If I have appeared hostile to Marxism it is because I share their basic theme of socialist transition and would hope it can repair itself after the colossal failure of Bolshevism.
But more directly I will offer a speculative take on its materialism along with ditto ditto for ‘secular humanism’ which in some form or other is my own view. But the stubborn facts of religion in history and the basic obscurity of its full content/context suggests a speculative interpretation of historical agents.
First, how would a historical materialist explain the clear parallel of Mahayana and Christianity? In fact, I can think of a very simple explanation which I offer as ‘off the wall’ but relevant to understanding historical agency: how in fact could histomat explain ‘enlightenment’ without discarding it as superstition? Further what happens to those who do reach ‘englightenment’.
To me there is a set of obvious ‘answers’, the enlightened entities in relation to Buddhism (but in some larger sense unknown to us) cease rebirth but persist in disembodied ‘existence’ and move to influence history in their action and by the time of the birth of Christianity and Mahayana are directing their new starting points. Many have actually said so, btw, but in accounts too often very muddled. There is far more than this to the whole question, but this aspect needs a hearing in conventional histories despite the inability of secular humanists to evade religious idiocy.
There is clearly an agency in history beyond the eonic effect but into which ‘spiritual’ agents intervene and generate religious histories.
We will leave it at that for the moment.
We added two updates to our post on /marxism/world history/eonic model, link below. The question of marxism and world history raises so many issues that the post could go on and on. We note two iss…
1848+: The End(s) of History 