Socialism

Posted: 12 Aug 2005 06:43 pm Post subject: Bebel's "Women Under Socialism"

I had the Deleon translation of Women under Socialism kicking around. I noticed at the marx archive they only had excerpts from an abridged edition. So I decided to OCR it page at a time and post them here. When we get a chapter's worth we can archive it somewhere with a link to it here.

Interesting - Graymouser has mentioned a James Connolly in these fora several times. Unfortunately I don't know a thing about him. I did come across an entry at Wickipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/August_Bebel that the Women under Socialism book sparked a heated controversy between DeLeon and Connolly - that Connolly thought the book lewd. Perhaps this controversy was cooked up to spur sales – consanguine family life – huba huba.

Posted: 12 Aug 2005 11:52 pm Post subject:

Scanned images of the book cover, frontispiece, title page etc to be posted at www.socialistindustrailunion.com.

Women Under Socialism

by August Bebel, 33rd German Edition

Translated into English by Daniel DeLeon, 1903

p. iii

TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE

Bebel's work, "Die Frau und der Socialismus," rendered in this Eng lish version with the title "Woman under Socialism," is the best-aimed shot at the existing social system, both strategically and tactically considered. It is wise tactics and strategy to attack an enemy on his weakest side. The Woman Question is the weakest link in the capital ist mail.

The workingman, we know, is a defenseless being; but it takes much sharpening of the intellect to appreciate the fact that "he cannot speak for himself." His sex is popularly coupled with the sense of strength. The illusion conceals his feebleness, and deprives him of help, often of sympathy. It is thus even with regard to the child. Proverbially weak and needing support, the child, nevertheless, is not everywhere a victim in the existing social order. Only in remote sense does the child of the ruling class suffer. The invocation of the "Rights of the Child" leaves substantially untouched the children of the rich. It is otherwise with woman. The shot that rips up the wrongs done to her touches a nerve that aches from end to end in the capitalist world. There is no woman, whatever her station, but in one way or other is a sufferer, a victim in modern society. While upon the woman of the working class the cross of capitalist society rests heaviest in all ways, not one of her sisters in all the upper ranks but bears some share of the burden, or, to be plainer, of the smudge,-and what is more to the point, they are aware of it. Accordingly, the invocation of the "Rights of Woman" not only rouses the spirit of the heaviest sufferers under capitalist society, and thereby adds swing to the blows of the male militants in their efforts to overthrow the existing order, it also lames the adversary by raising sympathizers in his own camp, and in citing sedition among his own retinue. Bebel's exhaustive work, here put in English garb, does this double work unerringly.

p. iv

I might stop here. The ethic formula commands self-effacement to a translator. More so than well-brought-up children, who should be “seen and not heard," a translator should, where at all possible, be neither seen nor heard. That, however, is not always possible. In a work of this nature, which, to the extent of this one, projects itself into hypotheses of the future, and even whose premises necessarily branch off into fields that are not essentially basic to Socialism, much that is said is, as the author himself announces in his introduction, purely the personal opinion of the writer. With these a translator, however, much. in general and fundamental accord, may not always agree. Not agree ing, he is in duty bound to modify the ethic formula to the extent of marking his. exception, lest the general accord, implied in the act of translating, be construed into specific approval of objected to passages and views. Mindful of a translator's duties as well as rights, I have re duced to a small number, and entered in the shape of running foot notes to the text, the dissent I thought necessary to the passages that to me seemed most objectionable i n matters not related to the main question; and, as to matters related to the main question, rather than enter dissent in running footnotes, I have reserved for this place a summary of my own private views on the family of the future.

It is an error to imagine that, in its spiral course, society ever re turns to where it started from. The spiral never returns upon its own track. Obedient to the law of social evolution, the race often is forced, in the course of its onward march, to drop much that is good, but also much that is bad. The bad, it is hoped, is dropped for all time; but the good, when picked up again, never is picked up as originally dropped. Between the original dropping and return to its vicinity along the tracks of the spiral, fresh elements join. These new accretions so trans mute whatever is re-picked up that it is essentially remodeled. The "Communism," for instance, that the race is now heading toward, is, materially, a different article from the "Communism" it once left be hind. We move in an upward spiral. No doubt moral concepts are the reflex of material possibilities. But, for one thing, moral concepts are in themselves a powerful force, often hard to distinguish in their effect from material ones; and, for another, these material possibilities unfold

p. v

material facts, secrets of Nature, that go to enrich the treasury of sci ence, and quicken the moral sense. Of such material facts are the discoveries in embryology and kindred branches. They reveal the grave fact, previously reckoned with in the matter of the breeding of domestic animals, that the act of impregnation is an act of inoculation. This fact, absolutely material, furnishes a post-discovered material basis for a pre-surmised moral concept,-the "oneness of flesh" with father and mother. Thus science solidifies a poetic-moral yearning, once held im prisoned in the benumbing shell of theological dogma, and reflects its morality in the poetic expression of the monogamic family. The moral, as well as the material, accretions of the race's intellect, since it uncoiled out of early Communism, bar, to my mind, all prospect,-I would say danger, moral and hygienic,-of promiscuity, or of anything even remotely approaching that.

Modern society is in a state of decomposition. Institutions, long held as of all time and for all time, are crumbling. No wonder those bodies of society that come floating down to us with the prerogatives of "teacher" are seen to-day rushing to opposite extremes. On the matter of "Woman" or "The Family" the divergence among our rulers is most marked. While both extremes cling like shipwrecked mariners to the water-logged theory of private ownership in the means of production, the one extreme, represented by the Roman Catholic church-machine, is seen to recede ever further back within the shell of orthodoxy, and the other extreme, represented by the pseudo-Darwinians, is seen to fly into ever wilder flights of heterodoxy on the matter of "Marriage and Divorce." Agreed, both, in keeping woman nailed to the cross of a now perverse social system, the former seeks to assuage her agony with the benumbing balm of resignation, the latter to relieve her torture with the blister of libertinage.

Between these two extremes stand the gathering forces -of revolution that are taking shape in the militant Socialist Movement. Opinion among these forces, while it cannot be said to clash, takes on a variety of shades-as needs will happen among men, who, at one on basic prin. ciples, on the material substructure of institutional superstructure, can-

p. vi

not but yield to the allurements of speculative thought on matters as yet hidden in the future, and below the horizon. For one, I hold there is as little ground for rejecting monogamy, by reason of the taint that clings to its inception, as there would be ground for rejecting co-opera- tion, by reason of the like taint that accompanied its rise, and also clings to its development. For one, I hold that the smut of capitalist conditions, that to-day clings to monogamy, is as avoidable an "incident" in the evolutionary process as are the iniquities of capitalism that to-day are found the accompaniment of co-operative labor;-and the further the parallel is pursued through the many ramifications of the subject, the closer will it be discovered to hold. For one, I hold that the monogamous family-bruised and wounded in the cruel rough-and-tumble of modern society, where, with few favored exceptions of highest type, male crea tion is held down, physically, mentally and morally, to the brutalizing level of the brute, forced to grub and grub for bare existence, or, which amounts to the same, to scheme and scheme in order to avoid being forced so to grub and grub-will have its wounds staunched, its bruises healed, and, ennobled by the slowly acquired moral forces of conjugal, paternal and filial affection, bloom under Socialism into a lever of mighty power for the moral and physical elevation of the race.

