung. Marx: The workers externalisation in
his product not only implies that his labour becomes an object, an external existence, but that
his labour exists outside him, independently of him and alien to him, is starting to confront
him as an autonomous power; it means that the life which he has placed in the service of the
object now confronts him as hostile and alien.31 The externalisation, therefore, is the
transformation of life into an alien, even hostile existence. It is not only a matter of
Verdinglichung, the archetype of all social relationships according to Lukcs, but of an aspect
27

Cf. Ruud Welten, Het lichaam vergeet niet. Fenomenologie van de prereflectieve, alledaagse
lichaamsbewegingen bij Maine de Biran, Merleau-Ponty en Henry, in: Algemeen Nederlands Tijdschrift voor Wijsbegeerte,
jrg. 95, nr. 3, 2003, p. 157-173.
28

Cf. Henry, LEssence de la manifestation, o.c.

29 pM 152=I/XXII. Je mehr der Arbeiter sich ausarbeitet um so mchtiger wird die fremde, gegenstndliche
Welt, die er sich gegenber schafft, um so rmer wird es selbst, seine innere Welt, um so weniger gehrt ihm zu
eigen.
30

pM 152 (=I/XXII), Der Arbeider legt sein Leben in den Gegenstand; aber nun gehrt es nicht mehr ihm,
sondern dem Gegenstand.
31

pM 152 (=I/XXII), Die Enturung des Arbeiders in seinem produkt hat die Bedeutung, nicht nur, da seine
Arbeit zu einem Gegenstand, zu einer uern Existenz wird, sondern da sie auer ihm, unabhnging, fremd von ihm
existiert und eine selbstndige Macht ihm gegenber wird, da das Leben, was er dem Gegenstand verliehn hat, ihm
feindlich und fremd gegenbertritt.

that surpasses the objective domain: that is, the subjective domain of life itself. Sinnlichkeit
ought to be fundamental to all sciences: not computation.32 The difference between live
labour and economics is the phenomenological difference between affects and sensory
experience on the one hand, and mathematisation on the other. Here we come across the roots
of Husserlian analysis as put forward in The Crisis of European Sciences, which identifies
Galileo as the founding father of the mathematisation of the originally phenomenological
domain.33

The Enturung of labour results in labourers that are alienated from their soul. Production
(Entfremdung der Sache34), first alienated from labour itself, is to blame for a fundamental
Enturung of labour from the labourer. Marx calls this second kind of alienation die
Selbstentfremdung. The fact that labour is external (uerlich) to the worker means that it
does not belong to his essential being; that he, therefore, does not assure himself in his work,
but denies himself, feels miserable and not happy, does not develop free mental and physical
energy (freie physische und geistige Energie), but mortifies his flesh and ruins his mind.
Hence, the worker feels himself only when he is not working; when he is working, he does
not feel himself (Der Arbeiter fhlt sich daher erst auer der Arbeit bei sich und in der Arbeit
auer sich).35 This difference between auer der Arbeit bei sich and der Arbeit auer sich
presupposes an initial notion of labourer in which the labourer bejaht, assures the self by
labouring. Naturally, this initial notion is not alienated, not auer sich, but with itself. It is,
in accordance with the quote, a freie physische und geistige Energie. It is Life itself. The
fact that Marx calls it spiritual here by no means implies that the labour is not physical. Marx
mentions the workers own physical and mental energy, his personal life36, and adds: for
what is life but activity? as an activity directed against himself, which is independent of him
and does not belong to him.37

Apparently Marx does indeed understand the initial non-alienated domain as Life sticking to
itself, as not externalising--though he hardly ever enlarges on the subject. This is the life of
the labourer asserting life by his labours. Remember Nietzsches famous words in Gay
Science on the self-affirmation of life: of life wanting itself. Besides, Henrys conclusion does
not exclude Lukcs thesis that such non-alienating labour is primarily artistic labour. On a
more practical level we can imagine the labourer carrying out even the simplest of tasks with
undivided attention and love, but in that case it must be unpaid labour: the labour of a child
32

pM 194 (=III/IX).

