Friday, March 14, 2014

Regulation

Miranda Threlfall-Holmes has a thoughtful post on 'Sex and Marriage'. I suggest she both gets a basic issue in current debates (when is sex sinful and when is it not) and offers an answer which begs other questions (when love is present sex is not sinful ... but that begs many questions re marriage, including why marry at all).

Time does not permit a full analysis of this post (and, in any case, that could be conducted by engaging in the comments at the post itself). Rather I want to lodge my own question here re sex which has been catalysed by her post:

why - from the perspective of Scripture as God's voice intruding in human affairs - is sex sinful in some circumstances and not in others?

To give a mere sketch of where an answer might head: sex is a physical act between two human beings which is invested with meaning beyond the basic biological fact concerning a purpose of sex, the procreation of another human being; it is the investment of meaning concerning sex which leads to concepts of sex is sometimes sinful and sometimes not; and it is the question of who invests meaning concerning sex which lies at the heart of our debates, with particular attention being paid to the following possible investors: the state, society, church, individuals and individual coupls.

6 comments:

  1. Looks like no-one is up for answering such an obvious (and yet rarely asked question of late) Peter. I suppose it is a branch of the question, what makes things sinful or not sinful, a rather large question. Your "investment of meaning" theory (which I confess I find difficult to understand) seems to be of the same ilk as " well what of everyone did that" moral theories, or "greatest good of the greatest number " theories, and unlike "rebellion against God" or "holding down the truth in unrighteousness" understandings. I suppose, with God, things we divide up may in fact all be parts of the whole in a way too big for us to grasp.
    It seems to me that sex outside the covenantal relationship means taking what isn't yours to take (or giving what isn't yours to give!). And for spiritual/psychic and also quite practical reasons there are some persons (delineated in scripture) that it is absolutely not good to make this covenant with - though there seems to be a bit of uncertainty about deceased wife's sister. As you can tell I'm thinking aloud.
    Best wishes
    Rhys

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  2. By 'investment of meaning' I mean that we humans have generally decided that sex is not just a physical action which can happen whenever two people feel like it (as seems to be the case with, say, rabbits ... Though some human sexual behaviour does get compared to rabbits' behaviour!). So we invest sex with meanings such as 'love', 'commitment', 'deepening bonds of affection' while also making rules about sex which we wouldn't make about other physical actions such as eating (eating with random strangers is fine, eating with family is fine). Does that help?

    Anyway, thanks for thinking out loud here!

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  3. Further ramblings. The "glutton a desert island" might throw some light on the discussion of sin. If you hold sin to be a breach of what we owe to our neighbour, then a glutton alone on a desert island doesn't seem to be a sinner since she harms no-one else and the resources of the island would only go to waste if she did not gorge on them. But is sin defined only by what it does or fails to do to others.
    (Admittedly one might argue that by damaging her health the glutton will, if rescued, not be able to give that love to her neighbour that she owes to the same extent)
    Rhys

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  4. And, Rhys, there might be suicidal implications to gluttony on a desert island. Whoops, I ate all the food ...

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  5. Re your first comment above; is it significant that eating strangers (or family) would count as sin but eating the family pig wouldn't (though the family dog?); and eating with family in the presence of a hungry stranger would be sinful; or eating caviar in your own group at a love feast while others had cabbage leaves would be sinful. Can sin be thought of separately to the good that might be done in its place; that is could it be that there aren't really neutral human behaviours that have meanings attached to them but rather behaviours are good and if not good then ill.
    Still thinking aloud
    Rhys

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  6. As I think about it, Rhys, it is very hard to think of any action which does not get invested with meaning. If I drink milk have I contributed to the nitrate pollution of waterways? If I don't drink milk have I deprived a farmer of income?

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