Page 167 - Culture Society and Economy

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CULTURE, SOCIETY AND ECONOMY

the value of the commodity produced. The rest was appropriated in various
proportions by different sections of the capitalist class as a whole. Yet the
worker was paid for her labor-power, only not for her labor time. Thus the
hiding achieved in the hidden abode is no simple matter and is not read-
ily obvious to any observer. On the contrary, it is only by overcoming the
limited conceptions – the false consciousness – generated at the popular
level in the noisy sphere and by careful study of the hidden abode, that
the secrets of the capitalist mode of production could be revealed. One has
to rehearse these hoary truths of the labor theory of value if the issues
before us are to be resolved.
Marx reverts to the ancient traditions of Jewish mysticism – the hidden
abode where God (Eyn Sof ) resided – alluding to a metaphor borrowed
from the Kabala in order to ironically emphasize his point. The point
being emphasized by Marx’s use of this metaphor is about the effort, intel-
lectual and political, which was required to penetrate this inner sanctum
of capitalist production analytically. For in the Kabala, the ascent to God
sitting on his throne in his hidden abode is the most arduous and testing
of ordeals, fraught with every conceivable trial and tribulation. It is only
after pronouncing the seven seals that the adept is allowed to pass through
the fiercely guarded gates of the seven heavens and finally to come before
and to ‘know’ Eyn Sof. Only a privileged few theurgs would acquire
knowledge of the voces magicae which would finally open the gates to this
hidden abode where He sat on His Throne. With such an analogy at the
back of his mind, one gets a sense of the point Marx is trying to make by
the use of this metaphor about the vital and indispensable role of exacting
and rigorous intellectual analysis.
According to this analogy, the ascent to the hidden abode of the
capitalist system was a long and arduous intellectual and political journey,
requiring persistence, intense and prolonged commitment and great moral
courage. Only after this struggle, in which one had to overcome numer-
ous obstacles, could one arrive at class consciousness and a truthful
understanding of reality. Thus, the limits of popular consciousness did not
arise from the deception of the priests – an idea arising from the traditions
of French anti-clerical rationalism and which was incompatible with
Hegelian notions of dialectical reason, let alone with historical material-
ism. Nor did the limitations of popular consciousness arise from ignorance
or any intellectual limitations of the people, although there was ignorance
aplenty under slavery, feudalism and capitalism. Neither the truths nor
falsehoods of ideology had an abstract rationalist and intellectualist origin,
in ‘discourse’ or ‘discursive formations’. Such thinking may be found in
Feuerbach but not in Marx. The limits of popular consciousness arose

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