Atheism in China: How the Communist Party Proves that God Does Not Exist – Bitterwinter.org

by Peng Huiling

Notwithstanding almost uniformly negative and often humorous reactions on social media, Professor Li Shen and his book The Principles of Scientific Atheism continue to be heavily promoted in China through a major campaign to divulge Marxist atheistic principles. As Bitter Winter mentioned in a previous article, this campaign will continue because it does not come from the private initiative of some propagandists of atheism but follows instructions coming directly from Xi Jinping and the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party.

In this article, I look at how Professor Li proves that God does not exist. Li argues that God did not create living creatures, but living creatures created God. He mentions living creatures rather than humans because he believes animals may also believe in God. For instance, he argues that domestic dogs identify God with their owners. How Li can know canine psychology and even canine theology is not explained, but he uses an argument of authority. Friedrich Engels, Marxs closest associate and co-founder of Marxist theory, said so, and who are we to argue that Engels was wrong?

Actually, Li explains, Engels went even more deeply into the theology dogs supposedly believe in. He said that, at least if they feed them, dogs do not care whether their owners are good citizens or not. The greatest criminals may still be regarded as gods by their well-fed dogs.

It may seem that this observation, even coming from such a great luminary as Engels, does not prove much about whether God exists or not, but this is not Lis opinion. In fact, he argues, the most primitive humans function very much as Engels dogs. He offers as a proof the followers of Falun Gong.

We all know, Professor Li explains, that Li Hongzhi, the founder and leader of Falun Gong, is a small-scale ruffian, a little bastard () yet his followers regard him as God. Falun Gong practitioners may object that their view of Li Hongzhi is a little bit more complicated, but this is not important for Professor Li. His point is that divinity is in the eye of the beholder.

In fact, Li claims that while dogs regard human as gods, ancient humans sank even lower because they regarded dogs and other animals as gods. Li is aware that most scholars would object that when certain cultures made animal-like images of the gods, they were not worshipping the animals, nor the statues, but the gods or forces of which the animals were the symbols. These scholars, he says, are wrong. Li believes that it is an unequivocal historical fact that primitive populations really worshiped animals.

The human evolution interpreted through the laws of Marxist historical materialism, Li continues, shows that humans evolved from the first stage, worshiping animals, to four other subsequent stages. First, they worshiped demons, entities they created by combining animal and human features. Second, they worshiped humans, sometimes deceased heroes or kings and sometimes fictional human-like characters such as the Greek goddesses and gods. Third, they tried to imagine entities that were purely spiritual, and called them gods.

The most advanced state of religious belief, and one that manifested itself firstly in Eastern Asia, or so Li believes, is one in which a supposed invisible and non-representable mystical ground of all that exists is worshiped as god.

However, no matter how far the evolutionary path went, the model for producing gods remained the same. Humans endowed some real or fictional being with divine features, be it a dog or the unreachable Tao.

The continuous invention of new religions may lead us astray, but if we go back to the dogs calling their masters gods or the primitive humans calling their animals gods, we will stay on the right path, Li tells us.

Of course, the question will arise why did the humans invent the gods or God or the Tao or whatever other reality they regarded as divine. Nobody satisfactorily answered this question, Li states, before Marx and Engels. They clarified that looking at the question about religion through religious or philosophical lenses will never answer the question. The answer lies in politics and economy. Elites invented religions as a tool to control the masses.

The pre-Marxist German philosopher Ludwig Feuerbach, Li says, stopped at this answer, which explains the founders of religions, but still does not explain why the masses believe them. Happily, Marx and Engels answered the latter question, too. They claimed that the suffering and exploited masses have needs that are not satisfied by the rich, who do not care, nor by the bourgeois liberal or humanitarian reformers, who do not understand the core of the problem. Only Marxism explains the roots of these needs, and offers the proletarians the revolutionary answer that solves their problems. When this answer is delivered, the need for God will go away.

Only, it doesnt, as the Chinese experience itself proves. Millions of believers prefer to go to jail rather than surrender their beliefs. This is why China itself is, Professor Lis arguments notwithstanding, the best evidence that Marx and Engels were wrong.

Continued here:
Atheism in China: How the Communist Party Proves that God Does Not Exist - Bitterwinter.org