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The beloved icon: an Augustinian solution to the problem of sex

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 January 2021

Onsi A. Kamel
Onsi A. Kamel*
Affiliation:
The Davenant Institute, Leesburg, VA, USA
*
*Corresponding author. E-mail: onsiakamel@outlook.com
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Abstract

Augustine famously believed fallen human sex to be inescapably bound up with sinful lust. In every sexual act, lust embodies both the sin of the fall (prideful idolatry) and that sin's consequences. John C. Cavadini has extended Augustine's conception of lust to include domination, and even violence. This leaves us with a disturbing question: is sex without violence possible? Building upon Jean-Luc Marion's distinction between idol and icon, this paper locates a solution to the problem of lust in Augustine's conception of friendship. Identifying the beloved as an icon of God entails relating to the beloved without lustful domination.

Keywords

Augustinefriendshipiconidolatrylibido dominandisex
Type
Research Article
Information
Scottish Journal of Theology , Volume 73 , Issue 4 , November 2020 , pp. 318 - 329
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Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2021

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References

1 Eliade, Mircea, The Myth of the Eternal Return: Cosmos and History, trans. Trask, Willard R., 2nd edn (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2005), p. 4Google Scholar.

2 Augustine of Hippo, The City of God, trans. Dods, Marcus (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 2009)Google Scholar, 14.12, 14.13.

3 Ibid., 14.13.

4 Ibid.

5 Ibid.; Cavadini, John C., ‘Feeling Right: Augustine on the Passions and Sexual Desire’, Augustinian Studies 36/1 (2005), p. 201CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

6 Augustine, On Marriage and Concupiscence 1.8.

7 Importantly, while Augustine's account of concupiscence can apply to both men and women, his account of the sexual act as independent of the will and dependent upon sexual lust is informed by distinctly male physiology (especially the erection) and does not apply in the same way to women (who can conceive without lust). Thus the use of the word ‘man’ in the argument is significant.

8 Augustine, On Marriage and Concupiscence 1.7.

9 Cavadini, ‘Feeling Right’, p. 204.

10 Ibid.

11 Augustine, On Marriage and Concupiscence 1.9.

12 Cavadini, ‘Feeling Right’, p. 209.

13 Burnaby, John, Amor Dei: A Study of the Religion of St Augustine (Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock, 2007), p. 117Google Scholar.

14 Wojtyla, Karol, Love and Responsibility, revised edn (San Francisco, CA: Ignatius Press, 1993), p. 27Google Scholar. Wojtyla's broader argument is, of course, based on a quasi-Kantian scheme of means and ends. It is, therefore, rather different from Augustine's argument and the argument advanced here. This particular statement, though, helpfully illuminates Cavadini's Augustinian wrestling with lust and domination.

15 Cavadini, ‘Feeling Right’, pp. 198, 209. Strikingly, as Cavadini has demonstrated, Augustine's critique of sex is similar to certain feminist critiques, especially that of Andrea Dworkin.

16 Ibid., p. 211.

17 Ibid., p. 215.

18 Hubbard, Kyle, ‘Idolatrous Friendship in Augustine's Confessions’, Philosophy and Theology 28/1 (2016), pp. 44–5CrossRefGoogle Scholar. He cites Hannah Arendt and C. S. Lewis as critics of Augustinian friendship on the grounds that it is use-oriented.

19 McNamara, Marie Aquinas, Friends and Friendship for Saint Augustine (Staten Island, NY: Alba House, 1964), p. 64Google Scholar.

20 Augustine, Confessions, trans. Henry Chadwick (Oxford: OUP, 2009), 4.6.11.

21 Frank Vander Valk, ‘Friendship, Politics, and Augustine's Consolidation of the Self’, Religious Studies 45/2 (June 2009), p. 126; cf. Augustine, Confessions 4.6.11.

22 Augustine, Sermons 336.2.

23 Ibid.

24 Sarah Stewart-Kroeker, Pilgrimage as Moral and Aesthetic Formation in Augustine's Thought (Oxford: OUP, 2017), p. 214.

25 For other fruitful investigations of Augustinian friendship in relation to Marion's concept of icon, see Richard B. Miller, ‘Evil, Friendship, and Iconic Realism in Augustine's Confessions’, Harvard Theological Review 104/4 (Oct. 2011), pp. 387–409; and Hubbard, ‘Idolatrous Friendship’.

26 Jean-Luc Marion, Thomas A. Carlson and David Tracy, God without Being: Hors-Texte, 2nd edn (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2012), p. 17.

27 Hubbard, ‘Idolatrous Friendship’, p. 52.

28 Augustine, Confessions 4.12.18.

29 Ibid.

30 Hubbard, ‘Idolatrous Friendship’, p. 52.

31 Augustine, Confessions 4.8.12.

32 Ibid., 4.4.8.

33 Ibid.

34 Ibid.

35 Ibid.

36 Ibid., 4.6.11.

37 Ibid.

38 Ibid., 4.8.13.

39 Ibid., 4.6.11.

40 Hubbard, ‘Idolatrous Friendship’, p. 50.

41 Marion, God Without Being, p. 10.

42 Miller, ‘Evil, Friendship, and Iconic Realism’, p. 391.

43 Augustine, Confessions 4.7.12.

44 Marion, God without Being, p. 9.

45 Augustine, Confessions 10.32.48.

46 Ibid., 10.33.49.

47 Ibid.

48 Ibid.

49 Ibid., 10.11.65.

50 Ibid.

51 Ibid.; cf. Rom 7:15.

52 Ibid., 10.33.49.

53 Ibid.

54 Ibid., 10.3.3.

55 Ibid., 10.3.4.

56 Ibid.

57 Ibid., 10.43.69.

58 Ibid.

59 Ibid.

60 Ibid., 10.43.70.

61 Augustine, Sermons 272.

62 Ibid.

63 Ibid.

64 Boersma, Hans and Levering, Matthew (eds), The Oxford Handbook of Sacramental Theology (Oxford: OUP, 2015), p. 158CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

65 Ibid., p. 160.

66 Cavadini, ‘Feeling Right’, p. 211.

67 Ibid., p. 213.

68 Ibid.

69 Ibid., pp. 213–14.

70 See e.g. 1 Cor 11:26 and Rom 6:3.