In Civilization and Its Discontents, Freud continues to muse about civilization and the individual's place in society. He discusses personal development and even, at one point in the previous section, brings up the power of yoga and meditation.
As for organized religion, he sees it as a "system of doctrines and promises which on the one hand explains . . . the riddles of this world with enviable completeness, and, on the other, assures [the believer] that a careful Providence will watch over his life and will compensate him in a future existence for any frustrations he suffers here." He says that for most, the idea of God is based on "an enormously exalted father" figure.
Freud's response: "The whole thing is so patently infantile, so foreign to reality, that to anyone with a friendly attitude to humanity it is painful to think that the great majority of mortals will never be able to rise above this view of life. It is still more humiliating to discover how large a number of people living to-day, who cannot but see that this religion is not tenable, nevertheless try to defend it piece by piece. . ."
In the next sections, Freud gets at primal sex and aggression drives and the way civilization seeks, without much success, to contain and channel these drives through rules, laws, and customs; even when they do succeed, such restrictions tend to create in people a byproduct of neurotic behavior. He also gets at the idea of sublimation, channeling energies into acts of cultural creation.
While I agree with Sheila that some of the specifics of Freud's notions about individual psychology were a bit wacky, overall, he was onto some major truths. Robin, wouldn't it have been fascinating to talk about all this with him?
Today's Rune: Wholeness.
3 comments:
The concept of god just fills a void in the human psyche. If there is no god, then humanity would create one to fill that need.
The whole concept of an all powerful being who would care if you worship him/her is fairly silly. Such a being would be as far beyond our understanding as nuclear physics is to a penguin (to paraphrase a quote from House).
Isn't it interesting how most of the requirements of the faith seem to empower or enrich the organized religions? Wouldn't you think that it wouldn't matter to god if you just lived a moral life, and never went to church? Also, so many religions are in conflict, and only one could really be right if what they say is true, so it's really would be just blind luck if you happened to pick the right one (or since most people follow in their parents' footsteps, if your ancestors picked the right one).
-Jamie
Yes, Erik, it would be a fascinating conversation, no doubt! I never knew he was interested in yoga or meditation--wow! I really appreciate your blog, too, for stirring up different ideas, things to ponder. I'll definitely have to check this book out. Someone gave his book on dream interpretation, but I just threw it on the shelf, thinking he'd only wrote about sexual gratification. I'll have to look it over now. Thanks! --Robin
Thanks Robin and Jamie!
Poor Freud has been made into a cartoon character. He had an immense body of work, some of which is socially retarded (especially about women), but then, he was coming up with revolutionary ideas about dream interpretation a hundred years ago. The basic idea was sound -- that dreams are important, that there's a lot more going on with people than meets the eye, all that. Psychology, and social psychology.
Here's to stirring things up ;) Peacefully, of course! ~~E'
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