title: [An offspring of love. Freud on belief].
abstract: This paper elucidates Freud's ideas of belief and believing. By investigating the semantic field, it discusses the place of his theory of religion in the context of his thought. It argues for a consistent model which does not stem from antireligious prejudice but meshes with his whole thinking. For Freud religious belief was a special case of the general attitude of believing. He situated it within a three-stage development of the individual as well as of humanity, starting with a state of magical-animistic thinking in autoerotism and narcissism and leading, via object-dependency and a belief in omnipotent parental figures, to emancipation through rationality and critical judgement. The origin of belief in wishing accounts for the believer's lack of judgement and submission to religious authorities. In the end some of the advantages and disadvantages of Freud's model are highlighted.
authors.affiliation: herbert.will@gmx.de
authors.forename: Herbert
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Will
mesh_terms: D049673:History, 20th Century; D006801:Humans; D008960:Models, Psychological; D011572:Psychoanalysis / Q000266:history; D011574:Psychoanalytic Theory; D012067:Religion