[lbo-talk] I'm a committed Leninist

[Charles Brown]

To avoid treating texts as "bibles," they need to be approached as
making arguments. The first, itself very difficult, task is to figure out
what the texts mean i.e. what are the arguments they make. This itself
requires a fairly well developed capacity for autonomous thought. You have
to allow texts to put your own foundational ideas in question. Failure to do
this produces e.g. Marx interpreted as a Leninist.

Ted

^^^^

 
Exercising a capacity for autonomous thought seems the opposite of allowing
a text to put your own foundational ideas in question, for one's autonomous
thought is not found in _somebody else's_ text. Autonomous of what ?
Evidently not autonomous of the text and its writer's thoughts.

Anyway, for Marx , the thing is not only to interpret texts well, be
self-critical and let your mind go free, but,also, to change the world.  On
the other hand , that practical effort to change the world is the ultimate
test of the arguments in texts ( See Theses on F, nos. 1, 2 and 11). That's
why the practice is practical-CRITICAL;  it is the acid criticism of
practice for thought. It is a good way to avoid treating a text as a bible.

The direct act is interpreting Lenin as a Marxist , here. All our
speculation on this thread about what Marx would have done in Russia after
his death is historical, counterfactual speculation or the like.

Charles