[The historical achievement and the limits of the work of Sigmund Freud (1855-1939)]

In this paper written on the occasion of Sigmund Freud's 125th birthday, an attempt is made to strike a balance of earlier marxist assessments of Freud's work. After a short presentation of the more important biographical and work-historical data, mainly Freud's antropological basic conceptions and their problematic consequences for his personality-theory are dealt with. Freud's historically important achievement is seen in the opening of a psychological access to the understanding of neuroses as well as the discovery of dynamic processes in the psychotherapeutic encounter.