At any rate, however the genius of our descendants may shape mat ters on this head, one thing is certain: Woman-the race's mothers, wives, sisters, daughters-long sinned against through unnumbered gen erations - is about to be attoned to. All the moral and intellectual forces of the age are seen obviously converging to that point. It will be the crowning work of Militant Socialism, like a mightier Perseus, to strike the shackles from the chained Andromeda of modern society, Woman, and raise her to the dignity of her sex.

DANIEL DE LEON

New York, June 21, 1903.

Posted: 13 Aug 2005 01:44 am Post subject:

p. vii INDEX

TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE.......................................iii

INTRODUCTION.....................................................1

WOMAN IN THE PAST-

Chapter I-Before Christianity...............................9

Chapter II-Under Christianity...............................47

WOMAN IN THE PRESENT-.

Chapter I-Sexual Instinct, Wedlock, Checks and Obstructions

to Marriage..............................................79

Chapter II-Further Checks and Obstructions to Marriage, Nu-

merical Proportion of the Sexes, Its Causes and Effects. . . . 118

Chapter III-Prostitution a Necessary Social Institution of

the Capitalist World.....................................146

Chapter IV-Woman's Position as a Breadwinner, Her Intel-

lectual Faculties, Darwinism and the Condition of Society. . 167

Chapter V-Woman's Civic and Political Status................216

Chapter VI-The State and Society............................235

Chapter VII-The Socialization of Society.....................272

WOMAN IN THE FUTURE............................................343

INTERNATIONALITY...............................................350

POPULATION AND OVER-POPULATION.................................355

CONCLUSION....................................................372

Posted: 13 Aug 2005 10:49 am Post subject:

p.1

INTRODUCTION.

We live in the age of a great
social Revolution, that every day
makes further progress. A
growingly powerful intellectual stir and
unrest is noticeable in all the l
ayers of society; and the movement
pushes towards deep-reaching
changes. All feel that the ground they
stand on shakes. A number of
questions have risen; they occupy the
attention of ever widening circles;
and discussion runs high on their
solution. One of the most important
of these, one that pushes itself
ever more to the fore, is the
so-called "Woman Question."

The question concerns the
position that woman should occupy in
our social organism; how she
may unfold her powers and faculties
in all directions, to the end that
she become a complete and useful
member of human society, enjoying
equal rights with all. From our
view-point, this question coincides
with that other:-what shape and
organization human society must
assume to the end that, in the place
of oppression, exploitation, want
and misery in manifold forms, there
shall be physical and social health
on the part of the individual and
of society. To us, accordingly, the
Woman Question is only one of
the aspects of the general Social
Question, which is now filling all
heads, which is setting all minds in
motion and which, consequently,
can find its final solution only in the
abolition of the existing social
contradictions, and of the evils
which flow from them.

Nevertheless, it is necessary to
treat the so-called Woman Question
separately. On the one hand the
question, What was the former posi-
tion of woman, what is it to-day,
and what will it be in the future?
concerns, in Europe at least, the
larger section of society, seeing that
here the female sex constitutes
the larger part of the population. On
the other hand, the prevailing notions,
regarding the development that
woman has undergone in the course
of centuries, correspond so little
with the facts, that light upon the
subject becomes a necessity for the
understanding of the present and
of the future. Indeed, a good part
of the prejudices with which the
ever-growing movement is looked
upon in various circles-and not
last in the circle of woman herself-
rests upon lack of knowledge
and lack of understanding. Many are
heard claiming there is no Woman
Question, because the position that
woman formerly occupied, occupies
to-day and will in the future con-
tinue to occupy, is determined by
her "natural calling," which destines
her for wife and mother, and limits
her to the sphere of the home.

Posted: 13 Aug 2005 08:56 pm Post subject:

p.2 Introduction

Accordingly, whatever lies beyond
her four walls, or is not closely and
obviously connected with her household
duties, concerns her not.

On the Woman Question, the same
as on the general Social Question,
in which the position of the working
class in society plays the chief
role, opposing parties stand arrayed
against each other. One party,
that which would leave everything
as it is, have their answer ready
at hand; they imagine the matter
is settled with referring woman to
her "natural calling." They forget
that, to-day, for reasons later to be
developed, millions of women are
wholly unable to fill that "natural
calling," so much insisted upon in
their behalf, of householders, breeders
and nurses of children; and that,
with other millions, the "calling" has
suffered extensive shipwreck-wedlock,
to them, having turned into a
yoke and into slavery, compelling
them to drag along their lives in
misery and want. Of course, this
fact concerns those "wise men" as
little as that other fact, that unnumbered
millions of women, engaged
in the several pursuits of life, are
compelled, often in unnatural ways,
and far beyond the measure of their
strength, to wear themselves out
in order to eke out a meager existence.
At this unpleasant fact those
"wise men" stuff their ears, and they
shut their eyes with as much
violence as they do before the
misery of the working class, consoling
their selves and others with "it has
ever been, and will ever remain so."
That woman has the right to share the
conquests of civilization achieved
in our days; to utilize these to the
easing and improving of her condi-
tion; and to develop her mental and
physical faculties, and turn them
to advantage as well as man, -they
will none of that. Are they told
that woman must also be economically,
in order to be physically and
intellectually free, to the end that
she no longer depend upon the
"good-will" and the "mercy" of the
other sex?-forthwith their patience
is at end; their anger is kindled;
and there follows a torrent of violent
charges against the "craziness of
the times," and the "insane emancipa-
tional efforts."

These are the Philistines of male
and female sex, incapable of find-
ing their way out of the narrow
circle of their prejudices. It is the
breed of the owls, to be found everywhere
when day is breaking, and they
cry out in affright when a ray of
light falls upon their comfortable
darkness.

Another element among the
adversaries of the movement cannot
shut its eyes before the glaring facts.
This element admits that there
was hardly a time when a larger
number of women found themselves
in so unsatisfactory a condition
as to-day, relatively to the degree of
general civilization; and they admit
that it is therefore necessary to
inquire how the condition of woman
can be improved, in so far as she
remains dependent upon herself.
To this portion of our adversaries,

p.3 Introduction

the Social Question seems solved
for those women who have entered
the haven of matrimony.

In keeping with their views, this
element demands that, to unmarried
woman, at least, all fields of work,
for which her strength and facul-
ties are adequate, shall be opened,
to the end that she may enter the
competitive field for work with man.
A small set goes even further,
and demands that competition for
work be not limited to the field of
the lower occupations, but should
also extend higher, to the professions,
to the field of art and science.
This set demands the admission of
woman to all the higher institutions
of learning, namely, the univer-
sities, which in many countries are
still closed to her. Their admission
is advocated to the classes of several
branches of study, to the medical
profession, to the civil service
(the Post Office, telegraph and railroad
offices), for which they consider
women peculiarly adapted; and they
point to the practical results that
have been attained, especially in the
United States, through the employment
of woman. The one and the
other also make the demand that
political rights be conferred upon
woman. Woman, they admit, is
human and a member of the State,
as well as man: legislation, until now
in the exclusive control of man,
proves that lie exploited the privilege
to his own exclusive benefit, and
kept woman in every respect under
guardianship, a thing to be hence-
forth prevented.