33 Edmund Husserl, The Crisis of European Sciences and Transcendental Phenomenology. Evanston: Northwestern
University Press 1970, p. 23; Michel Henry, La barbarie, Paris, 1987 (Grasset), 2001(PUF, Quadrige).
34

pM 156 (=I/XXIV).

35

pM 155 (=I/XXIII). Da die Arbeit dem Arbeiter uerlich ist. d.h. nicht zu seinem Wesen gehrt, da er
sich daher in seiner Arbeit nicht bejaht, sondern verneint, nicht wohl, sondern unglcklich fhlt, keine freie
physische und geistige Energie entwickelt, sondern sein Physis abkasteit und seinem Geist ruiniert. Der Arbeiter
fhlt sich daher erst auer der Arbeit bei sich und in der Arbeit auer sich.
36
37

pM 156 (=I/XXIV). die eigene physische und geistige Energie des Arbeiters, sein persnliches Leben.

Ibidem, denn was ist Leben anderes als Ttigkeitals eine wider ihn selbst gewendete, von ihm unabhngige,
ihm nicht gehrige Ttigkeit.

building a tree house. This kind of labour is therefore not included in the economy for the
benefit of the capitalist. The point is not so much that we need to revert to some initial type of
laboura live, joyous kind of labour--but that any economy presupposes such live labour.
Henrys interpretation does not so much aim to abolish the secondary domain of economy, but
rather to save it from oblivion in order to reassess human experience. We simply live in a
manifest world and have to deal with each other and there is nothing wrong with thatunless
economy becomes normative. If this is the point both Marx and Henry propagate, it will
radically alter our image of Marx: he is no longer primarily an economic or political reformer,
but criticises the economics of his day to uncover the initial immanent domain of life.

Marxist tradition--including Soviet communismhas made the economic domain absolute

and attached political consequences to it as well, thus severing its connection with the domain
of Life. Marx calls this alienation even in his early texts. Instead of implementing Marxist
ideas, Marxists have turned them around and set aside the point Marx initially tried to make!
This is nowhere more obvious than in the work of Althusser, whom systematically ignores the
early Marx[].38 Henry spots a radical criticism of economizing in Marx later texts especially
from 1857 onward, that is: texts in which he expounds on his economic theory (Grundrisse
and Das Kapital). According to Henry, in his early writings Marx never quite succeeds in
shaking off Hegel. Though he is critical of Althusser, Henry agrees that the later Marx is more
important, though on completely different grounds. Althusser believes that the later Marx gets
round to developing a pointed theory of economics. Henry believes that the later Marx always
presupposes that economy is subject to living labour. So this is not about vitalism or about a
new understanding of life, life is the preuve de soi. Indeed, life withdraws when faced
with conceptualisation. Conceptualising life will immediately alienate it from experience. The
only touchstone is the experience of life itself, and in this respect, the approach is
phenomenological. When re-reading Marx, Henry is taking the famous German Ideology
phrase seriously: Life is not determined by consciousness, but consciousness by life.39

Christianity and atheism

Henrys re-reading of Marx is dominated by this dual theme of life and the alienated domain,
which also dominates his later work on Christianity. All of Marx notions reappear in the
language of Christianity: life, alienation, practice, pathos. I do not, however, primarily want to
address Henrys later studies on Christianity, but intend to approach Christianity by means of
Henrys interpretation of Marx, taking into account what Henry says about Christianity in his
later work.40 Marx seems to take an explicit atheist stand in his early texts especially. His
comments on Christianity are taken from Feuerbach (The Essence of Christianity) and Bruno
Bauer (On the Jewish Question). The younger Marx links the economic domain of abstracted
labour to religion, over and over again. When he introduces the theory of alienation in the
Manuscripts of 1844, he writes: It is as in religion: the more man puts his life in God, the less
38

Althusser, Pour Marx, Paris: Maspero, 1965.

