As far as the relation between Olympism and religion is concerned, Coubertin, unlike many of his followers who try to conceal the true nature of modern Olympism, is crystal clear: "The first essential characteristic of ancient and of modern Olympism alike is that of being a religion."(1) Departing from Compte's philosophy, Coubertin seeks to establish a new spiritual system which will correspond to the Social Darwinist and progressistic spirit of capitalism, "incorporate" all social (class) contradictions that prevent the development of capitalism and enable its limitless global expansion. It is the creation of a "dynamic religion" (Brundage) which, apart from being efficient in establishing "social peace" and introducing "control in heads" (Coubertin), is capable of "overcoming" the existing (static) religions (discarding their emancipatory heritage) since it is not limited by a certain way of life and by national cultures, but springs from a "dynamic", universal and totalitarian spirit of capitalist globalism. Bearing in mind the spiritual sources of the Olympic idea, we can conclude that Olympism is a formulated, and by way of the Olympic movement and the Olympic Games, realized positive religion, which is "analogous to positive philosophy" (Prokop) and which should, in the Modern Age, play the part of traditional religion in the Middle Ages. Olympism becomes a spiritual firmament from which derives all "humanism" and which offers final answers to the crucial questions of human existence. Hence, to speak of Olympism means to glorify it. At the same time, Olympism erases the difference between religious and secular spheres: life itself becomes a service to the Olympic gods. Modern Olympism tends to be an indisputable spiritual power to which man serves not only through contemplation, meditation, prayers and kneeling, but, like in antiquity, through his regular agonistic activism. Life as a constant struggle between people, nations and races for a place under the sun - that is the essence of Olympic piety. In that sense, sport is an idealized form of the "true" life, while the Olympic Games are a symbolic incarnation of the spiritual and active unity of the world. Bearing in mind Coubertin's endeavour to eliminate critical rationalism and the emancipatory heritage of mankind, it can be said that it is a peculiar totalitarian thought as well as a totalitarian spiritual and political movement. Olympism becomes a "black hole" in which all hints of stepping out of the existing world are to disappear.

Olympism and Christianity

Modern Olympism is not an attempt to create "new Christianity", which was advocated by Saint-Simon, (2) but new paganism: Hellenic civilization is the (idealized and distorted) spiritual source and foundation of Olympism. Coubertin wishes to turn Olympism into a religion analogous to ancient paganism, which completely integrates man into its spiritual orbit and eliminates the possibility of his (critical-changing) relation to the existing world. The Olympic Games become the highest religious ceremony dedicated to the creation and glorification of the cult of the present world, which means its basic principles.
Coubertin is not satisfied with Christianity because (with its ideas of man as "a God's being", and of a "better world", "equality", "brotherhood"...) represents a contrast to the Social Darwinist doctrine and progressistic spirit, the pillars of the capitalist order. More importantly, Christianity was not efficient enough in preventing revolutions, upheavals and uprisings, which shook Europe in the end of 18th and during 19th century, especially in suppressing and controlling the ever more numerous, more organized and politically conscious proletariat, which won the right to claim power by legal means. Hence the need for a more efficient religion which will correspond to the "new spirit" and will become a unifying spiritual force of society capable of integrating the workers into the established order and dealing with the emancipatory heritage of civil society, with a critical-changing conscious and with the idea of future. Coubertin abolishes the divine firmament and opts for a natural order which corresponds to the progressistic and expansionist spirit of capitalism. The existing order is not the realization of the divine will nor has a divine character, but is the result of the (mindless, non-spiritual, immoral, non-aesthetical) natural laws that rule the animal world. The "theological" and "metaphysical" worlds are "overcome" by a positive world.
Coubertin, a pagan, does not try to hide that for him Olympism is a religion that "surpasses" not only Christianity, but also all other ("ethnical") religions (which, as the religions of the "lower races", are, according to Coubertin, under the level of Christianity) and seeks to achieve what the Catholic Church has not been able to achieve: to deal with traditional religions and national cultures and spiritually colonize the world. According to Coubertin's doctrine, the Olympic Games are to become the highest religious ritual of the modern world which will supersede traditional religious holidays. In that sense, the "sacred rhythm" of the Olympic Games becomes an indisputable spiritual guide of mankind according to which all other global manifestations are scheduled: the Olympic calendar takes over the role of the Christian calendar while the Olympic Games become the chief form of expressing the continuation and limits of the capitalist time. The Olympic Games are akin to Christian Easter, but they do not represent a renewal of the spiritual power of Christianity and strengthening of the faith in God, but a revival of the life force of capitalism and strengthening of the faith in the present world: the Olympic Games are capitalist Easter.
Coubertin rejects ecumenism, but accepts the Christian (Catholic) universalism (from which follows the Christian "missionary work" of the Jesuit type) and, departing from it, establishes Olympism as the ideology of the capitalist (imperialist) globalism. (3) The bourgeois "cosmopolitism" and "humanism" make the essence of Olympism as a "universal religion". Unlike Christianity, Olympism does not develop a critical but an idolatrous relation to the present world. Coubertin abolishes the divine firmament only to deify capitalism by way of Olympism. His "Ode to Sport" indicates the true nature of modern Olympism. At the beginning of each line Coubertin refers to sport with pious admiration: "Ode to Sport" becomes a peculiar "Te Deum". (4) Sport, as the embodiment of the existential principles of capitalism in a ''pure'' form, becomes the Supreme Being and as such a fateful power. It is no accident that Coubertin repeatedly claims that Olympism is the "cult of the existing world" and that the creation of a "religious feeling" for the dominant relations, which at the Olympic Games appear in a mythological form, represents the most important aim of his "utilitarian pedagogy". Going to the stadium replaces going to church; physical exercises and sports contests replace the ascetic life and Christian prayers and become a ritual dedicated to the creation of the cult of the present world.
Guided by Compte's "positivist popery" (Windelband) and by the idea of a "Western Committee", which will turn positivist philosophy into a new "world religion", Coubertin seeks to establish a new Church with the Olympic clergy, new dogmatic, myths and cult. Here is what Coubertin says about that: "For me, sport represents a religion with its Church, dogmas, cult... but especially with a religious feeling". (5) Speaking of IOC, Coubertin concludes: "We are self-recruiting and our mandates are not limited. (...) We do not trespass upon the privileges of the sports associations; we are not a council for technical policy. We are simply the 'trustees' of the Olympic idea."(6) Coubertin proclaimed Olympism the highest and only true religion of the Modern Age, and himself the arch priest of modern Olympic paganism - "the divine baron", as his most loyal followers called him. Coubertin wanted the Olympic Games to become the spiritual center of the world - new Vatican. He speaks of the Olympic Games as of a "Church" (to the spirit of his Olympic paganism the term "sanctuary" would be more appropriate) trying to preserve its authority as a traditional and institutionalized form of political integration of the ruling class and a means of spiritual domination over the working "masses".
