THE YOUNG HEGELIANS

The Young Hegelians, or Left Hegelians, were a group of German intellectuals who, in the decade or so after the death of Georg WilHeim FriedRich Hegel in 1831, wrote about his ambiguous legacy.
The Young Hegelians interpreted the entire state apparatus as ultimately claiming legitimacy based upon religious tenets. While this thought was clearly inspired by the function of LutherAnism in contemporary Prussia, the Young Hegelians held the theory to be applicable to any state backed by any religion. All laws were ultimately based on religious tenets. As such, their plan to undermine the corrupt and despotic state apparatus, was to attack the philosophical basis of religion.
Main Members: -David Strauss, he argued against both the supernatural elements of the Gospel and the idea that the Christian Church was the sole bearer of absolute Truth. He believed the Gospel were mythical responses to the situation the Jewish community at the time found themselves in. The idea that "Infinite Reason" or "The Absolute" could be incarnated within a finite human being was absurd. The original teachings of Jesus, amid at aiding the poor and downtrodden, he stated, had slowly been perverted and usurped by the established Church, only to manipulate and oppress the populaces of the world by promising them a reward in the afterlife, if they refrained from rebellion against the powers of the world that exist in this life.
-Bruno Bauer, went further, and claimed that the entire story of Jesus was a myth. He found no record of anyone named "Yeshua of Nazareth" in any then-extant Roman records. The Roman historian Tacitus and the Jewish historian Josephus, although were viewed as forgeries. Bauer argued that almost all prominent historical figures in antiquity are referenced in other works (e.g., Aristophanes mocking Socrates in his plays), but as he could not find any such references to Jesus, it was likely that the entire story of Jesus was fabricated.
-Ludwig FeuerBach wrote a philosophical profile of a believer, "The Essence of Chriatianity." He argues that the believer is presented with a Doctrine that encourages the projection of fantasies onto the World. Believers are encouraged to believe in miracles, and to idealize all their weakness by imagining an Omnipotent, Omniscient, Immortal God who represents the antithesis of all human flaws.
-Carl Nauwerck was a German orientalist, theologian and lecturer of Hegelian Philosophy in Berlin who lost his teaching license along with Bruno Bauer in 1842.
-Arnold Ruge shared Hegel's belief that history is a progressive advance towards the realization of freedom, and that freedom is attained in the State.
-Max Stirner would occasiopnally socialize with the Young Hegelians, but held views much to the contrary of these thinkers, all of whom he satirized and mocked in his "The Ego and its Own."
Young Members: -Karl Marx was at first sympathetic with the strategy of attack Christianity to undermine the Prussian establishment, but later formed divergent ideas and broke with the Young Hegelians, attacking their views in works such The German Ideology. Marx concluded that Religion is not the basis of the establishment of power, but rather Ownership of Capital - processes that employ technologies, land, money, and especially human labor-power to create surplus-value, and only that lie at the Heart of the World Power. Marx and Engels considered religion as a "component of the ideological superstructure" of societies, and a pre-rational mode of thought, which was wielded by Ruling Elites to obscure social relationships including the true basis of Political Power. He described religion as "the Opium of the People."
-Karl Schmidt in "The Realm of Understanding and the Individual" he examined the history of Hegelianism and derived the truth that, "I am only Myself."
-Edgar Bauer, (1820-1886), was the young brother of Bruno Bauer. He was the most anarchistic of the Young Hegelians. It is possible to discern in his early writings the theoretical justification of political terrorism.