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Posted on 05/06/2018 1:49:30 PM PDT by pcottraux
Is Christianity Just Wishful Thinking?
By Philip Cottraux
Sigmund Freud devoted his life to studying the intricate workings of the human mind. He is responsible for many of the common psychological terms saturating modern culture: the id, the ego, the superego. The Oedipus complex.
But in recent years, many of Freud’s ideas have come under scrutiny. Some have taken it as far as to suggest that most of his theories were made up. His influence has been so strong, however, that it’s hard to sort out what might have been pseudo-science. But I want to focus on Freud’s other notorious reputation: his controversial views on religion.
To say that he despised religion would be an understatement. He viewed it as an aberration on humanity. He blamed belief in God on all of society’s ills. Here are a few of his nastier quotes on the subject:
“Religion is an illusion and it derives its strength from the fact that it falls in with our instinctual desires (New Introductory Lectures on Psychoanalysis, 1933).”
"The whole thing (religion) 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 a large number of people living today, who cannot but see that this religion is not tenable, nevertheless try to defend it piece by piece in a series of pitiful rearguard actions (Civilization and Its Discontents, 1929)."
Reading Freud, it’s surprising how much influence he has had not just on psychology, but neo-Atheism. Richard Dawkins or Sam Harris borrow directly from him, and I’ve been surprised at how many atheists have challenged me with a Freudian theory, whether they realize it or not. According to Freud, religious rites attempting to achieve salvation are akin to obsessive compulsive rituals, such as constantly washing one’s hands to get rid of imaginary germs. It was Freud who proposed that religion was holding science back; and that once it was gone, humanity could spring forward into a utopia of reason.
I’m no humanist; and as a result, I would never buy into the last claim, even if I were an atheist. The reality is that there will never be a utopia and scrubbing religion from the face of the earth doesn’t look very pleasant; North Korea, Cambodia, and the Soviet Union have all shown us that. Furthermore, even if a utopia were achievable, it would never be sustainable; the human mind isn’t wired to just sit around and be content with biological needs being met. If humans ever built a perfect world, they would soon tear it apart again out of sheer boredom. And the results would be catastrophic; untold numbers dead to reach paradise, untold numbers more dead as paradise is lost.
But Freud’s explanations of how religious thought emerges from the inner workings of the human mind were admittedly good points. So good, in fact, that they even had me questioning my own faith for a time, something I once never thought possible.
To sum it up, belief in God can be explained as an evolutionary trait that emerges from our inner desire to follow a strong alpha male. Our inner tribal man yearns to form packs; and as civilization advanced and tribes were no longer necessary, we created an imaginary one to replace male leaders. I personally find this very problematic (as it’s clear from history that any successful civilization had strong male leaders; I don’t see how this ever needed replacing in the human psyche), but it’s the second part of the point that I find feasible. According to Freud, belief in the afterlife emerged from our basic fear of death. Sense the instincts towards survival and self-preservation are prevalent in all life, the concept of heaven emerged as a coping mechanism from our inability to accept the finality of death.
This is a good point, and considering it did once have a terrible negative impact on my faith. Freud’s conclusion is that ultimately, Christianity is wishful thinking. He points to our belief in the afterlife as a survival mechanism and our talks of a loving Father as an attempt to recapture our childhoods, wanting to be loved by a parental figure that we project onto an imaginary pie in the sky.
(If you want to get technical, the “wishful thinking” argument can be traced as far back as German philosopher Ludwig Feuerbach in 1841; but since Freud is more famous for it, let’s keep the focus on him).
But if Freud’s psychological theories are finding increasing scrutiny by new researchers, can the same be said of his atheist philosophy?
Actually, it was within his own lifetime.
C.S. Lewis devotes all of chapter 4 of Mere Christianity (“Morality and Psychoanalysis”) to Freud. In his takedown, he says something that resonates with me today: “And furthermore, when Freud is talking about how to cure neurotics he is speaking as a specialist on his own subject, but when he goes on to talk general philosophy he is speaking as an amateur.”
