Marx and Engel’s thought began to take shape by criticizing religion. This was not only due to a popular retrospection on religion in their days but due to the internal necessity of their thought. It was just due to this internal necessity that they benefitted much from their contemporaries, Youth Hegelianists. In terms of contents, Fetishism, the key concept of Marx’s thought, was derived from religion, and he absorbed from religion nourishment and ideological framework for his later career of economic analysis. Meanwhile Engels’s lifetime study of The Holy Bible further improved Marx’s idea about the relation between religion and freedom, much extending his view of religion.. This indicates the enormous revolutionary tension within religion.

Marx; Engels; religion; fetishism; The Holy Bible