Sigmund Freud on Religion (Part 1)

(Written June 2019)

Many of you have probably heard the name Sigmund Freud in the past. He’s best known for his obsession with sexuality, his cocaine addiction, and the infamous Oedipus Complex. Though despite his shortcomings, the father of psychoanalysis was ridiculously brilliant and much insight into the human condition can be gained from his pioneering work. Among his best essays is Civilization and its Discontents, in which Freud attempts to provide us with an explanation of why humans are unhappy. His thesis essentially boils down to two points: humans are unhappy because of the demands civilization imposes on them, and happiness is not a permanent state that can be achieved. As is typical with Freud, the positions he advocates for are advanced in a very sophisticated way and lots of other topics are touched upon in the essay.  

About a third of his essay is also devoted to critiquing religion – a common theme in Freud’s writings. The first and second chapters are an extension of his previous work The Future of an Illusion, in which he puts forth his psychological argument against religion, specifically the Christian faith. On the surface, the case sounds well constructed, but it relies on some fatal assumptions. The rest of Civilization and its Discontents is devoted to unfolding the main argument regarding civilization and an extended discussion of happiness and the meaning of life. 

I don’t seek to analyze these works specifically, but do want to take a closer look at some of the positions he takes on the topic of religion. I think that this endeavor will prove to be both entertaining and help to understand some of the places where Freud misstepped.       

Freud’s View of Religion

Other people and I are a bit surprised by some of the moves Freud makes in the discussion of religious topics, specifically Judeo-Christian ones. For a man as committed to the facilities of human reason as he was, he uses a significant number of ill-founded ad hominem attacks on believers and generally views the human race in low regards. This point is vital in understanding his entire worldview and seeing it in contrast with the Christian one he so vehemently opposed. 

As a materialist, Freud took a classic Darwinian approach to his view of humankind, presuming, in some key respects, that we are no different than other creatures. By this, I mean that Freud viewed humans as innately material, and driven by biological forces. This view underpins all Freud’s theories and helps to explain why his outlook on humanity was, to say the least, pessimistic. In Civilization and its Discontents, Freud explains that he does not believe some people to be deserving of love (love in the same sense that it is used in Mark 12:30-31). He also states that all religious people are “delusional” and that religion is mass neurosis and which serves no purpose. If one is to take up a Darwinian worldview, then these positions are of no surprise; for it is the Judeo-Christian narrative that postulates infinite value of all humans due to the spark of the divine imbued within them. Operating without that principle and under one in which humans are no different than other creatures, why would you hold a high value of humankind? 

There is not one person, who emerges themselves in a thoughtful study of Western Civilization, that would agree with Freud’s proposition that religion serves no purpose. That topic, however, is outside the scope of this thesis, but I may get to it in time. This [religion serving no prupose], along with Freud’s strange ad hominem characterizations, leads me to the question of why Freud hated religion so much? 

To answer this question, it is imperative to look into Freud’s history. Without going into too much detail, I’ll sum it up in a few short lines: Freud had a troubled childhood and a rocky relationship with his father – who also happened to marry a woman roughly the same age as Freud and his siblings. His caretaker also left him early on. He grew up poor and had to postpone his wedding for a time due to lack of funding. When he asked his fiance’s family for money to help pay for the wedding they refused, it was after I had read the latter point that I realized how all of these things fit in to shape Freud’s view on religion. His psychological argument, which will be discussed in a later paper, his outright rejection of a Divine Authority, and his reasoning for why religion devalues life all have their roots in his early years. 

There is a strong correlation between the rejection of a heavenly father and an unstable relationship with one’s father. Many of the foremost atheists of history have fit this mold. Freud is no exception. He viewed his father as a failure and wrote about him in many of his works. The most significant of these recollections come in The Interpretation of Dreams when Freud talks about how his father would not stand up in the face of severe anti-Semitism. The impact affected Freud for the rest of his life. Couple this with the profound impact that the problem of pain had on Freud, and it is no wonder that he rejected God. For both, his father and God had failed, be it in different ways, at doing what Freud viewed their duties were – protecting him. Freud also had “complex” feelings toward his mother, which is probably where the roots of the Oedipus Complex gravitated from; needless to say this did not help his relationship with his father.

Early on in his life, Freud lost a caretaker that he depended on fiercely. They had a good relationship, and she was let go from the family. He had dreams about her throughout his life, and the event impacted him in significant ways. As mentioned previously, Freud had to postpone his wedding since he did not have enough money to pay for it. When asking the family of his soon to be wife, they rejected his request. These events, along with the fact that Freud was fiercely independent, certainly helps to explain why Freud rejects the notion of dependence. A central tenet in Christianity is that God is the original life source – through Him, we were created, and without Him, we are separated from life, thus partaking in death. This necessitates a dependency upon Him in order to live on through death. The concept of complete dependence is reinforced in verses such as Matthew 6:33, John 6:35, 15:5, and many more. Freud likely knew about this central tenet, as he was reasonably familiar with Jewish and Christian scriptures. More factors contribute to this hypothesis, such as Freud’s moving during childhood and his severe heartbreak, which seem to imply Freud’s struggle to find stability during his early years. It, therefore, seems very plausible that the notion of full dependence on a fatherly figure was utterly foreign to him, and that he wanted nothing to do with it.