I think this all the time about atheists today. I don’t deny that Dawkins knows a lot about biology. Or that Sam Harris is well-versed in neuroscience. But both men seem to think that makes them geniuses in all fields of understanding. In the realm of theology, neither clearly knows what he’s talking about. It’s the classic case of an emperor without clothes.
Back to Freud. He was born of a Jewish family in the heavily Roman Catholic of Freiburg, Moravia. Lewis noted that Freud showed a startlingly lack of understanding about Christianity when he wrote about it. Upon careful observation, I notice the same thing.
In Thank God For Atheists: How the World’s Greatest Skeptics Led Me to Faith, Timothy Morgan makes a devastatingly good point about the wishful thinking argument: “This worn-out argument has been thoroughly refuted over the last 175 years. Even Nietzsche called it preposterous. First, wanting something does not equate with the lack of its existence. Human thirst actually points to a need for water.”
Lewis also had this to say: “Creatures are not born with desires unless satisfaction for those desires exist. A baby feels hunger: well, there is such a thing as food. A duckling wants to swim: well, there is such a thing as water. Men feel sexual desire: well, there is such a thing as sex. If I find in myself a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that I was made for another world.”
After studying it closely, the real problem I have with Freud’s criticism is that he assumed that Christianity is about the pursuit of comfort and pleasure. It’s why he thought we view God as a warm, comforting presence that loves and accepts us for who we are. This, of course, overlooks the full, sometimes terrifying nature of the Almighty, that He is also capable of horrifying judgment and that Christians are, in some ways, to fear the Lord.
But there’s two other critical points Freud ignored.
While I’m a Christian, if I stand back and compare it objectively to all the other religions, I have trouble wanting it to be true. It contains perhaps the most brutal realities. Rather than a pursuit of comfort, it expects us to take on a life of pain, suffering, and persecution. It tells us people will hate us and reject us for preaching in the name of Jesus. And ye shall be hated of all men for my name's sake: but he that shall endure unto the end, the same shall be saved (Mark 13:13).
There was no comfort for the disciples in what they endured for Christ. Stephen was stoned. Peter was arrested and beaten. James was executed. Acts 5:41: And they departed from the presence of the council, rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer shame for his name. Paul wrote to the church in Corinth: Are they ministers of Christ? (I speak as a fool) I am more; in labours more abundant, in stripes above measure, in prisons more frequent, in deaths oft. Of the Jews five times received I forty stripes save one. Thrice was I beaten with rods, once was I stoned, thrice I suffered shipwreck, a night and a day I have been in the deep; In journeyings often, in perils of waters, in perils of robbers, in perils by mine own countrymen, in perils by the heathen, in perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils in the sea, in perils among false brethren; In weariness and painfulness, in watchings often, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness (II Corinthians 11:23-27).
The other uncomfortable reality Christian doctrine is a place called hell. Every day, I wish hell weren’t real. I take no pleasure in the thought that anyone will burn in eternal darkness. I sometimes can’t believe that the God I love so much created it. The thought of how many people have gone there, and how many are going there every day, and how they will never escape, is incredibly disturbing. More than I can bear.
But what I think, or what I want, is irrelevant. Hell is real, whether I like it or not. And my discomfort has to motivate me to preach as hard as I can. I want the Lord to use me to save as many people as possible from that eternal place. And I must be willing to pay the same kind of price the apostles were to keep as many from going there as possible.
And why I think it’s real isn’t a coping mechanism, but as I’ve mentioned in earlier blogs, based on the evidence. The simple logic I keep reiterating is that by examining the historical evidence, Jesus clearly was a real person in history who actually rose from the dead, proving He was who He said He was. Which means all things He says are truth. Which means heaven is real. And so is hell. Then shall he say also unto them on the left hand, Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels: (Matthew 25:41).
It is not for God to live within our fantasy, but for us to live within His reality.
But did he have the mind to see the person of God?
I once read that one of Freud’s regrets later in life was not having pursued the occult. This doesn’t sound like he found God.
As Jeremiah told us, “christianity” is the collection of “inherited lies wherein there is no profit.”
The big one is “Saved by Grace.”
