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In the opening sentence of this book we are told that "the intimate relationship between psychoanalysis and the 'Jewish spirit' is so obvious that few of those who refer to it stop to define the 'Jewish spirit'…" Expanding on this assertion, the author proposes to examine the "secret roots" of Freud's "coolness to specific contents of Judaism" and thus to explain "how it came about that psychoanalysis, though profoundly marked by its Jewish origin, has something essential to say about mankind in general" (p. 7).
At this point the reviewer suspects that most Psychoanalytic Quarterly readers may decide to read no further. This approach is all too reminiscent of Jung, the Nazi outlook, and the misreading of both psychoanalysis and the Kabbala by Bakan.1 Robert's arguments, however, are more subtle; her style is persuasive and she is not alone among contemporary critics holding such views.2
The author's first witness is Franz Kafka who wrote to Franz Werfel in 1922, "It is no pleasure to busy oneself with psychoanalysis and I keep as far away from it as possible." So much for Kafka's attitude toward psychoanalysis. The sentence of Kafka that Robert uses as a starting point for her book is found in a letter to Max Brod: "… the father complex from which more than one Jew draws his spiritual nourishment relates not to the innocent father but to the father's Judaism. What most of those who began to write