# Zur Frage der psychologischen Grundlagen und des Ursprungs der Religion — Index

> **TL;DR:** Lecture delivered 25 March 1921 at the Psychological Society of Sofia (translated from Bulgarian). Kinkel applies Freudian psychoanalysis to the origin and development of religion, arguing for a psychoanalytic sociology in which religious ideas and moods derive from universal infantile complexes.

**Project method (archive, not endorsement):** This index preserves Kinkel’s Freudian / developmental-psychology framing for research. Paradigm Threat does **not** adopt that reduction of ancestral religion to childish projection. Recurring myth is tested first as intelligent eyewitness sky memory; see [Prisca sapientia — Explicit non-Jungian method](/docs/PRISCA_SAPIENTIA.md#explicit-non-jungian-method-author-lock-2026-07-14).

**Author:** Dr. Johann Kinkel (Ivan Kinkel)  
**Published:** 1922 (Internationaler Psychoanalytischer Verlag, Leipzig–Wien–Zürich)  
**Subtitle:** *Beitrag zum System der psychoanalytischen Soziologie*  
**Source:** Expanded reprint from *Imago*, Zeitschrift für Anwendung der Psychoanalyse auf die Geisteswissenschaften, Vol. VIII (1922)  
**Full text:** `Ivan-Kinkel-Psychologische-Grundlagen-1922.zip` → extracted to `Ivan-Kinkel-Psychologische-Grundlagen-1922/` (80 OCR pages, German)

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## Overview

Lecture delivered **25 March 1921** at the Psychological Society of Sofia (translated from Bulgarian). Kinkel applies Freudian psychoanalysis to the origin and development of religion, arguing for a **psychoanalytic sociology** in which religious ideas and moods derive from universal infantile complexes.

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## Main Arguments

### 1. Biogenetic Law Applied to Psychology

- **Ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny** (Haeckel): Individual development repeats species development.
- **Sociological parallel:** The "primitive" mentality of *Naturvölker* (indigenous/natural peoples) corresponds to the psychology of the modern child.
- Child psychology and primitive religious symbolism share the same structural patterns.

### 2. Father and Mother Complexes as Foundation of Religion

- **Mother complex:** Good fairy, mother earth, nurturing figures = symbol of the mother.
- **Father complex:** Giant, terrifying or powerful figures, sky gods = symbol of the father.
- **Infantile sexuality:** First object of (unconscious) sexual sympathy for girls = father; Oedipal structure in both sexes.
- Religion sublimates these complexes; ritual and doctrine express repressed infantile wishes.

### 3. Monotheism as Father-Projection

- **God the Father** = projection of the paternal ideal; authority, law, moral demand.
- Jehovah (Jewish), Christian God = same structure: paternal authority internalised as conscience (Kant's categorical imperative).
- Cultural parallels: feudal lord, *pater familias* in medieval Europe; South Slav and Turkish patriarchalism.

### 4. Symbolism

- **Fairy tales:** Fairy = mother, giant = father; child's fantasies encoded.
- **Language:** Primitive word-formation (e.g. *Bik/Byk* for ox from the sound "bu") as symbolic.
- **Number symbols in children:** 1 = pillar, 6 = woman with child, etc.
- Same symbolism appears in primitive religion.

### 5. Regression: Russian Khlysty Sect

- **Khlysty (Chlysty):** Secret prayer meetings → religious ecstasy → dancing, jumping → candles "extinguish" → sexual orgies (hetero- and homosexual) in darkness.
- Kinkel interprets this as **regression** to ancient sexual-religious forms (spring festivals, fertility rites, Mother Earth / Father Heaven; Astarte-Aphrodite mysteries on Cyprus).
- Sublimated libido returns to raw sexual form under ecstatic conditions.

### 6. Infantilism as Core of Religion

- **"Feeling of absolute dependence"** on nature (birth, death, rain, thunder) = religious root.
- Primitive and modern alike: helplessness before nature → flight into infantile submission to a parental figure (God).
- **Harnack** (1892): Religion = dissolving oneself in a higher personality; soul finds God as Father "like the child in the father's house."
- **Matthew 18:1–5** (Christ: "Become as little children") cited as scriptural support for religious infantilism.

### 7. Persistence and Regression

- Religion infantilism persists in moderns; trauma can trigger regression.
- **Post-WWI Germany:** "Search for a new religion" in some socialist circles = regression under disappointment.
- **Conclusion:** "We are powerless against the great laws of psychology that lie hidden in the depths of our soul."

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## Structure (Approximate)

| Pages | Content |
|-------|---------|
| 1–4 | Title, dedication (Krstnikoff, Psychological Society of Sofia) |
| 5–12 | Introduction; biogenetic law; child ≈ primitive |
| 13–20 | Father/mother complexes; symbolism; monotheism |
| 21–55 | Development of religious ideas; ethnological examples |
| 56–60 | Khlysty sect; regression to sexual-religious orgies |
| 61–76 | Infantilism; Harnack; Matthew; conclusion |
| 77–80 | Coda; "Quo vadis, sapientia?"; printer colophon |

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## Key References

- **Ernst Haeckel** — Biogenetic law
- **Freud** — Psychoanalysis, Oedipus, sublimation
- **Adolf Harnack** — *Dogmengeschichte* III, p. 529 (religion as childlike relation to Father)
- **Dostoevsky** — *Brothers Karamazov*, Iljuschetschka (Ilusha); Dr. Krstnikoff's observation on sadism, pity, wounded childish feelings after father's public humiliation
- **Biblical** — Matthew 18:1–5
- **Ethnology** — Astarte-Aphrodite mysteries, Cyprus; universal Father-Heaven / Mother-Earth cults

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## Dedication

To **Dr. Nicolaus Krstnikoff** (founder of the Psychological Society of Sofia) and its first members: N. Popoff, Sp. Kasandjieff, Mladen Nikoloff, Michael Dimitroff, Dimitër Botscharoff, Nicolo Dolaptchieff.

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## Cross-References

- [Nenovsky 2015](nenovsky_Kinkel_EJHET_2015.md) — Kinkel's economic theory; biography; Schmoller, psychoanalysis in Bulgaria
- [Sources index](index-ivan-kinkel-sources.md) — All Ivan Kinkel materials
- [Gottfried Kinkel](../gottfried-kinkel/gottfried-kinkel.md) — Possible family link (unresolved)

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