It is noteworthy that the efforts
here roughly sketched, do not
reach beyond the frame-work of
the existing social order. The question
never is put whether, these objects
being attained, any real and thor-
oughgoing improvement in the
condition of woman will have been
achieved. Standing on the ground
of bourgeois, that is, of the capital-
ist social order, the full social equality
of man and woman is considered
the solution of the question. These
folks are not aware, or they slide
over the fact that, in so far as the
unrestricted admission of woman to
the industrial occupations is concerned,
the object has already been
actually attained, and it meets with the
strongest support on the part
of the ruling class, who, as will be
shown further on, find therein their
own interest. Under existing conditions,
the admission of women to
all industrial occupations can have for
its only effect that the competi-
tive struggle of the working people
become ever sharper, and rage ever
more fiercely. Hence the inevitable
result, -the lowering of income
for female and male labor, whether
this income be in the form of wage
or salary.

That this solution cannot be the right
one is clear. The full civic
equality of woman is, however, not
merely the ultimate object of the
men, who, planted upon the existing
social order, favor the efforts in
behalf of woman. It is also recognized
by the female bourgeois, active

Posted: 13 Aug 2005 10:23 pm Post subject:

Dave - visual check ... your last post stopped in the middle of a sentence.

Posted: 14 Aug 2005 12:11 am Post subject:

I'm staying with the original pagnation or else I would never be able to pick up the thread. Had you read this book before? Hard to believe that this was from the 33rd edition of Bebel's work.

I wanted to do this OCR if only because the book is falling apaprt and I don't know if it's still available.

Posted: 14 Aug 2005 12:13 am Post subject:

p. 4 Introduction

in the Woman Movement. These,
together with the males of their
mental stamp, stand, accordingly,
with their demands in contrast to
the larger portion of the men, who
oppose them, partly out of~ old-
fogy narrowness, partly also--in so
far as the admission of woman to
the higher studies and the better-paid
public positions is concerned-out
of mean selfishness, out of fear of
competition. A difference In princi-
pie, however, a class difference,
such as there is between the working
and the capitalist class, does not exist
between these two sets of male
and female citizens.

Let the by no means impossible case
be imagined that the represent-
atives of the movement for the civic
rights of woman carry through
all their demands for placing woman
upon an equal footing with man.
What then? Neither the slavery, which
modern marriage amounts to
for numberless women, nor prostitution,
nor the material dependence
of the large majority of married
women upon their marital lords, would
thereby be removed. For the large
majority of women it is, indeed,
immaterial whether a thousand, or
ten thousand, members of their own
sex, belonging to the more favored
strata of society, land in the higher
branches of learning, the practice of
medicine, a scientific career, or some
government office. Nothing is thereby
changed in the total condition
of the sex.

The mass of the female sex suffers
in two respects: On the one side
woman suffers from economic and
social dependence upon man. True
enough, this dependence may be
alleviated by formally placing her
upon an equality before the law,
and in point of rights; but the depend-
ence is not removed. On the other
side, woman suffers from the eco-
nomic dependence that woman in
general, the working-woman in particu-
lar, finds herself in, along with the
workingman.

Evidently, all women, without
difference of social standing, have
an interest-as the sex that in the
course of social development has
been oppressed, and ruled, and
defiled by man-in removing such a state
of things, and must exert themselves
to change it, in so far as it can
be changed by changes in the laws
and institutions within the frame-
work of the present social order.
But the enormous majority of
women is furthermore interested
in the most lively manner in that the
existing State and social order be
radically transformed, to the end
that both wage-slavery, under
which the working-women deeply pine,
and sex slavery, which is Intimately
connected with our property and
industrial systems, be wiped out.

The larger portion by far of the
women in society, engaged in the
movement for the emancipation of
woman, do not see the necessity for
such a radical change. Influenced,
by their privileged social standing,
they see In the more far-reaching
working-women's movement dangers,

p. 5 Introduction

not infrequently abhorrent aims,
which they feel constrained to
Ignore, eventually even to resist.
The class-antagonism, that in the
general social movement rages
between the capitalist and the working
class, and which, with the ripening
of conditions, grows sharper and
more pronounced, turns up likewise
on the surface of the Woman's
Movement; and it finds its corresponding
expression in the aims and.
tactics of those engaged in it.

All the same, the hostile sisters have,
to a far greater extent than
the male population-split up as the
latter is in the class struggle-a.
number of points of contact, on which
they can, although marching
separately, strike jointly. This happens
on all the fields, on which
the question is the equality of woman
with man, within modern so-
ciety. This embraces the participation
of woman in all the fields of
human activity, for which her strength
and faculties are fit; and also
her full civil and political equality with man.
These are very im-
portant, and as will be shown further on,
very extensive fields. Be-
sides all this the working woman has
also a special interest in doing
battle band in hand with the male
portion of the working class, for all
the means and institutions that may
protect the working woman from
physical and moral degeneration,
and which promise to secure to her
the vitality and fitness necessary
for motherhood and for the education
of children. Furthermore, as already
indicated, it is the part of the
working-woman to make common
cause with the male members of her
class and of her lot in the struggle
for a radical transformation of so-
ciety, looking to the establishment
of such conditions as may make
possible the real economic and
spiritual independence of both sexes, by
means of social institutions that
afford to all a full share in the en-
joyment of all the conquests of
civilization made by mankind.

The goal, accordingly, is not merely
the realization of the equal rights
of woman with man within present
society, as is aimed at by the bour-
geois woman emancipationists.
It lies beyond,-the removal of all im-
pediments that make man dependent
upon man; and, consequently,
one sex upon the other. Accordingly,
this solution of the Woman Ques-
tion coincides completely with the
solution of the Social Question. It
follows that he who aims at the
solution of the Woman Question to its
full extent, is necessarily bound
to go hand in hand with those who have
inscribed upon their banner the
solution of the Social Question as a
question of civilization for the
whole human race. These are the So-
cialists, that is, the Social Democracy.

Of all existing parties in Germany,
the Social Democratic Party is
the only one which has placed in its
programme the full equality of
woman, her, emancipation from all
dependence and oppression. And the
party has done so, not for agitational
reasons, but out of necessity,

p.6 Introduction

out of principle. There can be no
emancipation of humanity without the
social independence and equality
of the sexes.

Up to this point all Socialists are
likely to agree with the presenta-
tion made of fundamental principles.
But the same cannot be said on
the subject of the manner in which
we portray the ultimate aims to
ourselves; how the measures and
special institutions shall be shaped
which will establish the aimed-at
independence and equality of all mem-
bers of the sexes, consequently
that of man and woman also.

