Sigmund Freud and the Lubavitcher Rebbe

In the winter of 1902-1903, Rabbi Shalom Dov-Ber Schneersohn, the 5th Lubavitcher Rebbe1 (known by the acronym RaSHaB), from a scion of Chassidic Rabbis, traveled from Russia to Vienna to consult with “the famous Professor,” Sigmund Freud. He was accompanied by his son, Rabbi Josef Yitzchak Schneersohn (known by the acronym RaYaTZ). At that time the Rebbe RaSHaB was 42 years old, and his son was 22 years old.

While various details of this visit to Vienna had been known in Lubavitch circles for some years, the name of the famous doctor was not revealed in print until 1997, when the private Diaries (R'Shimos) of the late Lubavitcher Rebbe, Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson, were published. The diary for the period of Spring 1932 relates a conversation that Rabbi Menachem Mendel (the 7th Rabbi in the dynasty known as Lubavitch Chassidim) had with his predecessor in Riga, Latvia, about the three-month visit (January 6 to April 5, 1903) that he had made with his father (the RaSHaB, the 5th Lubavitcher Rabbi) to Vienna. In this conversation the name of the famous professor is specifically identified.2

The authors have tried, unsuccessfully, to confirm this meeting by referring to letters and diaries of Freud.3 It is possible that corroborating materials have not been released or have been lost.4 According to his son, the RaSHaB met Freud on several occasions during the period from January to April 1903 (J. Y. Schneersohn, quoted in Glitzenstein, 1972, p. 53).

At this point a brief description of Chassidism in general,