在馬克思的原始文獻中,他并沒有提出"社會存在決定社會意識"這樣的觀點,從德文原文看,馬克思用以表征歷史唯物主義關鍵性原則的概念是社會定在和定在方式。雖然在1845—1847年創立歷史唯物主義的特定時期,馬克思恩格斯刻意回避使用定在概念,但是從《共產黨宣言》開始,特別是在《1857—1858年經濟學手稿》和《資本論》等經濟學手稿中,馬克思重新啟用社會定在等概念來說明資本主義經濟關系的具體性和現實性,并由此揭露資產階級經濟拜物教的秘密。社會定在決定人們的一切意識,這是歷史唯物主義最重要的理論原則。

In Marx’s original texts,he did not put forward the idea that "social existence determines social consciousness. "In his original German texts,the concepts he used to characterize the key principles of historical materialism were gesellschaftlich Dasein and Daseinsweise. Although Marx and Engels deliberately avoided using those concepts when they were developing historical materialism in 1845-1847,Marx reintroduced the concept of gesellschaftlich Dasein to explain the specificity and reality of capitalist economic relations beginning with the Communist Manifesto,and particularly in the Economic Manuscripts of 1857-1858 and Capital,thus revealing the secrets of bourgeois economic fetishism. That gesellschaftlich Dasein determines all people’s consciousness is the most important theoretical principle of historical materialism.