Fromm Redux

When I was an undergrad, Adolf Grunbaum introduced me to the writings of Erich Fromm (specifically, his book Psychoanalysis and Religion). At the time I first read it (1980 or '81) I remember being somewhat nonplussed by Fromm’s suggestion that psychoanalysis could fill the gap left in people’s lives by the loss of religion. Yes, I would agree that psychoanalysis should probably be provided to the masses (now more than ever), but what probably seemed plausible back in the late 1940s (when he wrote that book) was, more than thirty years later, no longer even thinkable. So I filed his project under “Quixotic” and left it at that for forty years.

I recently re-read the book, however, and was surprised to discover how much more there is to it than his promotion of a psychoanalytic alternative to traditional religion, and even more surprised to discover how much of his essentially humanistic approach to religion I had absorbed and, really, made my own. Perhaps my selective memory of the book was a symptom of influence anxiety...

At any rate, I would suggest that an even more urgent read today is Fromm's 1966 book, You Shall Be As Gods: A Radical Interpretation of the Old Testament and its Tradition. For this book, Fromm reached back into his Jewish upbringing and education and wrote a truly powerful interpretation of the Hebrew Bible as the well-spring of the best of what we may call the “Abrahamic tradition.” I will go so far as to say that if Christians, Jews, and Muslims could step outside of the particularities of their traditions and give this book a fair reading on its merits, it could potentially lay the foundation for an “Abrahamism” that would make the phrase “Abrahamic tradition” more than the polite “interfaith” lip service that it has become.

Of course, I recognize that is a proposition beyond the capacity of most Christians, Jews, and Muslims to entertain. But at least it doesn’t face anyone with the prospect of having to spill their guts once a week at the rate of $ 150 for 45 minutes.