The moment the field of the known
is abandoned, and one launches
out into pictures of future forms,
a wide field is opened for speculation.
Differences of opinion start over
that which is probable or not probable.
That which in that direction is set
forth in this book can, accordingly,
be taken only as the personal opinion
of the author himself; possible
attacks must be directed against him
only; only he is responsible.

Attacks that are objective, and are
honestly meant, will be welcome
to us. Attacks that violate truth in
the presentation of the contents of
this book, or that rest upon false
premises we shall ignore. For the rest,
in the following pages all conclusions,
even the extremest, will be
drawn, which, the facts being verified,
the results attained may warrant.
Freedom from prejudice is the first
condition f or the recognition of truth.
Only the unrestricted utterance of that
which is, and must be, leads to the
goal.

(End of Introduction)

Posted: 14 Aug 2005 02:30 pm Post subject:

p.7

PART 1

WOMAN IN THE PAST

p.8 (blank)

p. 9

CHAPTER I.

BEFORE CHRISTIANITY

Woman and the workingman have,
since old, had this in common-
oppression. The forms of oppression
have suffered changes in the course
of time, and in various countries. But
the oppression always remained.
Many a time and oft, in the course of
the ages, did the oppressed become
conscious of their oppression; and such
conscious knowledge of their
condition did bring on changes and reliefs.
Nevertheless, a knowledge,
that grasped the actual feature of the
oppression by grasping its causes,
is, with woman as with the workingman,
the fruit of our own days. The
actual feature of society, and of the
laws that lie at the bottom of its
development, had first to be known,
before a general movement could
take place for the removal of conditions,
recognized as oppressive and
unjust. The breadth and intensity of
such a movement depends, how-
ever, upon the measure of the
understanding prevalent among the suf-
fering social layers and circles, and
upon the measure of freedom of
motion that they enjoy. In both respects,
woman stands, through cus-
tom and education, as well as the freedom
allowed her by law, behind
the workingman. To this, another
circumstance is added. Conditions,
lasting through a long series of
generations, finally grow into custom;
heredity and education then cause
such conditions to appear on both sides
as "natural." Hence it comes that,
even to-day, woman in particular,
accepts her subordinate position as a
matter of course. It is no easy
matter to make her understand that
that position is unworthy, and that
it is her duty to endeavor to become
a member of society, equal-righted
with, and in every sense a peer of man.

However much in common woman
may be shown to have with the
workingman, she leads him in one
thing: -Woman was the first human
being to come into bondage: she
was a slave before the male slave existed.

All social dependence and oppression
has its roots in the economic
dependence of the oppressed upon
the oppressor. In this condition woman
finds herself, from an early day
down to our own. The history of the
development of human society
proves the fact everywhere.
The knowledge of the history of this
development is, however, compar-
atively new. As little as the myth of
the Creation of the World-as
taught us by the Bible-can be upheld
in sight of the investigations of
geographers and scientists, grounded
as these investigations are upon
unquestionable and innumerable facts,
just so untenable has its myth
proved concerning the creation and
evolution of man. True enough, as

Posted: 14 Aug 2005 02:45 pm Post subject:

I HAVE BEEN ADJUSTING AND READJUSTING THE TEXT SIZE SO THAT IT WILL APPEAR IN THE COLUMN AS IT IS IN THE BOOK. IF IT IS TOO SMALL TO READ GO TO VIEW IN YOUR BROWSER AND INCREASE THE TEXT SIZE OR IF THE TEXT LINES BREAK BEFORE THE LINE ENDS IN THE BOOK DECREASE THE SIZE SO IT FITS ON ONE LINE. DAVE

The page above is poetry to me. But still note the male dominant language:

"Hence it comes that, even to-day, woman in particular, accepts her subordinate position as a matter of course. It is no easy matter to make her understand that that position is unworthy..."

Oh well. Progress (if only in language) has been made in the last 100 years but I don't think that such language in this book affects the underlying theme of equality of the sexes and liberation of the oppressed of both sexes.

dave

Posted: 15 Aug 2005 04:00 pm Post subject:

p. 10

yet the veil is far from being lifted
from all the sub-departments of this
historical development of mankind;
over many, on which already light
has been shed, differences of opinion
still exist among the investigators
on the meaning and connection of this
or that fact; nevertheless, on the
whole, there is agreement and clearness.
It is established that man did
not, like the first human couple of the
Bible, make his first appearance
on earth in an advanced stage of
civilization. He reached that plane
only in the course of endlessly long
lapses of time, after he had gradually
freed himself from purely animal conditions,
and had experienced long
terms of development, in the course of
which his social as well as his
sexual relations -the relations between
man and woman- had under-
gone a great variety of changes.

The favorite phrase -a phrase that
the ignorant or impostors daily
smite our ears with on the subject
of the relations between man and
woman, and between the poor and
the rich -"it always has been so,"
and the conclusion drawn therefrom
-it will always be so," is in every
sense of the word false, superficial
and trumped-up.

For the purposes of this work a cursory
presentation of the relations
between the sexes, since primitive society,
is of special importance. it
is so because it can thereby be proved that,
seeing that these relations
have materially changed in the previous
course of human development,
and that the changes have taken place in
even step with the existing sys-
tems of production, on the one hand,
and of the distribution of the
product of labor, on the other, it is natural
and goes without saying that,
along with further changes and revolutions
in the system of production
and distribution, the relations between the
sexes are bound to change
again. Nothing is "eternal," either in nature
or in human life; eternal
only is change and interchange.

As far back as one may go in the
development of human society, the
horde is found as the first human
community. True enough, Honeger
mentions in his "General History of
Civilization" that even to-day in
the little explored interior of the island
of Borneo, there are wild people,
living separately; and Huegel likewise
maintains that, in the wild moun-
tain regions of India, human couples
have been discovered living alone,
and who, ape-like, fled to the trees as
soon as they were met; but there
is no further knowledge on the subject.
If verified, these claims would
only confirm the previous superstition
and hypothesis concerning the devel-
opment of the human race. The probability
is that, wherever human
beings sprang up, there were, at first, single
couples. Certain it is, how-
ever, that so soon as a larger number of
beings existed, descended from
a common parent stock, they held
together in hordes in order that, by
their joint efforts, they might. first of all,
gain their still very primitive
conditions of life and support, as well as
to protect themselves against

p.11

their common enemies, wild animals.
Growing numbers and increased
difficulties in securing subsistence,
which originally consisted in roots,
berries and fruit, first led to the splitting
up or segmentation of the
hordes, and to the search for new habitats.

This almost animal-like state, of which
we have no further credible an-
tiquariari proofs, undoubtedly once existed,
judging from all that we
have learned concerning the several
grades of civilization of wild peoples
still living, or known to have lived within
historic times, Man did not,
upon the call of a Creator. step ready-made
into existence as a higher
product of civilization. It was otherwise.
He has had to pass through
the most varied stages in an endlessly long
and slow process of develop-
ment. Only via ebbing and flowing periods
of civilization, and in constant
differentiation with his fellows in all parts
of the world, and in all zones,
did he gradually climb up to his present height.