This hypothesis also gains credence when the implications of Freud’s view of life are sought out. It was Carl Jung who said that someone’s motives could be determined by looking at their actions and viewing the consequences. When applied to Freud, we see that freedom and independence are his ultimate motivators underpinning his supposed deified view of sexual gratification. In Civilization and its Discontents, Freud claims that humankind would be happiest if there were to be no restrictions on his ability to act. He derives this view from his presupposed “Aggression Instinct” and the fact that the rules of civilization impose constraints upon our “natural” (in a Darwinian view) inclination toward unrestricted sexual gratification and violence. No restrictions would lead to a society in which the strongest survive, and those who survive can have near unlimited pleasure. In other words, a society with ultimate freedom; one in which individuals need not depend on civilization to provide them with anything.           

After all this, however, a simple question seeks and pulls out the lynchpin in Freud’s view. Why is dependence a bad thing? If the Christian religion is true, then God is the eternal life source, which also means that we have been separated from that life source, and therefore dependence on him is not submission to authority but a reunion with our original life. In short, dependence is not bad, it’s logically consistent with [at least the Chrstian] religion, and one might even go so far as to say that it’s a necessary condition for the Christian religion! 

This brings me to yet another point. Freud mentions briefly in Civilization and its Discontents that he views religion as unwarranted submission to authority. In his eyes, the moral law that Christian traditions pose carries no weight. It almost seems like he believes that Christianity is just another instance of Divine Command Theory. But, this does not do the religion justice. 

I’ve thought for a couple of years on what precisely the rationale is for the New Testament Laws and commands. Are they just arbitrary? Why would God command people to abstain from so-called sinful acts? I haven’t given the issue its priority, nor have I come to a complete answer to those questions. But, I do have a hypothesis that will be refined in due time. It does not seem that the commands God gives to Christians are merely arbitrary. I discuss this a little in my post on Euthyphro, which you can find under the ethics section on the website. It appears that God gives these commands for reasons, such as to protect us or to protect society. Each instance must be looked at on a case by case basis, but the next time you encounter a New Testament COMMAND, I implore you to think about why a divine being would sanction such a thing.

If my hypothesis were to hold, then it would not be submission to some arbitrary authority as Freud thought, but accordance with natural law. 

Delusion

Freud’s belief that religion is a delusion does not have any merit nowadays. That statement has evolved and is a standard line used by many modern atheists. They claim that religion is indoctrination and that atheism is a default position of humankind; without our culture to impose religion on us, we would be atheists. However, unlike big metaphysical questions, this question can and has been empirically tested. 

There has been a lot of research devoted to this subject. People like Andrew Newberg M.D., Eugene D’aquili, Jesse Bering, Justin Barett, and more are all pioneers in this area of study. The literature and evidence on this are very substantive, and it would be impractical to discuss it at length here. However, I did come across two excellent videos delving into the topic that are paramount to seeing the conclusive evidence opposing Freud’s position. In them, the “author” makes a strong case, backed up by all of the evidenced I previously mentioned, for religion being natural, and not the result of mental disorders, or delusions, as Freud literally claimed. 

However, as of late, studies in the field of cognitive science of religion have helped to refute some of Freud’s assertions. In the works cited page are links to two videos summarizing and citing some of those studies.

On top of refuting Freud’s belief that religion is a delusion, the studies help to resolve a fascinating paradox. Freud, even though a staunch atheist, nevertheless had an obsession with the supernatural – specifically The Devil. He often quoted the lines of Goethe’s character Mephisto (Satan) in the book Faust. There are numerous references to Freud’s keen interest in Satan throughout his letter and works. Moreover, Freud, like many other atheists, was angry at God for leaving the problem of pain unresolved, which supports the hypothesis mentioned in the videos that atheists subconsciously believe in the Divine. I also find it ironic that Freud uses “theistic language” in his writings. E.g., saying “By the grace of God, etc.. Keeping in mind that he was a man who thought that even a slip of the tongue was a manifestation of some unconscious thought it is puzzling as to why he would say such things and whether or not he ever analyzed his deep thoughts.      

Freudian Views & Religion

Near the end of Civilization and its Discontents, there is an in-depth discussion into the nature of man. Are we avatars of goodness and our culture/environment corrupts us? Or are we naturally aggressive violent? Believe it or not, the answer to this question has vast implications on the decisions we make and the society that we live in. Through his evolutionary lens, Freud concludes that humans are innately aggressive; he calls this the Aggression Instinct. Though his reasoning for this claim is a bit weak, modern scientific research supports it. 

In the 1970s, Jane Goodall discovered that chimpanzees were naturally prone to extreme acts of violence and that they are very territorial creatures. This is not surprising considering the rest of the animal world, but it did pose problems for evolutionists who thought that man’s nature was corrupted and that we, supposedly like non-humans, were not prone to violence. The discovery of a biological inclination toward aggression and violence heavily supports Freud’s hypothesis. I’ll be refraining from discussing the implications of this view for the time being as I solely want to focus on the eerie parallels between Freudian views and religion here. 

