“The Future of an Illusion”: Allelu-Freud

Peter Gay points out that “Freud was a consistent, aggressive, dogmatic atheist, a child of the Enlightenment who saw a world at war to the death between science and religion. To study religion, he was convinced, one must take a stand outside it: only the unbeliever can truly understand belief” (Gay 429). In other words, Freud felt that in order to evaluate any religion, one had to be an atheist. It is a powerful statement that follows a specific pattern of logic that beautifully reverberates in the saying: All the thoughts of a lizard are lizard. Still, should we take this notion for granted? I think that this essay will answer the question quite clearly, for I will deal with four critics and their views vis-à-vis The Future of an Illusion, but also with their position towards religion. Furthermore, I shall analyze the text of The Future of an Illusion in order to ascertain any relationship between its rhetorical devices and the proposition of this essay.

T.S. Eliot’s Perspective

T.S. Eliot did not have much to impart about The Future of an Illusion, but if the little he said was not entirely negative, the rest of it was surely derived from his Waste Land mentality. He found it to be “one of the most curious and interesting books of the season” (Eliot 350). This phrase is extremely misleading, for he followed it with his true opinion: “It is shrewd and yet stupid; the stupidity appears not so much in historical ignorance or lack of sympathy with the religious attitude, as in verbal vagueness and inability to reason” (Eliot 350). Eliot believed that Freud was quite naive when he spoke of human culture, and considered his definition of it “oddly inadequate and even circular” (Eliot 351). In addition, he argued that Freud could not distinguish between the terms illusion and error, and that he did not elucidate those of science and the riddles of the universe. Eliot’s criticism is too trivial and even bogus.

Firstly, he states that in order to elevate human culture above brute life, Freud should have differentiated between the two. I think that we can imagine these differences without Freud having to list them for us. At our worst, we can be more beastly than any animal on the face of the earth. However, at our best, and even with our slow-motion action, we surely surpass any known creature. Secondly, he thinks that Freud should have enumerated the human needs before linking the term to culture. Following the present industrial revolution, it is perhaps easier to understand the ties between culture and human needs, especially in terms of communication. Surely, I can see the superiority of The Future of an Illusion to The Waste Land when it comes to a long-run influence. Thirdly, he declares that he cannot grasp Freud’s assertion that the gist of culture consists of preventing the dangers that it faces. Culture gradually modifies itself but always strives to ensure its survival. And religion is a perfect example of it, for when ancient persuasive tactics do not function properly, religion resorts to science. For instance, religion holds that the dead are well and living in a better world by recording blurry glimpses of them at cemeteries. The “scientific” priest shows them happy, and they even speak to the camera. But religion forgets that science is based on facts and that recordings can be admirably staged. Fourthly, Eliot adds that Freud’s use of the term asocial escapes his understanding when Freud regards it as a trait of our kind. I am myself quite asocial. Of course, I have my off days. As for Eliot, he perceives in his mind only the few asocial men who contributed to civilization, but neglects to consider all the asocial men and women whose sole offering was, and is, that of suffering. And lastly, in the case of culture, Eliot refers to Freud’s utilization of the terms us and nature in “it is the principal task of culture, its real raison d’être, to defend us against nature.” Here, Eliot stresses the lack of proper definitions for the terms. These words, us and nature, are important concepts, but I cannot see why Freud had to define them. Many people find it to be a problem when us is used to include them. It should only be seen as a rhetorical device, especially when Freud seems to use it very often. Us means the reader and I or all the sapient beings, and nature consists of everything that is not us and therefore not directly applicable to our nature. It can be as simple as that. Ironically, these objections came from a man who published The Waste Land five years before the appearance of The Future of an Illusion.

As for the case of illusion and error, they are relatively interchangeable, but one may also choose to distinguish between them. Still, how can Eliot declare that Freud is unable to perceive the difference between the two? I suspect that it is clearer in German. Yet it is plausible to hold that Columbus’ belief that he discovered a new sea-route to India was an illusion and not an error. Today, we might see it as an error, but at the end of the fifteenth century, it was surely an illusion.

