Lacan and the Biblical Ethics of Psychoanalysis

In this fascinating and ground-breaking book, Itzhak Benyamini uses discourse analysis to lay out the way Lacan constructed his own intellectual discourse informed by Judeo-Christianity. Offering an understanding of Lacan’s emergence and intellectual struggles with significant contemporary intellectuals, the author builds a panoramic view of the entire psychoanalytic discourse at the time of the foundational post-Freudian generation. 

By engaging in close reading of texts and seminars given by Lacan between the 1930s and 50s, Benyamini uncovers the coming-into-being of Lacan's key concepts: The Mirror Stage, the Imaginary, the Real, the Symbolic, the Name-of-the-Father, the Other, jouissance, and das Ding. The author argues that Lacan wished to regulate this process of conceptualization by connecting the concepts of the "Father" and the "Other" with themes from the Judeo-Christian tradition, especially the Biblical one, to create a clinical ethic, that does not reflect aworldview or ideology and is guided solely by the analyzand’s unconscious desire.

“Benyamini's new book is an in- depth, fascinating and innovative study of Lacan's theory, and the many schools of thought in the history of Western philosophy that contributed to the discourse of Lacan’s life and time. This book, therefore, is not only for those interested in a new, rich understanding of Lacan, and of the origins of psychoanalysis. From Heraclitus to Freud, through Judaism and Christianity- this strikingly erudite author offers a masterful weaving together of western philosophy and theology.  Using the study of Lacan as a focal point of structuralism, psychoanalysis, Judeo- Christian theology and even mysticism,  Benyamini offers  his readers fresh perspectives and new, exciting  integration of classical Ideas . A real treat for lovers of interdisciplinary thought and cultural studies.”

—Alice Bar Nes, PH.D  is a Clinical psychologist, Author of Psychoanalysis, Mysticism and the  Problem of Epistemology: defining theindefinable.  Head of the post graduate track "Beyond the interpersonal: The Psychic overlap Paradigm In Psychoanalysis" In "Temurot" school of psychotherapy, Bar Ilan University

 “Attending to both Lacan's Catholic Christian and Freud's Jewish perspective on the Father, Benyamini brilliantly opens up a new understanding of Lacan. His interpretation raises the stakes of how we inherit the legacy of monotheism in religious, psychoanalytic, and cultural terms. Anyone invested in psychoanalysis should read this book!”

—Clayton Crockett, University of Central Arkansas

"Benyamini’s excellent book shows us how fundamentally important religious themes are to Lacan’s teaching. While the author rightly insists that there is not a skerrick of the “believer” in Lacan, the achievement of his book is to show that religious themes, far from being superficial borrowings, run very deep indeed. The result is a penetrating, and deeply reflective, analysis of the most important psychoanalyst since Freud."

—Russell Grigg, author of Lacan, Language and Philosophy

Itzhak Benyamini teaches at the Tel Aviv University and Bezalel Jerusalem, Israel. He is the editor of Resling publishing house and the author of a number of books, including Narcissist Universalism (Bloomsbury, 2012) and A Critical Theology of Genesis (Palgrave, 2016).