304
PAIl..T ISAN R EVI EW
Freud 's almos t lifelo ng identifi ca ti o n w ith M oses parallels hi s obses–
sion with the w riting of thi s book , w hi ch to rmente d him, as Freud said,
" like an unbid ghos t. " Its tex t , Ye ru shalmi no tes, " seems to refl ect the
diffi culti es Freud experi enced w hile compos in g it. It is riddl ed with
apologies, hes itati o ns, repetiti o ns." Its to ne is "deliberatel y austere,
IlIis–
sCl/ seli a/tlieli .
Unlike hi s letters and hi s talks w ith fell o w-J ews, the book
refers to the J ew s as 'they ' rather th an ' we .' 13y no w we sho uld recognize
such di stancing as strategi c and no t be mi sled by it. "
This "strategic di stan cing, " as bo th Ye ru shalmi and I<..i ce understand
it, arose from Freud' s very consc io us w ish th at hi s brain child , psychoanal–
ysis, no t be seen as a Jewi sh " nati o nal aff:l ir" o r a J ewi sh sc ience, but as
some thin g mo re uni ve rsa l. This di stanclll g co ntinu ed in va ri o us guises,
and with o ut ca llin g Freud a li ar , bo th Ye ru shalmi and Ri ce no te how
hard Freud w o rked
to
crea te a fa mil y roman ce, di stancin g himse lf and his
parents fro m th eir Ortho dox-J ewish Eas te rn Euro pean roo ts. Freud's
adole sce nce , Ri ce w rites, w as " m ark ed by an e thni c se lf-h atred that
would make an anti -Semite proud ." Ri ce prese nts us w ith a cache of
photocopied doc uments from Vienn ese archives, ex plainin g that Freud's
previous bi ographers perpetu ated th e Freud f:1I11il y fi cti o n " beca use they
appear no t to have grasped the full impli cati o ns o f th e available data." He
maintains that Freud w as mo ti va ted by th e comlll o n Vienn ese middle–
class d esire " to overcompensa te by be in g as C erman and middl e-class in
their cultural and intell ectu al interests and va lu es as th e no n-J ewish mid–
dl e class, if no t mo re so." Sc rutini zin g th e Freud fa mil y 13ible and the
elabo rate and lea rn ed Hebrew dedi ca ti o n w ritte n inside a book given by
Freud 's fa ther to his son o n hi s thirty-fifth b irthday, Ri ce comments that
an extremely ass imilated fa the r wo uld simpl y have bee n unabl e to write
such a dedi ca ti o n and th at he ce rtainl y wo uld no t have w ritten it to a son
who kn ew no H ebrew:
Su ch in congruiti es ca n occur but arc Ill ost unlikely. . . Freud 's
"aggressive ath eislll ," a phrase iPeterl Gay repea tedl y uses .
is not
reall y as aggressive as Cay portrays it to be.
It woul d appea r that
despite Freud 's intense wish fo r th e ridda nce of reli gion, th ere is an–
oth er part, not too
f.u
benea th th e sur(lCe , whi ch yea rns fo r its reten–
tion in its Ori ginal O rth odox fo rm .
This parti cul ar "yearning" is o nly o ne o f th e controve rsial and curious
matters that crop up at every turn wh en thinking 3bout th e inte rsecti on of
Freud 's writin g and hi s J ewi shness. Why did Freud so repe3 tedly disavow
any real kno wl edge o f eithe r H ebrew o r Yiddi sh? Why did he pretend
not to kno w abo ut J ewi sh holidays, culture, and ritu als? And why did he