Finally, Eliot is quite moronic to insist upon a definition of science and a listing of the riddles of the universe. Science is religion’s enemy and our most promising path to reaching the borders of happiness. And the riddles of the universe are the ensemble of our inquiries, which science attempts to answer and does so on many occasions. At least, it has replied to questions that religion has “answered” before they were asked. In other words, science may advance slowly but surely, but religion recedes and is stuck somewhere in Sufferland.

Eliot is also annoyed by Freud’s concept of super-ego, and regards it as one of “Dr. Freud’s supernatural beings” (Eliot 352). Nevertheless, he ends his review on a lighter note: “This is a strange book” (Eliot 353). What is really weird is Eliot’s so-called review. And applying Eliot’s words to Eliot himself, he wanted to be shrewd, but he only accomplished to appear unwise.

Gregory Zilboorg’s Angle

Gregory Zilboorg published many articles on psychoanalysis and religion between 1939 and 1958. It is possible that he waited for Freud to die before voicing his critical points of view. Moreover, he began to mention The Future of an Illusion only in 1953. It must have been a more appropriate year for dealing with the future of the illusion.

Zilboorg emphasizes that Freud’s belief that knowledge could only originate in science was unfounded even in his writings, since Freud “relied upon myths, sagas, folklore, dreams” and “fantasies” (Zilboorg 104) in his scientific works. Religion is made up of all these notions and its existence depends heavily upon the power of imagination. But more importantly, Freud found many concepts to possess a very prominent position in psychoanalysis and especially in dreams. Zilboorg goes on to suggest that Freud succumbed to scientism, elevating science “to the level of unshakable dogma” (Zilboorg 105) and thus, losing its scientific character. There are many instances when Freud is not very scientific, but in most cases, it is due to his literary style. His need to proselyte us gives his writing an unscientific quality, but the core of his work is quite scientific. Yet, to imply that scientism is his only raison d’être is going too far. One can easily regard religion as a forceful dogma that strives to dominate its slaves, ironically, by using its own principles.

Zilboorg’s 1956 article, which was published only in 1967, contains a troubling idea: “To me Freud’s…Future of an Illusion” is “as much of Freud as the Etruscan vase which he owned, or the Egyptian statuettes which he cherished. But that which is of Freud is not necessarily of Freudian psychoanalysis” (Zilboorg 175). In other words, Zilboorg seems to say that The Future of an Illusion was just an object similar in value to a vase or a statuette, that it was acquired by Freud, and therefore that its contents were not his own. Zilboorg’s following statement is ridiculous; it is a phrase that makes too much sense. One could also say, not to annoy him, that which is of God is not necessarily of religion. The essence of Freud’s message is not original, but its level of meaning and rhetorical characteristics cannot escape the label of newness.

In 1958, a year before his death, Zilboorg declared that Freud’s meta-psychology, or what should “replace” religion, was a purely hypothetical construction that should not intrude upon the field of theology. Freud’s metapsychology is not more hypothetical than theology, and personally, I regard religion as being the most poignant example of it. Furthermore, it intrudes upon an important field of the individual: self-reliance. Zilboorg adds:

In The Future of an Illusion (1927) Freud merely demonstrated the psychological mechanisms involved in some religious ideas, and concluded that these psychological mechanisms alone were not sufficient for him to accept religious beliefs. In other words, he actually never refuted the existence of God, nor the natural laws involved in the development of morality and other tenets of religion. (Zilboorg 209)

I think that if Freud dismissed religion as being an illusion, it went without saying that God was one as well. And if one refuses to accept this assumption, then Freud’s Obsessive Actions and Religious Practices, Totem and Taboo, and Civilization and Its Discontents will solve the dilemma. Freud was sympathetic towards religion’s objectives, but he strongly urged that science was a better tool to the realization of the golden task. It is also probable that he only chose to attack religion and not its symbol in order not to appear too radical. And allusion and irony served him splendidly: “Having recognized religious doctrines as illusions, we are faced by a further question: may not other cultured assets of which we hold a high opinion and by which we let our lives be ruled by of a similar nature?” (Freud 706).

Zilboorg pursues his critical assault by stating that Freud did not understand the meaning of religion as did the believers in God, and that he never referred to the true believers such as St. Ignatius of Loyola, St. Francis de Sales, or St. John of the Cross. Religion has many meanings, but I think that Freud covered the most important ones: its relation with the believer, the believer’s relation with it, and its deceptive quality. As for not dealing with “true believers,” they are quite invisible in numbers, and each one of us possesses a different list. Freud’s elite included Leonardo da Vinci and Moses.

