Preview

Freud's – "If Moses Was an Egyptian" – Response

Satisfactory Essays
Open Document
Open Document
499 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Freud's – "If Moses Was an Egyptian" – Response
Freud's – "If Moses was an Egyptian" – Response

Freud's "If Moses was an Egyptian" is an obviously different kind of text than his previous ones. The text deals primarily with historical facts, a fact which may lead the readers to wonder whether what they read is indeed an actual Freudian text. However, after reading the third section, the reasons behind the text's occurrence seem to be much clearer to me; there are two particular themes I found most interesting in the text, two themes which seem to eventually connect with each other in addition to one of Freud's claims in the third section. The first is the assumption that Moses does not actually have any speech deficiency, but that he only speaks in a strange way (his accent perhaps) and more slowly than normal, as Hebrew is not his native language (in correlation with Freud's hypothesis that he is Egyptian). The other relates to the fact that the Jewish religion is historically actually dual, while one part of the religion is lead by people who went through traumatic experiences. And finally, the part of the third section where Freud relates to the German invasion and him being forced to leave his own home, which I found particularly interesting - not only because it seems deeply connected with the former two, but also because of Freud's direct reference to the experience of having been personally forced to do something – something highly extreme – leaving his own country and living space.
The assumption that Hebrew was not Moses' native language may be compared with the general opposition to Freud's ideas and theory, while they symbolize a different language, foreign to the public's native one. The second assumption may be compared to the actual historical time the text was written – the ongoing Anti-Semitism against the Jews and other minorities; therefore the second assumption may imply that the general population and culture consisting of Germany is not only made of one group but out of many others

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Satisfactory Essays

    4. Analyse what Elie means when he states "The ghetto was ruled by neither German nor Jew; it was ruled by delusion." (Page 12)…

    • 1282 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Apwh Tri 3 Review Answers

    • 1721 Words
    • 7 Pages

    | An insistence on a racial revolution and the use of Jews as a symbol of the foreign influences corrupting society.…

    • 1721 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    The reason that the German voted the Nazis party is because they didn't like the communist or the Jews because of anti antisemitism.For example that Eric Von Ronheim considered the communist as a serious threat he feared they would set up the one just like the soviet union showing that people don't like the communist.In addition it states that people blames the Jew for world war 1 so they would pick the Nazis party since they would get rid of the Jew.…

    • 82 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    However, whereas Freud was an id psychologist who articulated the stages of psychosexual development and attributed behavior to “libido”, Erikson was an ego psychologist who talked about the stages of psychosocial development. Specifically Erikson claimed that a human has to go through eight stages during his/her life in order to complete his development. Each stage poses a number of challenges that have to be confronted successfully. These challenges are a conflict between his or her biological forces and sociocultural forces.…

    • 80 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    The racism to Germany expanded quickly in the year of 1933 when Hitler became chancellor of Germany. Memorable things started to happened because it was the start of the Second World War and this also meant it was the beginning of the Holocaust. This Holocaust was caused by the Germans they were in control of this cruel act they made will never be forgotten. Germans looked at Jews differently because they believed in a different religion then the Germans. The Germans plan was that they were going to get completely rid of all the Jews and their memory. They began to put their plan in to action and several Jews were killed from it and others were missing and that did affect Jewish population greatly. In the book “Night” by Elie Wiesel tells the horrendous story about the everyday life of a Jew during the Holocaust, it’s a memoir of their struggles and their unhappiness. This book tells us how Jews were punished with out no reason and how things could of ended if they would of seen that everybody is the same for this reason people should read “Night” and read what Jews went through those horrible years. The approximate deaths of Jews were 11-17 million not including other races which were discrimination against Jews. The Holocaust emerged as the most significant event in the twentieth century, not just for genocide of the Jewish people, but for efforts humanity. The causes and effects of the Holocaust must awaken our world conscience to the plight of oppressed people…

    • 265 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Better Essays

    German anti-Semitism played the main role in Holocaust and extermination of Jewish population in Europe during World War 2. There are different views on this subject among historians. Some support the fact that German society was anti-Semitic and ordinary Germans’ hatred towards Jews was the main factor in horrors of Holocaust. One of supporters of this idea is political science professor Daniel Goldhagen. He argues that German citizens were willing to commit all kinds of crimes against European Jewry during years of World War 2. In his article “The Paradigm Challenged” he emphasizes that many books were written about the Holocaust and none of them includes studies of the perpetrators; people who designed and implemented the strategies of mass extermination of Jews. Goldhagen discussed that most scholars have a very strange view on the attitude of perpetrators. In their studies most perpetrators presented as victims of the Nazi regime and social pressure of that time. They made Germans look like they had no choice, but to follow violent and unlawful orders of their leaders. In fact there was always a choice not to kill innocent people. There is no record of anybody from German military being seriously punished for not following the order to kill Jews. Despite that, ordinary German soldiers were killing Jewish people all around the Europe and the Western part of Soviet Union. Also the writers who defense German perpetrators and look for more complicated explanation of their…

    • 2325 Words
    • 10 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    | The idea that the Germans weren't always harsh during that time baffles me. I always thought that the Germans were constantly beating down on Jews, and, even though they were for most of this historical time, this quote proves me wrong. There were times when they could be civilized and tolerant human beings. There was a belief during this time that the Germans and followers of the Germans believed that Jews were aliens, but I actually believe the Germans were the aliens. How they could go from being decent individuals, as stated in this quote, to being madmen who slaughter people for no good reason is utterly beyond me. The aliens must have taken over the minds of the Germans at this point in time. It's the only logical explanation...…