39

M I, 401-2. Karl Marx, Friedrich Engels, The German Ideology, New York, Prometheus Books, 1998, [GI], p. 42.
Karl Marx, Werke, Band 3 (Deutsche Ideologie), p. 27: Nicht das Bewusstsein bestimmt das Leben, sondern das Leben
bestimmt das Bewusstsein.
40

Cf. Ruud Welten, God is Life. On Michel Henrys Arch-Christianity, in: Peter Jonkers and Ruud Welten (eds.),
God in France. Eight Contemporary French Thinkers on God. Leuven, Peeters, 2005, p. 119-142.

he keeps to himself.41 So he draws a parallel between criticising economics and criticising

religion. Just as capital is the abstract representation of living labour, religion is the abstract
representation of living human beings. In keeping with Feuerbachs understanding of religion
as a mirror of humanity, Marx finds that human beings externalise in religion.42 Paraphrasing
Feuerbach, he writes: Humanity looked for a superhuman being in the fantastic reality of
heaven and found nothing there but the reflection of itself.43

The relation between religion and life is therefore transcendental, or according to Marx:
Religious suffering is at the same time the expression of real suffering and a protest against
real suffering.44 Also, the critical analysis of religion is aimed at abolishing it: The abolition
of religion as the illusory happiness of the people is the demand for their real happiness.45
Marx criticises religion because it is the imaginary realization of human essence, because the
human essence possesses no true reality.46 So, religion is within the realm of illusions - it is
the opium of the people within the realm of dreams that everlastingly promise to come true.
According to Henry, this is Marx approach of reality. A single foundation carries both his
comments on nineteenth century capitalist society and his critique of religion.

This means a critique of the kind of religion that is indeed a projection and nothing more. The
realm of illusions has no reality of its own. As long as religion is understood as devotional, it
will alienate humanity from reality. However, Christianity also emphasizes reality, real Life. It
is in this perspective that Marx speaks highly of Luther:47 Luther, we grant, overcame
bondage out of devotion by replacing it by bondage out of conviction. [] He freed man from
outer religiosity because he made religiosity the inner man. Here, the transformation of
devotion, which always presupposes a phenomenological distance, to the spiritual domain of
conviction, is crucial. The recognition of the spiritual meaning of Lutheran thought leads us
to the origins of dialectics, to a living experience, says Henry.48 This living experience is not
a devotional experience, so it is not outside itself and needs no exteriority. This allows us to
understand religion as a way of experiencing ourselves, instead of experiencing
externalisation [and alienation].

Marx of course rejects Luthers solution but praises his perceptivity on the transformation of
devotion into conviction. Protestantism revealed the problems of the critique of religion
41

pM 152 (=I/XXII). Es ist ebenso in der Religion. Je mehr der Mensch in Gott setzt, je weniger behlt er
sich selbst.
42

Cf. Ludwig Feuerbach, Das Wesen des Christentums, Leipzig 1849/ Stuttgart 1994, (Reclam).

43

Karl Marx, Werke, Band I (Zur Kritik der Hegelschen Rechtsphilosophie), p. 378. (transl from
www.marxists.org).
44

Idem 378/9.

45

Ibidem.

46

Ibidem.

47

M I, 131.

48

M I, 147, La reconnaissance de la signification spirituelle de la pense luthrienne nous reconduit lorigine de

la dialectique, lexprience vcue.

without having a hope of coming up with the right solutions. Marx: But, if Protestantism was
not the true solution of the problem, it was at least the true setting of it.49 So, Luther wanted
to free religion of its Feurbachian mirror function. Marxs critique of religion has the same
purpose and is part of his crusade against alienation.

The fact that Marx early critique of religion does indeed rely on an original domain, which is
life, is supported by two important early texts in which he discusses atheism: Critique of
Hegels Philosophy of Right and On the Jewish Question. In the latter, Bruno Bauer asks
Christians and Jews to distance themselves from their religions so they may become real
citizens that may reach political unity, build a rational state. Marx however denies that
Bauers dialectics hit the mark, as they remain alien to reality.50 Replacing religion with the
state just does not solve the problem, though Lenin and Stalin thought so. Marx: In the state
[] where man counts as a species-being, he is an imaginary participant in an imaginary
sovereignty, he is robber of his real life and filled with an unreal universality.51 A simple
change of focus is not whats at stake here.

