Chapter XIII. Religion

This critical topic, Freud and Religion, has been the occasion of many books and a spate of essays. It has evoked more controversy and condemnation than any other of his writings except perhaps those on sexuality. We may consider separately Freud's personal attitude towards religion and the contributions he made towards the understanding of certain aspects of it.

Upbringing is usually an important factor in determining later attitudes towards religion, though it is far from being the only one. We know two things about Freud's. The first is that he had a Catholic Nannie until he was two and a half years old, and that she used to take him to her church services. On his return he would imitate for the benefit of the family what he had seen. Even if this was greeted with a mild amusement he may well have detected something of his parents’ lack of enthusiasm for the Nannie's beliefs. My own opinion about such behaviour is that its significance was theatrical rather than theological. The Nannie also told him about hell-fire, and presumably threatened him with it if he was not obedient. But, as I know from my own similar experience, a young child takes such threats as applying to his personal life in the near future, rather than to a hypothetical existence beyond the grave which it is not yet in a position to apprehend.

Much has been made of this Nannie by writers who are eager to discover a neurotic origin for Freud's negative attitude towards religion. It is of course easy enough to weave conjectures and speculations on a theme of this sort, but I am not aware of any evidence that might justify one in attributing any lasting influence to the Nannie's theological beliefs, and in any event the contact ceased at the age of two and a half. It has even been suggested that his attitude to religion derived from the circumstance of his losing her at that age. It was only when he was forty-six that Freud learned from his mother the reason for the Nannie's disappearance—her being de