Back when I was in high school, I learned a little bit about Freud in an introductory psychology course. I was intrigued by the Oedipus Complex not because of how weird and grotesque it is, but because of the subtle view into man’s nature, it gives us. The Freudian view presupposes an aggressive human – one that is, like apes and other creatures, far darker than what we assume ourselves to be. This concept is a Christian one; it is referred to as original sin. When humankind was created in the Garden of Eden, Adam and Eve did not have corrupted natures. Through The Fall of Man, they were corrupted by the forces of evil, and through them, their offspring inherited the corrupted nature. In the Oedipal situation, the child engages in fantasy in which the father is killed, and the mother becomes the object of the child’s sexual desire. I bring this up specifically because Freud hypothesized that it occurs from ages 3-6. 

I am inclined to think that the [Oedipal] phenomenon that Freud described lends further evidence to the belief that man has been corrupted and now lives with original sin. So far I have not been able to find any studies that support the hypothesis that children from 3-6 years old cannot tell the difference between the moral “rightness/wrongness” of the fantasies of the Oedipus Complex, but that does not mean my point has no support, it just means that it hasn’t been tested. If children experiencing Oedipal thoughts cannot tell that murder [of the father for sexual satisfaction] is morally wrong, then this provides support our nature being prone to evil, rather than ourselves being corrupted through external circumstances. 

Freud’s notion of guilt and his tripartite mind also share parallels with Christianity. In Civilization and its Discontents, Freud attempts to explain where guilt and the Superego originate from and then says that civilization uses it to control us. This latter statement an accurate representation of reality need not concern us now, only the former must. Guilt originates, Freud says, from the perceived threat of a loss of love. I.e., we feel guilty when we commit an action and the authority figures or people we love then view us in a negative way. We also end in a state of fear when those people can punish us through a particular medium after committing an action. To illustrate, consider a shoplifter. Without laws or societal pressures not to steal, would the thief feel guilty or be afraid? It is a daunting question.

Over time this authority becomes embedded in the individual and with the help of repressing the aggressive impulses of the individual, turns into the Superego. You can think about this as your conscious or the little angel on your shoulder. The Superego then moderates your internal thoughts and, through sublimation of the aggression instinct, punishes the individual with a sense of guilt. The entire spectrum of guilty feelings is now accounted for; from guilt imposed by external figures, to the guilt imposed by the internal authority.  

Freud was puzzled as to why some people seem to be punished more by their Superego than others. E.g., virtuous and religious people. He argues that each renunciation of the Superego increases the severity of it and that our hatred toward authority produce this. My issue here is that it seems like Freud says this ad hoc. His theories regarding authority predict ambivalence, not pure antipathy. So why then would people all of the sudden hate authority so much that they repress it into their Superego? They still leave open the question as to why this cycle occurs? In this phenomenon, I see a close parallel with Christianity. The verse Matthew 5:48 commands Christians to strive for perfection. If the Christian God were real, and his commandments were to be followed, then this feedback loop would make sense. The God would want to see his followers striving for perfection and instill in them a mechanism to enable that to occur. 

Furthermore,  there is a final parallel I saw between Freudian thought and Christianity – the tripartite mind. Freud broke the mind down into three parts the Id, the Ego, and the Superego. The Id can be thought of as one’s earthly desires. However, the Id is uncontrolled – it wants what it wants at any cost. The Ego is what attempts to control the Id in a way that is consistent with reality. You can think of this as a horse and horseback rider analogy. The Superego, as I have discussed, is the authority over all the actions. It seems as if the Id is akin to the unrestrained temptations that the Christian narrative talks about so much, while the Ego is yourself, attempting to control the temptations, and the Superego is the so-called conscious that the Bible describes as having been written on the human heart by God. 

Throughout his works, Freud pioneered some great ideas, but some were way off base. The claims about religion stem mostly from his conjecture, and as I hypothesized, from his own past experiences. His attacks on religious people do not have any evidence, and it is actually the case that Freud’s position (Atheism) seems to be the delusion. There are also many parallels between the religion Freud attacked so much and his school of thought. The irony of the situation is that the religion Freud tried so hard to destroy lives on, and his theories can be used, not in juxtaposition as he thought, but to actually make more sense of how our inner nature operates through the lens of a Christian worldview.   

Works Cited

Freud, Sigmund. Civilization and Its Discontents. General Press, 2018.

InspiringPhilosophy, director. Is Atheism a Delusion? . YouTube, YouTube, 2 Sept. 2016, www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Ii-bsrHB0o&t=317s.

InspiringPhilosophy, director. Is Atheism a Delusion (Follow Up). YouTube, YouTube, 6 Jan. 2017, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xnBTJDje5xk.

“Woman Lying on Couch and Sigmund Freud Sitting in Vector Image on VectorStock.” VectorStock, http://www.vectorstock.com/royalty-free-vector/woman-lying-on-couch-and-sigmund-freud-sitting-in-vector-21894996.