Modern Olympic Games are not linked to a particular "holy ground" (like ancient Olympia) where the Games are always held; the location which the "Olympic fathers" from IOC choose for the Olympic Games becomes a "holy place" - by the very fact that the Games are held there. Its "holiness" springs from the "sanctity" of the Olympic Games, which means that there, during the Olympic Games, rules a superhuman and suprahistorical Olympic spirit. The so-called "Olympic peace" means that nothing worldly must disturb the highest religious ceremony at which the "best" representatives of nations and races bow to the ruling spirit, seeking to win its favour through a "fair fight". A constant change of the place at which the Games are held is not only a form in which modern Olympic paganism expresses its dynamism, but is the expression of the endeavour to "spread" the Olympic religion in all parts of the world. However, the Olympic Games are not designed as a "traveling circus" with Olympic spectacles. For Coubertin, the preparation of the Games in the host country, which lasts four years, is of great importance. He saw in it the way in which the Olympic religion, through an active participation of people in preparing the Games, penetrates not only their conscious, but also their very being. Coubertin was particularly enthusiastic about the Berlin Olympic Games, because the Nazis succeeded in mobilizing in their preparation the widest social layers and thus "won" them over to become the supporters of the Olympic cult. The mobilization of the "masses" to achieve the ends put before them by the ruling "elite" through the elimination of the (critical) reason and through their fanatization, represents one of the corner stones of the Olympism. At the same time, going to the Olympic Games becomes a pilgrimage to the spirit that rules the world, while the Olympians are the "elite" of mankind which on behalf of their nations (races), fighting on the "holy" Olympic battlefield, expresses an unconditional submission to the power that rules the world - seeking to win its mercy.
According to the Christian doctrine, God created man from inorganic nature and inspired life in him in the form of the soul. The purpose of this earthly life is to liberate the soul from its bodily "prison" in order for it to soar to eternity. Hence in Christianity the movement of the body to the grave is dominant as well as the movement of the spirit to God: "Because he who puts in the seed of the flesh will of the flesh get the reward of death; but he who puts in the seed of the Spirit will of the Spirit get the reward of eternal life." (7) Coubertin abolished the soul and thus broke man's connection to God, in order to create from the muscular body an unbreakable connection of man to the present world. For Coubertin, similarly to Nietzsche, despising the body means despising this worldly life. Unlike Nietzsche, who, in opposition to the Christian "despisers of the body", sees in the body the source and the basic condition of man's "peculiarity", (8) Coubertin sees in the body what the Christians see in the soul: a means of abolishing its peculiarity and of his complete integration into the existing (deified) world. For Coubertin, man is not a temporary resident on this planet who acquires eternity in God, but is the continuation of the organic nature and the highest form in its development and thus is its integral part, while the laws that rule the animal world are the supreme creative and moving force of the world.
Coubertin's conception not only radically deals with Plato's conception of the relation between the body and the spirit, but also with the Catholic maxim cura del corpo si, culto del corpo no, which represents a "soft" version of the original Christian relation to the body as the "prison of the soul". Trying to build the cult of a muscular body and physical strength, Coubertin rejects the maxim mens sana in corpore sano and creates a new principle: mens fervida in corpore lacertoso - which becomes one of his most important starting points in the creation of a positive man. This different relation to the body indicates a different relation to life: the creation of the cult of a muscular body serves to create the cult of worldly life. Coubertin: "By chiseling his body with exercise as a sculptor chisels a statue the athlete of antiquity was 'honoring the Gods'. In doing likewise the modern athlete exalts his country, his race, his flag." (9) In Coubertin, the muscular body in a combatant effort acquires the same importance an eager look of a hermit directed to the skies has for a Christian.
Coubertin determined his relation to Christianity through his relation to Arnold, who paganized Christianity. Arnold tried to use sport in order to create from school a "civilized" menagerie in which "order" is established through a merciless submission of the weaker on the part of the stronger. According to Coubertin, it is the highest form of "moral perfectioning" of the young, which corresponds to the life for which the children (of a bourgeois) are being prepared. Arnold created from sport a means for creating the cult of the "muscular" body and of a character that corresponds to the nature of capitalist society, but he tried to perch upon it Christian moralism; Coubertin rejects Christian "meekness", as well as everything that represents a restraint for the "master race" in its attempt to conquer the world: from the "muscular Christians" all that is left are muscles and their insatiable greediness which Coubertin declares to be the moving force of "progress".
The establishment of a rigid dualism between the body and the spirit, the body being submitted to the spirit, represents one of the most important common features of modern Olympism and Christianity. In that context, both ideologies instrumentalize the body and see in it the means for realizing "higher" ends. While in Christianity the body is the tool for realizing "God's will", in Coubertin's doctrine it represents the means for realizing the strategic interests of capitalism. In spite of insisting on man's "animal nature" and relying on the laws of evolution, Coubertin, with his "utilitarian pedagogy", deals with man's natural being and thus breaks his connection with nature. Coubertin deprived man from naturalness and instrumentalized him to such an extent that his relation to the human body becomes similar to the relation which Descartes formulated in his mechanistic philosophy of the physical, although in Coubertin it is mediated by the masochistic spirit of Jesuitism and the destructive spirit of capitalist progressism. Unlike Christian meditative activism that leads to the inhibition and dying out of bodily (natural) functions, sports activism (based on the absolutized principle of "greater effort" which corresponds to the maxim citius, altius, fortius) leads to a maniacal intensification of muscular effort and thus to the repression, degeneration and destruction of man's natural being, as well as spirituality and intellectuality.
