Het hart van de mens

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Dr Fromm considers The Heart of Man a counterpart to The Art of Loving. The present volume reveals the other face of Janus, however, as he's concerned here essentially with the nature of evil--& by the converse of its definition, good--& the human capacity for it. He equates evil with tendencies toward death, the regression to the prehuman mass against the good of progressing toward life & true humanness. He sees necrophilia, extreme narcissism & incestuous symbiosis as the "syndrome of decay." Persons are free to choose between evil & good, but previous choices have effects: the more choices made against life, the harder it is to avoid a hardened heart, to turn back. Yet this is almost always possible. In a social context, he observes the influence of a Hitler or Stalin & analyzes their appeal. More clinical than The Art of Loving, this will mainly be of interest in terms of its religious-phychological equation. It appears as the 12th volume in the Religious Perspectives series.--Kirkus (edited) Religious Perspectives--Ruth Nanda Anshen Foreword Man--Wolf or Sheep? Different Forms of Violence Love of Death & Love of Life Individual & Social Narcissism Incestuous Ties Freedom, Determinism, Alternativism Index