QUESTION: How important is our body from the perspective of Incarnation? – Peter John

ANSWER: Jacob Parappally MSFS

It is a right thing to reflect on the importance of human body when we celebrate the birth of Jesus who is God’s Word. God assumed humanity in its entirety. In him was included all humans who lived before him, after him and contemporaneous with him. As a human born in a particular space and time he was like any other human with a body and soul as the Fathers of the Church explained using the categories of Greek philosophy or as a human with physical, vital, mental, intellectual and spiritual layers or sheaths presided over by the Logos or the Word according to Brahmabandhab Updhyay, the father of Indian Christian Theology explained using Indian philosophical categories.
In spite of the basic Christian faith-affirmation that God became human with body and human faculties, throughout the history of the Church, body was considered something evil and as an enemy to be repudiated, hated and subdued with ascetical practices. Such a hatred of one’s body was considered a virtue and even now many Christians hold this view and develop a spirituality accordingly. In our times, we find another extreme of exaggerated concentration on the welfare of one’s body alone by adopting various means to care for it even at the cost of one’s spiritual needs. Both extremes do not understand the sacredness of the bodily dimension of humans and its sacramentality.
When a person is dead, immediately he or she is referred to as a dead body and not by name. Even in a funeral ceremony, a dead person is often referred to as a dead body. His or her identity is lost and is counted among other objects. Such a thinking about the dead comes from a wrong theological anthropology which considers humans as “incarnated souls” and not as “animated bodies”. When we think of humans as incarnated souls, we follow Origen’s idea that human souls are stored in some heavenly places that is placed in the body that is formed in the mother’s womb. ‘The soul remains there until one dies and leaves it to go back to its original pristine state. This theory called’ apokatastasis (original state) was condemned by the Church because it negates the freedom and moral responsibility of humans to live a good life on earth. According to this position, whatever one does, good or evil does not affect one’s life especially the life after death. The belief in judgement, eternal reward and eternal punishment have no place in this anthropology which presents humans as incarnated souls. However, according to biblical revelation, humans are animated bodies.
The term body stands for the entire person and not just the physicality. The expressions like, some-body, no-body, every-body stand for the person and not the body of a person. But a confused understanding of body as an enemy in opposition to human soul or spirit leading humans to sin and eternal punishment has created paranoiac attitude to human sexuality in general and even to the conjugal relationship in married life. From the time of Thomas Aquinas to the Council of Trent, Christians were constantly reminded by preaching and teaching that the enemies of the soul were the world, the flesh and the devil. The Sixth Session of the Council of Trent states: “Nevertheless, let those who think themselves to stand, take heed lest they fall, and, with fear and trembling work out their salvation, in labours, in watching, in alms deeds, in prayers and oblations, in fasting and chastity: for, knowing that they are born again unto a hope of glory, but not as yet unto glory, they ought to fear for the combat which yet remains with the flesh, with the world, with the devil, wherein they cannot be victorious, unless they be with God’s grace, obedient to the Apostle, who says; We are debtors, not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh; for if you live according to the flesh, you shall die; but if by the spirit you mortify the deeds of the flesh, you shall live” The flesh or body was believed to be the source of disordered passions, sexual immorality, corrupt practices, gluttony etc. It was never shown that the mind or human consciousness and free decisions were the cause of all these evils and not the flesh or the body. It was also was a problem that if the flesh or body is so bad how could the Son of God or the Word become incarnate as human? Those who solved this problem were Gnostics who denied true incarnation and the true humanity of Jesus Christ.

Gnostic Belief: Body as Matter is Evil
Gnosticism was a widespread heresy in the early Church. According to the Gnostics the reality is composed of matter and spirit. Matter is evil and spirit is good. Human beings are good spirits imprisoned in the evil material body. Therefore, God cannot become truly human assuming human body. There is no true incarnation or no salvation through the death of Jesus on the cross. Therefore, Jesus Christ is God but not truly human. Knowledge or gnosis that the spirit is in the evil body and the means to liberate it is to be taught. Jesus is such a gnostic teacher to the disciples. There were also Docetics who denied true incarnation of God. They had no difficulty in accepting Jesus as God but they denied his humanity. They taught that Jesus appeared to be human and not really human. Both these heresies continue to have influence on the beliefs of many Christians even today. St Augustine’s negative understanding of humans as having concupiscence or the lust of the flesh as a consequence of original sin which vitiated and corrupted humans had a strong influence on Christians’ negative attitude to their bodies.
The gnostic condemnation of human body as evil and spirit as good affects the spirituality and spiritual outlook of a large majority of Christians even today. Many ways of persecuting one’s body with austere practices and penances even at the cost of charity and justice towards others and right loving relationships with others is a remnant of the gnostic spirituality and gnostic theology of the past. Even though all Christians believe that the Second Person of the Trinity or the Word assumed humanity with human body they are still suspicious of the goodness of body which is the sacrament of their personhood in their historical existence in this world!

