The problem of ‘divine hiddenness’ arises from the lack of an explanation for why an all-loving God would choose not to make his existence evident. I argue that Kant provides a compelling solution to this problem in an often overlooked passage located near the end of the second Critique. Kant’s suggestion is that God’s revealing himself would preclude the development of virtue because we would lose the experience of conflict between self-interest and the moral law. I provide a reconstruction and defence of Kant’s argument, and I explain why it is consistent with his overall position in the second Critique.

Marx holds that capitalism is exploitative, but not unjust. Kant crafted a theory of right that explains why human beings are treated unjustly when the social system deprives them of the conditions of a free life. This essay attempts to relate Kant’s and Marx’s views to one another and to the capitalist social system, which these two thinkers studied at different stages of development. The economic and social theories of Fichte and Hegel are also employed to help make sense of the points of agreement and of disagreement between Kant and Marx concerning the ways modern capitalism deprives workers of freedom and whether this deprivation should be condemned as unjust.

In §76 of the third Critique, Kant claims that an intuitive understanding would represent no distinction between possible and actual things. Prior interpretations of §76 take Kant to claim that an intuitive understanding would produce things merely in virtue of thinking about them and, thus, could not think of merely possible things. In contrast, I argue that §76’s modal claims hinge on Kant’s suggestion that God represents things in their thoroughgoing determination, including in their connection to God’s actual will. I conclude by using my interpretation to argue that §76’s modal claims do not entail Spinozism.

This article examines Kant’s and Marx’s analysis of religion in its relation to human emancipation. It highlights some important affinities in their accounts of human nature and their critique of religious authority including: the emphasis on freedom as distinguishing human beings from other species, the relation between moral and political progress, the critique of revealed religion, the role of political community and the importance of ethical community to achieve moral emancipation.