Zilboorg’s last words are quite revealing:

It seems to me that one of the greatest failures of the last century, in the center of which Freud stands out so boldly, is the failure to recognize that man’s true greatness lies in the humble recognition of his task and mission, to follow the mysteries of the world of man and the world of things without superstitious occultism and without megalomanic scientism. (Zilboorg 243)

It may sound good, but Zilboorg’s message is rotten to the core. The key words seem to be humble and mission, which can be attributed respectively to lamb and servant that are in turn two more key terms of religion. He seems to dislike the pleasure of adventure; he prefers to follow the enigmas of the universe instead of questioning them, and chooses to stand between the realms of occult powers and scientific dogmas instead of adhering to one. He resembles the agnostic, but his character is more compatible to that of the servant.

Hans Küng’s Outlook

Hans Küng argues that “despite defective authentication…religious ideas exercised the strongest influence of all on human beings” (Küng 43), and adds that they could not have acquired their power through the strength of human wishes. Religious thoughts could also have inseminated the worst influence of all on civilization, robbing it, for a long bloody while, from its capacity to reason. And these religious ideas got their fuel by exploiting our fears and wishes, and by feeding upon our naiveté. Küng, as well, questions the relationship between our childish helplessness and religion. It is too clear to me that defenselessness triggers a need for comforting and love. And religion was eager to supply both, but with an adamant twist — Do not fear death! It is only the beginning of an everlasting bliss. If you believe, I can guarantee a place for you in Heaven. Give to the Lord and you shall be rewarded.

Least but not last, Küng evokes the issue of God: “Is God an idea, a goal, or reality?” and of course supplies the solution that “God is overwhelming reality” (Küng 63).

And lastly, Küng presents his “pièce de resistance”:

Psychoanalysis can remove neurotic guilt feelings, but it cannot liberate a person from real sin. It can eliminate psychosomatic illnesses, but it cannot answer ultimate questions about meaning and meaninglessness, life and death. Its aim is to bring things into consciousness, not to forgive; it is healing, not salvation. (Küng 101)

The only thing I regard as sin is murder, and by murder I also mean all its numerous attributes such as any violence: child abuse or the murder of innocence, rape or the murder of womanhood, torture or the murder of the senses, and all the other imaginable and unimaginable atrocities. Any other “sin” such as theft or tax evasion can be negotiated. Moreover, religion does not free one from homicide, whereas psychoanalysis can uncover its deep-rooted motives. Also, life and death can be seen as the ultimate quandaries, and are apt to seem mind-boggling forever. Up to now, only science proposes any plausible conclusions, while religion’s elucidations are more suitable for the fairy tale frame of mind. Finally, we do not require forgiveness nor salvation; we should be mended in a world of personal integrity and social commitment, but especially in a world where we are conscious to the bone.

Naomi R. Goldenberg’s Approach

Naomi R. Goldenberg indicates that Freud believed that “if a person wishes to believe in religion, she or he must suppress doubt and thus hamper her or his own intellectual growth” (Goldenberg 9). We could have lived in our future if religion had not acted so authoritatively in our past, thus slowing our development. She also mentions Freud’s disgust with religion’s commandment of belief without proof. If Freud could have known that even in the twenty-first century there are still people, a multitude, who believe the world to be flat. She then quotes one of Freud’s boldest allegations: “‘I shall assert the view that civilization runs a greater risk if we maintain our present attitude to religion than if we give it up’” (Goldenberg 9). Why? Because religion is prohibiting the potentially sapient beings from becoming even wiser. Freud, argues Goldenberg, also perceived the destruction of civilization if its desire for social change was blocked. Why not? If some horny half-wit decided to press the bloodiest button because he or she is tired of life, then a certain current in society could accomplish the same result, but for a nobler cause. She remarks that “for Freud religion implied the image of a Father-god who limited the free exercise of thought” (Goldenberg 20). How can the master allow his or her slaves to ponder upon the state of their miserable existence? She points out that Freud saw religion as a social phenomenon, the reason for which he neglected to treat the individual’s religious development. He dealt with the bigger picture, thinking that its remedy constituted one for all its patterns.