Christianity ought to be experience, not devotion or religion as mere representationalism. This

is not a moral or hypothetical imperative, but precisely what Christian experience means: a
re-turn to life, understood as self-experience, without the alienation, without disassociation of
the self. It is a life of acting without knowing. As Henry already says in Marx, Christ is the
metaphysical expression of experienced life itself: The passion and the sacrifice of Christ
reveal the metaphysical law of fundamental affectedness of Life itself.52 And so, Henrys
notion of Christ is defined by inner experiences that are understood phenomenologically
instead of psychologically: What Christ teaches is the purity of the heart, an internal and
unlimited love. But what is love, that is not realized and does not act?53 This however does
not imply a withdrawn mystique: It is no longer an issue of dreaming of some interior
perfection that relies on itself, nor even of sketching a harmonious system of actions in which
this perfection would be possible. Nothing can be done within a person, no change capable of
affecting his real being that does not presuppose as its precondition a real change in the world
a world whose true essence is not primarily natural but social. There is a frequently cited
statement by the young Marx: Philosophers have only interpreted the world in a different
way; what matters is to transform it.54 Consequently, reducing Henrys philosophy to
mysticism or unwordliness would be a mistake. Life is not an abstract notion, it simply and
solely must be lived, which means that essentially, it is defined by real activity involving, for
instance, labour, physicality and ethics. Christianitys ethical ideals - love of others, solidarity,
49

Karl Marx, Werke, Band I, p. 386.

50

M I, 122.

51

Karl Marx, Werke, Band I (Zur Judenfrage), p. 355, (transl. from www.marxists.org).

52

M I, 143, Dans la passion du Christ et dans son sacrifice se rvle et sexprime la loi mtaphysique de la vie
pour autant quelle trouve son essence dans laffectivit.
53

MV 295/IT 236, Ce que le Christ enseigne, cest la puret du cur cest un amour intrieur et sans limites.
Mais quest-ce quun amour qui ne se ralise pas, qui nagit pas?
54

MV 296/IT 237.

generosity, justice, and so on simply must be realised.55 So Christianity is truly a Marxist

praxis in two senses of the word. First, there is no ideology that must be put into practice and
second, life manifests itself in human performances. Ultimately, Christianity is the
performance of invisible life56, which is consistent with the way Henry interprets the Marxist
notion of praxis.

It is not like there are two separate realities, one true and one alienated. According to
Christianity there exists only one Life, the unique essence of all that lives,57 which entails:
This thesis is that there exists only one reality, that of Life.58 Praxis, action, the preuve de
soi, thus mean that there are no two separate domains but that there is one reality of Life.
Even alienation remains subject to the initial manifestation of life.59 Some Henry interpreters
speak of Michel Henrys gnosis but there can be no such thing when gnosis refers to the
unbridgeable duality of reality.60 True, Henry uncovers a primordial domain in both Marx and
Christianitys focus on Life, but there is no doomed worldly domain that is totally separate
from Lifethough some old Gnostic systems are controlled by such stringent dualism.
Christianity teaches that the imperceptible domain is the only reality, rather than that there is
the perceptible domain that is totally separate from the imperceptible domain. The illusive,
the mirror that is central to Marx critique of religion, is dependent and alienated from the
reality of life itself.

As Henrys interpretations make clear, Marx philosophy is therefore primarily a philosophy

of incarnation. The human subject is not mere spirit, as was held by German idealism, but is
and always will be a material labouring subject. It is the incarnated subject that is prerequisite
in Marxs eleventh proposition on Feuerbach. In Henrys language, Marx teaches us that
humanity is subjectivit pathtique and understands labour as effort souffrant. The premises
of a materialist conception of history, as Marx calls it in German Ideology, are not
philosophical abstractions, but They are the real individuals.61 The first premise of all
human history is, of course, the existence of living human individuals. And he goes on to say:
This mode of production must not be considered simply as being the production of the
physical existence of the individuals. Rather it is a definite form of activity of these
individuals, a definite form of expressing their life, a definite mode of life on their part. As
individuals express their life, so they are. What they are, therefore, coincides with their
production, both with what they produce and with how they produce. The nature of
individuals thus depends on the material conditions determining their production.62 This is
55

MV 297/IT 237-8.

56

MV 216/IT 171.

57

MV 72/IT 54. Selon le christianisme il nexiste quune seule Vie, lunique essence de tout ce qui vit.

58

MV 297/IT 238.

59

MV 297/IT 238.

