Dr. Martin Dysart of Peter Shaffer's play Equus is
a man faced with the modern dilemma of Sigmund Freud's "problem of
religion." It is a problem which must be asked of religious scholars
such as Ninian Smart and states briefly this: religion was once a powerful
and driving force in the lives of human beings but now we have evolved
to such a point where we realize it to be an object of useless expense
which we no longer need. Freud believes he has solved the problem
while Dysart is confused and unsure. I do not believe, as did Freud,
that the problem of religion is so easily solved.
Freud established his view of religion in his books Totem and
Taboo and The Future of an Illusion. He was fond of allegories and
compared man's need for God with a child's need for a father. He
says, "And thus a store of ideas is created, born from man's need to make
his helplessness tolerable and built up from the material of memories of
helplessness of his own childhood and the childhood of the human race"
(Future of an Illusion-18).
He adds that like a child, we felt a need for protection, thus
we created a divine father, and established a moral world-order to ensure
the fulfillment of the demands of justice (30). Religious belief
is an illusion, says Freud, because it is motivated by a wish fulfillment
without basis in what we know about reality. They cannot be proven
nor can they be refuted and thus they must be rejected.
But Freud does not say that currently we can live without religion,
for without it the world might very well fall into chaos. Religion
has done a great service in taming asocial instincts, but man can do better.
Freud saw humanity as an adolescent, a child who is still bound to the
father. He also brings up the Oedipus complex which means that the
child harbors feelings of resentment for the father and when it grows older,
it will turn away from Him as a process of growth (43). Freud thought
that man will someday use scientific reasoning to outgrow the need for
spiritual beliefs.
Where Freud could live without a god, Martin Dysart cannot.
He too is a psychiatrist, and a very successful one. He has a flourishing
practice at an overcrowded mental hospital and is highly respected.
He has never had to question his beliefs or standards until he begins to
counsel a young man named Alan Strang. Alan was referred to Dr. Dysart
because he cut out the eyes of six horses, blinding them. Dysart
discovers that Alan worships a horse-god which he calls Equus. He
lived for being able to ride Equus once every three weeks. Dysart
soon realizes that he has never known the kind of worship Alan knows and
he becomes jealous because he realizes, as Freud did, how fulfilling
worship and religion can be in life. Dysart says, "Without worship
you shrink, it's as brutal as that...I shrank my own life" (82).
Thus he does not reject worship and religion as Freud did but he personally
realizes it's formidability even in the modern world.
I believe that Ninian Smart does well to discus this issue at
the end of his book on worldviews. Smart states that man cannot live
without religion as long as the necessity of facing death, suffering, and
the spiritual experience exist. Science, for all it can do for mankind,
cannot open one up to the numinous or mystical, he says. Science
is a self correcting process. A theory that may have been held for
generations may be totally disintegrated by a single profound discovery.
Thus, people need something that they can hold onto and the knowledge that
what exists today will be there tomorrow and that is where religion comes
into play.
I feel that Freud, Dysart, and Smart all have valid points.
Freud had great influence on secular ideology and the psychology of religion.
Yet Freud's logic concerning God as a father figure has a problem when
it is applied to a religion such as Theravada Buddhism which has no godhead.
And Smart does not believe as Freud did that man will out grow religion
because there will always be the questions that science cannot answer.
I agree with Smart that man will always have religion but I believe that
it's impact will be lessened as science improves because, as we have seen,
it is constantly providing answers to questions we thought we could never
answer.
Smart argues that we will never be able to experience the numinous
with science, but when I go outside with my Newtonian telescope and look
at the stars, planets, and galaxies I think that I may have what could
be called a numinous experience. I am in awe of how vast the universe
is and how great is the power of nature. But perhaps it is a religious
experience after all since I try to rationalize how it all came to be and
how it is all going to end and in the end I come to the conclusion of God.
One reason why I enjoy futuristic science fiction is because it deals with
such questions as the future of religion and the man's place in the cosmos.
Perhaps the most successful modern futurist is Star Trek creator, Gene
Roddenberry. It was his belief, in key with Freud's, that religion
would not last until the 24th century. He believed that science would
be all the religion future man would need. I tend to take a middle
standpoint. I believe as Smart does, that scientific culture and
religious culture will become integrated as one and the same.
Freud never states if science will become authoritarian like
religion, or if it will fulfill Smart's and Dysart's need for the numinous
and the mystical, so we don't know what he would give in response to Smart's
discussion at the end of Worldviews. I believe Dr. Dysart would disagree
with Freud after his experience with Alan and instead lean toward Smart's
conclusions. Science, currently, is unfulfilling in the face of real
worship. As Dysart says, without worship, you shrink. Science
cannot yet answer our questions or our yearning for, as the Ojibway call
it, the Gichi Manidoo-the Great Unknown or Mystery. Will it one day?
Perhaps that can appropriately be called, "the problem of science."