Modern Olympism is similar to Christianity in other respects. Above all, in its anti-libertarian character. The Olympic "reconciliation" to the existing world and the destruction of man's libertarian dignity basically correspond to the Christian demand, addressed to the oppressed, to unconditionally submit to their masters and obediently suffer injustice. The attitude of Apostle Paul from his letter to Timothy is illustrative of this: "Let all who are servants under the yoke give all honor to their masters…" (10) A similarity between these two doctrines is suggested also by the abolishment of man as an emancipated citizen (and thus of civil society) and his being reduced to a subject of the absolutized ruling power. Furthermore, there is the combat with the critical reason, and the submission of man to the indisputable spiritual authority (the establishment of "control in heads") which is independent of man. A suppression and destruction of man's playing nature (Eros, creative spontaneity) represents another common feature of modern Olympic paganism and Christianity. Also, man is not the creator of the world, but is the tool of ''destiny'' (of God and natural laws), which means that subjective freedom and the category of possibility are abolished. Another common point of Christianity and Olympism is their insistence on the indisputable character of patriarchal order and degradation of women to incubators. Contempt of work is also characteristic of both doctrines. For Christianity, work is a curse to which people are doomed ("in toil you shall eat of it all the days of your life"), and the workers are accordingly cursed. The production of commodities is separated from their appropriation. Parasitism and plundering of the working "masses" become the "divine" and "natural right" of the strong. In their prayers people thank God for their "daily bread", although they made it by their hands. Coubertin has the same view: "The human race has always asked its rulers for amusement as well as a livelihood." (11) And that is what claims Coubertin, an aristocrat who inherited his family fortune of 500,000 gold French francs, accumulated over the centuries of plundering the French peasants. The Christian agon is also close to the "sports spirit". Between "true" Christians there is a competition in suffering, since the one who suffers most has a better chance of passing through the gates of paradise. Hence the greatest "martyrs", as the "recorders" in suffering, are the highest challenge for worshippers. However, while a Christian, guided by the logic of commerce, is ready to obediently suffer injustice hoping to receive his reward in the form of "eternal blissfulness" - this earthly life becomes a stake that should provide him an incomparably higher profit - Coubertin offers to people a "reward" in the form of life itself in which some ("the master race") find "happiness" in a sadistic oppression of the "weaker", while some (the workers, the "lower races" and the woman) find ''happiness'' in their masochistic flattering to the ruling power. Olympism is the means for developing a belligerent character in the bourgeois youth and at the same time the means for pacifying the workers and colonized peoples. This "holy duality" has also been present in Christianity ever since it became a tool in the hands of the parasitic classes. Coubertin proclaims the principle of "control in heads" his supreme political principle, which, through the (ab)use of Christianity, has been applied over the centuries by the aristocracy and clergy. Coubertin is "original" in his wish to make the principle efficient again by using new means that correspond to the New Age. Striving to control man's spirit and thus his whole life, Christianity prescribes prayers and holidays: there exist days when one is supposed to "rejoice'' and those when one is supposed to "mourn"; days for eating and days for starving; days for working and days for celebrating... Coubertin also strives to establish a complete spiritual control over people, but he tries to incorporate man's spirit into his everyday life in order to make his behavior completely conditioned by the dominant relations: not the Christian dogma, but life itself becomes an indisputable regulative principle that determines people's behaviour and thought.

Olympic Dogmatics

Coubertin cites the words of Albert Thibaudet according to whom "religious life consists in learning writings by heart, but the Greek religion is a religion without books", (12) and this becomes the "golden rule" of modern Olympic paganism. Not the knowledge of "God's Word", not its repetition, reflection and experience, but the fight for victory over others and the fight for "victory over oneself" (the principle of "greater effort" as the basis of "perfectioning"), become the foundation of the Olympic gospel and the main way of performing the religious service. Life itself, reduced to a constant struggle for survival, becomes the source of a (positive) religious spirit and the service to superhuman powers, while Olympism becomes the building of its cult. Similarly to ancient Olympism, modern Olympism seeks to be a comprehensive spiritual power to which man does not serve through contemplation and meditation, but through everyday agonal activism. There are no guidelines offering man a possibility of establishing a (critical-changing) relation to the existing world and posing the question of the purpose of life. Life as a constant struggle between people, nations and races for a place under the sun - that is the essence of Olympic piety. Like Homer's heroes, modern (petty) bourgeois do not preach sermons in order to call up gods, they preach in their merciless struggle for domination. In that context, the Olympic Games appear as an idealized expression of the main life principles of the established world - as their virgin form. They are a "festivity of youth" (Coubertin), designed to renew faith in the "eternal" Olympic ideals and provide "moral strength" necessary to proceed with new vitality from where it was stopped. That is why Coubertin attaches such importance to the "sacred rhythm" of the Olympic Games, which by no means must be interrupted.
Unlike the Christian "In the beginning was the Word" and Goethe's "In the beginning was the Deed" ("Im Anfang war die Tat"), in Coubertin there is no beginning in the development of human society, but a continuity of the animal world whose development is based on the laws of evolution - which are "superstructured" by the dominant spirit of capitalism. It is an activism that blindly follows the dominant logic of life expressed in the Social Darwinist principle bellum omnium contra omnes and the progressistic principle citius, altius, fortius. In that sense, Coubertin's religio athletae does not involve only a complete submission of sportsmen to the dominant spirit of capitalism, but their being completely accustomed to the role which, as a symbolic incarnation of that spirit, they have. From their physical appearance and movements it is clear that with their whole being they should be in unity with the dominant spirit in order to adequately express its renewed strength and indestructibility. Under the guise of a struggle with Christian dogmatism, Coubertin deals with reason as the basis of human behavior and the criterion for its appraisal, and introduces evolutionary apriorism which proclaims the laws prevalent in the animal world the highest and indisputable dogma. What was attacked was a religious conscious that directs man to God and to the "true" life in the other world, but also the thought which from the human point of view questions those processes and tries to place them "under control" of the true human values. In the form of fight against religious dogmatics and theoretical reason, the strivings to establish universal criteria for establishing a critical distance to the existing world and create the ideal of future, are dealt with. A "theoretical" and "contemplative" man is replaced by a "practical" and "utilitarian" man.
Although he rejected religious dogmatics, Coubertin gives the Olympic "commands" profusely, and they become a peculiar Olympic gospel: "the battle at Waterloo was won on the sports fields of Eton"; "arms turn a young man into an adult"; "sport is an intelligent and efficient means in colonization"; "the white race is the purest, the most intelligent and the strongest"; "brotherhood is for angels, and not for man"; "the stronger survive, the weaker are eliminated"; "inequality is the oldest law against which it is useless to fight"; "a woman who is guided by reason rather then emotions is not only abnormal, she is monstrous"; "it is not the spirit that makes a character, it is the body"; "combatant spirit in a muscular body" (mens fervida in corpore lacertoso) and so on.
