Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-dsjbd Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-25T22:07:46.235Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Freud's Monotheism

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 December 2022

William Parsons
Affiliation:
Rice Universtiy

Summary

This Element consists of three interrelated parts. 'What Freud Said' summarizes the salient details of Freud's psychology of religion: his views on the origins and development of western religions; on contemporary western monotheisms; on the 'unpsychological' proceedings of the religio-cultural super-ego; his qualified endorsement of religious forms of psychotherapy; and his cursory analysis of eastern religions.'What Freud got Wrong' surveys the history of the multidisciplinary critiques (anthropological, sociological, later psychoanalytic, theological/philosophical) that have been levelled at his interpretative strategies. 'Towards a Revised Psychoanalytic Theory of Religion' suggests that the best way forward is to employ a psychoanalytic theory of religion which, taking its cue from the history of its critique, houses reflective, inclusive and dialogical elements. It presents illustrations taken from a variety of contemporary religio-cultural phenomena (marvel movies; issues concerning religion, sexuality and gender; the Megachurch; QAnon) as portable lessons for such applications.
Get access
Type
Element
Information
Online ISBN: 9781108919975
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication: 26 January 2023

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Abel, E. (1990). Race, Class, and Psychoanalysis? Opening Questions. In Hirsch, M. and Keller, E. F., eds., Conflicts in Feminism. New York: Routledge, 184204.Google Scholar
Akhtar, S., ed. (2008). The Crescent and the Couch. New York: Jason Aronson.Google Scholar
Akhtar, S. and Tummala-Narra, P. (2008). Psychoanalysis in India. In Akhtar, S., ed., Freud along the Ganges. New Delhi: Stanza, 328.Google Scholar
Albright, W. F. (1946). From the Stone Age to Christianity. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press.Google Scholar
Beit-Hallahmi, B. (2019). Flesh and Blood: Interrogating Freud on Human Sacrifice, Real and Imagined. Leiden: Brill.Google Scholar
Benslama, F. (2009). Psychoanalysis and the Challenge of Islam. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.Google Scholar
Berger, P. (1990[1967]). Sacred Canopy. New York: Anchor Books. www.christiancentury.org/article/2012-03/protestantism-and-quest-certainty.Google Scholar
Bibring, E. (1941). The Development and Problems of the Theory of the Instincts. International Journal of Psychoanalysis 22, 102131.Google Scholar
Brickman, C. (2003). Aboriginal Populations in the Mind. New York: Columbia University Press.Google Scholar
Chodorow, N. (1978). The Reproduction of Mothering. Berkeley: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Cooper, P. (2019). Zen Insight, Psychoanalytic Action. New York: Routledge.Google Scholar
Cooper-White, P. (2018). Old and Dirty Gods: Religion, Antisemitism, and the Origins of Psychoanalysis. New York: Routledge.Google Scholar
Douglas, M. (1982). The Effects of Modernization on Religious Change. In Douglas, M. and Tipton, S., eds., Religion and America: Spiritual Life in a Secular Age. Boston, MA: Beacon Press, 2543.Google Scholar
Drescher, E. (2016). Choosing Our Religion: The Spiritual Lives of America’s Nones. New York: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Durkheim, E. (1965[1912]). The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life. New York: Free Press.Google Scholar
El Shakry, O. (2017). The Arabic Freud. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Erikson, E. (1958). Young Man Luther. New York: W. W. Norton.Google Scholar
Fanon, F. (2008[1952]). Black Skin, White Masks. New York: Grove Press.Google Scholar
Freud, S. (1951). A Letter from Freud. American Journal of Psychiatry 107, 786787.Google Scholar
Freud, S. (1966). The Standard Edition of the Complete Psychological Works of Sigmund Freud (S. E.). Volumes 1–24. Trans. and ed. Strachey, J.. London: Hogarth Press.Google Scholar
Hamman, J. (2017). The Reproduction of the Hypermasculine Male: Select Subaltern Views. Pastoral Psychology 66, 799818.Google Scholar
Hewitt, M. (2022). Review of “Freud and Religion: Advancing the Dialogue.” By William B. Parsons. https://doi.org/10.1093/jaarel/lfac.038CrossRefGoogle Scholar
James, W. (1929[1902]). The Varieties of Religious Experience. New York: Modern Library.Google Scholar
Jones, E. (1953–1957). The Life and Work of Sigmund Freud. 3 vols. New York: Basic Books.Google Scholar
Jones, J. (2008). Blood That Cries Out from the Earth. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Jonte-Pace, D. (2001). Analysts, Critics, and Inclusivists: Feminist Voices in the Psychology of Religion. In D. Jonte-Pace and Parsons, W. B., eds., Religion and Psychology: Mapping the Terrain. New York: Routledge, 129148.Google Scholar
