ABSTRACT
This chapter addresses the position Freud takes in his eight sections of The Future of an Illusion. Freud proposes that he is looking directly at psychology rather than at economics. He addresses "the means by which civilization can be defended, measures of coercion and other measures that are intended to reconcile men to it are to recompense them for their sacrifices. Freud raises the question of the psychological significance of religious ideas and how one might classify them: Religious ideas are teachings and assertions about facts and conditions of external (or internal) reality which tell one something one has not discovered for oneself and which lay claim to one's belief. Freud viewed religion as an off-shoot of the father-complex. He saw it as representing man's helplessness in the world and his need for countering the ultimate fate of death, the struggle of civilization, and the forces of nature.