The word says we are saved by our faith, and it is by the grace of Yehova that we are led to that faith.
***
No, Ed. The Word says that we are saved BY grace THROUGH faith, not the other way around.
Ephesians 2 is very clear and cannot be read any other way. Anyone who says otherwise is contradicting the Word of God.
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No, you are completely misreading the verse!
And all the other writings of the apostles have to agree, which they do with my statement.
Deliberate twisting of one single verse in Ephesians is the oddball out. Hebrews 4 absoloutely demolishes your try at buying the lie.
Nuh-uh, Ed. Wrong.
I’ve read the Greek. I’ve read the rest of the New Testament. I’ve read the book of Hebrews too—the WHOLE thing, not just the bits that Rood cherry-picked out of the English.
I’ve even gone all the way back to the oldest manuscripts we have from 200 AD, and yes, it’s salvation by grace there too.
It’s saved by grace. Period. No works, no ‘saved by Torah,’ no ‘saved by obedience.’ Salvation by grace. End of story. Period. Reject that and you reject all of Scripture.
239. The Hound of Heaven
By Francis Thompson (1859–1907)
I FLED Him, down the nights and down the days;
I fled Him, down the arches of the years;
I fled Him, down the labyrinthine ways
Of my own mind; and in the mist of tears
I hid from Him, and under running laughter. 5
Up vistaed hopes I sped;
And shot, precipitated,
Adown Titanic glooms of chasmèd fears,
From those strong Feet that followed, followed after.
But with unhurrying chase, 10
And unperturbèd pace,
Deliberate speed, majestic instancy,
They beat—and a Voice beat
More instant than the Feet—
‘All things betray thee, who betrayest Me.’ 15
I pleaded, outlaw-wise,
By many a hearted casement, curtained red,
Trellised with intertwining charities;
(For, though I knew His love Who followèd,
Yet was I sore adread 20
Lest, having Him, I must have naught beside).
But, if one little casement parted wide,
The gust of His approach would clash it to.
Fear wist not to evade, as Love wist to pursue.
Across the margent of the world I fled, 25
And troubled the gold gateways of the stars,
Smiting for shelter on their clangèd bars;
Fretted to dulcet jars
And silvern chatter the pale ports o’ the moon.
I said to Dawn: Be sudden—to Eve: Be soon; 30
With thy young skiey blossoms heap me over
From this tremendous Lover—
Float thy vague veil about me, lest He see!
I tempted all His servitors, but to find
My own betrayal in their constancy, 35
In faith to Him their fickleness to me,
Their traitorous trueness, and their loyal deceit.
To all swift things for swiftness did I sue;
Clung to the whistling mane of every wind.
But whether they swept, smoothly fleet, 40
The long savannahs of the blue;
Or whether, Thunder-driven,
They clanged his chariot ’thwart a heaven,
Plashy with flying lightnings round the spurn o’ their feet:—
Fear wist not to evade as Love wist to pursue. 45
Still with unhurrying chase,
And unperturbèd pace,
Deliberate speed, majestic instancy,
Came on the following Feet,
And a Voice above their beat— 50
‘Naught shelters thee, who wilt not shelter Me.’
I sought no more that after which I strayed
In face of man or maid;
But still within the little children’s eyes
Seems something, something that replies, 55
They at least are for me, surely for me!
I turned me to them very wistfully;
But just as their young eyes grew sudden fair
With dawning answers there,
Their angel plucked them from me by the hair. 60
‘Come then, ye other children, Nature’s—share
With me’ (said I) ‘your delicate fellowship;
Let me greet you lip to lip,
Let me twine with you caresses,
Wantoning 65
With our Lady-Mother’s vagrant tresses,
Banqueting
With her in her wind-walled palace,
Underneath her azured daïs,
Quaffing, as your taintless way is, 70
From a chalice
Lucent-weeping out of the dayspring.’
So it was done:
I in their delicate fellowship was one—
Drew the bolt of Nature’s secrecies. 75
I knew all the swift importings
On the wilful face of skies;
I knew how the clouds arise
Spumèd of the wild sea-snortings;
All that’s born or dies 80
Rose and drooped with; made them shapers
Of mine own moods, or wailful or divine;
With them joyed and was bereaven.
