God-Building

God-Building was an idea proposed by some prominent

Marxists of the Bolshevik faction of the Russian Social
Democratic Labour Party which proved to be very controversial. It was inspired by Ludwig Feuerbach's 'religion of humanity' and had some precedent in the French
Revolution with the 'cult of reason'. The idea consisted
of the notion that in place of the abolition of religion,
there ought to be a new religion created which did not
recognize supernatural existence, but which worshipped
humanity and retained many of the cultural aspects of organized religion.

ple. They considered that religion was needed by people

to function.
Feuerbachs religion of humanity, on which this was inspired, held that God would be replaced by man as an
object of worship. It did not mean that single individuals
would be worshipped, but rather the entire potential of
the human race and all its achievements would be the object of worship. Instead of projecting human values onto
the heavens and submitting people to their own illusory
creation, these values would be worshipped in humanity
as a whole, which possessed them collectively. This religion would bring people to value themselves and to nd
common purpose, community and universal meaning in
themselves as a collective.

Lunacharsky

Along with Feuerbach, they also received inspiration

from Richard Avenarius' 'Naturlisof', Ernst Mach's 'Empiriocriticism' as well as from Nietzsche.

Anatoly Lunacharsky was aligned with the Vperedist

wing of the Bolshevik faction. Although he would later
rejoin the Bolsehviks and indeed become Peoples Commissariat for Education after the coup of October 1917,
he was originally closely associated with Lenin's rival, his
brother-in-law Alexander Bogdanov. In his two volume
work Religion and Socialism (1908-11) he propounded
his theory of bogostroitelstvo (,
God-Building).

They understood the term 'religion' to mean a link between human beings as individuals, as a link people between human beings and nations, and as a link between
human beings and societies in the past as well as future.
Lunacharsky wrote, 'For the sake of the great struggle
for life... it is necessary for humanity to almost organically merge into an integral unity. Not a mechanical or
chemical... but a psychic, consciously emotional linkingtogether... is in fact a religious emotion.'[3] He argued
""Scientic socialism, is the most religious of all
that atheism in itself is pessimistic, because life becomes
religions, and the true Social Democrat is the
meaningless, and that in order to solve this one needed to
most deeply religious of all human beings. he
turn to the pleasure of a religion to give meaning. Athewrote in 1907.[1]
ism didn't provide people with the meaning in their lives
that religion did and once religion was taken away, people
He proposed a new religious sentiment which would be
would feel empty unless something was put in its place.
accommodating to the world-view of Communism by
In its place, Lunacharsky proposed they should place hucreating a new religion that was compatible with science
manity as a transcendent entity.
and not based on any supernatural beliefs.
Lunacharsky wished to change the commandment to love
Lunacharsky claimed that while traditional religion was
God above everything into, 'You must love and deify matfalse and was used for the purposes of exploitation, it
ter above everything else, [love and deify] the corporal
still cultivated emotion, moral values, desires and other
nature or the life of your body as the primary cause of
aspects of life that were important to human society.[2]
things, as existence without a beginning or end, which
He believed that these aspects should be transformed into
has been and forever will be.'[4] He wrote, 'God is hupositive humanistic values of a new communist morality,
manity in its highest potential. But there is no humanity
instead of destroying religion outright when it served as
in the highest potential... Let us then love the potentials of
the psychological and moral basis for millions of people.
mankind, our potentials, and represent them in a garland
In his idea, God would gradually be replaced with a new
of glory in order to love them ever more.[4]
vision of humanity, and through doing so socialism would
Lunacharsky saw Marxism as having religious compoachieve great success.
nents, including its faith in the inevitable victory of socialHe and his supporters argued that Marxism was too meism, as well as its belief in science and material existence
chanically deterministic with regard to human beings and
as producing all human relations. These elements could
that it alone would not be able to inspire masses of peo1

assist in the God-Building. Lunacharsky interpreted the

events of the 1905 revolution as an expression of religious
forces in the nation.[4] The religion to be created would
worship the social ideal of socialism in its deication of
humanity.
Lunacharsky and his supporters rejected the divinity of
Christ, but they deeply respect him and re-interpreted
him as a revolutionary leader and the worlds rst Communist. The new religion would have prayer that would
be addressed to progress, humanity, the nation and human genius. Collective, rather than individual, prayer
was stressed due to the wish to use the cult to support
a common revolutionary action. This new religion would
have temples and rituals, and theatre with symbolic plays
to induce religious feelings.[5]

