The theme of the paper is the quotidian debate about the role of theory in analytic practice. Based on examples from recent psychoanalytic publications, I argue that psychoanalytic theory may influence therapists as ideology, heuristics, or empiricism, or combinations thereof. Bion's eschewing of theory, and advocacy of an analytic stance ‘beyond memory and desire’ as a precondition for psychoanalytic creativity is questioned. Buber's advocacy of I-Thou relatedness is compared with the concept of mentalizing, and related to recent findings in developmental psychopathology. Parallels are drawn between the therapeutic relationship - bringing together theory and spontaneity in a hermeneutic enterprise - and the infant's use of security-promoting care-givers.