RIK, in your first post at Delphi on 28 Feb 1999 you quoted from S. Freud,

Religion is an attempt to get control over the sensory world, in which we are placed; a world which we have developed within us by means of the "wish-world", as a result of biological and psychological necessities.

Freud could not know that earnest, deeply convinced religious people are born with such inclination. There appear to be determinant "religious genes." Most probably, religious tenets were products of ancient, genetically determined minds.
The existence of the disease called Obsessive-Compulsive Syndrome, which mimics in some way religious rituals, is a supporting finding. Chaos and order are of the essence of physical reality, the more so in living organisms. Human brain contains this innate unconscious knowledge, in the guise of archetypes. There is good reason for the Bible to start with Creation, the imposition of Order over Chaos. Order is necessary to feel 'in control.' This need is innate. Gods are the imposers of order. Several of my posts in geocities deal with the subject.

Personally, as a derivative of the D-SP, I find in the myth of Paradise evidence of the division of humanity in creationists and evolutionists, the principle of the Cartesian doubt, of the scientific method... and more. I helped by my interpertation of Eve's problem, for the treatment of a patient that was suffering from Eve's existential problem. I started to write about it (Eve's Faces).
Freud, as you quote him, was concentrating on the conscious motivations, while those motivations are guided by genetic determinants. Therefore, he generalizes, not having realized that he was actually talking about a specific sector of the population.

Then you added your message 408:

Freud's account of religion, taken as a whole, is highly speculative, and will probably be the least-enduring aspect of his thoughts.

Scientific advances make obsolete wrong speculative musings. The communist's view that religion is the opium of the masses did not take in consideration that many people are genetically attracted to drugs of abuse. Education, without proper ancillary means, is impotent. So are political slogans.

His general view that faith is a kind of "psychological crutch", and that it has the quality of phantasy thinking, is endorsed by many as applying to much that is popularly called religion.

The 'crutch' determinant of faith is self-evident. It applies as well to beliefs that do not have a 'religious' character. By religious I mean beliefs in powerful entities ('gods'), perhaps derived from the father-figure. The 'religious inclination' is directed to a given body of creeds, with associated rites and their resulting rituals, or to a particular 'religious construct.' Spinoza, Jewish by birth, created his own religious beliefs. Since the trappings of creed rites and rituals were absent, it constitutes a way of understanding the 'supernatural.' It was originally his 'philosophy of life.' Once it was published and gathered a vast audience, it became "A PHILOSOPHY." The word "religion" probably derives from "reverence."

Empirical religion is a bewildering mixture of elements, and undoubtedly wish-fulfillment enters in and is a major factor in the minds of many devotees.

Religion is the core of theology. It cannot be empirical nor scientific. That's why it embraces "bewildering" elements. The analysis of religion is either empirical, as Freud's example, or scientific, thanks to recent finds. I believe that the D-SP essay on the subject is enlightening:

CRIME AND PUNISHMENT.

The aspect of 'value' or 'meaning' of life is important to understand 'religious' needs for all of us. If we do not revere something --even irreverence-- our 'value' is nil. Thus, religions and philosophies of life should be understood as belonging to the THIRD LAW OF BEING. D-SP deals with it in the essay: THE TRUE.