Lastly, Goldenberg promotes Freud’s most audacious vision:

In Freud’s view, stagnation in the Oedipal complex meant psychological and thus intellectual stagnation. He saw “religions” …as encouraging this Oedipal stagnation because they endorsed “father” so heavily that they hampered resolution of the father complex in individuals. (Goldenberg 32)

Christianity seconded the father figure with the mother one, and perhaps, unknowingly, reduced the level of the Oedipal stagnation. Yet, Freud’s perception remains extremely poignant in so far as it indicates that the harm done to the individual will become irreparable if religion is not modified or abolished. Science is a beneficial substitute for religion, since its bedrock is the development of the individual mind. If Freud’s observation seems harsh, his insight remains illuminating.

The Future of an Illusion

Freud’s The Future of an Illusion is divided into ten parts, and may form a superior counterpart to the Ten Commandments. The first segment deals with civilization’s past, present and future, and constitutes a meaty bait for what ensues. This component is related in the first person singular and the third person singular and plural up to its closing sentence, where the first person plural is “finally” introduced: “What is in preparation there is unfinished and therefore eludes an investigation for which our own long-consolidated civilization affords us material” (Freud 689). The sapient beings have been often compared to dumb fish, but in this case, the fish is wise if it is trapped in Freud’s net. This brings us to the second section of the book.

Here he speaks of the discontents of the greater part of civilization, which are bound to be internalized but not forever, that is until they are ejected with tremendous forcefulness. The first-person plural takes charge of this portion of the book and is represented thirteen times. We are well in it and slowly become important pawns in the dirty game between the rich and the poor — terms that should be understood in all their connotative values. Freud also uses this part of his book to bring forth, again in the last sentence, the main objective of his book, that religion is an illusion: “No mention has yet been made of what is perhaps the most important item in the psychical inventory of a civilization. This consists in its religious ideas in the widest sense — in other words (which will be justified later) in its illusions” (Freud 692).

The third segment contains a history of civilization, the struggle with nature, and the appearance of consolation through the figure of the Father-god and all its religious attributes. The first-person plural dominates this chapter: forty-two occurrences. This suggests Freud’s insistent attempt to include his readers in the scheme of his true story. He tells, retells, foretells, inquires, replies, evokes, and explains everything he thinks will occur in our minds. His rhetorical adventure may be annoying to some, haunting to others, or pleasing to a “minority,” but the nucleus of his statements is incredibly refreshing. If Freud, referring back to his previous ideas, relates what one should conclude: “It is easy to see that not all the parts of this picture tally equally well with one another, that not all the questions that press for an answer receive one, that it is difficult to dismiss the contradiction of daily experience” (Freud 696), he does not forget to add, before the beginning of the next section, what should be presently asked: “And now the question arises: what are these ideas in the light of psychology? Whence do they derive the esteem in which they are held? And, to take a further timid step, what is their real worth?” (Freud 697). Timidity does not seem to be one of Freud’s virtues, but then, why should he be timorous?

In the fourth part of his book, Freud introduces a fictional opponent who represents a reader, and who gives him the chance to also utilize the second person. Thus, after having been warned, we are thrown into a dialogue whose main purpose is to clarify everything we thought or should have thought to be strange or unnatural. Suddenly, we are in the midst of a textual play whose lesser objective is to amuse us. Freud is also justifying his arguments; he does not allow us to doubt him. And in case we do, he recapitulates his best points:

I have tried to show that religious ideas have arisen from the same need as have all the other achievements of civilization: from the necessity of defending oneself against the crushingly superior force of nature…from the urge to rectify the shortcomings of civilization which made themselves painfully felt. (Freud 697)

To this, he adds that religion is given to us like the multiplication table or geometry, and that the possible strangeness we might feel while reading his text is probably due to the fact that religion is usually portrayed as a divine revelation, whereas his presentation ignores that, while playing within the religious system. The dialogue, in which the second person occurs eighteen times, goes three times back and forth. The frequent use of you enforces Freud’s rhetorical power, for we feel an even stronger speaker in charge of all persons. Nevertheless, we is featured on four occasions, which Freud uses in order to increase the forces on his side of the argument. Freud closes this chapter of his book with a significant statement: “it is not my intention to inquire any further into the development of the idea of God; what we are concerned with here is the finished body of religious ideas as it is transmitted by civilization to the individual” (Freud 699). This clearly suggests that his main intent was to battle with the religious establishment and not with the “Creator.”

