The way in which Matthew Fox deals with the issue of “the flesh” (see yesterday’s DM) is remarkable especially because of the widening of one’s vision that he almost forces on his readers.
Rather than focusing on issues of sexuality, or just the human body, he places such themes within a cosmological context. Thus, he helps us connect the dots between the truth of the fleshliness of the earth and of its relation to the fleshliness of the universe and our own flesh. He calls poets such as Mary Oliver and Walt Whitman as witnesses to these relationships, but it is he who opens our eyes to the fact that the new cosmology gives a whole new meaning to flesh.
This attitude reminds me of Richard Hooker, the Anglican defender of the Elizabethan establishment of the 16th century. He was confronted with the Puritans’ conviction that the Bible, including the New Testament, hosted a great number of “laws” which ought to be discovered, numbered, and obeyed literally and to the further extent of their meaning.
To this obsessive attitude, Hooker responded first by asking “what is a law?” and then by pointing out that God has set many such “laws” in the universe as well as in the human heart, apart from anything written in any book — even the most holy of them all.
Most Puritans were incensed, but while they remained completely immersed in “the Book,” Hooker set Anglicans free to roam the cosmos with their intelligence — which is God’s gift just as the Bible — and there also find God’s laws, that is, God’s wisdom.
In the same vein, Matthew Fox asks “what is flesh?” and he finds that to answer that question one’s gaze must be enlarged to all creatures and the cosmos. He ends up finding a whole new and cosmic meaning to “flesh.” I should not be surprised about this because, after all, both Matthew Fox and Richard Hooker are scholars of that great Dominican mind of the 13th century, Thomas Aquinas. And a good method seldom fails to yield good results.
In the first part of his book Sins of the Spirit, Blessings of the Flesh, Matthew delights in listing all kinds of scientific facts about the flesh of stars and planets, the flesh of the Earth and its creatures, and human flesh, in order to elicit awe. This provides the correct context to discuss the issues at hand — those related to flesh — including sexuality without being narrowly defined by it.
Hooker discussed at length nature’s laws, angelic (i.e. cosmic) laws, and laws in the human conscience, so that when the time came for examining biblical laws his adversaries the Puritans were already either completely exhausted or had their heart and minds enlarged by the marvels of the macrocosm and the microcosm, i.e. the human being. Only then they could truly understand what the Bible was really about. It was not about their narrow view of morality.
So when the time comes for Matthew to discuss sexuality in his book, he can pen some pearls such as the following:
None of us would be here without lust. Our parents’ lust is what brought us into this world. Lust in itself, therefore, is holy and sacred. It is a sacred desire wanting to penetrate and connect to another. (…) It is not just the lust of our human parents that has brought us to this place but the lust of their parents and others before them and others before them. It is the holy lust of all our ancient ancestors that we can thank for being here.
What I find remarkable in this quote is not just the declaration that lust is holy, but the extension of the gaze unto the lust of beings which preceded us physically as our true ancestors, even up to the level of monocellular organisms from which all life developed. It is carnal lust as such that is holy, not the one experienced by humans only.
The shadow side of lust is also explored by Matthew with remarkable ingenuity, but — and this is very important — not as the shadow side of flesh. He writes: Our energy of desire can be thwarted. Then a kind of seething occurs and violence can naturally result.
Lack of mutuality, sentimentalism, humorlessness (remember the Puritans!), homophobia, control issues, and sadomasochism are some of the bad offsprings of thwarted lust, according to Matthew. Further, a look at the headlines shows the shattering impact of pedophilia, exploitation, and trafficking of the vulnerable by the powerful.
Moreover, addictions should not be anymore understood as “sins of the flesh” but rather as “sins against the flesh” inasmuch as they are offensive to the flesh, they damage our bodily integrity. Addictions to food, drugs, alcohol etc. obviously are bad for the sacred flesh which we experience in our bodily existence. In the end, our second chakra, the sexual chakra, is about reconciling matter and spirit, sexuality and mysticism, self and another.
Banner Image: Caressing the flesh of the Earth: a gardener prepares to plant. Photo by Jonathan Kemper on Unsplash.
Queries for Contemplation
What do you make of Matthew’s rewriting of the notion of flesh?
Related Readings by Matthew Fox
Sins of the Spirit, Blessings of the Flesh: Transforming Evil in Soul and Society, pages 63, 46, 237-264.
Original Blessing: A Primer in Creation Spirituality
Creation Spirituality: Liberating Gifts for the Peoples of the Earth
WHEE! We, wee All the Way Home: A Guide to Sensual Prophetic Spirituality
The Tao of Thomas Aquinas: Fierce Wisdom for Hard Times
Order of the Sacred Earth: An Intergenerational Vision of Love and Action
One River, Many Wells: Wisdom Springing from Global Faiths
