In the years 1843 and 1844 Marx was influenced by the work of Ludwig Feuerbach, a critic of Christianity. Feuerbach saw religion as an alienated projection of humanity. In 1843 Marx wrote a piece entitled The Critique of Hegel's Philosophy of Right. In this essay Marx openly expresses his feelings towards religion. For Marx, men create religion and not vice versa. “Religion is in fact the self-awareness and self-esteem of man who has not yet conquered himself, or has not already lost himself”. Because man in his task of realizing himself created this supernatural fantasy that would help him justify and console himself. Due to man's physical limitations and the inability to overcome life events and inevitable situations, man has come to the need to create a religion, which according to Marx is “the expression of true suffering and a protest against real suffering. Religion is the gaze of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world and the soul of soulless conditions.” Religion was a chain that oppressed men, and it was when they freed themselves from those chains that he thought, acted and shaped his reality. For Marx, religion itself was not evil, but he believed that religion blinds people and prevents them from seeing the truth about men. their struggles. In the Communist Manifesto, Marx argued that ideologies, religious beliefs and philosophies are created from the point of view of the dominant power.