Freud describes the oceanic feeling that is taken to be the basis of religiosity as “a feeling…of being indissolubly bound up with and belonging to the whole of the world outside oneself,” (4). What do you think about Freud’s account of the religious, both here and in chapter II? How would you characterize religious experience?
Firstly, I thought the first two chapters were absolutely amazing. Freud has a talent for communicating ideas. Here is an abridged summary of my thoughts…
In regards to the ‘Oceanic feeling’, I thought Freud’s account was incredibly original.
I thought it was ingenious how he went about explaining how people might have these feelings ‘of being indissolubly bound up with and belonging to the whole of the world outside oneself’. He starts off recalling the abstractions that he named the id and the ego that were a result of man differentiating his external world from the internal world. Freud noted that in mans infantile stages of development there was no distinguishable difference from the the outside objective world and the conscious self. Only through ‘responses to various promptings’ does a infant develop to differentiate between self (ego) and these sensations. Over time one develops definitive lines of demarcation between the self and the outside world. He gave examples of babies developing this as a result of response and reward, and learning to differentiate responses generating pleasure and pain. He then went on about the regression of memories, analogizing them to the evolution of ancient to modern cities. It was important to point out how necessary the deconstruction of old memories was to the formation of new memories, and how their remnants may never completely disappear, but still serve as certain foundations.
This said, he begins to explain these religious feelings of being connect to something bigger by first claiming that love is one of the ways that this line of demarcation blurs. How love invokes feelings of oneness with another person buy ‘blurring’ the boundary’s between self and the object.
From here he describes how these ‘oceanic feelings’ may be some of the original feelings we as humans ever experienced in infantile. Before we managed to develop and define this ego of ours, a world existed where our self and the outside world were one in the same. The mass sensations outside ourselves were indistinguishable from anything we thought or did. Hence the quote “We cannot fall out of this world” perfectly relates to the origins of these oceanic feelings of oneness. The religious oneness we experience is simply residue from original memories as an infant experiencing sensations and self for the first time. This is what Freud, more elegantly stated, explained as a cause for these oceanic feelings.
He also addressed this idea of having a purpose and that without one, life would lose all value . He questions in return: who said there needs to be a purpose? What of animals and their purpose? And the ones who have no service to humans, what them? He proposes that this idea of purpose was a self serving product of religion. He directs these questions to ‘less ambitious’ inquiry: what can be derived from the behavior and intention of their lives. His answer is happiness. More clearly defined, the drive for more pleasure and less pain. He then suggests answers that explain the motives and reasons behind certain behaviors and psycho-mechanisms.
Is Freud correct? I do not know. Is he compelling? Surely, for me anyway. Is there more to the story here? Undoubtedly. I believe Freud critically challenges some crucial paradigms. His assertions are not entirely outdated.
As a recovering believer in religion, I can say that the religious experience, for me, was characterized by illusions, very similar to how Freud described religion as a collective mass delusion of mankind (33). “The religions of mankind must be classed among the mass-delusions of this kind. No one, needless to say, who shares a delusion ever recognizes it as such.” These illusions are created to bridge the gap in understanding. I believe that these gaps are sometimes a result of emotional trauma caused by life’s unpredictability, or expectations that were unrealistically adjusted to certain outcomes. Religion assuages these gaps, provides filler and comfort for answers.
Initially it was characterized by a feeling of oneness with god. I was told that a ‘relationship’ needed to be cultivated in order to preserve an ongoing oneness. Despite my efforts, my ‘feelings’ never produced these results. I understand why Freud mentions love as a mechanism that triggers this oneness. It makes sense its so prevalent in so many religious. A god that loves you is a god you can love, thus providing a more inviting doorway to embrace the religious experience.
William Dare 