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The legacy of Lou Andreas Salome and Donald W. Winnicott as a psychoanalytical contribution to the study of religion
Journal Title: RICERCHE DI PSICOLOGIA  
Author/s: Mario Aletti 
Year:  2015 Issue: 2 Language: Italian 
Pages:  12 Pg. 421-432 FullText PDF:  156 KB
DOI:  10.3280/RIP2015-002010
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For Freud psychoanalysis is "an impartial instrument" also when it comes to religion. "Defenders of religion will make use of psycho-analysis in order to give full value to the affective significance of religious doctrines". Lou Andreas Salome believed that narcissism is an early experience of "oneness with the universe". According to her, man tries all his life, to regain such a state of well-being via creative experiences such as art, love, and religion. As far as religion is concerned, Salome articulates a clear distinction between a "creative" and a "sedentary" believer, since the creative believer - in a certain way - calls into being his God. Winnicott considers religiousness to be an illusory transitional phenomenon, when liberated from the childhood hallucinatory omnipotence; as a child with his mother, a believer "creates" the God he "finds". Since Salome’s "creative" believer’s religious faith encompasses doubt and Winnicott states that, in conclusion, the psychological value of believing is "believing in anything at all", believers and psychologists of religion become aware of the never ending metaphoricity of religious language and, consequently, of the necessity of religious pluralism.
Keywords: Psychoanalysis, religion, transitional phenomena, Lou Salome, Winnicott

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Mario Aletti, The legacy of Lou Andreas Salome and Donald W. Winnicott as a psychoanalytical contribution to the study of religion in "RICERCHE DI PSICOLOGIA " 2/2015, pp. 421-432, DOI:10.3280/RIP2015-002010

   

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