Indeed, while in one section of the earth's
surface great peoples and
nations belong to the most advanced stages
of civilization, other peoples
are found in different sections standing on
the greatest variety of grada-
tions in development. They thus present to
us a picture of our own past
history; and they point to the road which
mankind traversed in the
course of its development. If but certain
common and generally accepted
data are established, that may serve
everywhere as sign-posts to guide
investigation, a mass of facts will follow,
throwing a wholly new light
upon the relations of man in the past
and the present. A number of
social phenomena-unintelligible to us today,
and attacked by superficial
judges as nonsensical, not infrequently even
as "immoral" -will become
clear and natural. A material lifting of the
veil, formerly spread over
the history of the development of our race,
has been effected through
the investigations made, since Bachofen,
by a considerable number of
scientists, like Tyler. MacLennan, Lubbock
and others. Prominently
among the men who joined these was
Morgan, with his fundamental work,
that Frederick Engels further substantiated
and supplemented with a
series of historical facts, economic and
political in their nature, and that,
more recently. has been partly confirmed
and partly rectified by Cunow. (see footnote 1)

Page 11 Footnote 1 by Bebel

Bachofen’s book appeared in 1861
under the title, "Das Mutterrecht”
(Mother-right) "Eine Untersuchung
ueher die Gynaekokratie der Alten Welt
nach ihrer rellgioesen und rechtlichen Natur,"
Stuttgart, Krais & Hoffmann.
Morgan's fundamental work. "Ancient
Society," appeared in a German trans-
lation In 1891, J. H. W. Dietz, Stuttgart.
From the same publisher there
appeared In German: `The Origin of the
Family, of Private Property and
the State in support of Lewis H.
Morgan's Investigations," by Frederick
Engels. Fourth enlarged edition,
1892. Also "Die Verwandtschafts-Organ-
isationen der Austraineger.
En Beitrag zur Entwickelungageachichte der
Familie," by Heinrich Cunew, 1894.

Footnote Comment by DeLeon:

(The perspective into which the
Pleides of distinguished names are
thrown in the text just above is apt
to convey an incorrect impression and
the impression Is not materially corrected
in the subsequent references to
them Neither Bachofen, nor yet
Tyler, McLennan or Lubbock contributed
to the principles that now are canons
In ethnology. They were not even
path-finders, valuable though their works are,

Bachofen collected, in his work entitled
"Das Mutterrecht," the gleanings
of vast and tireless researches among
the writings of the ancients, with an
eye to female authority. Subsequently,
and helping themselves more par-
ticularly to the more recent contributions
to archeology, that partly dealt
with living aborigines, Taylor,
McLennan and Lubbock produced
respectively,
“Early History of Mankind;" "Primitive
Marriage;" and "Pre-Historic
Times" and "Origin of Civilization."
These works, though partly theoretic,
yet are mainly descriptive. By an
effort of genius-like the wood-pecker,
whose instinct tells It the desired worm
is beneath the bark and who pecks
at and round about-all these men,
Bachofen foremost, scented sense in the
seeming nonsense of ancient traditions,
or surmised significance in the more
recently ascertained customs of living
aborigines. But again, like the wood-
pecker, that has struck a bark too thick
for Its bill, these men could not
solve the problem they were at.
They lacked the information to pick, and
they had not, nor were they so situated
as to furnish themselves with, the key
to open the lock. Morgan furnished the key.

Lewis Henry Morgan, born in Aurora, N. Y,
November 21, 1818, and
equipped with vast scholarship and
archeological Information, took up his
residence among the Iroquois
Indians, by whom, the Hawk gens of the
Seneca tribe, he was eventually
adopted. The fruit of his observations
there and among other Indian tribes
that he visited even west of the Mis-
sissippi, together with simultaneous
information sent him by the Amer-
ican missionaries In the Sandwich Islands,
was a series of epoch-making
works, "The League of the Iroquois,"
"Systems of Consanguinity and Affinity
of the Human Family," and "Ancient Society,"
which appeared in 1877. A
last and not least valuable work was
his "Houses and Houselife of the
American Aborigines." A solid
foundation was now laid for the science
of ethnology and anthropology.
The problem was substantially solved.

The robust scientific mind of Karl
Marx promptly absorbed the revelations
made by Morgan, and he
recast his own views accordingly. A serious
ethnological error had crept into
his great work, "Capital," two editions of
which had been previously published
in. German between 1863-1873. A foot-
note by Frederick Engels (p. 344,
Swan, Sonnenschein & Co., English edition,
1886) testifies to the revolution Morgan's
works had wrought on the eth-
nological conceptions of the founder of
Socialist economics and sociology.

Subsequently, Frederick Engels, planted
squarely on the principles estab-
lished by Morgan, issued a series of
brilliant monographs, in which, equipped
with the key furnished by Morgan and
which Engels' extensive economic
and sociologic knowledge enabled him
to wield with deftness, be explained
interesting social phenomena among
the ancients, and thereby greatly en-
riched the literature of social science.

Finally, Heinrich Cunow, though imagining
to perceive some minor flaws
In some secondary parts of Morgan's
theory, placed himself In absolute ac-
cord with the body of Morgan's real work,
as stated later In the text In a
quotation from Cunow; and, following
closely in Morgan's footsteps, made
and published interesting independent
researches on the system of consan-
guinity among the Austral-Negros.
-THE TRANSLATOR.)

End of Footnote Comment by DeLeon

Posted: 15 Aug 2005 11:08 pm Post subject:

p. 12

By means of these expositions
-especially as clearly and lucidly pre-
sented by Frederick Engels, in his
support of Morgan's excellent and
fundamental work,-a mass of light
is shed upon hitherto unintelligible,
partly seemingly contradictory phenomena
in the life of the races and
tribes of both high and low degree of
culture. Only now do we gain an
insight into the structure that human
society raised in the course of
time. According thereto, our former
views of marriage, the family, the
community, the State, rested upon
notions that were wholly false; so
false that they turn out to be no better
than a fancy-picture, wholly de-
void of foundation in fact.

p. 13

All that is said and proved about
marriage, the family, the community
and the State holds good especially
with regard to woman, who, in the
various periods of development did
likewise fill a place, that differs
materially from the "eternal,"
imputed to her.