In Coubertin, there is no good and evil, which means that there is no moral reasoning. Man is released from ancient hybris and Christian sin, only to be released from (personal) responsibility for his deeds; in Coubertin, there is no Socrates' daimenion or conscience. In addition, by abolishing God as a fateful power, Coubertin deprived man of the possibility of transferring responsibility for his actions on him, and of asking for "pardon for his wrongdoing" on account of his devoted service and repentance, and thus of "atoning for" his (miss)deeds. Modern Olympism deprives man of any possibility of wrongdoing, since it releases him in advance from any (personal) responsibility for his deeds, which only "spontaneously" follow the logic of life determined by the laws of evolution of the living world and appearing in the form of "progress". Those who question this logic are treated by Coubertin not in the way the Church treats "sinners", but as "antichrists". At the same time, by putting on the Olympic robe mankind's greatest butchers become (Olympic) angels. Coubertin does not threaten the disobedient with hell nor does he offer a reward in the form of Eden: life itself, reduced to a merciless struggle for survival, rewards some (the "strong") and punishes the others ("the weak"). Injustice which man suffers every day is not evil, but is something inevitable and is founded in the natural order, so it is useless (and thus meaningless) to question its moral (humane) justification. "Mercy" of the rich does not result from pursuing "social justice", but is a political means for calming down the workers' dissatisfaction and establishing "social peace" - in the conditions of such relations between class forces when the workers' submission cannot be insured by sheer force. As far as Coubertin's principle "to fight well" is concerned, it represents the unity of the fight for life and fight for the ruling order and is not based on a respect for universal rules: "well" does not have an ethical, but a utilitarian character. A fight to preserve racial pureness, to maintain a stable development of the ruling order and for a colonial expansion represents the greatest duty for the members of the ruling class. They are responsible neither to God nor to people, but to "progress".
One of the main documents suggesting the nature of modern Olympic paganism is Coubertin's interview, published in the French magazine "L'Auto" on September 4, 1936, on the occasion of the Nazi Olympic Games: "It has been announced that, from the technical point of view, the Berlin Olympic Games were a complete success. I could answer that, for me, it is enough. But it would not provide an explanation. Surely, the sports side must be the dominant element of the Games, but I do not think that the Games should be held without an element of passion which is only capable of giving them the meaning they are supposed to have. I have always sought this passionate vehemence, I have desired it, invoked it with all my powers. For a competitive sport, in itself, is not an ordinary thing that can comply with firm and inflexible rules. Let us understand, the Olympic Games are a fierce, wild fight suitable only to fierce and wild beings. To surround them with the atmosphere of a conformist weakness without passion and excessiveness, would mean to distort them, to deprive them of any exceptionality. Not to speak of the Games at which the participation of women and young people is allowed, generally of the weak. For them there is another form of sport, physical education which will give them health. But for the Games, my Games, I want a long passionate cry, whatever it may be. In Berlin, they fought for an idea which is not up to us to judge, but which was the passionate challenge I keep looking for. The technical part is, on the other hand, organized with all the necessary care, and the Germans cannot be attributed with unfairness. How can you expect me to renounce the celebration of the XIth Olympiad in such conditions? For, also, that glorification of the Nazi regime was an emotional shock which enabled their enormous development." (13) "Passionate vehemence", "fierce fight" suitable only to "fierce beings", "excessiveness", "a long passionate cry" - all this indicates that the purpose of the Olympic religiousness is to give vent to the animal nature of Coubertin's bourgeois. It is a peculiar "call of the wildness" which in a "civilized" form appears as an overt "will to power" that seeks to deal with the civilizatory norms which try to stop the attempts of the master race to conquer the world. In this text Coubertin revealed his original Olympic intention. The rules that apply to ordinary people do not apply to a bourgeois who hurries to conquer the world: he is released from any responsibility. At the same time, he is deprived of the qualities that characterize the "Homeric" as well as the "heroic man" of antiquity: Eros, emotions, readiness to sacrifice and repent, to protect the weak, childish cheerfulness... Insatiable greediness, the main feature of Coubertin's "new man", devoured all that is human in man. To purify mankind from the "deposits" of the human, which means to purify man from humanity, is one of the most important tasks of Coubertin's "utilitarian pedagogy".
What modern Olympism bows to is neither the Christian God nor the Olympic gods, but the expansionist power of monopolistic capitalism. It is the source from which Coubertin draws the power for his Olympic mission and on which the success of his "renovation" is based. Coubertin's visit to Arnold's grave at Rugby has a symbolic significance: it was a pilgrimage to the original spirit of the colonial power of Victorian England, whose creator, according to Coubertin, was Arnold. Here is how Coubertin describes it: "In the twilight, alone in the great gothic chapel of Rugby, my eyes fixed on the funeral slab on which, without epitaph, the great name of Thomas Arnold was inscribed, I dreamed that I saw before me the cornerstone of the British Empire."(14) The conquering (oppressive) power of capitalism is the real source of Coubertin's religious enthusiasm. The crucial point of Coubertin's Olympic piety is best expressed in his original Olympic call "Rebronzer la France!" which corresponds to the cry for God of a fanatical Christian. The dream of the "master race", embodied in the European bourgeoisie, conquering the world - this is the "vision" Coubertin cherished till the end of his life, the realization of which, handing down into their hands the "holy" Olympic "lance" (Diem), he was to bequeath to the Nazis.

Olympic "Holy Trinity"

Coubertin's Olympic doctrine relies on three pillars which acquire the role of the Christian "holy trinity" and embody the indisputability and eternity of the established order becoming the bearers of positive (Olympic) transcendence. These are the laws of evolution ("progress"), which correspond to God as a fateful power; the "immortal spirit of antiquity", which acquires the role of the Christian "holy spirit" (belligerent spirit); and the Olympic "humanism" (the cult of the existing world), which in the Olympic doctrine has the role that Christ has in Christianity. By way of the "immortal spirit of antiquity", embodied in the "renovated" Olympic Games, the existing world is mystically inseminated with the laws of evolution, which reached their highest form in ancient Greece and gave birth to Olympic humanism.
