Sigmund Freud

Sigmund Freud believed that religion was a product of the human mind.

Freud was the founder of psychoanalysis. This is basically looking at how the human brain and mind works at providing explanations. He believed that our personality, or psyche is broken up into 3 parts. These are:

Id-The impulsive and instinctive part of us

Super ego-The part of us that considered morality behind our choices. This includes the conscience and ideal-ego.

Ego-This is the decision making part.

Firstly, Freud wrote the paper' Obsessive Actions and Religious Practices'.

He said that just as people who suffer from an obsessional neurosis repeat certain actions (think OCD) so it is similar to religious people who carry out routines or rituals. Both groups of people take care in carrying out the action.

Both take particular care over how certain actions must be carried out, such as reciting the rosary. If they are not carried out, the person feels guilty.

However, he said that those suffering from obsessional neurosis don't understand why, whereas religious people do.

Freud believed that the reason behind the actions being carried out was down to past events that the subject feels guilty about. in order to repress, or push down this guilt, they carry out these actions. It is a sort of protective measure to stop themselves from doing it.

As an obsesisonal neurosis, religion is formed as an 'exprexsion of the instincts it has suppressed'.

In religion, the rituals' are similar. Freud called religion a 'universal obsessional neurosis'.

The Primal Horde:

To demonstrate further that religion was nothing but a way of handling our guilt and so simple a neurosis, Freud wrote Totem and Taboo.

He said that building on Darwin's ideas, primitive humans lived in small groups. These were controlled by a single dominant male who either killed or drove off the rivals. These included his sons. His sons were then angry at this, so came back and killed the alpha. However, they were so filled with guilt that they took a totem in replicate their father.

Over time, the totem then gained almost divine properties becoming god-like.

There was only one day in the year when the totem animal was killed and eaten (usually it was forbidden) and this would involve a communal meal. Freud compared this to Christianity. The Holy Communion was the totem meal and Jesus was killed rather than the father. Therefore, he said that the reason behind religious practices is due to our guilt and acts as a way to repress it.

The Oedipus Complex.

This comes from the tragedy of Oedipus Rex who's father was given a prophecy by the Oracle that he would kill his father and marry his mother. This, of course, happened although Oedipus does not know.

Freud said that guilt was a huge part of our personality, as was sexual drive.

Freud believed that between 3-6 was a child's sexual development where he realised the physical and social differences between men and women. He said that boys during this time, are jealous of their fathers because they believe that they are a rival for their mothers. He fears the results of replacing his father though, which he develops a fear of castration.

He is told by his parents not to touch himself, resulting in this fear of castration. This is intensified though realising that women do not have penises, so he believes that it is a punishment.

Neurotic behaviours comes due t his trying to repress this guilt. Neurotic behaviours includes turning to religion as a means to overcoming guilt.

Religion is Wish Fulfilment

Freud said that religion was an 'illusion'. religion is just because of our deepest wishes that we had, such as to be all-powerful. Each attribute of God is just a trait that we wish we had. People who embrace religion do it because they only see if as fulfilling their wishes.

Religion is a reaction against helplessness.

Religion is a reaction to the things in life that we can't control. We're humans and like to think that we're top dog, but the truth is, there are some things that are outside our control, such as volcanos or earthquakes. Religion then gives us a sense of security because we believe that we are no longer powerless against them, bu humanizing the forces that threaten us, turning them into gods and hoping to have some sort of control over htem.

Supporting Evidence

Freud looked at various case studies which supported his belief that neurosis is due to repressed sexual thoughts, supporting the Oedipus complex.

Darwin's theory of evolution said that in order to survive, only the fittest would live. They would then pass on their genes to ensure that the next generation too would be able to survive. In turn, the unhelpful genes or qualities would not be passed on.

To ensure that natural selection is carried out, sexual drive would be central to it, which was also found in Freud's work.

Positives:

Freud's comparison of the rituals of religion and compulsive neurosis is reasonable because there is a clear correlation.

Darwin's theory of evolution supports the primal horde theory and the belief in a primal father who was killed. Freud correctly draw parallels between the Holy Communion and totem meal.

Cases such as 'Wolf man' backs up Freud's view because it shows that religion was down to psychological conflict. Freud had 133 cases in total; only 6 were the subject of full histories and 4 were analysed directly by Freud. The 'Wolf man' demonstrates specific links to the idea of the totem, due to the patient's father expressed as an animal, as well as support for the oedipus complex and subsequently a turn to faith as a way of expressing guilt.

A disciple of Freud, Theodor Reik produced a book called Ritual psycho-analytic studies. This supports Freud's work on totem and taboo by repeating that ceremonies are created by obsessional patients. He deals with four examples of rituals 1) couvade

2) puberty rites

3) singing the kol nidre

and 4) the shofar.

Subsequent research such as the author Paul Simonds has shown that organizations will be based on solitary individuals, isolated one male groups etc. However Zuckerman says that even if this is true in animals, it does not necessarily mean it is true for the first humans.

Freud's psycholoanalytical foundations have found great strength. For example, his idea that religion emerges from the oedipus complex and the need to atone and repress guilt has been backed up with clinical evidence to show that repression is definitely used as a defence mechanism.

Challenges

There is nothing that said people were originally in hordes. Darwin's work was only making intelligent guesses. There is not proof either of a totem animal that was worshipped. This is because the primal horde theory was based on Darwin's speculations which was based on a time where there was no reliable data.

Freud only selected evidence that he felt backed up his point, therefore his appraoch could hardly be called scientific.

No firm evidence for the Oedipus complex. Freud based it on 5 case studies and assumed that this was true across the board.

Freud had a simplistic idea of religion. Religion is more than just rituals .

Assumes that God is considered to be male, but does not consider religions with female deities.

All Freud based his work on were theories and there was no verifiable evidence or statistical data.

Freud believed his work to be scientific. However it fits in with every possible state of affairs and cannot be falsified.

The idea of universal guilt that has been suppressed has been ridiculed. The idea of guilt is what Freud ideas are based on so due to this being undermined, there is no strength in his theories. The Oedipus complex has also been shown not the be universal because of the work of Malinowski.

Freud's work deals with unobservable causes, or repressed unconscious conflicts. If Freud is wrong, we have no way of knowing it because it is unconscious.

There is not evidence that there were primal crime of murder due to sexual rivalry. There is some evidence that the Peking man practices cannibalism and the Australopithecines murdered each other, but that doe not supply enough evidence to support the idea of an original crime.

Many cultures such as the Ainu, primitive eskimos did not practice totemism.