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46 - The Soviet Union

from Part VII - Lived Atheism in the Twentieth- and Twenty-First Centuries: Case-Studies

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  25 September 2021

Michael Ruse
By
Sonja Luehrmann  and
Victoria Smolkin
Edited by
Stephen Bullivant
Michael Ruse
Affiliation:
Florida State University
Stephen Bullivant
Affiliation:
St Mary's University, Twickenham, London
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Summary

The Soviet project presents the first case in which atheism was not just an abstract philosophical position on the question of God’s existence, but a tool used by a revolutionary state in the service of a political project. This project aimed at nothing less than the transformation of the meaning and order of the world, and for the revolutionary state, one of the biggest threats to this was the continued existence of institutions, beliefs, and ways of life that challenged Soviet claims to a monopoly on truth and power. Guided by Marxist–Leninist theory, the Bolshevik Party that stood at the head of the new Soviet state therefore construed religion as an obstacle to the successful construction of Communism, which made religion not just a theoretical question that needed an answer, but a practical problem that needed a solution. The party turned to atheism to solve this problem.

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The Cambridge History of Atheism , pp. 850 - 873
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2021

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