Just as for Christianity God is an indisputable power that determines man's destiny, so for Coubertin "progress" is an indisputable superhuman power which controls human life and determines "future". Ultimately, both God and "progress" offer man a possibility of "eternal life". What distinguishes them is that in Christianity man acquires the possibility of "eternal life" as an individual in "other world", while in Coubertin mankind obtains this possibility as an abstract collectivity in the eternal this worldly life which is reduced to quantitative shifts without any qualitative changes. While the life of a Christian is reduced to atoning for his "sins" and a preparation for "doomsday", the life of Coubertin's positive man, released from sin and responsibility, is reduced to a constant struggle for increasing his wealth and preserving the established order.
The creation of the world by God is the basis of Christian mystery. In Coubertin, the process of creation is not a purposeful and willful act; it is a mindless and spontaneous activism that follows the logic of evolution which appears in the form of "progress". Coubertin abolishes the creation of man on the part of the absolute (as well as the creation of the world on the part of man) and affirms the "development of mankind" reduced to a sequence of the laws of evolution, independent of human will, which is manifested in the struggle between races for survival. Modern Olympic mystery should enable the invisible omnipresent power of capitalism, deriving from certain social processes and relations, to become incorporated into man's being and arouse religious enthusiasm. Coubertin also does not make any difference between the faithful and the fanatics. In his Olympic philosophy there is no place for doubt, questioning, confrontation, for a search for purpose and answers... Coubertin attaches primary importance to the psychological aspect and in that context to a spectacular performance which involves man in the Olympic mystery. The Olympic ceremony is a mechanism intended to eliminate reason, open the road to the subconscious and reach "man's innermost part". Olympism, like Christianity, insists on the cult acts, a peculiar Olympic liturgy, which is by its nature analogous to a hypnotically séance that eliminates reason and achieves a complete integration of man into the existing world. The strictly observed form of the ceremony has a ritual character and creates a peculiar illusion: a ritual repetition creates the impression that the ceremony is not carried out according to people's will, but that they are merely the executors acting on the will of an invisible power that holds everything in its hands. In that context appears the "sacred" four-year rhythm of the Games, which must not be interrupted and which becomes a form of expressing the eternal domination of the fateful power over man (Olympie éternelle!). The point is to constantly renew, by way of the Olympic Games, the faith in the original principles of the present world. Modern Olympic mystery has nothing to do with God and natural forces, but is connected with the dominant spirit of capitalism which, through the Olympic spectacle, should be shown in a mystic light. In that context, in the creation of the Olympic ceremony Coubertin is not guided by the Christian liturgy, but seeks to create a performance which gives a mythological and cult dimension to the this worldly dominant power, similarly to monarchist pomp's, military parades and great world exhibitions - in which he found a model for the spectacularization of the Games. Hence grandiosity, monumentality, a military spirit and showy decorations become the most important segments of the Olympic (decorative) aesthetics.
What should give a special dimension to the Olympic cult ceremony is that it evokes the "immortal spirit of antiquity", which means that the Olympic Games are designed as a peculiar spiritual séance. According to Coubertin, sport is not a product of the Modern Age, it is the form of resurrection of the spirit of antiquity, which becomes an inexhaustible source of light and warmth, and that means of life. In his "Ode to Sport" Coubertin "sings" with admiration: "O Sport, delight of the Gods, distillation of life! In the grey dingle of modern existence, restless with barren toil, you suddenly appeared like the shining messenger of vanished ages, those ages when humanity could smile. And to the mountain tops came dawn's first glimmer, and sunbeams dappled the frost's gloomy floor." (15) That modern Olympic Games are designed to be a peculiar spiritual séance is clearly seen from the official "Olympic Hymn": "Immortal spirit of antiquity, / Father of the true, beautiful and good, / Descend, appear, shed over us the light / Upon this ground and under this sky / Which has fits witnessed by imperishable fame. / Give life and animation to those noble games! / Throw wreaths of fadeless flowers to the victors / In the race and in the strife! / Create in our breasts, hearts of steel! / In thy light, plains, mountains and seas / Shine in a roseate hue and form a vast temple / To which all nations throng to adore thee, / Oh immortal spirit of antiquity." (16) The Olympic Games become the ceremony of a mystical union between the "immortal spirit of antiquity" and the Modern Age and are thus the insemination of man with the spirit of antiquity - from which positive man is to be born. It is an authoritarian (tyrannical) spirit analogous to the Olympic gods as the immortal oligarchy which symbolizes the indisputable power of the tribal aristocracy over the slaves. In the Modern Age this power descends again from Olympus onto the earth, only to appear in the form of the bourgeois who becomes the capitalist surrogate of the ancient "hero". Coubertin abolishes the ability of capitalism to breed in its "bosom" (Marx) the ideas that open the possibility of overcoming the present world and thus deprives it of historical fruitfulness, and uses the "immortal spirit of antiquity" to "inspire new life" into capitalism. The "immortal spirit of antiquity" becomes a symbolic expression of the time in which the evolution of the living world reached its highest level of development, a peculiar "Holy Grail" which will provide eternal youth to the present world: the Olympic Games serve to draw the elixir of life of ancient Hellas in the modern world. Hence such importance of the "sacred rhythm" of the Games: as a "festivity of youth" (Coubertin), they are a regular rejuvenation of capitalism and are thus a symbolic end of history. Unlike antiquity and Christianity, which link immortality to the Heavens, Coubertin descends immortality down to the earth. "The immortal spirit of antiquity" is not the incarnation of the unearthly power of the Olympic gods, but is a mythical form of the capitalist spirit and a way of giving it a "cultural" and "divine" legitimacy. That is why Coubertin does not mind the "fact" that the Hellenic world declined. The spirit of capitalism raises the ancient spirit from the ashes inspiring it with a new life and insuring its eternity.
As the ideology of positive progress Olympism abolishes transcendency and affirms immanence as the basic principle of development of the world. There is nothing that transcends the present world or that appears as the end according to which the direction to which civilization is moving can be determined. In modern Olympism the purpose of life is not determined by God, but everything proceeds according to the purpose given by a natural course of events (by the laws of evolution) and the progressistic spirit deriving from it, which has a quantitative and totalitarian character and for which the "future" is open. "The divine right", to which Coubertin refers from time to time, has neither an a priori nor a supernatural character and it serves to create the impression that the world cannot be changed. There is an identity between the ideal and the present worlds: Olympism becomes a positive ontology in which the essence is reduced to existence. The contrast between the false and the true, the phenomenological and the essential is "abolished" in the world of the factual. Since Coubertin discarded the normative sphere, there is no possibility of confronting the established progress with the idea of true progress. Coubertin deprived of meaning every evaluative judgment of progress, while the knowledge of the world has merely a utilitarian and empirical character. The only possible question is the one concerning the measure of progress, which is expressed in a quantitative accumulation of material wealth by the ruling "elite" and in increasing the efficiency in the combat with the libertarian working movement and the emancipatory heritage of mankind. The former is expressed in the Olympic maxim citius, altius, fortius, and the latter in the principle "might is right": all that has been created must become the means in the hands of the ruling class for preserving the ruling order. Similarly to his treatment of democratic institutions, Coubertin here tries to eliminate the emancipatory possibilities of man's power to do more, to go further, and to act more strongly... All more developed productivistic powers of man become the source of the oppressive power of the ruling class: an increase in progress is followed by a decrease in freedom.
