Said's provocative response to Freud

There is a biographical introduction and a response by Professor Jacqueline Rose.

Brief though it is, the book will provoke endless thought and debate.

Said uses his academic as opposed to his more popular style, so one needs to read with concentration.

He takes a very late work by Freud, entitled Moses and Monotheism, as the subject for his lecture.

In this fragmentary work, Freud states that Moses was not Jewish, but Egyptian, and that the worship of one god was borrowed from Egypt itself.

The work was not fully developed as Freud's physical powers were waning. However, he meditates on the nature and essence of Judaism plus the possible characterisation of the Jews as a European people.

Nationalism postulates a purity of origin which scarcely, if ever, exists, Said argues.

This is the case with zionism, which is an extreme manifestation of nationalism.

Freud's conclusions concerning Moses run counter to zionist interpretations of history.

Freud's relationship with zionism was contradictory and fraught.

Intellectually, he could not accept it. He felt that Jews, belonging to no nation, tended to "universalise," as opposed to being confined to narrow nationalistic interpretations.

Nonetheless, he lived in the times of the Tsarist anti-semitic pogroms and the rise of nazism. For these reasons. he granted it some credence.

Although Freud was no campaigner against colonialism, he did counter, possibly unwittingly, another zionist myth.

The European was portrayed as culturally superior to the African, Arab and Asian. This, one might add, with scant regard being paid to real history.

So, zionism and imperialism categorised the Jews as a European people, superior to the Arabs, more fitting to inhabit and develop Palestine.

Freud argues that the Jews are much more a Mediterranean people in origin.

Said develops Freud's thoughts, demonstrating how even archaeology is called to the support of zionism.

It creates reality by occupation and attempts to write history by selective investigation.

Israeli archaeology seeks to demonstrate that Israel is incontrovertibly Jewish.

The reality is that it has been the home of various peoples since Biblical times.

Zionist archaeology could not depart further from Freud's concept of the secular, universalising Jew.

It is a concept which is idealistic, but preferable to extreme nationalism.

Brief but fiendishly intelligent, the main lecture in this book will have readers debating its ramifications for many a long year.

It is a tribute, of which many will follow, to one of the most important thinkers of our times.

GLEN BAKER