Rejection

Lenin was infuriated by the notion, and considered

Lunacharskys position to be extremely harmful, by
supposedly transforming Marxism into a mild liberal
reformism.[2] He believed it obscured the fact that religion had been a tool of ideological exploitation, and
that this idea was making a compromise with reactionary
forces.[6]

LEGACY OF LUNACHARSKY

Alexander Bogdanov.
Lunacharsky had caved in after the revolution and he
would change his views on Christ in later propaganda
by calling him a mythical personality and not an historic
gure.[10]

3 Legacy of Lunacharsky
Lunacharskys notion that religion was a complex phenomena with many aspects stood in contrast to the views
of other Soviet leaders in the early days of the USSR who
thought religion would disappear with the changing material conditions, under the Marxist presumption that religion and all ideology was simply a product of material
conditions. Lunacharskys ideas concerning this complex
nature of religious existence was later adopted by other
Soviet leaders.
Lunacharsky advocated criticizing clergymen for failing
to keep biblical teaching and other strategies that relied on
understanding religion in greater depth. While he urged
moderation (not on principle but out of pragmatic concerns) and this would be ignored, the simplistic views on
religion as a mere class phenomena were discarded in
favour of understanding it as a more complex phenomena.

Lenins victory in the 1917 October Revolution led to the Ideas related to God-building did emerge in the years folrejection of this school of thought, except in the case of lowing.
Bogdanov.[7]
A Russian-Soviet writer and medical doctor, V. Veresaev,
Lenin had extreme views on religion going back many beginning in 1926 argued in favour of developing beautiyears: 'Religion is one of the forms of spiritual oppression ful and standardised rituals for important occasions such
which everywhere weighs down heavily upon the masses as giving names to infants, weddings and funerals. He
of the people, over burdened by their perpetual work for argued that the state already possessed many rituals (paothers, by want and isolation. Impotence of the exploited rades, demonstrations, etc.), but that they were 'depressclasses in their struggle against the exploiters just as in- ingly untalented and miserable'.[11] He and many others
evitably gives rise to the belief in a better life after death
argued that people were going to churches due to disapas impotence of the savage in his battle with nature gives pointment in the bureaucratic indierence and poor qualrise to belief in gods, devils, miracles, and the like. Those
ity of Soviet state marriages or birth-registration. One
who toil and live in want all their lives are taught by re- Communist rural teacher who supported him claimed that
ligion to be submissive and patient while here on earth,
he would not preach atheism to peasants because when
and to take comfort in the hope of a heavenly reward. one makes them atheists, one deprives them of all rituBut those who live by the labour of others are taught by
als along with the religion and gives nothing to replace
religion to practise charity while on earth, thus oering them with. A Komsomol activist who supported him
them a very cheap way of justifying their entire existence presented a case of a person whose wife had died, was
as exploiters and selling them at a moderate price tickets buried through means of an emotionally cold and indifto well-being in heaven. Religion is opium for the people. ferent secular-communist ceremony, and the man, greatly
Religion is a sort of spiritual booze, in which the slaves depressed by it, consumed a full bottle of vodka while
of capital drown their human image, their demand for a crying in tears. Lenin had claimed that religion was a kind
life more or less worthy of man.'[8]
of spiritual booze in that it acted like a drug for people,
Marx had rejected Feuerbachs idea of a religion of hu- while this man had turned to booze in place of religion.[11]
manity as well, and this example served Lenins argu- Veresaev, however, was attacked by Marxist intellectuals
ment. Lenin would not compromise with religion even and his ideas, like Lunacharskys, were rejected. Verein this form, and he felt that it would ultimately degener- saev warned that 'life would become a bore and man
ate into a betrayal of the Bolshevik cause.[9]
would turn into an empty container' as a result, and that
Lunacharskys idea was adopted by a number of these people who opposed him were 'stooping people
other leading Bolsheviks, including Maxim Gorky, and with protruding foreheads, short-sighted eyes and thick