60

Oa. Jad Hatem, Le sauveur et les viscres de ltre. Sur le gnosticisme et Michel Henry, Paris: Lharmattan, 2004.

61

GI 37.

62

GI 37.

the theory of immanent incarnation in which a human being is not a spiritual being that may
realise its potential at will, but an essentially material physical creation. Merleau-Ponty has
reproached Christianity with not drawing the obvious conclusions of incarnation and insisting
that ultimately, God is eternal spirit.63 Remarkably, discerningly, he understands Marxism to
correct the ambiguity. Henry, too, denies that God is spirit first and body later. For
Christianity actually teaches that Christ and God are inseparable.

The Iconoclast Marx

Reading Marx keeps one continually aware of the parallel between his critique of economy
and his critique of religion. This parallel results from his unrelenting focus on the domain of
immanent life, which is presupposed by both externalisations. The obvious question is, how
Christianity managed to result in utter externalisation and alienation, when it is primarily
understood to be the incarnated pathos of life itself. A possible answer can be found in the text
Difficile dmocatie64, in which Henry argues that human religiosity must not be understood
as a possible mode of expression, but as one that is rooted in the fundamental human
experience of not being ones own foundation. The experience is not simply one among many
other experiences, but basic to human existence. This might lead one to suspect that this basic
human experience of the relation between humanity and God is transcendental from the very
beginning. This would make God the object of theology, as the giver of life that transcends
humanity. According to Henry, however, such theologising is secondary to the primal, basic
experience of Life, which must experience itself before it is capable of objectifying itself, as it
is by itself, experiencing itself. Calling God the creator irrevocably leads to the
Feurerbachian alienation and externalisation mentioned before. The archaic experience of
sanctity, says Henry, is not transcendent but immanent. The experience itself is immanent, as
it does not depend on anything external.

Michel Henrys oeuvre as a whole takes a new course towards Marxism: a new Marxism that
welcomes Christianitys objection against alienation as an ally. But let us not underestimate
him: Henry also radically and unorthodoxly re-evaluated Christianity (to say the least) in a
way un-thought-of in Christian tradition and theology. Implicitly, Henrys Christianity does
not refer to the external religion normally called Christianity. He is not out to distinguish
two kinds of Christianity, inner mysticism versus ecclesiastic tradition, either. Christianity is
One, and it uses the word God to refer to Life. Life is One, just like God is One. So Henry
hardly ever mentions Church-approved Christianity and dogmatic theology. Essentially,
according to Feuerbach-Marx analysis, Christianity is neither a collection of external rituals
nor a series of dogmas, but a religion that is basically characterized by illusory
externalisation. Like Marxism, Christianity actually teaches that self-manifestation precedes
every mode of externalisation.

Rituals are always rituals of Life itself: they must be realised in daily life and take the place
of conventional church service. Now, can we understand these rituals as fundamentally
physical practice? Henry finds himself outside the precast scope of convention: his
philosophy is no conventional Marxism, no Christianity, no conventional religion. His
63

Maurice Merleau-Ponty, Foi et bonne foi, in Maurice Merleau-Ponty, Sens et non-sens, Paris: Gallimard 1996.

64

Michel Henry, Difficile dmocatie, in PV III167-182.

philosophy allows only one single touchstone, has no rational genesis, is created by day-today contact with the realities of Life itself. The immediate vitality of Life, therefore, is not
externalised. Here, religion does not equal expression or, more specifically, does not equal
worship and is not representative. The basis of religion does not consist of believing in
something, for instance in God. God is not an object of faith, God is not a mirror either, but
God is the immanent vitality of Life itself. Henry develops this idea in Cest moi la vrit but
in Marx, he already specified it as immanent reality. God is the only reality that is not
objectified but that is self-generating and self-experiencing Life.

