Abstract

The work of the Orthodox Jewish psychoanalyst, Moshe Halevi Spero, is examined as representing a non-reductionistic dialogue between religion and psychoanalysis in one analyst’s work. The development of Spero’s thinking is traced as he has grappled with the possibility of conflict between Jewish theology and psychoanalytic theory and with issues involving transference and countertransference in the work of a religious therapist with religious patients. These issues led to the formulation of a reconciliation between Jewish law, halakha, and psychoanalysis in what Spero termed the “halakhic metapsychology.” Eventually his assertion that the reality of God must be acknowledged in clinical psychoanalytic work with religious patients has led to a critique of Lacanian thinking and the formation of a psychoanalytic epistemology in which divinity, in whose image humanity is created, becomes the “ground” for representation and interpersonal communication.

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