3
spectacles who didn't appreciate beauty and had no need ants receive their prizes and diplomas. Then all of them
for rituals in their lives.[11][12][13]
make public production-quota pledges for the forthcom[18][19]
Lunacharskys idea of 'God-building' would not be re- ing year at the city theatre.
vived in any major way, however, until the 1960s.
The Orthodox church saw this whole new religion in the
category of the false prophets that Christ had predicted,
and related it to Satanism. A Soviet author, Laskovaia,
pointed to a similarity in Lunacharskys ideas with the
'Death of God' concept of western agnostic and atheistic
theologians, such as Dietrich Bonhoeer and Bishop John
A.T. Robinson.[10]

Revival of God-Building

In February 1962, the 'All-Union Conference on Scientic Propaganda' was held in Moscow. Among the ideas
discussed it was suggested that 'Religious people should
be educated in the principles of communist morality and
ethics, religious customs and traditions are to be replaced
by religious feasts and rituals to satisfy the aesthetic and
emotional needs of believers[14][15][16][17]
In 1965, as Khrushchev's attack on religion had appeared
to produce no eective results, more suggestions began
to appear in the Soviet press that pseudo-religious rites
should be instituted that would create a mystical link between people and the promised Communist society of
the future, gloried in the labour of the present.[10] The
rites and services would be oriented to an utopian future
promised by the Communist society. Events and days
for glorifying Communism would be celebrated. Special temples with symbolic artistic ornaments would be
built to glorify Communism as mans greatest achievement, with oratorios composed and performed in the
temples.[10]
The new proponents of this God-Building scheme did not
go as far as Lunacharsky and tried to avoid blatantly challenging Lenins earlier rebuke. The theoretical discussion
produced little of what it proposed, but it did lead the way
to the introduction of special rituals being created in certain ocial events. For example, in 1966, an 'All-Union
Day of the Agricultural Worker' was set up and based
on rituals connected with St John the Baptists Day. The
new ceremonies were meant to help call people to the
'social, political, and ideological unity of society under
socialism.[18] In the Ukraine it was called the Holiday of
the Hammer and Sickle, which is described:
'On an early December morning tractor drivers [from the
surrounding region] converge in Zhitomir. At the entry to
the city they are met by the representatives of the city factories who report to them on the progress of the socialist
competition and invite the drivers to their factories, where
the peasants and the workers engage in heart-searching
and business like discussions. Then a parade of agrarian
technology takes place at the Lenin Square. Solemnly,
accompanied by an orchestra, the best workers and peas-

Special rites and ceremonies were devised in the 1960s

to celebrate the granting of passports on the sixteenth
birthday (the passport was used to control every movement, act and job of Soviet citizens). Another rite was
created for initiation into the ranks of workers and peasants. As early as the late 1950s, the state had also been
making more ceremonious civil marriages, name-giving
ceremonies for babies and funerals, in order to compete
with the church.
In the western Ukraine, clubs of militant atheists in the
post-Khrushchev years created new secular rites to replace church-related rites.[20]
Paganism re-emerged in areas that the church had been
eliminated from, and this was used in the arguments of
those who argued in favour of God-building and the need
for people to have religion.
Ocial Soviet propaganda proclaimed much success in
these rites tearing people away from the church, however, this may not have been truthful. Ocial gures
that showed declines in baptisms or church marriages,
may have reected more people asking pastors to do such
things secretly rather than an actual decline after the introduction of improved secular rites.[21]