Goodness and Sacredness of Human Body
The early Fathers of the Church, especially, Ignatius of Antioch (d. 110 CE) and Irenaeus of Lyons (d.202 CE) fought against the gnostic and the docetic heresies by affirming the goodness of human body which God had created. Ignatius affirmed that “There is but one physician: sarkikos (in flesh) and pneumatikos (in spirit), born without becoming, made into human yet God, subject to death but true life, from Mary yet from God, became passible yet impassible, Jesus Christ our Lord.” In his Letter to the Ephesians, Ignatius wrote that his martyrdom has no meaning if his body is evil matter. Irenaeus, in his book Adversus Haereses (Against Heresies) defended the Christian faith that Jesus is both God and Human. God, with his both hands, namely, Logos and Pneuma (Word and Spirit), created this world. Humans are created in God’s own image and likeness. ‘The one and the same’ Logos (Word) who was already present in the world becomes human and his body was created of the same substance with which Adam was made. Against the Gnostics and Docetics Irenaeus affirmed that whatever God created is good and God became human that we may become divine. When humans become unfolded as humans they become the glory of God.
By incarnation everything in this world is Christified or graced. To consider body or matter as evil or bad is a denial of the existence of Jesus Christ as truly human like any other human except sin. The Letter to the Hebrews affirms that Jesus’ bodily existence as human was to do the will of the Father and offer himself as a sacrifice to reconcile humans with God. “Consequently, when Christ came into the world, he said, “Sacrifices and offerings thou hast not desired, but a body hast thou prepared for me; in burnt offerings and sin offerings thou hast taken no pleasure. Then I said, `Lo, I have come to do thy will, O God, as it is written of me in the roll of the book…. And by that will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all” (Hebrews 5-6, 10). Both by incarnation and by his sacrifice on the cross God made human body sacred and made it a means to do God’s will to do good to others in self-sacrificing love,
Transform Mind, Care for the Body
St Paul exhorts the Christian community at Philippi, to ‘have the mind of Christ’ (Philippians 2;5). Then he uses the Christological hymn to explain that it is to have the self-emptying attitude of Christ who emptied himself to become human and as human, humbled himself and was obedient to offer himself as a sacrifice on the Cross. This attitude of Christ needs to govern human relationship with one another. In his Letter to the Romans, Paul appeals to all his brothers and sisters in Christ to offer their bodies as a living sacrifice by the transformation of their minds. “I appeal to you therefore, brothers and sisters, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. Do not be conformed to this world but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that you may prove what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect”( Romans 12:1-2). Even the sacrifice of one’s body is worthless if there is no love. “If I give away all I have, and if I deliver my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing” (1 Corinthians 13:3).
My body makes me somebody. Embodiment is necessary for any being for its being here in this world. It is true in an eminent way for the historical existence of humans who are called to live in this world as images of God. Our Christian faith is that we are chosen before the foundation of the world to be in Christ (cfr Ephesians 1:3) and to be manifestations of Christ in this world. Therefore, taking care of our body is a God-given duty in order to fulfil the mission entrusted to us. For whatever reason any negative attitude towards our bodily existence or the abuse of our bodies with a perverted thinking of our minds is an affront to God who created us for himself .The present day abuses of the body with various perversions and indifference to moral values without any care for the health of body can be seen, at least to some extent, as a reaction to the Christian puritanism and condemnation of anything connected with body as sinful. The birth of God in flesh or incarnation or the hominization of the Word affirms that body is sanctified and is sacred and it is the dwelling place of the Holy Spirit (1 Corinthians 3:16). The resurrection of Jesus from the dead is the glorification of human body and human nature. Transformation of the mind is necessary to recognize the beauty and worth of human body and a deep faith to overcome one’s own prejudices and false understanding about body as the source of temptation and sin. Liberation of the mind precedes the resurrection of the body. Incarnation liberates the body and resurrection glorifies the body!