I was heavy with the even,
When she lit her glimmering tapers 85
Round the day’s dead sanctities.
I laughed in the morning’s eyes.
I triumphed and I saddened with all weather,
Heaven and I wept together,
And its sweet tears were salt with mortal mine; 90
Against the red throb of its sunset-heart
I laid my own to beat,
And share commingling heat;
But not by that, by that, was eased my human smart.
In vain my tears were wet on Heaven’s grey cheek. 95
For ah! we know not what each other says,
These things and I; in sound I speak—
Their sound is but their stir, they speak by silences.
Nature, poor stepdame, cannot slake my drouth;
Let her, if she would owe me, 100
Drop yon blue bosom-veil of sky, and show me
The breasts o’ her tenderness:
Never did any milk of hers once bless
My thirsting mouth.
Nigh and nigh draws the chase, 105
With unperturbèd pace,
Deliberate speed, majestic instancy;
And past those noisèd Feet
A voice comes yet more fleet—
‘Lo! naught contents thee, who content’st not Me!’ 110
Naked I wait Thy love’s uplifted stroke!
My harness piece by piece Thou hast hewn from me,
And smitten me to my knee;
I am defenceless utterly.
I slept, methinks, and woke, 115
And, slowly gazing, find me stripped in sleep.
In the rash lustihead of my young powers,
I shook the pillaring hours
And pulled my life upon me; grimed with smears,
I stand amid the dust o’ the mounded years— 120
My mangled youth lies dead beneath the heap.
My days have crackled and gone up in smoke,
Have puffed and burst as sun-starts on a stream.
Yea, faileth now even dream
The dreamer, and the lute the lutanist; 125
Even the linked fantasies, in whose blossomy twist
I swung the earth a trinket at my wrist,
Are yielding; cords of all too weak account
For earth with heavy griefs so overplussed.
Ah! is Thy love indeed 130
A weed, albeit an amaranthine weed,
Suffering no flowers except its own to mount?
Ah! must—
Designer infinite!—
Ah! must Thou char the wood ere Thou canst limn with it? 135
My freshness spent its wavering shower i’ the dust;
And now my heart is as a broken fount,
Wherein tear-drippings stagnate, spilt down ever
From the dank thoughts that shiver
Upon the sighful branches of my mind. 140
Such is; what is to be?
The pulp so bitter, how shall taste the rind?
I dimly guess what Time in mists confounds;
Yet ever and anon a trumpet sounds
From the hid battlements of Eternity; 145
Those shaken mists a space unsettle, then
Round the half-glimpsèd turrets slowly wash again.
But not ere him who summoneth
I first have seen, enwound
With glooming robes purpureal, cypress-crowned; 150
His name I know, and what his trumpet saith.
Whether man’s heart or life it be which yields
Thee harvest, must Thy harvest-fields
Be dunged with rotten death?
Now of that long pursuit 155
Comes on at hand the bruit;
That Voice is round me like a bursting sea:
‘And is thy earth so marred,
Shattered in shard on shard?
Lo, all things fly thee, for thou fliest Me! 160
Strange, piteous, futile thing!
Wherefore should any set thee love apart?
Seeing none but I makes much of naught’ (He said),
‘And human love needs human meriting:
How hast thou merited— 165
Of all man’s clotted clay the dingiest clot?
Alack, thou knowest not
How little worthy of any love thou art!
Whom wilt thou find to love ignoble thee,
Save Me, save only Me? 170
All which I took from thee I did but take,
Not for thy harms,
But just that thou might’st seek it in My arms.
All which thy child’s mistake
Fancies as lost, I have stored for thee at home: 175
Rise, clasp My hand, and come!’
Halts by me that footfall:
Is my gloom, after all,
Shade of His hand, outstretched caressingly?
‘Ah, fondest, blindest, weakest, 180
I am He Whom thou seekest!
Thou dravest love from thee, who dravest Me.’
