Almost the entire philosophical edge found in Marxism is due to Hegel and this fact is particularly evident
in the specific terminology that Marx adopted from Hegel. Marx's system of "dialectical materialism" (or "historical
materialism") is obviously indebted to Hegel's focus on reality as a continuous historical process where the dialectic
is the key to understanding this historical change. In his introduction to 'The Communist Manifesto,' Gareth Jones notes,
however, that it was the writings of another Left-Hegelian, Ludwig Feuerbach, that eventually guided Marx to his eventual
break with Hegel's Idealism. Jones declares that is from Feuerbach that "Marx adopted the notion that Hegelian idealism
needed only to be 'reversed' or 'inverted' to become true." Contrasted to Hegel's idealism and dialectic, Feuerbach instead
embraced, respectively, materialism and metaphysics. Marx took the dialectic change from Hegel and the materialism of Feuerbach
and reshuffled them to come up with the novel combination of "dialectical materialism." Instead of the dialectic
being relegated solely to the Spirit, Marx brought it back to earth. Hegel had not recognized the development found in nature
or society and left it up to Marx to turn him on his head.
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