Freud and the Non-European

Using an array of material from literature, archaeology and social theory, and demonstrating an abiding interest in Freud's work and its influence on his own, Said explores the profound implications in Moses and monotheism for Middle-East politics today.

Quite differently from the spirit of Freud's deliberately provocative reminders that Judaism's founder was a non-Jew, and that Judaism begins in the realm of Egyptian, non-Jewish monotheism, Israeli legislation countervenes, represses, and even cancels Freud's carefully maintained opening out of Jewish identity toward its non-Jewish background.