The Conflict of Interpretations in Harvey

This paper seeks to argue that the 1950 movie Harvey, which focuses on the friendly but rather idiosyncratic Elwood P. Elwood and his best friend, an invisible white rabbit named Harvey, provides an insightful example that can be applied to the philosophy of religion. This paper will argue that the challenge that arises from trying to make sense of Harvey’s existence is analogous to one of the central methodological problems within the philosophy of religion; namely how to interpret private, inner religious experiences. In this respect Harvey prevents us with a ‘conflict of interpretations’ of the sort discussed by Paul Ricoeur in Freud and Philosophy. As such, this paper seeks to show that an analysis of these interpretations and their conflict can provide an insight into Ricoeur’s philosophy of religion and some of the wider issues discussed in the philosophy of religion.