V. I.

Lenin

The editors have received a letter signed by thirteen “Left Bolsheviks” and bearing the address “Tiflis, Caucasus”, asking
for our opinion on the question of having A. Bogdanov as a contributor. The
signatories call themselves “ideological adherents of the Vperyod
group”, and their tone is openly and definitely hostile to our newspaper.

Nevertheless, we consider it necessary to have it out with them once
and for all.

Why has it become impossible to have A. Bogdanov as a contributor to
workers’ newspapers and journals that adhere to a stand of consistent
Marxism? Because A. Bogdanov is not a Marxist.

The writers of the letter, following the cue given by Bogdanov himself
in his letter to the liquidator newspaper, try to account for A. Bogdanov’s
disappearance from the columns of our newspapers on personal grounds, as
being due to personal spite, and so forth. All this is sheer nonsense that
is not worth going into or explaining. Everything is much simpler and
plainer.

If the writers of the letter were interested, not in “personalities”,
but in the history of the organisational and ideological relations among
the Marxists, they would know that as far back as May 1909 a delegate
meeting of Bolsheviks, after a long and detailed preliminary discussion,
rejected all responsibility for A. Bogdanov’s literary-political
utterances. [2] If the writers of the letter attached less importance to
philistine scandal and gossip and paid more attention to the ideological
struggle among the Marxists, they would know that in his books A. Bogdanov
has built up a definite social and philosophical system and that
all Marxists, irrespective of group allegiance, have expressed
their opposition to this system as being non-Marxist and anti-Marxist. All who are interested in the
history of Marxism and the working-class movement in Russia know—and
those who do not should make it their business to learn, read and
find out—that the question of A. Bogdanov’s contributions to a workers’
newspaper is bound up with a much more important question of principle,
namely, the relation between Marxist philosophy and Bogdanov’s
theories. This question has been discussed, examined, and worked to death
in books, pamphlets and articles. The question of a writer’s contributions
to the workers’ press should be approached from the political angle, i. e.,
not from the point of view of the writer’s style, wit, or popularising
talent, but from that of his general trend, from the point of view of what
he is bringing into the working masses by his theories. The Marxists are
convinced that the sum of A. Bogdanov’s literary activities amounts to
attempts to instil into the consciousness of the proletariat the touched-up
idealistic conceptions of the bourgeois philosophers.

If anybody thinks that this is not the case and that, in the
controversy over the philosophical principles of Marxism, it is not
Plekhanov and not
Ilyin, [3] but Bogdanov who is right, that person should come out in
support of Bogdanov’s system, and not argue that one popular article or
another of Bogdanov’s ought to be given space in the columns of a workers’
newspaper. But we know of no supporters of Bogdanov’s system among
Marxists. His theories have been opposed, not only by his “factional”
opponents, but also by his former colleagues in his political group.

That is how the matter stands with Bogdanov. His attempts to “modify”
and “correct” Marxism have been examined by Marxists and recognised as
alien to the spirit of the modern working-class movement. The groups he
formerly co-operated with have rejected all responsibility for his literary
and other activities. One can think whatever one pleases about Bogdanov
after this, but to demand that he be given space in the columns of the
workers’ press, which is called upon to disseminate the elementary
principles of Marxism, reveals a failure to understand either Marxism,
Bogdanov’s theories, or the task of spreading Marxist education among the
masses of the workers.

As regards the business of educating the masses of the workers, to
which our newspaper is dedicated, our path and Bogdanov’s diverge, for we
differ in our understanding of what that education should be. That is the
real issue, which, for self-interested motives, is being obscured by hints
about personal relations. Workers to whom the trend of their news
paper is dear should brush aside as trash all these attempts to reduce the
issue to the “personalities” of certain writers; they must look into the
character of Bogdanov’s theories. When they begin to do so they will
speedily reach the conclusion we have arrived at, namely, that Marxism is
one thing, and Bogdanov’s theories are quite another. A workers’ newspaper
should clear the minds of the proletariat of bourgeois, idealistic
hodge-podge, not offer them this indigestible fare in their columns.

We may be told: Nevertheless, Pravda did publish several of
Bogdanov’s articles. So it did.