The fifth segment illustrates the psychological meaning of religion and the classification of its beliefs. Freud evokes the “Credo quia absurdum” and the philosophy of the “As if” to demonstrate to what extent religion has gone in order to evade the problem of its authenticity. The first person plural is used forty-one times, and Freud ends another one of his endeavours by posing two questions that he answers in the beginning of the following chapter: “We must ask where the inner force of those doctrines lies and to what it is that they owe their efficacy, independent as it is of recognition by reason” (Freud 703).

The sixth part of his book embodies Freud’s distinction between illusion and error. He stresses that an illusion is a belief whose motivation is based upon a wish fulfillment, and that an error is, therefore, a belief whose incentive is not based upon a wish fulfillment. His fictional opponent makes a reappearance to bring forth this case: if one cannot refute religion by reason, why not simply believe it. Freud’s reply is beautifully poignant:

Just as no one can be forced to believe, so no one can be forced to disbelieve. But do not let us be satisfied with deceiving ourselves that arguments like these take us along the road of correct thinking. If ever there was a case of a lame excuse we have it here. Ignorance is ignorance; no right to believe anything can be derived from it. (Freud 705)

The first-person plural is “only” mentioned on thirty-five occasions, with the last one referring to “our wretched, ignorant and downtrodden ancestors” (Freud 706) who never succeeded to solve the challenging secrets of the cosmos.

In the first paragraph of the seventh chapter of his book, Freud considers that he has proved religion’s doctrines to be illusions, and stipulates that other highly regarded cultural tenets might be so as well. He employs the first-person plural on sixteen occasions, and that is a record for a paragraph of nineteen lines. Moreover, he himself is seen as a fictional character, and is referred to as the author. Further in this chapter, the dialogue form resumes, in which the adversary accuses Freud of trying to strip civilization of its spiritual support, and thus, promoting it to recede into anarchy. Freud replies with great subtlety and tries to sell himself short with his newly acquired modesty:

I have said nothing which other and better men have not said before me in a much more complete, forcible and impressive manner. Their names are well known, and I shall not cite them, for I should not like to give an impression that I am seeking to rank myself as one of them. All I have done…is to add some psychological foundation to the criticisms of my great predecessors. (Freud 707)

Freud goes on, in the manner of an autobiography, to list the possible reactions to his book. He also raises the case in which The Future of an Illusion could harm his beloved baby: psychoanalysis, and even puts that prospect in the mouths of a group of fictional characters: “Now we see…where psychoanalysis leads to. The mask has fallen; it leads to a denial of God and of a moral ideal, as we always suspected” (Freud 708). He follows this ingenious rhetorical contrivance with an even better one: a defence of religion. It has tamed us, he says. However, his vindication is quite false, for it is actually a new attack with a different approach. If religion is good for us, he argues, then how is it that so many people are unhappy and trying to change civilization or flee it. Freud ends this portion of his book with the certitude that eventually, religion will lose its grip even if The Future of an Illusion is not published. Yet he follows this assertion with the postulation that the new unbelievers may begin to kill without remorse, since Godisnowhere. The total number of occurrences of the first-person plural is forty-six: wow.

The eighth division of his book deals with the Sixth Commandment: “You shall not kill.” Freud points out that we have linked this law to God, and that if we dismiss God, we might do the same with the rule. He then discerns that religious ideas are not only made up of wish fulfillments but also of historical recollections such as the killing of the primitive father, and declares that religion is the universal obsessional neurosis of the world, which “arose out of the Oedipus complex, out of the relation to the father” (Freud 713). In the last paragraph of this section alone, the first-person plural appears seventeen times, and in the entire chapter we encounter it on fifty-six occasions. We are, more than ever, participants in his rhetorical triumph.

