Abstract
Anarchism is nearly always anticlerical and frequently atheistic, yet the intersection of religion and anarchism is more complex than is often assumed. Indeed this intersection has proved a fertile ground for a variety of analyses, especially in recent years. The interactions between religion and anarchism vary: sometimes anarchists are making or revisiting claims about religion; sometimes religious scholars are articulating a theology which engages with anarchism; sometimes the focus is on how specific anarchists approached religion; and sometimes religious scriptures are interpreted to point to anarchist politics. In other words, the encounter between religious studies and anarchism can concentrate on very different facets of either, and involves very different approaches and methodologies, very different modes and tones of enquiry. The aim of this chapter is to map out the intersections of religion and anarchism by considering four main types: classic anarchist quarrels with religion and its institutions; anarchist interpretations of founding religious scriptures and figures; anarchist ‘theology’ as distinct from scriptural exegesis; and historical studies on specific religious anarchist thinkers, communities and movements.
This is a revised version of A. Christoyannopoulos and L. Apps, ‘Anarchism and Religion’, in N. Jun (Ed), A Companion to Anarchist Philosophy (Leiden: Brill, 2018); A. Christoyannopoulos, ‘Religious Studies and Anarchism’, in C. Levy and S. Newman (Eds), The Anarchist Imagination: Anarchism Encounters the Humanities and the Social Sciences (tbc: Routledge, 2017).
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Notes
- 1.
This includes the following collections of essays: A. Christoyannopoulos (Ed), Religious Anarchism: New Perspectives (Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2009); A. Christoyannopoulos and M. S. Adams (Eds), Essays in Anarchism and Religion: Volume I, Stockholm Studies in Comparative Religion (Stockholm: Stockholm University Press, 2017), available from https://doi.org/10.16993/bak (accessed 14 August 2017).
- 2.
For other overviews of classic anarchist criticisms and their main proponents, see, for instance, H. Barclay, ‘Anarchist Confrontations with Religion’, in N. Jun and S. Wahl (Eds), New Perspectives on Anarchism (Lanham, MD: Lexington, 2010); J. Ellul, Anarchy and Christianity, trans. G. W. Bromiley (Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans, 1991); N. Walter, ‘Anarchism and Religion’, The Raven: anarchist quarterly, 25:7/1 (1994).
- 3.
A. K. Shulman, Red Emma Speaks: An Emma GoldmanReader (Amherst, NY: Humanity, 1996), 7.
- 4.
W. Godwin, Enquiry Concerning PoliticalJustice (Dublin: Luke White, 1793), I:28–29.
- 5.
Ibid., 151–152.
- 6.
Ibid., 154.
- 7.
Ibid., 155.
- 8.
Ibid., 160.
- 9.
R. Baldwin (Ed), Kropotkin’s Revolutionary Pamphlets (New York: Dover, 1970), 98.
- 10.
Ibid.
- 11.
M. Bakunin, God and the State (New York: Dover, 1970), 24.
- 12.
Ibid., 25.
- 13.
Ibid., 16–17.
- 14.
P.-J. Proudhon, What Is Property?, ed. D. R. Kelley and B. G. Smith, trans. D. R. Kelley and B. G. Smith (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994), 21.
- 15.
Ibid., 20–21.
- 16.
P.-J. Proudhon, System of Economical Contradictions, trans. B. R. Tucker (New York: Arno, 1972), 5.
- 17.
Ibid., 445.
- 18.
Ibid., 446.
- 19.
Ibid., 448.
- 20.
Ibid., 468.
- 21.
S. Faure, Does God Exist? Twelve Proofs of the Non-Existence of God (The Anarchist Library), available from http://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/sebastien-faure-does-god-exist (accessed 7 August 2013).
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J. Most, The God Pestilence (Anarchy Archives), available from http://dwardmac.pitzer.edu/Anarchist_Archives/bright/most/godpest.html (accessed 27 November 2015).
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M. Stirner, Art and Religion (The Anarchist Library), available from http://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/max-stirner-art-and-religion (accessed 11 August 2017).
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E. Malatesta, The Method of Freedom: An Errico Malatesta Reader (Oakland, CA: AK Press, 2014), 42.
- 25.
Ibid., 25–26.
- 26.
Ibid., 27.
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C. Ward, Anarchism: A Very Short Introduction (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004).
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Christoyannopoulos, A., Apps, L. (2019). Anarchism and Religion. In: Levy, C., Adams, M.S. (eds) The Palgrave Handbook of Anarchism. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-75620-2_9
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