Morgan, whom Engels agrees with
in this, divides the history of man-
kind into three main epochs :
-savagery, barbarism and civilization.
Each of the two first ones he again
divides into an under, a middle and
an upper period, each distinguishing
itself from the other by certain
innovations and improvements,
predicated in each instance upon the
control over subsistence. Morgan,
accordingly, exactly in the sense of
the materialist conception of history,
as established by Karl Marx and
Frederick Engels,-perceives the
leading characteristics in the develop-
ment of society to be the changes
that, in given epochs, the conditions of
life are molded into; and he perceives
the changes to be due to the prog-
ress made in the process of production,
that is to say, in the procurement
o~ subsistence. Summed up in a few
words, the lower period of savagery
constitutes the infancy of the human
race, during which the race, partly
living in trees, is mainly nourished
by fruits and roots, and during which
articulate language takes its inception.
The middle period of savagery
commences with the acquisition of
a fish subsistence, and the use of fire.
The construction of weapons begins;
at first the club and spear, fashioned
out of wood and stone. Thereby also
begins the chase, and probably also
war with contiguous hordes for
the sources of food, for domiciles and
hunting grounds. At this stage
appears also cannibalism, still prac-
ticed to-day by some tribes and peoples
of Africa, Australia and Poly-
nesia. The upper period of savagery is
characterized by the perfection
of weapons to the point of the bow
and arrow; finger weaving, the making
of baskets out of filaments of bark,
the fashioning of sharpened stone
tools have here their start, and thereby
begins also the preparation of
wood for the building of boats and huts.
The form of life has, accord-
ingly, become many-sided. The existing
tools and implements, nei~1ed
for the control of a plentiful food supply,
make possible the subsistence
of larger communities.

The lower period of barbarism Morgan
starts with the invention of the
art of pottery. The taming and
domestication of animals, and, along
with that, the production of meat
and milk, and the preparation of hides,
horns and hair for various purposes
of use, have here their start. Hand
in hand therewith begins the cultivation
of plants,-in the West of maize,
in the East of almost all known cereals,
maize excepted. The middle
period of barbarism shows us, in the
East, the ever more extensive domes-
tication of animals; in the West, the
cultivation of maize and plants by
irrigation. Here also begins the use
of adobe-bricks and of stone for house-
building The domestication of animals
promotes the rearing of herds,

Posted: 16 Aug 2005 12:28 am Post subject:

p. 14

and leads to the pastoral life. The
necessity of larger quantities of food
for men and beasts leads to field
agriculture. Along therewith, the peo-
ple begin to be localized; food increases
in quantity and diversity, and
gradually cannibalism disappears.

The upper period of barbarism begins
finally with the smelting of iron
ore, and the discovery of the phonetic
alphabet. The iron plow-share is
invented, making possible agriculture
on a larger scale; the iron axe
and spade are brought into requisition,
making easy the clearing of the
forests. With the preparation of iron,
a number of fields are opened to
activity, imparting to life a new form.
Iron utensils help the building
of houses, vessels and weapons;
with the preparation of metals arises
skilled handwork, a more perfect
knowledge of weapons, and the building
of walled cities. Architecture, as
an art, then rises; mythology, poetry
and history find support and expansion
in the discovery of the phonetic
alphabet.

The Orient and the countries bordering
on the Mediterranean, partic-
ularly Egypt, Greece and Italy, are those
in which the last sketched stage
of life principally unfolded; and it laid
the foundation for the social
transformation that in the course of time
exercised a determining influ-
ence on the social development of
Europe and of the whole earth.
As a matter of course, the social
development of the human race
through the periods of savagery and
barbarism had also its peculiar
sexual and social relations, differing
materially from those of later days.
Bachofen and Morgan have traced
these relations by means of thorough
investigations. Bachofen, by studying
closely all ancient and modern
writings, so as to arrive at the nature of
phenomena that appear singular
to us in mythology, folk-lore~ and historic
tradition, and that, neverthe-
less, seem to be re-echoed in incidents
and events of later days, occa-
sionally even of our own. Morgan, by
spending decades of his life among
~the Iroquois Indians, located in the
State of New York, and thereby
making observations, through which
he gained new and unexpected in~.
sight into the system of life, the family
and the relationships of the said
Indian tribe, and, based upon which,
observations made elsewhere, first
received their correct interpretation
and explanation.
Both of them, Bachofen and Morgan,
discovered, each along his own
line of research, the latter, however,
far more clearly than the former,
that the relations of the sexes during~
primitive times of human develop-
ment were substantially different
from the relations existing in historic
days, and among the modern civilized
peoples. Especially did Morgan
discover-thanks to his many years'
sojourn among the Iroquois of
North America, and grounded upon
comparative studies, which he was
moved to by that which he there
observed,-that all the existing races,
that are still materially backward,
possess systems of family and con-

p. 15

sanguinity that are totally different
from ours, but must be similar to
those once prevalent among all races
during the previous stages of civi-
lization.

Morgan found, at the time that he lived
among the Iroquois, that
among them there existed a system of
monogamy, easily dissolvable by
both parties, and which he designated
as the "pairing family." He also
found that the terms for the degrees of
consanguinity-father, mother,
son, daughter, brother, sister-although,
according to our conception,
there can be no doubt as to their
application, were there, nevertheless,
applied in quite different sense.
The Iroquois calls not only his own
children "sons" and "daughters,"
but also the children of all his brothers;
and their children call him "father."
Conversely, the female Iroquois
calls not only her own children "sons"
and "daughters," but all those of
her sisters, and likewise do their
children call her "mother." On the
other hand, she calls the children of her
brothers "nephews" and "nieces,"
and these call her "aunt." The children
of brothers call one another
"brothers" and "sisters;" likewise the
children of sisters. Finally, the
children of a woman and those of her
brother call one another "cousins."
Accordingly, the singular spectacle is
seen of the terms of relationship
going, not as in our sense, by the degree
of consanguinity, but by the sex
of the relative.

This system of relationship is in
full force, not only among all the
American Indians, as well as among
the aborigines of India, the tribes
of Dekan and the Gaura tribes of
Hindostan, but, according to the investi-
gations that have taken place since
Bachofen, similar conditions must
have existed everywhere in primitive
times, as they still exist to-day
among many peoples of Upper and
Further Asia, Africa and Australia.
When, in connection with these
investigations and established facts, the
investigation will be everywhere
taken up on the sex and family rela-
tions of wild and barbarous nations
still living, then will the fact trans-
pire that, what Bachofen still confusedly
found among numerous peoples
of antiquity, and rather surmised than
otherwise; what Morgan found
among the Iroquois; what Cunow found
among the Austral-Negros, are
but social and sexual formations,
that constitute the groundwork of
human development for all the
peoples of the earth.
The investigations of Morgan
bring, moreover, other interesting facts
to light. Although the "pairing family
of the Iroquois starts in insolv-
able contradiction with the terms of
consanguinity in use among them.
it turns out that, as late as the first half
of the 19th Century, there
existed on the Sandwich Islands (Hawaii)
a family-form that actually
`tallied with that which, among the
Iroquois, existed in name only. But
the system of consanguinity, in force in
Hawaii, failed, in turn, to tally
with the family-form actually in
existence there. It referred to an older

Posted: 16 Aug 2005 10:47 am Post subject:

p. 17

family-form, one still more primitive,
but no longer extant. There, all
the children of brothers and sisters,
without exception, were "brothers"
and "sisters." Accordingly, they were
not considered the common chil-
dren of their mothers and of the sisters
of these, or of their fathers and
of the brothers, of these, but of all the
brothers and sisters of their
parents, without distinction. The
Hawaiian system of consanguinity
corresponded, accordingly, with a
stage of development that was lower
than the family-form still actually in
existence. Hence transpires the
curious fact that, in Hawaii, as with
the Indians of North America, two
distinct systems of consanguinity are,
or rather, at a time, were in vogue,
which no longer tallied with actual
conditions, but were both overtaken
by a higher state. On this head Morgan
says: "The family represents
an active principle. It is never stationary,
but advances from a lower
to a higher form as society advances
from a lower to a higher condition,
and finally passes out of one form into
another of higher grade. Sys-
tems of consanguinity, on the contrary,
are passive; recording the prog~
ress made by the family at long intervals
apart, and only changing rad-
ically when the family has radically changed."

