Karl Marx
Karl Marx is often called the father of communism, but his life entailed so much more. He was a political economist, philosopher, and idea revolutionist. He was a scholar that believed that capitalism was going to undercut itself as he stated in the Communist Manifesto. While he was relatively ambiguous in his lifetime, his works had tremendous influence after his death. Some of the world’s most powerful and most populace countries follow his ideas to this day. Many of history’s most eventful times were persuaded by his thoughts. Karl Marx was one of the most influential persons in the history of the world, and a brief history of his life will show how he was able to attain many of his attitudes.
Karl Heinrich Marx was born in 1818 into a Jewish family in Prussia. His father converted to Christianity later in his when the authorities would not let him practice his Jewish customs. Marx was one of seven children. He was educated at home until age 13 and then went on to school. He went to the University of Bonn at age seventeen to learn in the field of law. At the university is when he first discovered his love for philosophy and literature, but his dad would not let him follow through with the subject. He wrote many poems during this time where he would refer to his father as a “deity.” Marx earned a doctorate in 1841 with a thesis titled The Difference Between the Democritean and Epicurean Philosophy of Nature. As one can see, this may have been the foundation for his most famous works.
Marx had joined a group called the Young Hegelians. They consisted of a group of philosophers and journalists. Together, they often criticized both the faculty of their institutions and the leaders of the country. This had instilled...
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...ng point for Lenin. In China Mao Zedong also claimed to be an heir to Marx, but argued that peasants and not just workers could play leading roles in a Communist revolution. Under Stalin, Soviet suppression of the rights of individuals became a fight in the name of the struggle against capitalism. So many lives have been influenced by Marx, that he was named number 27 in Michael Hart’s The 100 – A listing of the most influential people in history. After taking a good look throughout his life, it is easy to see how such an important person could have been shaped by the events surrounding him.
Works Cited
• Jonathan, Wolff. "Karl Marx." Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. 2003. Stanford University. 27 Nov. 2007 .
• "Karl (Heinrich) Marx Biography." Biography. 27 Nov. 2007 .
• Kreis, Steven. "Karl Marx, 1818-1883." The History Guide. 28 Feb. 2006. 27 Nov. 2007 .
9. Hoselitz, Ben F. "Karl Marx on Secular and Social Development: A Study in the
Temkin, G. (1998). Karl Marx and the economics of communism: Anniversary recollections. Communist and Post-Communist Studies, 31(4), 303–328. doi:10.1016/S0967-067X(98)00014-2
Marx, Karl and Friedrich Engels. "The Communist Manifesto." The Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism. Ed. Vincent B. Leitch. New York: Norton, 2001. 769-773.
15Karl Marx was born on May 5, 1818 to Heinrich and Henrietta Marx in the historical city of Trier. Karl was one of seven children raised within a comfortable middle class home provided by his father. Marx’s father worked as a counselor-at-law at the High-Court of Appeal in Trier. David McClellan believes that, “Trier first imbued Marx with his abiding passion for history.”1 Although the Marx family was linked to a long lineage of Jewish ancestry, Heinrich converted his family to Protestantism in order to keep his position at the courthouse. “Some have considered this rabbinic ancestry to be the key to Marx’s ideas and see him as a secularized version of an Old Testament prophet.”2 Overall, Marx was raised in a very loving, supportive, environment, and maintained a special relationship with his father throughout his life.3
In his Manifesto of the Communist Party Karl Marx created a radical theory revolving not around the man made institution of government itself, but around the ever present guiding vice of man that is materialism and the economic classes that stemmed from it. By unfolding the relat...
"SOCY 151 - Lecture 12 - Marx's Theory of History." Open Yale Courses. N.p., n.d. Web. 31 Mar. 2014.
Marx, Karl, Friedrich Engels, and Robert C. Tucker. The Marx-Engels reader . 2d ed. New York: Norton, 1978. Print.
Marx, Karl, and Friedrich Engels. The Communist Manifesto. Trans. Paul M. Sweeny. New York: Monthly Review Press, 1998.
Bender, Frederic L. Karl Marx: The Communist Manifesto. New York: W.W. Norton & Company. ed. 1988.
Marx, Karl, Friedrich Engels, and Robert C. Tucker. The Marx-Engels reader. 2nd ed. New York: Norton, 1978. Print.
Marxism and Leninism According to most historians, “history is told by the victors”, which would explain why most people equate communism with Vladimir Lenin. He was the backbone of Russia’s communist revolution, and the first leader of history’s largest communist government. It is not known, or discussed by most, that Lenin made many reforms to the original ideals possessed by many communists during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. He revised Karl Marx and Friedrich Engles’ theories to fit the so-called ‘backwardness’ of the Russian Empire.
Marx, Karl, and Friedrich Engels. "The German Ideology." The Marx-Engels Reader. Ed. Robert C. Tucker. New York: Norton, 1978. 146-200. Print
Now his work has also to a great extent the political forces of today all of which his work inspired. In my point of view it is no exaggeration to say that of all theorists of society Karl Marx is a revolutionary. and has deeply touched and affected all our lives. Our modern political field reflects his ideologies and is under much of his influence. The snare of the snare.
Marx, Karl and Friedrich Engels. "The Communist Manifesto." The Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism. Ed. Vincent B. Leitch. New York: Norton, 2001. 769-773.
Politics and many aspects of society today have been heavily influenced by political thinkers and scholars from ages before our time. Whether their ideas were implemented or avoided, society today has learned and grown from these influenced; there has been societal adaptions and changes with every success and failure. One important philosopher that is still widely talked about today is Karl Marx. His theories and ideas are still studies, discussed and utilized today. Some aspects of Marxism is relevant to modern day but there are still some major critiques to his opinions that prove there in inconsistencies with the relevance of Marxism. This is a result of his failure to predict how advanced and revolutionized society would be in modern day.