The ninth segment begins with his fictional character’s complaint that he contradicts himself quite often and in very important passages of his book. He then enumerates all Freud’s paradoxes, which are destroyed one by one. At this point, I felt that Freud was next to me, telling me how all his ideas concord with each other, how any apparent false representation is due to my lack of insight. But I did not feel inferior, for he had made me his equal. My most inner reaction was that of invisible tears. “But I am already an atheist,” I thought. “Why do I feel so sad?” Perhaps because Freud was not really near me; he was only in the infinitude of the text. Freud continues with a most ironic statement: “But I will moderate my zeal and admit the possibility that I, too, am chasing an illusion” (Freud 716). But his self-doubt is quickly dissolved, for he hopes for the future, and stresses that irreligious education is worth trying. He then states the objective of The Future of an Illusion: “Men cannot remain children forever; they must in the end go out into ‘hostile life.’ We may call this ‘education to reality.’ Need I confess to you that the sole purpose of my book is to point out the necessity for this forward step?” (Freud 717). He concludes this chapter with a beautiful line from Heine’s poem, Deutschland: “We leave Heaven to the angels and the sparrows.” Let us note that in this section, Freud uses the first-person plural only sixteen times. Maybe he does not want to include us in his contradictions.

The tenth chapter of his book starts with his opponent’s ironic comment:

We seem now to have exchanged roles: you emerge as an enthusiast who allows himself to be carried away by illusion, and I stand for the claims of reason, the rights of skepticism. What you have been expounding seems to me to be built upon errors which, following your example, I may call illusions, because they betray clearly enough the influence of your wishes. (Freud 718)

His protagonist goes on to point out that if religion must be abolished, some other system of doctrines must take its place, using the same mode of defence against annihilation. Freud replies admirably: “my illusions are not, like religious ones, incapable of correction” (Freud 720). He then appends:

You have to defend the religious illusion with all your might. If it becomes discredited…then your world collapses…From that bondage I am, we are, free. Since we are prepared to renounce a good part of our infantile wishes, we can bear it if a few of our expectations turn out to be illusions. (Freud 720)

Freud’s next almighty argument is that science is still young. Yes! It is still in the womb. Give it but a few hundred years and it shall rule the universe. His final sentence in noteworthy: “But an illusion it would be to suppose that what science cannot give us we can get elsewhere” (Freud 722). This final chapter features the first person plural fifty-three times, and its approximate number of occurrences in all The Future of an Illusion is three hundred and six: allelu-Freud.

Closing Remarks

My long glimpse at Freud’s masterpiece may have elucidated many problems that were created by Eliot, Zilboorg, and Küng. Their status of believers is quite certain: Eliot was too conservative to let himself drift into the pagan land, Zilboorg was a godless Jew who converted to Catholicism, and Küng ended his book by mentioning that he was a believer in God and a Christian. Goldenberg did not cultivate any difficulties. Instead, with the help of Freud’s discoveries, she used a feminist approach to the same end as The Future of an Illusion. She appears to be an atheist; the contrary would be highly improbable. In other words, the believers stuck with God, and Goldenberg and I remained attached to Freud.

The Future of an Illusion also marks a shift in Freud in terms of his chauvinistic attitude towards women. He seems to consider them as men’s equals. Perhaps he finally figured out that some of his readers were women and that they constituted a crucial force to the success of his propositions, for, after all, they were the potential mothers of a new generation of atheists.

Finally, his rhetorical devices were very effective, representing by themselves the ingredients of a chef-d’oeuvre. If a believer who reads The Future of an Illusion is not tempted by it, I do not know what else could accomplish it. Personally, I was a so-called believer up to 1986. Since then, I became quite an atheist. I thank all those visionary individuals whom Freud was too modest to mention: Whitman, Dickinson, Nietzsche, Freud…

Some books [people] leave us free and some books [people] make us free. Ralph Waldo Emerson

Works Cited

Eliot, T.S. Rev. of The Future of an illusion, by Sigmund Freud. Criterion 8.31 (Dec. 1928): 350-53.

Freud, Sigmund. “The Future of an Illusion.” The Freud Reader. Ed. Peter Gay. New York: Norton, 1989. 686-722.

Gay, Peter. The Freud Reader. New York: Norton, 1989.

Goldenberg, Naomi R. The End of God. Ottawa: Ottawa UP, 1982.

Küng, Hans. Freud and the Problem of God. Trans. Edward Quinn. New Haven: Yale UP, 1979.

Zilboorg, Gregory. Psychoanalysis and Religion. London: Allen, 1967.