Page:The International Journal of Psycho-Analysis II 1921 1.djvu/59

 A SHORT STUDY OF THE LIFE AND CHARACTER OF MOHAMMED 5l

and destroyed, so that, in certain circumstances, defiance of autho- rity was not only justifiable but to be encouraged.

In this aspect of Islam doubtless lies the secret of its tremen- dous power, for although it appears to make its appeal to man's conscious feeling for religion, in reality Islam stirs up the deeply- buried and unconscious complex against the father, which is an attribute that pervades the minds of all men. From hardly any other source could there spring those wild torrents of emotion that enable men, "utterly lost to every call of honour, or patrio- tism, or family affection, whose only occupation is eating, and whose only recreation is woman, to thrill with excitement at the summons of the faith, and meet death with a contempt the Red Indian could only envy". ^

It is beyond the scope of this article to consider the social and political consequences that might follow upon a fuller appre- ciation of this distinctive characteristic of Mohammedan doctrine, but it is evident that were such facts realised there must result the adoption of a more rational and scientific attitude towards all Muslim which would again result in saving those responsible for the maintenance of law and order in countries inhabited by Mo- hammedans from that condition of petrified embarrassment into which such persons invariably fall whenever they are called upon to face any widespread expression of Mohammedan feeling in regard to some religious or social dogma.

We have now seen how the case of Mohammed illustrates that the most intense desire to transcend the paternal authority cannot escape from the feeling that all authority whatsoever can be dispen- sed with. On the contrary, the phantasy that desires the abrogation of the father's omnipotence conceives simultaneously the existence of a still more tremendous power, and creates a fresh "father", either human or superhuman, in whom to repose these gigantic attributes. In the case of Mohammed this phantasy created a replace- ment-figure whose attributes were: "He is Allah, besides whom there is no God; the King, the Holy, the Author of peace, the Granter of Security, Guardian over All, the Mighty, the Supreme, the Possessor of every greatness; Glory be to Allah from what they set up (with Him)".

But the matter does not end with the creation of the replace- ment-figure. The phantasy is further concerned with the relation

' Townsend: 'The Great Arabian' in Asia and Europe, p. 182.

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