090
HANS MEYERHOFF
In a letter (no. 7) written a month after their engagement
Freud tells Martha about what happened when he bought her
some engraved writing paper with "an M and an S intimately
entwined" which "renders every page useless for intercourse save
between Marty and me." The shopkeeper, an old Jew, draws him
into a conversation expatiating upon Jewish life in Hamburg and
upon the meaning of Judaism in general. The letter, I thought,
glows with a subdued pride in Martha's grandfather, the
Chacham
Isaac Bernays, head of the Sephardic community in Hamburg.
Freud was obviously conscious of marrying into a distinguished
Jewish family, and quite pleased at the thought. And there was
something else which caught my attention. The shopkeeper cites
this great teacher, not only for his wisdom, but also for the
Hasidic message he preached that "the Jew is made for joy and
joy for the Jew." "The law commands the Jew to appreciate
every pleasure, however small, to say grace over every fruit which
makes him aware of the beautiful world in which it is
grown."
On taking leave Freud admits, "I was more deeply moved than
the Old Jew could possibly guess" and promises Martha that
"something of the core, of the essence of
this
meaningful and life–
affirming Judaism will not be absent from our home." I am sure
he kept the promise; yet only a year later (Jetter no. 18), while
commenting upon a performance of
Carmen,
Freud conveyed
to
Martha a somewhat different message which came to be a corner·
stone in the theory of psychoanalysis not yet dreamt of at
this
time: that the pleasure-principle means "avoiding pain [not]
seek·
ing pleasure," and that a rational economy of the self demands
deprivation, not indulgence in the "appetites" which we find
in
Carmen
and in "the psychology of the common man." "We de–
prive ourselves in order to maintain our integrity, we economize
in our health, our capacity for enjoyment.... We save ourselves
for something, not knowing what." That is of course also a
Jewish
thought, but it is not the voice of the Hasidim; it is much closer
to the message of self-restraint and sublimation which Freud,
in
later life, associated with the voice of Moses.
Again, I did not remember from reading Jones how deeply
Freud was involved
in
the unhappy love story of Minna Bernays,
Martha's sister, who was engaged to a friend of Freud's by
the
I
·
J
i
i
I
s
a
s
f
C
S
