La Legge del desiderio. Radici bibliche della psicoanalisi

The central theme of this book concerns the word of Jesus, originally reread by Massimo Recalcati as one of the unexpected roots of the psychoanalysis of the ‘Jewish’ Freud and the ‘Catholic’ Lacan. It is not a question of submitting life to the Law, but of seeing in the Law – that of love and grace – a force at the service of life. The Law no longer instils fear of severe punishment, no longer demands the scrupulous zeal of formal respect, but frees itself of the death it brings with it to become a Law that does not annul desire, but, on the contrary, sustains it. This is the essential legacy assumed by psychoanalysis: the Law is not the enemy of desire, but its most radical foundation. References to parables, miracles, healings, Peter and Judas, the night of Gethsemane, the resurrection and the thought of Paul of Tarsus are revisited in a surprising way. Here Recalcati challenges commonplaces and stereotypes of the psychoanalytic reading of Christianity by showing with great audacity how the testimony of Jesus is above all a testimony to the indestructible life of desire.