As a Jewish, spiritual psychoanalyst — newly Hasidic Orthodox — I’ve long been intrigued by exploring what nurtures and empowers, or suppresses and destroys, spiritual experience and development.
As a graduate student, I considered the spiritual origins and writings of psychology’s “patriarch” Sigmund Freud. (He never cited his main source). Recently, it dawned on me that Freud’s notion of defenses (The Life & Work of Sigmund Freud by Ernest Jones) seems to mirror the mystical Jewish understanding of Klipot (The Zohar).
This is no accident.
In Freud’s system, defenses form to create a protective barrier between our ego (mind) and threatening, overwhelming emotions (i.e., pain or terror). His theoretical formulation of mind or spirit was “ego.” Experientially, you or I would describe this as our thoughts, feelings, fantasies, and intuitions.
Though the ego is a concept, Freud believed scientists would discover it existed in a specific brain location. He also felt we’d find another part that housed the “id,” which holds our instincts. A third place would house the superego, which contains our socially conditioned conscience.
I agree… and more.
When the body responds to a wound, it creates a protective “scab” that protects it while it heals. When the psyche responds to emotional injuries, fear, and pain — it creates defenses. They function to “protect” us from experiencing overwhelming emotions such as fear, pain, shame, or guilt.
Especially in vulnerable childhood, psychic injuries can create rigid defenses that for many years — or even a lifetime — blind, distort, and constrict our experiences and actions. What becomes of those experiences we’ve defended away from our awareness? They gather in the darkness! Carl Jung, an intimate student of Freud, called one’s unwanted, defended-against emotions one’s “Shadow” (Man and his Symbols).
Injuries are part of life. Based on how we treat them, they can heal. Healing and growing may be incomplete, especially in families with limited love, patience, understanding, and forgiveness.
While defenses help us survive, they eventually slow or stop our growth and ability to live fully. Freud defined defenses such as: denial, regression, repression, suppression, projection, acting out, intellectualization, displacement, identification, dissociation, introjection, reaction formation, compartmentalization, and rationalization.
At their core, defenses obscure our sense of reality. The unifying characteristic between all defenses is: a departure from what is true and present.
The Zohar describes a universe of God’s creation that channels His light — which broke into pieces and scattered. (The Zohar is an ancient collection of books. “The Book of Radiance” is in the Jewish mystical tradition of the Kabbalah. It is written in Aramaic, covering mystical interpretations of the Torah.)
I suggest the Zohar contains the seeds of psychology. This breaking and scattering of the vessels that had channeled G-d’s light throughout our universe occurred when Adam ate the apple (pomegranate?) Eve gave him in the Garden of Eden.
When Eve handed the apple to Adam and he bit into this forbidden fruit from the Tree of Knowledge, the Divine vessels carrying the light of God throughout His creations ruptured. Then, crude “husks” formed around these fragments of Divine light, to protect them, like scabs. These defending husks are the Klipot.
Part of our mission as Jews, and as humanity, is to gather these bits of Divine light, remove their protective husks, restore the light to the ruptured vessels, and repair them — so the light of G-d can again flow into this universe. This is the mystic’s work.
What does this metaphor mean? When we let ourselves feel and experience what we’d always defended against, which involves a radical change in how we relate to others and ourselves, the light is restored. This means we now have awareness. The light of awareness is what creates enlightenment. When one becomes aware of one’s wounds and archetypal dynamics, his or her actions and decisions become far more creative.
With enlightenment, one can express and share love and meaning far more effectively with others — the vessels are restored and light flows again. We can share our emotions and empathize with others far better now that we’ve shined the light of consciousness on the true underlying experiences within ourselves, others, and our relationships with others. By experiencing and acting from a more enlightened place, we channel Hashem — and, He can enter this world to be with us.
Then… again — God and we will be one… we’ll all be together in harmony.
We can help this happen if we commit to disciplined study and living. The Zohar refers to such a person as a Man or Woman of Faith; servant, messenger, missionary, sentinel, envoy, seer, angel, prophet, and a Man or Woman of God.
Rigid psychological defenses form when our emotional fears, pain, or injuries are too traumatizing. At that moment, our mind, or “light of awareness,” is disconnected from our true emotions or perceptions. G-d’s light flowing into this universe is ruptured.
Defenses block or filter our true fears, feelings, needs, and injuries. Freud described how emotions occur when the ego and id meet — this is how our ego (spirit) can learn from the contents of our id (our animalistic side). This is why learning about ourselves and others is such an emotional experience. We’re impacted externally by new people and events, while we’re impacted internally by activated primal instincts.
When we’re overwhelmed by the intensity or duration of powerful experiences, our defenses can weaken, crack, or shut down. Defenses scramble to regroup and try again to mute or “turn off” the “unwanted” experiences. When we become “overwhelmed,” one might say our emotional vessels have ruptured — so the flow of processing ongoing experience is compromised or halted.
Klipot protectively cover and block Divine energies and wisdom, while psychic defenses protectively cover and block unwanted emotional self-awareness.
These parallel universes reveal deep truths about how we can heal and grow. By performing the role of the mystic and bringing our awareness to everything within, we grow within ourselves — and in our relationship with others — a light of self-awareness that heals and develops our intuition, playfulness, love, and empathy.
It seems Freud himself ate fruit from the Garden of Eden’s “Tree of Knowledge.” He absorbed Hebrew wisdom from his study of Torah — and growing up in a Jewish family and culture. Hebrew characters, notions, and values permeated his identity, thinking, and being. From Hebrew analysis and beliefs, Freud devised his science of psychoanalysis.
He sinned when he took the golden egg of psychoanalysis and slew the Divine Goose who laid it. By failing to thank Hashem, G-d, for teaching him via Torah Study, his culture, and his creative intuition — all that went into his theories and writings — Freud robbed from and disrespected his Father. It was as if he killed Him — by disowning him.
Freud claimed sole ownership of his creation. He never thanked the Creator for… His guiding role. None of us creates a thing on our own, in a vacuum! Freud’s theory and characteristic expression conveyed a solemn, sober belief that seemed to say:
“It’s up to our rational mind to figure things out. There’s no higher power to seek.”
Abraham’s descended tribes of Hebrews, Muslims, and Christians all want a relationship with G-d. We all seek to find and walk our unique Divine path God intended. We want to walk with Him by our side… or at least nearby. We must discover and follow this pathway by using free will, Divine intuition, and conscience. Just like our ancestors, we have these special Divine tools. It is our responsibility to use them well.
It also turns out that we are very special tools. We are the tools of G-d!
If we believe there is such a path for us — and we are committed to finding and following it — then our spiritual journey has begun!
As we advance, we can more fully receive and channel God into this world. As we do so, we live more peacefully within ourselves, with others, and — with our Creator. Then we can complete the restored Garden of Eden — and enjoy Heaven on Earth.
Reach out to learn more about Spiritual Psychoanalysis with me, Dr. Clifford Waldman, at Clifford.Waldman@gmail.com.
This article was edited by Erika Rasmussen.