Page:The International Journal of Psycho-Analysis III 1922 1.djvu/97

 BOOK REVIEWS 89

L'auteur montte it ses lecteurs comment la psychanalyse petit les aider k d^bfouiller les difficult^, qui relfevent autant de la conduite morale que de la vie religieuse, de ceux qui s'adressent k eux. D indique que c'est le moyen de les amener k la constatation de la ndcessite d'une r^g6n6ration morale et religieuse, et de preparer une reeducation com- pile. Celle-ci aura son point d'appui k I'origine meme des deviations, et elle sera effective, parce qu'elle enseignera au patient k faire usage de ses puissances affectives d^tenues dans les complexes inconscients.

La traductrice a su trouver un frangais clair et simple que ses lecteurs

certes n'auront aucun mal k comprendre.

F. Morel.

QtmLQUESTBAlTSDELAVIEDE JeSUS AU POINT DE VUE PSYCHOLOGIQUE ET

PSYCHANALYTiouE. By Georges Berguer, Docteur en Th^ologie. {Edition Atar, Paris and Geneva, 1920. Pp. cviii+267. Price 15 Swiss Francs.)

The immense influence that Christianity has exercised over a large portion of civilised humamty for a period of nearly 2,000 years must make any serious study of the founder of Christianity from the psycho- logical point of view worthy of profound attention on the part of the psycho-analyst. The discoveries of Psycho-Analysis on their part seem to call imperiously for application not only to the religious consciousness of the individual worshipper {an application which has to some extent already been made^or at least begun) but also to the personalities of those religious heroes or geniuses who have profoundly modified the nature and course of the religious consciousness of mankind. Dr. Berguer is to be congratulated therefore in his courageous attempt to apply the results of his obviously extensive studies in psychology and comparative theology to the person of Christ himself. . ,

The book is divided into two parts, the first of which consists of an extensive introduction of over 100 pages devoted to the methods of theo- • logy, psychology and psycho-analysis, to the relations between Christianity and the religious mysteries of antiquity, to the nature and documentary value of the historical material bearing on the life of Christ and to the arguments of those who have denied Christ's real existence.

In the course of this introduction. Dr. Berguer admits that the documentary evidence available is insufficient for the formation of a satisfactory historical life of Christ, and insists that it is all the more important to shift the emphasis from the historical to the psychological point of view, to understand the personality of Christ as depicted in the accounts we possess, the effect he made by his teaching and example, and the mentality of the persons through whose agency our knowledge of Christ is obtained. With this insistence on the psycho- logical as distinct from the theological or historical point of view every