Abstract
Psychoanalytic insights and discoveries are employed to help shed light upon the origin and nature of law. It is suggested that the origin of law is to be found in Oedipal prohibitions against incest and parricide: ancient prohibitions which, it is argued, reflect (as does the superego) an attempt to control the sexual and aggressive urges that presumably ruled mankind's ancestors during the era of the primal horde. Also considered in this article is the history of the first five books of the Old Testament known as the Jewish Torah, and particularly the history of the Jewish Sabbath. The conclusion is drawn that the law's very nature changes from time to time: sometimes requiring force, compliance, sovereignty, and legitimacy (or a combination of some of them), and sometimes not.
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