Coubertin's humanité is the third part of the Olympic "holy trinity". Just as humanism of the Modern Age appeared as the reaction of the awakened man to the long-lasting strivings of the Church to reduce him to the slave of "God's will", so Coubertin's humanité appeared as the reaction of the imperialist bourgeoisie to the guiding principles of the French Revolution and the emancipatory heritage of civil society - and in that context to the emancipatory ideas of Christianity. Instead of being the "God's slave", man becomes the slave of "natural laws" that are the incarnation of the ruling relations: Olympism "overcomes" Christianity by way of Social Darwinism. Coubertin does not try to discover "the divine in man", but to inspire him with the spirit of the established world: man being only the means for achieving the strategic ends of capitalism - in the guise of "progress". The creation of the character and conscious of positive man and his instrumentalization for the achievement of inhuman ends - that is the basis of Coubertin's humanism.
Christianity is critical of the present world which is only a temporary human abode: the "true" and "eternal life" begins in Heavens. For Coubertin, the present world is man's only possible and eternal abode, and not a station on his way to Heaven. Instead of looking up to God, there is in Coubertin a euphoric immersion in everyday life through a mindless physical activism. In spite of an idealized antiquity, the presence is what radiates in all directions since in it the unity of humanistic ideals and life has been realized: the existing world is a realized humanism. Coubertin's humanism is based on the myth of ancient society which serves to build the cult of the present world. For him, the ideal of positive society was already realized in ancient Greece, during its "Middle Ages" in which a complete domination of the tribal aristocracy over demos was established. The basic purpose of the ancient myth is not to give guidelines to human action, since ancient society is an unrealizable ideal, but to prove that the ideal of humanity was already realized in the past and that therefore it is useless to look to the future. Concluding that "Hellenism is above all the cult of humanity in its present life and its state of balance", Coubertin opposes religions that promise man happiness after death. In old Greece, according to him, "it is the present existence which is happiness." (17) Instead of striving to another ("higher") world, an endless glorification of the existing world becomes the highest challenge for man. Coubertin's dealing with the Christian illusory world (in which there are no "rich" and "poor" people, or "higher" and "lower" races) is actually a combat with the very idea of a better world, as well as with man's strivings to a just world. The purpose of Coubertin's idealization of antiquity is to prompt man to crave for a world in which, in an idealized form, appear the ruling principles of the existing world of injustice which has no alternative and which is eternal. These are the "facts" that by way of the Olympic doctrine acquire the character of absolute truth. The only thing left to man is to "reconcile" him to the existing state of affairs. Coubertin offers to the oppressed a "sports republic" as a compensation for their obedient suffering of injustice, but it is not a world parallel to the existing world, as was the case with Christian paradise; it is a space where the dominant spirit of the existing world appears in a pure form, it is a peculiar capitalist Olympic Heavens, and thus a training camp where (through a physical and mental drill) man's qualities that should enable his complete integration into the present world are being developed. Christianity moves man to "another world", sport pins him down to the present world.
The Olympic Games are a ritual deification of the basic existential principles of the present world that are embodied in sport: modern Olympism is the cult of capitalism. Hence such importance attached to the physical appearance and behavior of sportsmen, to their "moral pureness", as well as to religio athletae which should correspond to the religious enthusiasm (awe) with which the athlete of antiquity approached the Olympic altar to bow to Zeus. The ancient condition of participation at the Games - that the athlete had not offended the gods - becomes in modern Olympism a demand for the athlete not to violate the principles of amateurism, which means to be guided in his fight with others by a fanatical faith in the correctness and indisputability of the ruling principles of the world, and not by lucrative interests. Hence Coubertin insists on the "Olympic oath" (serment olimpique) as the highest religious act, with the participants "swearing" to fight fairly. Boulongne says on that: "Since each religion involves the knowledge of dogmas and deepening of a mystique, Coubertin bases on the pedagogy of Olympism the initiation into the Olympic philosophy and practice: the oath that the participants take represent in this case one of the rituals connected to that which is sacred." (18) Their oath is not addressed to God (supernatural power) or people, but to the invisible and dominant spirit of capitalism. The Olympic Games serve to show the "pureness" of that spirit and its indestructible power, while the sportsmen are its incarnation and thus peculiar "idols" of capitalism. Everything they do acquires a symbolic character, similarly to the behavior of soldiers in a parade, who are a personification of the ruling order. To break the strict pattern of behavior means to jeopardize the indisputable authority of the ruling power.