The theory,-even to-day generally
considered conclusive, and which
is stubbornly `upheld `as irrefutable
by the representatives of the statu
qt~o-to the effect that the existing
family-form has existed since time
immemorial, and, lest the whole
social fabric be put in jeopardy, must
continue to exist forever, turned out,
accordingly, after these discoveries
of the investigators, to be wholly
false and untenable. The form, under
which the relations of the sexes appear
and the situation of the family is
raised, depends rather upon the social
conditions, upon the manner in
which man controls his subsistence.
The form changes with the changed
degree of culture at each given period.

The study of primitive history leaves
now no room for doubt that, at
the lowest grades of human development,
the relation of the sexes is
totally different from that of latter times,
and that a state of things
resulted therefrom, which, looked at
with modern eyes, appears as mon-
strous, and as a sink of immorality.
Nevertheless, as each social stage
of human development has its own
conditions of production, so likewise
has each its own code of morals,
which is but the reflection of the social
condition. That is moral which is
usage; and that, in turn, is usage
which, corresponds with the innermost
being, i.e., the needs of a given
period.

Morgan reaches the conclusion that,
at the lower period of savagery,
there was sexual intercourse between
the several grades or generations,
every woman belonging to every man,
and every man to every woman,
-in other words, promiscuity. All men
live in polygamy and all women
in polyandry, There is a general
community of women and of men, but

p. 18

also a community of children. Strabo
reports (sixty-six years before
our reckoning) that, among the Arabians,
brothers cohabited with sisters
and with their own mother. On any
route other than that of incest, the
increase of population i~ nowhere
possible, if, as alleged in the Bible
also, descent from one couple is granted.
The Bible itself contradicts
itself on this delicate point. It is stated
there that Cain, after he bad
murdered his brother Abel, took a wife
of another people. Whence came
that other people? The theory of
promiscuity in primitive times, that is
to say, that the horde was endogamous,
that sexual intercourse was in-
discriminate, is furthermore supported
by the Hindoo myth, according
to which Brahma married his own
daughter Saravasti. The same myth
turns up again among the Egyptians
and the northern Edda. The Egyp-
tian god Ammon was the spouse of
his own mother, and boasted of it.
Odin, according to the Edda, was the
mate of his own daughter Frigga.(see footnote 2)
Morgan proceeds from the principle
that, from the state of promiscuity,
soon a higher form of sexual intercourse
took shape. He designates this
the consanguine family. Here the
groups, that stand in sexual relation,
are separated by grades or generations,
so that grandfathers and grand-
mothers, within an age group, are
husbands and wives. Their children,
likewise, constitute a group of common
couples; likewise the children of
these, so soon as they have reached the
requisite age. Accordingly, in
contrast with the sex relations of the
rawest period, in which promiscuity
of sexes exists without distinction of
age, now one generation is excluded
from sexual intercourse with another.
Sexual intercourse, however, exists
between brothers and sisters, male
and female cousins of the first, second
and third remove. All of these
together are brothers and sisters, but
towards one another, they are all
husbands and wives. This family-form
corresponds with the system of
consanguinity that still existed in Hawaii
during the first part of the 19th Century,
in name only,~ but no longer
in fact. On the other hand,
according to the American I4Iian system of
consanguinity, a brother and sister can never
be the father and mother of
th~ same child-a thing, however,
permissible in the Hawaiian family
system. Probably the consanguine
family was the state that, at the time
of Herodotus, existed among the
Massagetae, on the subject of which
he reports: "Each man received a wife,
but all were allowed to use her."
And he continues: "At any time a man
desires a woman, he hangs his
quiver in front of his wagon, and
cohabits, unconcerned, with her.

Footnote 2:

In his book against us, Ziegler ridicules
the Idea of attributing to myths
any significance whatever in the
history of civilization. In that notion
stands betrayed the superficial nature
of so-called scientists. They do not
recognize what they do not see.
A deep significance lies at the bottom
of myths. They have grown out of the
people's soul; out of olden morals
and customs that have gradually
disappeared, and now continue to live
only In the myth. When we strike
facts that explain a myth we are In
possession of solid ground for its interpretation.

Posted: 23 Aug 2005 03:10 am Post subject:

p. 20

of the two could, however, enter into connections with the Mouse, the Emu, the Rat, or any other family."

This tradition is more sensible and natural, by a good deal, than the Christian tradition, taught by the Bible. It shows plainly the rise of the consanguine groups. Moreover, Paul Lafargue makes in the "Neue Zeit" the sagacious, and, as we think, felicitous point, that names, such as Adam and Eve, are not names of individual persons, but the names of gentes, in which, at the time, the Jews were joined. Lafargue solves by his argument a series of otherwise obscure and contradictory passages in the first Book of Moses. Again, M. Beer calls attention, likewise in the "Neue Zeit," that, to this (lay, it is a conjugal custom among Jews that the bride and the bridegroom's mother may not carry the same name, otherwise-thus runs the belief-a misfortune will befall the family: sickness and death will pursue them. In our opinion, this is a further proof for the correctness of Lafargue's theory. The gentile organization forbids marriage between persons that descend from the same gene stock. Such a common descent must be considered to exist, according to gentile principles, between the bride, that carries the name of "Eve," and the bridegroom's mother of the same name. Modern Jews, of course, have no longer the remotest suspicion of the real connection between their prejudice and their old gentile constitution, which forbade such marriages of relatives. The old gentile order had for its object to avoid the degenerating consequences of in-breeding. Although this gentile constitution has for thousands of years been destroyed among the Jews, tradition, as we see, has continued to live in superstition.

Quite possible, the experience, made at an early day with the breeding of animals, revealed the harmfulness of in-breeding. How far this experience went transpires from the manner in which, according to the first book of Moses, chap. 30, verse 32 and sequel, Jacob understood how to outwit his father-in-law Laban, by knowing how to encompass the birth of eanlings that were streaked and pied, and which, according to Laban's promises, were to be Jacob's. The old Israelites had, accordingly, long before Darwin, studied Darwinism.

Once upon the subject of the conditions existing among the old Jews, a few other facts are in order, clearly proving that, among them, descent in the female line was actually in force of old. True enough, on the subject of woman, I Moses, 3, 16, runs this wise: "And thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee;" and the verse also undergoes the variation: "the woman shall leave father and mother, and cleave to her husband." In point of fact, however, I Moses, 2, 24, has it this way: "Therefore shall a man leave his father and mother and shall cleave unto his wife, and they shall be one flesh." The same language recurs in Matthew 19, 15; Mark 10, 7, and in the Epistle to the Ephesians 5, 31. The

p. 21

command sprang, accordingly, from the system of descent in the female line, and the exegists, at a loss what to do with it, allowed it to appear in a light that is utterly false.

