Sermon 162

SERMO 162

ON THE WORDS OF THE APOSTLE (1 COR 6:9-20):
"Every sin whatsoever that a man commits,"
It is outside the body; but whoever commits fornication sins against his own body.
[FRAGMENT]

A difficult question from the words of the Apostle.

The question concerning the Epistle of the Corinthians of the blessed Apostle Paul, where he says: Every sin that a man commits is outside the body; but he who fornicates sins against his own body; I do not know if it can be resolved fully, although something can be said with probability by the grace of the Lord: for it is indeed profound. For when earlier in the same Epistle, the Apostle says: Do not be deceived; neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor male prostitutes, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God; and shortly after, he says: Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ? Shall I then take the members of Christ and make them members of a prostitute? Never. Do you not know that he who joins himself to a prostitute becomes one body with her? For it is said, "The two shall become one flesh." But he who is joined to the Lord becomes one spirit with him. Flee fornication; and he adds there: Every sin that a man commits is outside the body; but he who fornicates sins against his own body. Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, which you have from God, and you are not your own? For you were bought with a price; glorify God in your body. Therefore, after listing many dreadful sins of humans in this chapter, for which the kingdom of God will not be given, and which nevertheless can only be perpetrated through the body; indeed, it is the body of the faithful which he says is the temple of the Holy Spirit whom we have from God; and he asserts that the very members of our body are members of Christ; reproving and somewhat questioning, he says: Shall I then take the members of Christ and make them members of a prostitute? May it never be! He continues to say: Do you not know that he who joins himself to a prostitute becomes one body with her? For it is said, "The two will become one flesh;" but he who is joined to the Lord becomes one spirit with him; and he concludes: Flee fornication; yet he himself follows and says: Every sin that a man commits is outside the body; but he who fornicates sins against his own body; as if indeed the sins which he enumerated, saying: Do not be deceived; neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor male prostitutes, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God; could these crimes and immoral acts be committed or practiced only through the body? Who in his right mind could deny this? The entire passage the Apostle treated and defended because of the body already redeemed at a great price, that is, the precious blood of Christ, made the temple of the Holy Spirit by the Lord, so it would not be defiled by such immoralities, but rather be kept inviolate as God's dwelling. Why then did he wish to add this, from which a difficult question arises; that is, to say: Every sin that a man commits is outside the body; but he who fornicates sins against his own body; since whether it is fornication itself or other similar sins, which can only be perpetrated through the body, they are carried out and practiced only through the body itself? For who, I ask, can be (to pass over the other things mentioned above) a thief, or a drunkard, or a reviler, or a swindler, without the operation of this body? Nor can idolatry or greed achieve their purpose and fruition without the service of this body. What then is the meaning: Every sin that a man commits is outside the body; but he who fornicates sins against his own body? First, because a man, situated in this body, whatever he can unjustly desire only in his mind, cannot be said to commit outside this body, since it is clear he is doing this with carnal sense and carnal prudence, still surrounded by this body. For also what is written in the Psalm: The fool has said in his heart, "There is no God;" the same blessed Apostle Paul could not separate from bodily work, in the place where he says: We must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each may receive what is due for what he has done in the body, whether good or evil. For evidently, it is only in the body that the impious could say: There is no God. And to pass over the fact that in another Epistle the Teacher of the Gentiles says: Now the works of the flesh are manifest; which are fornication, impurity, lewdness, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, wrath, disputes, dissensions, sects, envy, drunkenness, and things like these; I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. Do we not see that the other things he inserted there—jealousy, wrath, disputes, envy, sects—happen outside the body? And yet the Teacher of the Gentiles attributes these things to the works of the flesh in faith and truth. What then is the meaning: Every sin that a man commits is outside the body; and naming one sin only, fornication, he says: But he who fornicates sins against his own body?

The resolution of the difficulty. Why is fornication alone said to be a sin against one's own body.

It is clear to even the slow and dull how difficult this question is; and if the Lord deigns to shed some light upon our pious intention and reveal it, we may be able to say something reasonable. For it seems that the blessed Apostle, in whom Christ spoke, either wished to exaggerate the evil of fornication above all other sins, which, although committed through the body, do not bind and subject the human mind to carnal desire in the way that the act of physical fornication does, where the powerful force of lust makes the mind coalesce with the body and be united with it like glue; so much so that at the moment and in the very experience of this great shame, nothing else is allowed to occupy the mind of a person but what this sinking and, in a way, the absorption of lust and carnal desire enslave the mind to, so that what has been said seems to be true: "But he who commits fornication sins against his own body"; because then the heart of the fornicating man becomes, so to speak, particularly and especially a servant of the body, especially at the time of the most wicked act itself; so much so that the Apostle, insisting on urging people to avoid this evil, said: "Should I then take the members of Christ and make them members of a harlot?" and exclaiming and detesting, he answered: "Never! Do you not know," he said, "that he who is joined to a harlot is one body with her? For the two," he said, "shall become one flesh." Could this be said of any other crimes of men? For it is possible for the human mind in other wicked deeds to perform one of those deeds and at the same time be distracted by other thoughts; which is not allowed for the mind at the time and act of fornication to be free to think of something else. For the whole person is so absorbed by and in the body that it can no longer be said that he is his own mind; but the whole person can be said to be entirely body, and the spirit going and not returning. Thus can we understand because: "Every sin that a man does is outside the body, but he who commits fornication sins against his own body"; as I said, the Apostle seems to wish to so exaggerate the evil of fornication, that in comparison, all other sins are considered to be outside the body in contrast to this one evil of fornication, where it is said to sin against one's own body due to the greater burning of lust, than which there is no higher, as the pleasure of the body holds and makes a slave captive.