Coubertin's humanism does not have a foothold only in Hellenic culture, but also in Jesuitism. Karl Kautsky's analyses of the relation between Jesuitism and humanism offers a possibility of understanding the nature of Coubertin's humanité: "Jesuitism is humanism that is somewhat intellectually lower, deprived of independent ideas, rigidly organized, humanism compelled to serve to the Church. The difference between Jesuitism and humanism corresponds to the difference between Christianity in the time of the Empire and Neo-Platonism. Jesuitism is the form in which the Catholic Church adopted humanism, in which it was modernized and placed, as opposed to its previous feudal basis, on the foundations that ruled society from the 16th up to the 18th century. Jesuitism became the most brutal force of a reformed Catholic Church because it suited most too new economic and political circumstances. Jesuitism used the same weapons as had already been used by humanism: superiority of classical education, influence on rulers, consideration of monetary powers. Just like humanists, Jesuits assisted absolute power, but only the ruler who worked for them. Just like humanists, they did not think that it contradicted their monarchist affiliation if they had to remove the ruler who did not suit them. However, as far as money is concerned, Jesuits went further then humanists. They advocated not only the interests of a new way of production, but put it in their service. Jesuits became the biggest European trading company which had its offices in all parts of the world. They were the first to realize that a missionary could be used just as well as a trading agent; they were the first to organize capitalist industrial enterprises in overseas countries, for example, sugar factories." (19) In Coubertin, also, the dominant fanatism is not religious but lucrative and pragmatic. One of the most important principles of his original Olympic idea is as follows: "It is no longer Minerva, the Goddess of peace and wisdom that rules the world, but Mercury, the God of enterprise, movement and trading." (20)
In spite of insisting on a blind respect for the "factual", Coubertin tries to give through "humanism" the evaluative legitimacy to Olympism. In that way Coubertin opens the possibility of distinguishing between "true" and "false" Olympism. In spite of reducing Olympism to the "cult of the present world", during his Olympic career Coubertin was forced to face the reality of the Olympic Games, which only follow the fate of capitalist society, from the point of view of an evaluative model of the Olympic Games which sprang from a certain (positivist) philosophical concept and the strivings to its realization (positive society). A vision of a desired world and in that context an evaluative apriorism are the tacit starting point of Coubertin's Olympism. In addition, Coubertin's humanism has the same role given to the Olympic "pacifism": to cover in a propagandist way the field of fight for a true humanism and to show itself as an incarnation of genuine humanist aspirations of mankind. The terms such as "peace", "international cooperation" and the like, used to conceal the true nature of Olympic barbarism and to win the favor of people, tell us that Coubertin was aware of people's real aspirations - and they became a negative starting point of his Olympic doctrine. That is why a combat with the guiding principles of the French Revolution is one of the main objectives of Coubertin's political practice: without freedom, equality and brotherhood there is no true humanism. Instead of "humanism as a political ideal" (Mihailo Ðuriæ), Coubertin offers "new" barbarism, disguised in humanist phrases, as the highest political ideal. An unrestrained tyranny of the bourgeois "elite" over the "working masses", "lower races" and the woman is the foundation of Coubertin's (positive) humanism.

Olympism and Christian Churches

On a doctrinal level Olympism and Christianity relate to each other as water and fire. The vandalic passion with which the Christians, in the name of their God, destroyed Olympia, one of the most important Hellenic places of worship and the highest symbol of Hellenic spirituality, indicates that the abyss between these two world views is unbridgeable. Trying to deal with the libertarian struggle of the oppressed, the pragmatic Coubertin sees in the Church a political ally and all in Christianity that can contribute to a more efficient protection of the existing order becomes an inherent part of the Olympic doctrine and practice. Coubertin, a pagan, does not renounce Christian God and does not hesitate to appeal to the divine authority ("divine right") when he has to prove the indisputability and eternity of the principles he advocates. It does not occur to him to cry, like Nietzsche, "God is dead!", or to confront the Catholic Church. Coubertin's insisting on Christianity being above other ("ethnical") religions, and thus the affirmation of the racial "superiority" of the white to the "colored" races, indicates Coubertin's endeavour to establish a strategic alliance between the Olympic movement and the Catholic Church in a crusade against the cultural heritage and libertarian dignity of the "colored" peoples. For the same reasons as their co-fighter Coubertin, "good Christians", led by the aristocracy, bourgeoisie and clergy, view Olympism kindly and accept to be the patrons of modern pagan Olympic festivities, and as far as the Catholic Church is concerned, Pope himself (Pius XII) receives the gentlemen from IOC, the arch priests of modern Olympic paganism, to give them his blessing. To make things even more bizarre, the words of a Pennsylvanian bishop (ascribed to Coubertin): "It is important to take part at these Olympic Games, and not to win." - Which he pronounced on 19 July, 1908 in St. Paul's Cathedral in London, during a mass dedicated to the London Olympic Games - became the "humanist" motto of the Games. (21) What a hypocrisy: those who belong to a religion that destroyed ancient Olympia, the most sacred place of Hellenic civilization, hold masses "in honor of the Olympic Games" and glorify their "immortal spirit"! Even on this occasion it turned out that the "devil is not as black as he is painted" when it comes to the existential interests of the Church: "good Christians" appeal to the "ancient tradition" in order to deal with a critical-changing conscious and preserve the established order. The common interests in the fight against the ever stronger workers' (socialist) movement, and in the spiritual colonization of the world and preservation of the patriarchal order, united the representatives of irreconcilable spiritual movements, such as Christianity and Olympic paganism.
Christian Churches showed "appreciation" for "sport" long before Coubertin established modern Olympic movement. Even at the time when the cities in Italy were being founded the Catholic Church looked "favorably" at the mass "sports" celebrations, trying to appear in the role of a spiritual patron. That Christianity is being superseded by the spirit of the New Age is seen from the demands, on the part of the Church, for the development of physical exercises, sport and Olympism. The attitude of the Catholic Church was: cura del corpo si, culto del corpo no - and it appeared in answer to the revival of the body (man) in the Renaissance and had a moralistic and not a doctrinal character. The cult of physical strength and endurance, as the expression of progressistic logic, is present in a number of modern Christian reformers. At the time of the development of the workers' (socialist) movement in the second half of the 19th century, the Catholic Church tried to use sport to control the workers' dissatisfaction and establish control over their leisure ("free") time. It is one of the basic intentions of the encyclic "Rerum novarum" of Pope Leon XIII from 1891 (which was republished several times in the 20th century, last time in 1991 under the title "Centisimo anno"). (22) In England, the cradle of capitalism, the use of sport in the creation of "good Christians" had two forms. The first, in the first half of the 19th century, is the pedagogical movement of Thomas Arnold, who tried to turn the bourgeois youth, through sports competitions and physical drill, into "muscular Christians", the basic force of the British Empire. The second, in the end of the 19th century, tried to "colonize" the worker's leisure time by way of sport and spiritually integrate them into the established order in the form of a "Christian Socialist Movement". The opening of the "College of the Working Man" in London, by Kingsley and Maurice, in which sports events became the main instrument for pacifying the workers dissatisfaction, represents one of the typical forms of spiritual submission of the workers. In France, abbot Didon, one of Coubertin's spiritual idols, tried to develop in the bourgeois youth, in the guise of Christianity, the spirit of combatant individualism and the cult of physical strength. The same was done by "Christian reformers" in other European countries and the USA (like the Protestant pastor James Naismith who is the official "father" of basketball) who tried to follow "the spirit of a New Age" and protect their "herd" from new ideas which threatened the established order. Instead of being the apostles of Christianity, "Christian reformers" became the apostles of capitalism, who tilled the ground for launching a new Olympic (pagan) religion which was supposed to become the main integrative spiritual power of society, and protect capitalism from decline. The Christians destroyed ancient Olympia; modern Olympic pagans, headed by Coubertin, with even greater vandalic fervor dealt with Christianity and compelled the Christian Churches (as well as other religious communities) to accept their global domination.