5 See also
Atheism
Humanism

6 Notes and references

[1] Tumarkin, Nina (1981). Religion, Bolshevism, and the
Origins of the Lenin Cult. Russian Review 40 (1): 3546.
doi:10.2307/128733. Retrieved 1 April 2014.
[2] Dimitry V. Pospielovsky. A History of Soviet Atheism in
Theory, and Practice, and the Believer, vol 1: A History of
Marxist-Leninist Atheism and Soviet Anti-Religious Policies, St Martins Press, New York (1987) p. 20
[3] Dimitry V. Pospielovsky. A History of Soviet Atheism in
Theory, and Practice, and the Believer, vol 1: A History of
Marxist-Leninist Atheism and Soviet Anti-Religious Policies, St Martins Press, New York (1987) p. 93
[4] Dimitry V. Pospielovsky. A History of Soviet Atheism in
Theory, and Practice, and the Believer, vol 1: A History of
Marxist-Leninist Atheism and Soviet Anti-Religious Policies, St Martins Press, New York (1987) p. 94
[5] Dimitry V. Pospielovsky. A History of Soviet Atheism in
Theory, and Practice, and the Believer, vol 1: A History
of Marxist-Leninist Atheism and Soviet Anti-Religious Policies, St Martins Press, New York (1987) pp. 9495

[6] Laskovaia, Bogoiskatelstvo i bogostroitelstvo prezhde i teper'. Moscow: Moskovskii rabochii, 1976.
[7] N. Valentinov in Vstrechis Leninym (NY: Chekhov Publishing House, 1953) pp. 283304
[8] VI Lenin, 'Socialism and Religion, 1905. Reproduced
at: http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1905/
dec/03.htm
[9] Dimitry V. Pospielovsky. A History of Soviet Atheism in
Theory, and Practice, and the Believer, vol 1: A History of
Marxist-Leninist Atheism and Soviet Anti-Religious Policies, St Martins Press, New York (1987) pg 21
[10] Dimitry V. Pospielovsky. A History of Soviet Atheism in
Theory, and Practice, and the Believer, vol 1: A History
of Marxist-Leninist Atheism and Soviet Anti-Religious Policies, St Martins Press, New York (1987) p. 95
[11] Dimitry V. Pospielovsky. A History of Soviet Atheism in
Theory, and Practice, and the Believer, vol 1: A History of
Marxist-Leninist Atheism and Soviet Anti-Religious Policies, St Martins Press, New York (1987) pg 92
[12] Veresaev, 'Ob obriadakh', Krasnaia nov', no. 11 (Nov.
1926) pp. 17485
[13] Veresaev, Khudozhestvennomu oformleniiu byta', ibid,
no. 1 (Jan 1926) and Ob briadakh starykh i novykh
[14] Dimitry V. Pospielovsky. A History of Soviet Atheism in
Theory, and Practice, and the Believer, vol 1: A History of
Marxist-Leninist Atheism and Soviet Anti-Religious Policies, St Martins Press, New York (1987) pg 91
[15] D Ushinin (pseudonym of Dimitry Pospielovsky), 'Novye
veianiia v ateisticheskoi propagande SSSR', Grani no. 60
(1966) p. 206
[16] Powell, Anti-religious, p. 69 et passim; 'Novye sovetskie
obriady i ritualy', Radio Liberty Research Bulletin (Russian edn) (Munich, 16 August 1974, no. 258/74)
[17] G. Chebotar', 'Novye obriady v drevnem Polotske', Nauvka i religiia, no. 7 (1970) pp. 334; N.P Lobacheva,
'O protsesse formirovaniia novoi semeinoi obriadnosti',
Sovetskaia ethnograia, no. 1 (1972) pp. 3-13.
[18] Dimitry V. Pospielovsky. A History of Soviet Atheism in
Theory, and Practice, and the Believer, vol 1: A History of
Marxist-Leninist Atheism and Soviet Anti-Religious Policies, St Martins Press, New York (1987) pg 96
[19] PP Kampars, Sovetskaia grazhdanskaia obriadnost' (M.:
Mysl', 1967) passim
[20] Dimitry V. Pospielovsky. A History of Soviet Atheism in
Theory, and Practice, and the Believer, vol 1: A History of
Marxist-Leninist Atheism and Soviet Anti-Religious Policies, St Martins Press, New York (1987) pg 115
[21] Dimitry V. Pospielovsky. A History of Soviet Atheism in
Theory, and Practice, and the Believer, vol 1: A History of
Marxist-Leninist Atheism and Soviet Anti-Religious Policies, St Martins Press, New York (1987)

NOTES AND REFERENCES

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