Christianity and Psychoanalysis, Part 1: Jesus as the Anti-Oedipus

Basic connections between Freudian psychoanalytic theory and Christian theology are explored. The locus is on the Oedipus complex, the origin of neurosis in Freudian theory; it is argued that Oedipal motivation is a reasonably apt characterization of original sin. After a detailed comparison of the Freudian Oedipus with the Christian Jesus it is concluded that Jesus is the anti-Oedipus and thus he represents the logical answer to the neurotic consequences of the hypothesized universal Oedipal motivation. This rationale also provides an explanation of the irrational, unconscious motivation behind atheism, namely that atheism is Oedipal wish fulfillment.