由于马克思本人没有专门论述伦理道德问题的著作，未对伦理道德问题进行过系统的阐述，也未形成体系化的伦理道德理论，导致学界对马克思伦理道德问题的理解产生诸多分歧。研究者从马克思关于伦理道德问题零散的、片段式的思想碎片中发现，马克思对伦理道德持双重态度，一方面对道德进行拒斥和抨击，声称道德反映特定阶级的利益，充斥着明显的阶级偏见，具有意识形态性，并主张“废除道德”；另一方面，马克思的著作中又蕴含着强烈的道德愤慨和伦理关怀，充满着或隐或现的道德评价或道德判断。一些学者认为，马克思思想中这种看似自相矛盾的立场形成了所谓的“道德难题”。事实上，在马克思的思想语境中，存在着作为研究对象的道德和作为评价尺度的伦理，这涉及马克思的道德社会学与伦理评价思想。就道德社会学层面而言，马克思基于历史唯物主义的视角科学地探讨道德的起源和发展，解释人类的道德活动，这种语境内的道德更多地是一种描述性的解释和说明，表明道德的依附性、意识形态性和历史性。马克思从经济基础和物质现实出发考察社会道德现象，揭示道德的现实起源、内在本质以及社会功能等，并批判法权意义上的道德，剖析正义、平等等概念在资本主义社会的意识形态性。作为研究对象的道德并不涉及任何规范性的伦理观念，也不指涉具体的价值规范。但马克思并不仅仅对资本主义社会进行了客观的描述和剖析，还进行了明确的伦理批判，这种作为评价尺度的伦理并不在历史唯物主义的框架内，而是存在于他的人学理论中，尤其体现在人的需要层面。就伦理评判层面而言，马克思之所以对资本主义社会进行伦理批判，在于这种不人道的制度严重压制了人的合乎人性的需要，导致人的自我实现和自我完善被资本逻辑所钳制，生命本身被无限地商品化和货币化，丧失人之为人的自由意志和创造性，磨灭了本真性的伦理。而共产主义之所以值得向往可追求，具有可欲性，在于它能够充分地满足个体生存、享受和发展的需要。此外，马克思并不是一位规范性层面的道德相对主义者，历史唯物主义和人的需要理论能够回应道德相对主义的诘难。就历史唯物主义的层面而言，承认道德的历史性不等于倡导道德相对主义；历史唯物主义支持的是一种语境主义，道德在相当大的程度上是由人们具有的需求以及他们能在其中发现自我的客观情境决定的；道德在整体上呈现出进步的趋向。就人的需要的层面而言，存在着普遍有效的伦理评判标准和价值原则。基于此，在马克思的唯物史观和人的需要理论的思想视野中，所谓的“道德难题”可以得到有效的破解，也可以寻找到马克思对资本主义社会进行伦理批判的价值依据。

Due to Marx himself has no works devoted to ethical and moral issues, has not systematically expounded ethical and moral issues, and has not formed a systematic ethical and moral theory, which leads to many ambiguities in the academic understanding of Marx's ethical and moral issues. From the scattered and fragmented fragments of Marx's thoughts on ethics and morality, the researchers found that Marx held a dual attitude towards ethics and morality, on the one hand, rejected and attacked morality, claiming that morality reflected the interests of a particular class. full of obvious class prejudice, ideological, and advocate "abolishing morality" On the other hand, Marx's works contain strong moral indignation and ethical concern, full of hidden or present moral evaluation or moral judgment, emphasizing that the moral development of human society is a historical process of continuous progress. Some scholars believe that this seemingly contradictory position in Marx's thought has formed the so-called "moral problem". In fact, in Marx's ideological context, there are two types of morality, namely, morality as the object of study and ethics as the yardstick of evaluation, which involves Marx's thought of moral sociology and ethical evaluation. In terms of moral sociology, Marx scientifically discusses the origin and development of morality and explains human moral activities from the perspective of historical materialism. Morality in this language is more of a  descriptive explanation and explanation, indicating the dependence, ideology and historicity of morality. Marx examines the phenomenon of social morality from the economic basis and material reality, reveals the realistic origin, internal essence and social function of morality, criticizes morality in the sense of legal rights, and analyzes the ideology of justice and equality in capitalist society. Morality as the object of study does not involve any normative ethical concepts and does not refer to specific value norms. However, Marx not only objectively described and explained the capitalist society, but also made a clear ethical criticism. This kind of ethics as the yardstick of evaluation does not exist in the framework of historical materialism, but exists in his human theory, especially in the theory of human needs. In terms of ethical evaluation, the reason why Marx criticizes the capitalist society is that this inhumane system seriously suppresses people's human needs, causing people's self-realization and self-improvement to be restrained by capital logic. Life itself is infinitely commercialized and monetized, loses its free will and creativity as a human being, and obliterates the true ethics. The reason why communism is desirable and desirable is that it can fully meet the needs of individual survival, enjoyment and development. In addition, Marx is not a moral relativism at the normative level, historical materialism and the theory of human needs can respond to the criticism of moral relativism. From the perspective of historical materialism, acknowledging the historicity of morality is not equal to advocating moral relativism; historical materialism supports a kind of contextualism. morality is to a large extent determined by people's needs and the objective situation in which they can find themselves; morality as a whole shows a trend of progress. As far as human needs are concerned, there are universal and effective ethical evaluation standards and value principles. Based on this, in the dual theoretical perspective of Marx's historical materialism and human needs, the so-called "moral problem" can be effectively solved, and the value basis for Marx's ethical criticism of capitalist society can also be found.