Every religion in the world has us DOING something to merit, earn, deserve or work for heaven, for Nirvana, for Happy Hunting Grounds, etc. ONLY genuine Christianity teaches we CANNOT earn or merit or deserve or work for our salvation. That is because it is by the grace of God and NOT we ourselves, not by works lest any should boast. A lot of braggarts out there, the proudly pious who don't like hearing that but it IS the truth. Praise God for His amazing grace!
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Face reality, the Greek is a translation done by Pharisees.
The original is Hebrew in every NT book.
Even in the Greek, salvation in every case is through the righteousness of Yehova resulting from willing obedience to the commandments of the Father.
The grace will be applied to those that endure in that gift of righteousness to the end.
Do not return to your vomit like a dog, but be determined to endure. (2Peter)
Do not be fooled by the sweet lies.
I suppose you have proof for your ‘original Hebrew’ claim, Ed? Perhaps an original document from pre 200 AD?
No? That’s too bad.
If there’s anyone lying, it’s Michael Rood lying to you.
And believe me, I gave Rood’s stuff a chance with an open mind.
But the guy can’t even get God’s name right. Your ‘Yehova’ name is a bad transliteration from the Hebrew to Latin translation of the Old Testament. The Tetragrammaton, YHVH, had the vowel symbols for ‘Adonai’ put into it because when the vowel smybols were added, they didn’t want to speak the name of God, and so put that in as a reminder.
To put it bluntly, Rood’s teachings, upon being tested, are absolutely contradictory to the Word of God AND historical evidence AND linguistic evidence.
Sorry, but there’s no way ever that I’m believing anything he says!
The first part of your sentence is correct - salvation is through the righteousness of God which is IMPUTED to us by His grace THROUGH faith. See Romans 4.
The last part of your comment is a lie from the pit of hell. When salvation is conditioned upon "obedience to the commandments of the Father", it is saying one must merit it by his/her works of righteousness and Scripture is quite clear it is NOT by our works that we are saved. I pray you escape the clutches of the accursed gospel that condemns and can never save.
This kind of BS makes The Infinity Wars movie look like a documentary.
Imagine if Freud had been tempted by free unlimited internet porn. We'd never have heard of him.
Well, I didn’t say I agreed with it...
People said similar things in my critique of Stephen Hawking. I tend to look at the content of what people say moreso than their personal lives. Not that I don't think low moral character has any affect on the value of their ideas, I just tend to be uninterested in what they were like personally while researching.
The notable exception is Thomas Jefferson, of course. People have shown me his anti-Christian or pro-democracy quotes, and I respond: "This clown knocked up his slave girl! Who cares what he thinks?"
I could have summed it up this way, but would have been my shortest blog...
Actually, all atheists do this all the time. It's the entire flawed premise of "The God Delusion," "The End of Faith," and almost every argument any atheist has challenged me with. And sure enough, it goes back as far as Freud at least. It's a fascinating to see this appearing over and over again, from people who claim to be "free thinkers."
Absolutely true, and also why I'm not a humanist. Even if I were an atheist, I would reject utopianist nonsense.
I'm guilty of sometimes being too sympathetic towards other points-of-view. Always trying to get into the heads of people I don't agree with, be they Muslims, atheists, leftists...
There are certain absolutes that I simply can't fathom. And that point is one of them. I don't like the "what if you're wrong" argument, but you could rephrase it to "what are the ODDS that you're wrong, and what are the consequences?" The consequences aren't even remotely worth it!
The life, death, and resurrection of Jesus is a fact of history.There is no wishful thinking about it.
And this is why! Each Biblical event that fits into factual history increases the odds that Christianity is the truth, which makes heaven and hell real. People who don't want to accept that are playing a dangerous game. While atheists claim there's no evidence for God, I present them with the historical evidence for Christianity, and they usually laugh and say I'm crazy. It's disturbing for me to think how they're playing Russian roulette with eternity.
Agreed. It's interesting to take atheists from the time period and compare them to what CS Lewis wrote in response. The atheist vs theist debate hasn't really changed or advanced as much as people think in the last century.
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