Spirit, Mind and Brain - A Psychoanalytic Examination of Spirituality and Religion

Erscheinungsjahr 2006
ISBN: 978-0-231-13900-7
Verlag: Columbia University Press

Buch, Englisch, 232 Seiten, Format (B × H): 146 mm x 216 mm, Gewicht: 375 g

Reihe: Columbia Series in Science and Religion

Preeminent psychoanalyst Mortimer Ostow believes that early childhood emotional attachments form the cognitive underpinnings of spiritual experience and religious motivation. His hypothesis, which is verifiable, relies on psychological and neurobiological evidence but is respectful of the human need for spiritual value.

Ostow begins by classifying the three parts of the spiritual experience: awe, Spirituality proper, and mysticism. After he pinpoints the psychological origins of these feelings in infancy, he discusses the foundations of religious sentiment and practice and the brain processes associated with spiritual experience. He then focuses on spirituality's relationship to mood regulation, and the role of negative spirituality in fostering religious fundamentalism and demonic possession.

Ostow concludes with an analysis of an essay by the psychoanalyst Donald M. Marcus, who recounts his own spiritual experience during a Native American-style "vision quest" in the woods. Marcus's account demonstrates the constructive potential of spirituality and the way in which spirituality retrieves and recapitulates feelings of attachment to the mother.

Persuasively and brilliantly argued, Spirit, Mind, and Brain brings the disciplines of religion, behavorial neuroscience, and philosophy to bear on a groundbreaking new method for understanding religious ritual and belief.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Ostow, Mortimer

Fachgebiete

• Sozialwissenschaften Psychologie Allgemeine Psychologie Entwicklungspsychologie Kinder- und Jugendpsychologie
• Geisteswissenschaften Religionswissenschaft Sonstige Religionen Sonstige Religionen: Spiritualität, Mystik
• Sozialwissenschaften Psychologie Psychologie / Allgemeines & Theorie Psychologische Theorie, Psychoanalyse Psychoanalyse (S. Freud)

Inhaltsverzeichnis

Preface1. Introduction2. Spirit3. Mind: The Psychodynamics of Awe, Spirituality, and Mysticism4. Religion5. Brain6. Mood7. Apocalypse8. Demonic Spirituality: Infanticide, Self-Sacrifice, and Fundamentalism9. Analyzing an Account of a Spiritual ExperienceReferencesIndex

Über Autor(innen)

Mortimer Ostow was a psychiatrist and psychoanalyst whose experience included the last three major revolutions in psychiatry: psychoanalysis, psychopharmacology, and neuroscience. As emeritus professor of pastoral psychiatry at the Jewish Theological Seminary of America, he saw himself as an informed amateur in the field of religion.