But, as everyone now can see, this was a mistake inevitable in such a
new undertaking as the publication of the first workers’ newspaper in
Russia. The comrades who were in charge at the time had hoped that, in the
popular articles which Bogdanov offered the newspaper, propaganda of the
ABC of Marxism would overshadow these specific features of Bogdanov’s
theories. As might have been expected, things turned out differently. After
the first articles, which were more or less neutral, Bogdanov sent in an
article in which he obviously attempted to convert the workers’ newspaper
into an instrument for the propaganda, not of Marxism, but of his own
empirio-monism. A. Bogdanov evidently attached so much importance to this
article that after it, i.e., since the spring of 1913, he sent in no more
articles.

The question of Bogdanov’s contributions became a matter of principle
to our editorial board, who settled it in the way our readers already know.

Now a word about the Vperyod group In the columns of our
newspaper, it has been called “adventurist”. [1]

Owing to their inability to think politically and not like philistines,
the writers of the letter saw in this too an insinuation against the personalities of the members of this group. This,
too, is absurd. Marxists call “adventurist” the policy pursued by groups
that do not take their stand on the basis of scientific socialism, such
groups, for instance, as the anarchists, Narodnik terrorists, and so
forth. No one will try to deny that the Vperyod group is leaning
towards an archo-syndicalism, or that they are tolerant of Lunacharsky’s
“god-building”, [4] Bogdanov’s idealism, and the doctrinal anarchist
proclivities of S. Volsky, and so forth. Insofar as the policy of the
Vperyod group has tended towards anarchism and syndicalism, every
Marxist will call it a policy of adventurism.

This is simply a fact, which has been confirmed by the complete
break-up of the Vperyod group. As soon as the working-class
movement revived, this patchwork group, stitched together from the most
heterogeneous elements, without a definite political line or understanding
of the principles of class politics and Marxism, fell completely apart.

Marching under the banner of Marxism, the working-class movement will
ignore these groups, these “empirio-monists”, “god-builders”,
“anarchists”, and the like.

---
Notes:
[1]
See p. 94 of this volume— Ed .

[2]
Lenin is referring to the conference of the extended Editorial Board of “ Proletary ” held in Paris on June 8–17 (21–30),
1909, and attended by nine members of the Bolshevik Centre (elected by the
Bolshevik group of the Fifth [London] Congress of the R.S.D.L.P. in 1907),
headed by Lenin, and by representatives of the St. Petersburg, Moscow
regional and Urals organisations.

The meeting Was called to discuss the conduct of the otzovists and
ultimatumists. It dealt with the following questions: = (1) otzovism and ultimatumism; = (2) god-building tendencies among the Social-Democrats; = (3) the attitude to Duma activities among other fields of Party work; = (4) the tasks of the Bolsheviks in the Party; = (5) the Party school being set up abroad (on Capri); = (6) agitation for a Bolshevik congress or Bolshevik conference separate
from the Party; = (7) the breakaway of Comrade Maximov, and other questions.

In the chair was Lenin, who spoke on the main items of the
agenda. Otzovism and ultimatumism at the meeting were represented and
defended by A. Bogdanov (Maximov) and V. Shantser (Marat). Kamenev,
Zinoviev, Rykov and Tomsky took a conciliatory stand.

The meeting condemned otzovism and ultimatumism as being
“liquidationism inside out”. The Capri “Party” school organised by the
otzovists was declared to be “the centre of the breakaway
faction”. A. Bogdanov refused to accept the rulings of the extended
editorial board of Proletary and was expelled from the Bolshevik
organisation.

The meeting also condemned god-building and resolved to wage a
determined struggle against it by exposing its anti-Marxist character. (See
present edition, Vol. 15 “Conference of the Ex tended Editorial Board of
Proletary ”.)

[3]
Ilyin —a pseudonym of Lenin. His book Materialism and Empirio-criticism. Critical Comments on a Reactionary Philosophy
appeared in 1909 under the pseudonym of VI. Ilyin.

[4]
God-building —a philosophical trend, hostile to Marxism,
which arose in the period of the Stolypin reaction among a section of the
Party intellectuals, who departed from Marxism after the defeat of the
Revolution of 1905–07. The god-builders (A. V. Lunacharsky, V. Bazarov and
others) advocated the creation of a new, “socialist” religion in an
attempt to reconcile Marxism with religion. At one time they were joined by
Maxim Gorky.

The reactionary nature of god-building was revealed by Lenin in his
book Materialism and Empirio-criticism and in his letters to Gorky
during February–April 1908 and November-December 1913.