Jonte-Pace, D. (2006). Psychoanalysis, Colonialism, and Modernity: Reflections on Brickman’s Aboriginal Populations in the Mind. Religious Studies Review 32(1), 14.Google Scholar
Jonte-Pace, D. (2001). Speaking the Unspeakable. Berkeley: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Jung, C. (1977[1938]). Psychology and Religion. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Kakar, S. (1991). The Guru As Healer. In Kakar, S., ed., The Analyst and the Mystic. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 3554.Google Scholar
Kakar, S. (1982). Shamans, Mystics, Doctors. New York: Alfred A. Knopf.Google Scholar
Kohut, H. (1978). Forms and Transformations of Narcissism. In P. Ornstein, ed., The Search for the Self. 2 vols. New York: International Universities Press, vol. 2: 427–460.Google Scholar
Kohut, H. and Wolf, E.. (1978). The Disorders of the Self and Their Treatment: An Outline. International Journal of Psychoanalysis 59, 413425.Google Scholar
Lacan, J. (1982). God and the Jouissance of Women. In Mitchell, J. and Rose, J., eds., Feminine Sexuality: Jacques Lacan and the Ecole Freudian. New York: W. W. Norton, 137149.Google Scholar
Lasch, C. (1979). The Culture of Narcissism. New York: W. W. Norton.Google Scholar
Lorand, J. (2018). The Fetish Revisited: Marx, Freud, and the Gods Black People Make. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.Google Scholar
Malinowski, B. (2012[1927]). Sex and Repression in Savage Society. London: Forgotten Books.Google Scholar
McCutcheon, R. (2018). Studying Religion. New York: Routledge.Google Scholar
McGrath, J. (1986). Freud’s Discovery of Psychoanalysis: The Politics of Hysteria. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.Google Scholar
Meissner, W. W. (1986). Psychoanalysis and Religious Experience. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Meng, H. and Freud, E. L., eds. (1963). Psychoanalysis and Faith: The Letters of Sigmund Freud and Oskar Pfister. New York: Basic Books.Google Scholar
Miller, C. and Carlin, N.. (2010). Joel Osteen As Cultural Self-Object: Meeting the Needs of the Group Self and Its Individual Members in and from the Largest Church in America. Pastoral Psychology 59, 2751.Google Scholar
Mitchell, J. (2000[1974]). Psychoanalysis and Feminism. New York: Basic Books.Google Scholar
Obeyesekere, G. (1990). The Work of Culture. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Parsons, W. B., ed. (2018). Being Spiritual but Not Religious: Past, Present, Future(s). New York: Routledge.Google Scholar
Parsons, W. B. (1999). The Enigma of the Oceanic Feeling. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Parsons, W. B. (2013). Freud and Augustine in Dialogue. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press.Google Scholar
Parsons, W. B. (2021). Freud and Religion: Advancing the Dialogue. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Pfister, O. (1993). The Illusion of the Future: A Friendly Disagreement with Prof. Sigmund Freud. International Journal of Psychoanalysis 74, 557579.Google Scholar
Rice, E. (1990). Freud and Moses. Albany: State University of New York Press.Google Scholar
Rizzuto, A. (1979). The Birth of the Living God. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Said, E. (2003). Freud and the Non-European. New York: Verso.Google Scholar
Schorske, C. (1981). Fin-de-Siècle Vienna. New York: Vintage.Google Scholar
Smith, J. Z. (1988). Imagining Religion. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Smith, W. C. (1991[1962]). The Meaning and End of Religion. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press.Google Scholar
Thatamanil, J. J. (2020). Circling the Elephant: A Comparative Theory of Religious Diversity. New York: Fordham University Press.Google Scholar
Wallace, E. (1983). Freud and Anthropology. New York: International Universities Press.Google Scholar
Wallwork, E. (1991). Psychoanalysis and Ethics. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Webb, R. and Sells, M. (1995). Lacan and Bion: Psychoanalysis and the Mystical Language of Unsaying. Theory and Psychology 5(2), 195215.Google Scholar
Winnicott, D. W. (1971). Playing and Reality. New York: Penguin.Google Scholar
Wolfson, E. (1997). Through a Speculum That Shines. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Yerushalmi, Y. H. (1991). Freud’s Moses: Judaism Terminable and Interminable. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.Google Scholar

Save element to Kindle

To save this element to your Kindle, first ensure [email protected] is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Freud's Monotheism
Available formats
×

Save element to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Freud's Monotheism
Available formats
×

Save element to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Freud's Monotheism
Available formats
×