Religious practices cannot be reduced to objectifying routines, for that would mean religion
renders immaterial, unanimated appearances absolute. Religion would then become an
aesthetically structured objectification. Modern Christian culture is mainly characterised by
externalisation, so it is no surprise to find that that today, religious art has totally ceased to
exist, because the works of art of religion have been relocated to museums and galleries.
Religious works of art, such as icons, are no longer identified as artworks because they
externalise a devotion[].65 In todays world, they are primarily appreciated for their price, or
for the aesthetic thrill they offer. Perhaps we could say that, at least since the second century,
Christian tradition has ignored one of the most important commandments: Thou shalt not
make unto thee any graven image. For that commandment certainly seems to explicitly
forbid us to make a representation, externalisation, alienation of the divine! That is to say,
God cannot be represented, no picture of Him can exist, precisely because the word God
refers only to initial self-revelation experiencing itself without externalisation, in other words:
to Life itself.66 Life does not allow representation, portrayal, just as labour does not allow
economising. Economised labour is alienated labour, alienated from Life.

Approaching Christianity through Marx atheism allows us to understand Henrys

interpretation of it as a critique. For Christianity, as in European Christian Democrats for
instance, seems to have degenerated into an economy itself. Christianity, or so it seems, has
lost all contact with its roots. For that matter, such a critique of Christianity is no novelty in
phenomenologist circles. Early in his Cartesianische Meditationen, Edmund Husserl makes
insinuations about the contemporary position of Christianity being externalised into lifeless
conventions. In modern times, faith has fallen into Unechtheit und Verkmmerung.67 In
other words, faith has deteriorated into a resigned convention that is no longer alive, no longer
experienced, only persists in outward show. Martin Heidegger later also reproached
Christianity: with becoming a cultural practice that is not aus der Wurzel aufgestellt.68 In
this sense, it is fair to say that todays Christianity has lost all contact with its radical

65

Cf. Ruud Welten, Fenomenologie en beeldverbod bij Emmanuel Levinas en Jean-Luc Marion, Budel: Damon, 2001. p.
127-152.
66

Cf. MV 71ff.

67

Edmund Husserl, Cartesianische Meditationen und pariser Vortrge, Hrsg. S. Strasser, 1950, (Husserliana: Edmund
Husserl Gesammelte Werke. The Hague: Martinus Nijhof ,Volume 1), p. 46.
68

Martin Heidegger, Beitrge zur Philosophie (Vom Ereignis), (Gesamtausgabe Band 65), Vittorio Klostermann,
Frankfurt am Main, 1989, p. 117.

beginnings (radix), beginnings that are not lost in the mists of time but that simply lie in Life
itself .

The tradition of historical Christianity and also the so-called Christian Democratic political
systems that represent a large part of the population in most European countries today,
actually represent nothing but the tradition itself, when they ought to guarantee contact with
Life itself instead. In contrast with the former Communist states, Henry admits, capitalist
governments respect the rights of the individual but at the same time, modern capitalist
societies are more than ever subject to Marx criticism on the assumed autonomy of the
economy. True, capitalist respects the individual. However, presenting capitalism as the only
contemporary alternative for the collapse of socialism nevertheless means forgetting that
under cover of illusive appearances, agony is hiding. Communism and capitalism are
therefore deux figures de la mort.69 In this respect, Henry adopts Marx atheism, which he
feels does not actually destroy Christianity, but rather shows that life cannot be understood
through religion as something that is transcendental, externalised and imaginary from the very
beginningwhich is exactly what Christianity teaches, too.

!
!
!
!
!

69

CC 23, Lorsquon prsente aujourdhui le capitalisme comme le seul recours devant leffondrement du
socialisme, on oublie toutefois que, sous des dehors qui font encore illusion, il est lui-mme lagonie., Cf. PV III,
123.

Summary: Ruud Welten, From Marx to Christianity, and back. Michel Henrys
philosophy of reality

In the 1990s, the French phenomenologist philosopher Michel Henry (1922-2002) gets
interested in Christianitybut does not join the theological debate. Inspired by Marxwho is
usually considered an atheist thinkerHenry develops a radical phenomenology of immanent
self-affection. In this paper, I want to explore Henrys writings on Marx to find out how
Henry understands and constructs relations between Marx philosophy of reality on the one
hand, and Christianity on the other.

Ruud Welten (1962) is Ph.D. in philosophy. His thesis treats the role of iconoclasm in the
phenomenologies of Emmanuel Levinas and Jean-Luc Marion. He reads philosophy at the
Catholic Theological University of Utrecht, and social philosophy at the University of
Tilburg. He has written several books and many articles on French phenomenology and on
Jean-Paul Sartres political thought.