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A fact that is not widely appreciated today is that the central point of Freud’s analysis—namely, that religion is a projection of human needs, and thus an illusion—was widely known decades before Freud’s essay. Ludwig Feuerbach, in his historic attack on Christianity, The Essence of Christianity,11 first expressed the projection theory in its modern form. Feuerbach’s interpretation had become an intellectual commonplace, especially in German cultural circles. For example, both Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels were familiar with Feuerbach’s ideas and spent some time expanding (and refining on) his position, about which they were clearly enthusiastic.12 Freud in his late teens already mentioned having read Feuerbach on this issue.13 Even more interesting is that Freud’s personal library contained Feuerbach’s book expounding this view. The copy in his library had a 1923 copyright date, just a few years before The Future of an Illusion came out.14 It is plausible that Freud reread it at that time to refresh his memory on Feuerbach. Among Feuerbach’s more pertinent remarks are these:
Man projects his nature into the world outside of himself before he finds it in himself. In the beginning, his own nature confronts him as being distinct from himself. Religion is the child-like condition of humanity…. Hence the historical progress. of religion consists of this: that which during an earlier stage of religion was regarded as something objective is now recognized as something subjective, so that which was formerly viewed and worshipped as God is now recognized as something human.15 Every bit as “Freudian” are such comments as “God is…a personification of man’s moral conscience.”16 And as for wish-fulfillment, Feuerbach wrote: “What man misses—whether this be an articulate and therefore conscious, or an unconscious [emphasis added], need—that is his God.”17 Freud’s Lack of Experience with Religious PatientsIn view of the essentially derivative character of Freud’s thesis in The Future of an Illusion, how is one to account for the widespread power and influence that this essay had (and still has)? The effectiveness of the work has no doubt derived to some degree from Freud’s consummate style, and from his ability to weave together in an interesting fashion his understanding of science with his discussion of the origin of culture and his critique of religion. Moreover, Feuerbach had been to a degree forgotten by this time, and his writings were also generally longer and less elegantly expressed than Freud’s. Finally, by 1927 (when Freud’s work appeared), there was a much larger audience of unbelievers eager to hear such a message. But certainly one of the greatest reasons for this essay’s |