General fornication, by which one does not adhere to God.

These things are said regarding the specific fornication of this body. But since fornication is not only specifically but also generally rebuked and named in the sacred Scriptures; let us try, with God's help, to say something plausible about this as well. Therefore, general fornication is openly manifested in the Psalm, where it says: "For behold, those who go far from you shall perish; you have destroyed all who are unfaithful to you." Where subsequently, how this general fornication can be avoided and escaped, is added, saying: "But for me it is good to be close to God." So that we may easily observe from this, that it is the general fornication of the human soul by which, not adhering to God, one adheres to the world. Whence the blessed apostle John says: "If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him." And the apostle James says: "Adulterers, do you not know that friendship with this world is enmity with God?" Briefly, therefore, it has been defined that one who has the love of the world cannot have the love of God; and that one who wishes to be a friend of the world is an enemy of God. To this also pertains what the Lord says in the Gospel: "No one can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other." And he concludes: "You cannot serve God and mammon." Therefore, this, as it has been said, is the general fornication of the soul, containing all else within itself, by which one does not adhere to God while adhering to the world; so that we may also understand according to this general fornication, what the Apostle says: "Every sin that a person commits is outside the body; but the fornicator sins against his own body." Because if the human soul does not fornicate by adhering to God, nor by adhering to the world, whatever other sins a person might incur due to the frailty of mortality, whether through ignorance, negligence, forgetfulness, or misunderstanding, this is as it is said: "Every sin that a person commits is outside the body;" because no sin of carnal or temporal desire can be found here; whence such a sin might be rightly said to be outside the body. But if the worldly man, adhering to the world, distances himself from God by fornicating from God himself, he sins against his own body; because by carnal desire for temporal and carnal things, the human soul is led and distracted by carnal sense and prudence, serving the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever.

The apostle's interpretation is twofold.

Thus, as it seems to me, in keeping with faith, it can be understood the evil of both types of fornication, both special and universal, in this one passage by so great a Doctor, where he says: "Every sin that a man commits is outside the body; but the one who commits fornication sins against his own body." [This means] either the Apostle might be emphasizing this particular fornication, which is rightly understood to sin against one’s own body because nowhere else does the whole human being so dedicate himself to the pleasure of the body, and is ineffably and inevitably attached to it, that in comparison to this great evil, other sins seem to be outside the body, even if they are performed through the body. Just as the force of certain lustful desires of fornication subjects the body to its condition and makes the body itself a slave to this worst evil, especially during the most impure acts; so that there is nothing else for the human mind to think or intend other than what it does in that body. But if the Apostle also wanted to signify general fornication, because he seems to have said: "Every sin that a man commits is outside the body; but the one who fornicates sins against his own body," it must be understood and taken in this way, that anyone who does not adhere to God but adheres to the world, loving and desiring all temporal things, may rightly be said to sin against his own body, that is, being wholly given over and subject to carnal concupiscence, as one who, being a servant to creation, becomes alienated from the Creator, through that beginning of all sins which is pride, the beginning of which pride, as it is written, is to withdraw from God. Anyone who is free from the general evil of fornication may be understood to be sinning outside the body, that is, outside the evil of all corporeal and temporal lust, just as has often been said. For only by the evil of carnal and general concupiscence does the soul fornicate from God through all things, being bound and tied to corporeal and temporal desires and pleasures, sins against its own body. Serving universally the concupiscence of the world and alienating oneself from God amounts to what is written: "The beginning of the pride of man is to apostatize from God." Therefore, to avoid the evil of general fornication, blessed John admonishes, saying: "Do not love the world or the things in the world; for the things in the world are the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not from the Father but from the world. And the world passes away, and its lust; but he who does the will of God abides forever, as He abides forever." So, this love of the world, which includes in itself the universal lust of the world, is the general fornication, by which sin is committed against one’s own body; because the human spirit incessantly serves all the bodily, visible, and temporal desires and pleasures, deserted and abandoned by the Creator of all things.