    • 2779 Words
    • 12 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    By suggesting that the Jews were treated like robots, it shows how they were not thought of as humans. This shows how their distinctiveness was taken away.…

    • 400 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    The fact that this idea dated back as far as it did, made it fact, and allowed for the easy manipulation of ideas to make the Jews an “other.”…

    • 1266 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    During World War II, many Nazi’s did not believe in the perfect, Aryan race like Hitler but they did hate Jews. Now why did they hate Jews? Jews did not suffer nearly as much as others during the depression in Europe due to their work ethic and established businesses. When non-Jewish German’s saw the prosperity of the Jews in comparison with their poverty, the non-Jewish German’s pain and anger transferred to the Jews. Comparing the quality of life of the Jews to their own life, many non-Jews grew to hate Jews for their happiness. Throughout history many cases of hatred and prejudice came from comparison, displaying how comparison leads to hatred.…

    • 595 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    The unification of Germany allowed for many different ethnic groups to come together to become German citizens including Polish and slavic peoples and Jewish populations. These new German citizens often came from different ethnic backgrounds and cultural traditions holding a different identity than traditional Germans. Religion separated Jews from being accepted and many viewed the traditions and culture of the religion too different than the rest of the community. Many thought a German identity included being Catholic and practicing the traditions of being Catholic. For many Germans, Jewish citizens simply did not not fit the German identity because of how different their cultures and beliefs were. Many viewed Jewish individuals as aliens even when Jewish citizens considered themselves full German citizens. In fact many rejected them, Heinrich Von Treitschke started a movement to try to keeps Jew’s roles limited in the public sphere and he is also associated with the start of anti-semitism with his creating of an anti-jew petition. It called for limiting immigration of Jews, prohibiting them from positions of authority and that they be monitored closely. (page 38) The petition received lots of support and proved that many believed Jews were part of a different identity and did not belong to be aligned with the German state. It also promoted the distrust many had towards the Jewish…

    • 1479 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    Jews as "the other"

    • 651 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Jews became obsessed with identity. Jewishness constituted some mixture of ethnicity and religion. Jews who converted were no longer identified as outsiders- they were more like the majority now. This was not a problem, but racists made it a problem. Racists said that “Jews would always be Jews, because they belonged to a different race.” Around this time William Marr published a pamphlet called The Victory of Judaism over Germanism, and in it he used the word anti-Semitism for the first time. This word had a major effect in Germany. Theodor Fritsch thought it would be best for Jews and Germans to be kept separated so that Aryan blood could remain “pure”. Germans thought that blood and civilizations where linked together. This idea was used by the Nazis to justify the persecution and murder of Jews.…

    • 651 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    He believed that religion is an illusion, and this is based on wish fulfilment. In certain circumstances the human mind creates images and beliefs to satisfy their basic desires. Therefore Freud believes the human mind created religion, and so this is an illusion. Also, religion helps people overcome our inner psychological conflict (collective neurosis); conflicts between civilisation and helplessness and fear of natural forces.…

    • 514 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Prince of Eygpt

    • 616 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Moses is the ‘brother’ of the Pharaoh and his high rank in the Ancient Egyptian society would mean that he has power over all below him, especially the slaves. In the first half of the movie, Moses’ attitude towards his people is selfish and he merely uses them for their work and the means of entertainment as you states to a questioning slave, “you are in no position to question me, slave!” After Moses finds out about his secret past in which his true mother placed him on the river for a chance to live, he realizes, he is a Hebrew slave, and not of royal blood. Moses is in shock as it was a slave, who happened to be his sister that reveals this to him. When he runs back to the palace he questions his ‘father’, Pharaoh Seti, about the past and if he really did order his men to kill all infants. Moses now feels remorseful towards the slaves and wishes to stop the torture. When he runs away into the desert, he receives the words of God. With Gods power with him, he returns to the city and argues with the new pharaoh in order to “let my people go”. After the pharaoh declines, Moses brings upon Egypt biblical plagues.…

    • 616 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    One of Sigmund Freud’s most prominent claims that he makes in Civilization and its Discontents is that the laws that make up society are what holds man back from what man truly desires, and that if not for the superego, man would break those laws. Based on Plato’s recording of the dialogue in the Crito, Socrates would completely disagree with this claim. According to Socrates, laws are what allow the state to exist, and the state exists to serve its people, therefore any person living within the state should want to follow the law, as it would only benefit them. These are the core values which Socrates has lived his life by, and in Freudian terms, this simply means Socrates’ superego has been effective in mitigating the drive of the id. In Socrates’ case, the instance of the superego dominating the id is a consistent one; so consistent that I’m forced to question any presence of the id at all. If the id creates a desire to kill, fornicate, and indulge while the superego serves as a reminder to follow the law and do what’s right, but the superego always prevails, then there is no evidence to support any presence of an id. Socrates shows no signs of heeding to primitive desires such as breaking the law. While the two may not agree regarding the impact that laws have on their people, they both acknowledge that there is a general sense of responsibility to follow the laws that all humans should feel. How they perceive this responsibility is where the two philosophers differ.…

    • 1726 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays

Related Topics