A typical example of "Christianizing" modern Olympism is the work "Theological reflection of human dignity in sport - on the example of the Olympic Games" written by theologian Paul Jacobi. (23) Starting from the conclusion of the II Vatican Council, he sees "in the demand for unity" the basic way of justifying the Olympic Games and of the interpretation of Coubertin's Olympic doctrine. What it is all about is clearly seen from the very title under which the Council was held: "The Church and Today's World". It is an attempt of the Catholic Church to survive by adapting to the capitalistically degenerated world in which there is less and less space for faith. Hence Jacobi emphasizes Coubertin's demand for a new development of religious feeling, "overlooking" the fact that, for Coubertin, Olympism is above all the "cult of the present world" and thus a radical renouncement of the Christian ideal of "another" (better) world. The absurdity of the endeavour to Christianize modern Olympic paganism can be seen from Jacobi's attempt to, drawing on the book by Joseph Ratzinger "Christian Brotherhood", connect the Olympic idea with the idea of peace and brotherhood between people under God's wing. In his glorification of the Games Jacobi goes so far as to see in them a hint of "new society" governed by the "rules of fair-play, tolerance, justice, human dignity, peace, solidarity, brotherhood and freedom". (24) The Olympic Games become the means for realizing a "utopia" which includes the "divine kingdom on the earth". The words of Pope Paul VI: "In their shared work people discover that they are brothers." - become the guiding principle of the Olympic movement. (25) The relation of the Christian churches to Olympic paganism shows their true relation to Christianity. Trying to strengthen their ever weaker social position, they threw Christian humanism under the feet of primitive Olympic paganism and thus showed that positivism (the defense of capitalism) is the basis of the Church "Christianity". There lies the answer to the question why Coubertin and his followers, the members of the Catholic Church, were not expelled from it for preaching paganism and organizing the Olympic Games as pagan "Churches", but were first tacitly, and later openly, supported by Pope and the Catholic clergy, as well as by the aristocracy and the bourgeoisie - all "good Christians". One of the best comments on Christian hypocrisy was given by Kautsky who said that "Catholic fanatism of popery was not a religious fanatism, but the fanatism of greediness disguised in Church forms". (26) If we tried to describe the original nature of modern Olympism in a nut shell, then "fanatism of greediness" would be its most precise definition: Coubertin's "cult of humanism" is nothing else but a cult of greediness.
The ceremony of the burial of Coubertin's "heart" in the "Olympic valley" (today the "Valley of Pierre de Coubertin"), which Coubertin bequeathed to the Nazis as the executors of his Olympic will and "sacred" guardians of (his) Olympic idea (the burial was performed without the Catholic clergy) shows the relation of Olympism to Christianity. Coubertin did not send his "soul" to Heavens, but, on the "most sacred place" of pagan Hellas, through his heart (built in a monument) symbolically united it with the "immortal spirit of antiquity". What is "Christian" about that is the fact that his heart became a peculiar (Olympic) relic, like the remains of deceased Christian "saints". Anyway, the "burial" of his heart did not have a spiritual but a propagandist character: Coubertin "went to eternity" according to the same (banal) scenario which he used to organize "his" Olympic Games.

Footnotes
(1) P. d. Coubertin, "The Philosophic Foundation of Modern Olympism", In: P. d. C. The Olympic Idea, 131. p.
(2) Compare: Claude-Henri de Saint-Simon, 275. p. Školska knjiga, Zagreb, 1979.
(3) Compare: Avery Brundage, "Schluss der Eröffnungsrede zur 62. IOC-Sitzung am 6.10.1964 in Tokio" ; "Bulletin des IOC", In : Christian Graf von Krockow, Sport und Industriegesellschaft, 7, 8. p.
(4) P. d. Coubertin, "Ode to Sport", In: P. d. Coubertin, The Olympic Idea, 39. p.
(5) In: Baron Pierre de Coubertin, Olympische Erinerunngen, 109. p.
(6) In: P.d.Coubertin, Olympic Idea, 18, 19. p.
(7) In: Novi zavjet, 365. p. Preveo Vuk S. Karadžiæ, Prosveta/ Nolit, Beograd, 1987.
(8) Compare: F. Nièe, Tako je govorio Zaratustra, 67.p.
(9) P. d. Coubertin, "The Philosophic Foundation of Modern Olympism", In: P.d.C. The Olympic Idea,131.p.
(10) In: Novi zavjet, 398.p.
(11) In: P.d.Coubertin, The Olympic Idea, 56.p.
(12) In: P.d.Coubertin, The Olympic Idea, 109.p.
(13) In: Jean-Marie Brohm,Le Mythe olimpique, 431.p.
(14) In: J.MacAloon, This Great Symbol, 59.p.
(15) P. d. Coubertin, "Ode to Sport", In: P.d.Coubertin, The Olympic Idea, 39.p.
(16) In: The Olympic Movement, International Olympic Committee, 81.p. Lausanne, Switzerland, 1984.
(17) In: P.d.Coubertin, The Olympic Idea, 109.p.
(18) Compare : Iv-Pjer Bulonj, Olimpijski duh Pjera de Kubertena, 166,167.p.
(19) Karl Kaucki, Tomas Mor i njegova utopija, 90,91.p. Pod. K.K.Kultura, Bgd,1967.
(20) P. d. Coubertin, Textes choisis, III tome, 484.p.
(21) In: K. A. Scherer, 100 Jahre olympische Spiele,60.p. Harenberg, Dortmund,1995.
(22) Compare : Milorad Ekmeèiæ, Srbija izmeðu srednje Evrope i Evrope, 14, 15. p. "Politika", Beograd. 1992.
(23) Compare: Paul Jakobi, "Theologische Überlegungen zur Menschenwürde im Sport - am Beispiel der Olympischen Spiele", In : P.Jakobi/ Heinz-Egon Rosch (Hrsg.), Sport und Menschenwürde, Matthias-Grünewald-Verlag, 192-2o3. p. Mainz, 1982.
(24) Ibid. 202. p.
(25) Ibid. 203. p.
(26) Karl Kaucki, Tomas Mor i njegova utopija, 88. p.