Descent in female line appears clearly also in IV Moses, 32, 41. It is there said that ,Jair had a father, who was of the tribe of Judah, but his mother was of the tribe of Manasseh, and Jair is expressly called the son of Manasseh, and he inherited in that tribe. Another instance of descent in the female line among the Jews is met in Nehemiah 7, 63. There the children of a priest, who took to wife one of the daughters of Barzillai-a ,Jewisli clan-are called children of Barzillai; they are, accordingly, not called after the father, who, moreover, as a priest occupied a privileged position, but after the mother. For the rest, already in the days of the Old Testament, accordingly, in historic times, the father-right prevailed among the Jews, and the clan and tribe organization rested on descent in the male hue. Accordingly, the daughters were shut off as heirs, as may be seen in I Moses 31, 14-15, where even Leah and Rachel, the daughters of Laban, complain: "Is there yet any portion or inheritance for us in our father's house? Are we not counted of him strangers? for he has sold us, and hath quite devoured also our money."

As happened with all peoples where descent in male replaced descent in female line, woman among the Jews stood wholly bereft of rights. Wedlock was marriage by purchase. On woman the obligation was laid of the strictest chastity: on the other hand. man was not bound by the same ordinance; he, moreover, was privileged to possess several wives. Did the husband, after the bridal night, believe to have found that his wife had, before marriage, lost her maidenhood, not only had he the right to cast her off, she was stoned to death, The same punishment fell upon the adulteress ; upon the husband, however, on1y in ease he constituted adultery with a married Jewish woman. According to V Moses 24, 1-4, the husband also had the right to east off his newly-married wife, if she found no favor in his eves, even if only out of dislike. He was then to write her a bill of divorcement, give it in her hand, and let her out of the house. An expression of the low position that woman took later among the Jews is furthermore found in the circumstances that, even to this day, woman attends divine service in the synagogue, in a. space strictly separated from the men, and they are not included in the prayers. (see foot note 3)

The relations of the sexes in the punaluan family consisted, according to Morgan, in one or more sisters, belonging to one family group, marry-

FOOTNOTE 3: In the oldest ward of the City of Prague, there is a small synagogue that comes down from the sixth century of our reckoning, and is said to be the oldest synagogue in Germany, If the visitor steps down about seven steps into the half dark space, ho discovers in the opposite wall several target- like openings that lead into a completely dark room. To the question, where these openings lead to our leader answered: "To the woman's compartment, whence they witness the service." The modern synagogues are much more cheerfully arranged, but the separation of the women from the men is preserved.

Posted: 10 Oct 2005 10:46 am Post subject:

Sorry I haven't posted any more of the book here. Personal issues abound. In a month I hope I'll be able to get back to the project.

dave

Posted: 11 Oct 2005 05:12 am Post subject:

We need a new home for big posts. It mades a MySQL database difficult to manage. Several alternatives. Remember that even .txt files work properly on the web.

Posted: 11 Oct 2005 10:24 pm Post subject:

I will put the files on my site and when I post a new file I'll put a link here.

If someone posts something do you have the ability to delete it without much problem? When I move them to my site I'll put a link here and you can delete all the old ones. Would it be too crazy if I posted new items here and then when I post something newer for you to delete the older one?

dave

Posted: 12 Oct 2005 04:06 am Post subject:

Sure, my admin user i.d. has a delete button above every post, but don't you also have a delete button above each of your own posts? If someone is signed in with a password, they're supposed to see a button with an X located to the upper-right above each of their own posts, but not the posts of any other user.

Posted: 12 Oct 2005 10:50 pm Post subject:

Yes and no. We have a delete x for our own posts only if our post is the last post. Once someone else posts something else, the delete xc disappears. But this will work out. As soon as I get the stuff over on my site I'll let you know and then you can delete everything except the last bebel post. When I post something new I will ask you to delete the previous post that way only the latest pages will be on your site.

dave

Posted: 13 Oct 2005 03:37 am Post subject:

Okay.
By the way, you never posted page 19. You jumped from 18 to 20.

Posted: 13 Oct 2005 11:47 am Post subject:

How dare you point out my inconsistencies.

Posted: 15 Oct 2005 02:13 am Post subject:

Are such topics as the forms of marriage in ancient society really relevant to the modern socialist movement?

Posted: 16 Oct 2005 01:58 am Post subject:

What a great question.

And back up a little and consider what is meant by the word "relevant".

In the law, like in a criminal case - something is relevant that if true either increases or decreases the possibility that some act was committed or not committed.

Does knowing about the rudiments of social systems other than capitalism better help us to understand the structure of capitalism?

I do believe that it does- of late it has been especially relevant if only for all this crap floating around about the "sanctity of the one man one woman marriage relationship and that the present family structure has been literally handed down since Adam. Yes, it helps us to understand better that the society is constantly in a state of change and always has been.

dave

Posted: 16 Oct 2005 08:17 am Post subject:

Also, the need to end the patriarchal structure has been served by these studies of Morgan, et al. By the way - interesting thing - a few weeks ago the Catholic Church announced that the scene in Genesis 3 where God tells Eve (womankind), "your husband shall rule over you," is no longer considered one of the religious truths, but is merely one of the allegorical additions that got stuck in there due to the beliefs of the times. So it does seem to put developmental pressures on social institutions when people ponder the fact that domestic relations are historically conditioned and not "human nature."

I assume, likewise, that learning that property institutions have been historically established and conditioned helps to make the point that capitalism isn't "human nature."

Posted: 16 Oct 2005 12:06 pm Post subject:

flux was the word that I was thinking of. The norm in social relationships and institutions is (or at least seems to me to be) developmental (dialectical) change.

dave

Posted: 16 Oct 2005 06:45 pm Post subject:

For the flux to be meaningful it has to be directional and not random. If there is an identifiable order or pattern, then the scientific method can be used in history. Not only in archaeology, anthropology, etc., which provide evidence, but also in the underlying subject matter. However, if we ask "mainstream" historians to list a few of the "laws of history", they are very hesitant. How could a person make a lifetime study and not be able to identify a half dozen general conclusions? Many historians accept the idea of cause and effect only in the narrowest terms, like citing the assassination of Franz Ferdinand in 1914 as "one of the contributing causes" of a war. But just try to get them to talk about causality and directionality in a wider sense, encompassing all of economics, politics, science, art, philosophy, religion, and family structure. Marxian historiography does this.

Posted: 16 Oct 2005 09:14 pm Post subject:

It might do that but i am uncomfortable even thinking that it does except for piece at a time.

Many do not even acknowledge the flux - in the menatality of "the more things change the more they stay the same."

dave

Posted: 17 Oct 2005 04:11 am Post subject:

Mr. Spacely rules over George Jetson in the same way that Mr. Slate rules over Fred Flintstone.