A Powerful Spring

Passion, though a bad regulator, is a powerful spring. --Ralph Waldo Emerson

La Sacre de la femme -- Eve

I stumbled upon part of the poem below in a book on Rodin at a friend's home recently, and have had trouble finding it in English. The translated text below is a mix of a partial English version I found online, and a translation provided by iGoogle. (The robo-translated piece is the second section, in case you can't tell.) The original French follows for those who can read it.

Eve offered the blue sky of the holy nakedness;
Eve blonde admired the dawn, her sister rosy.

Flesh of woman! clay ideal! O wonder!
Sublime penetration of the spirit
In the silt that ineffable Being kneaded!
Matter where the soul shines through his shroud!
Mud where we see the fingers of the divine sculptor!
August dust drawing kisses and the heart of man
So holy that no one knows, as love triumphs,
As the core is thrust into this mysterious bed,
If this pleasure is not a thought,
And we can not, at which the senses are on fire
Hold beauty without embracing God!
Eve let his eyes wander over nature.

And beneath the green palms to tall,
Eve around above his head, the eye
Seemed to think, the blue lotus is collected,
The fresh forget-me remembered; roses
Sought his feet with their lips half-closed;
A breath came out of brotherly gilt lilies;
As if that would have been sweet to be like them,
As if those flowers, all with a soul
The most beautiful woman in flourished.

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Ève offrait au ciel bleu la sainte nudité ;
Ève blonde admirait l'aube, sa soeur vermeille.

Chair de la femme ! argile idéale ! ô merveille !
Pénétration sublime de l'esprit
Dans le limon que l'Être ineffable pétrit !
Matière où l'âme brille à travers son suaire !
Boue où l'on voit les doigts du divin statuaire !
Fange auguste appelant le baiser et le coeur,
Si sainte, qu'on ne sait, tant l'amour est vainqueur,
Tant l'âme est vers ce lit mystérieux poussée,
Si cette volupté n'est pas une pensée,
Et qu'on ne peut, à l'heure où les sens sont en feu,
Étreindre la beauté sans croire embrasser Dieu !
Ève laissait errer ses yeux sur la nature.

Et, sous les verts palmiers à la haute stature,
Autour d'Ève, au-dessus de sa tête, l'oeillet
Semblait songer, le bleu lotus se recueillait,
Le frais myosotis se souvenait ; les roses
Cherchaient ses pieds avec leurs lèvres demi-closes ;
Un souffle fraternel sortait du lys vermeil ;
Comme si ce doux être eût été leur pareil,
Comme si de ces fleurs, ayant toutes une âme,
La plus belle s'était épanouie en femme.

Intensity of love

The comment below from Ike was just so jam-packed with good stuff that I asked to add it as a post.

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In his biography of Jonathan Edwards, page 497, George Marsden writes, "In the Edwardses' world, the meaning of life was found in intense loves, including earthly loves." It was the tone of their life together. They understood that God is of such a nature, creation is for such a purpose, redemption is of such a power, that intensity of love is the meaning of it all. Intensity. Passion. Wholeheartedness.

Deuteronomy 6:5 makes intense love the greatest commandment: "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might." Moderate love is a sin. Maybe the worst sin.

As Augustine said, "Give me a man in love. He knows what I mean."

Eros in all his splendour

From The Four Loves (Ch 4):

It is in the grandeur of Eros that the seeds of danger are concealed. He has spoken like a god. His total commitment, his reckless disregard of happiness, his transcendence of self-regard, sound like a message from the eternal world. And yet it cannot, just as it stands, be the voice of God Himself. For Eros, speaking with that very grandeur and displaying that very transcendence of self, may urge to evil as well as to good. Nothing is shallower than the belief that a love which leads to sin is always qualitatively lower more animal or more trivial than one which leads to faithful, fruitful and Christian marriage. The love which leads to cruel and perjured unions, even to suicide-pacts and murder, is not likely to be wandering lust or idle sentiment. It may well be Eros in all his splendour; heart-breakingly sincere; ready for every sacrifice except renunciation.

Blossoming of desire

In prayer this morning I pondered what happens to our desires when we leave this world; desires which are often tarnished with a verdigris of sin.

My first thought was that they would burn away like dross as our metal is purified.

But that is too simple and too dismissive of beauty.

Then I wondered if these desires might get consumed by the burning fire of love for our God, that the beatific vision would enrapture them into it's raging core of flame. And rather than simply being burned away, they would feed the fire that is Him, and grow it.

Better, this explanation, but still a bit shallow.

I finally concluded that the desires of this world which we carry must blossom and bloom after death. Instead of being removed or subsumed, they expand and grow until our whole being burns with love and desire and passion for all of creation, rather than for little pieces of it.

Just as His being does.

I can't wait to find out the truth.

The three become one

I recently sat in a small group celebrating the morning office, and listened to our voices united in praying the Lord's prayer.

My mind wandered where it wanders, and I wondered what it might be like to recite the prayer responsively while in the preliminary steps of lovemaking.

What would it be like to turn lovemaking into worship?

Would the three become one?

(Did I mention that I sometimes wonder about my mind?)

This saying is hard; who can accept it?

The other day I had a thought which feels both intensely right and disturbingly wrong.

It came while pondering the scourging scene from Mel Gibson's The passion of the Christ. Christ's mother and Mary the Magdalene used white cloths to try and collect His precious blood which was spilled and splattered over the stone pavement around the whipping post. In addition to the blood, you could see scraps of flesh which had been ripped from his body by the barbs of the scourge.

As I meditated on this scene, I thought about the spot becoming forever holy through such an outpouring.

Here is the disturbing part:

I desired to eat those torn pieces of His body, and even lick up the blood which the women must have had to leave behind.

I recognize how grotesque this sounds, and yet I still desire it, and think that it is the only right and reverent thing to do.

Sometimes I wonder about my mind...

George MacDonald on the Passions

From Phantastes:

"The hot fever of life had gone by, and I breathed the clear mountain-air of the land of Death. I had never dreamed of such blessedness. It was not that I had in any way ceased to be what I had been. The very fact that anything can die, implies the existence of something that cannot die; which must either take to itself another form, as when the seed that is sown dies, and arises again; or, in conscious existence, may, perhaps, continue to lead a purely spiritual life. If my passions were dead, the souls of the passions, those essential mysteries of the spirit which had imbodied themselves in the passions, and had given to them all their glory and wonderment, yet lived, yet glowed, with a pure, undying fire. They rose above their vanishing earthly garments, and disclosed themselves angels of light."

Passionate encounter

This morning God talked to me about the kind of love affair he wants me to have with him. He wanted me to know that it should be passionate.

I thought whine-ily, in response:

"But I've never encountered you physically".

To which he replied:

"Oh, you haven't?"

On Passion

From Ministry and Imagination, Ch 6:

"The fact that 'passion' means both suffering and a frenzied release of the libido is not altogether accidental. Sexual intercourse and suffering have long been associated in man's mind. There is the notion that in coitus we die a little. It is also true that we pursue a vision that lies just outside our grasp. Ovid wrote somewhat facetiously Omne animal post coitum triste ('Every animal after coitus is sad'), and it is true (even without qualifications). Somehow we can sustain the sexual union, but we should come away with our routine existence more informed by what it might become. This is as true for any deep relationship as it is for mating, and it depends upon our willingness to trust ourselves, to let go of our self-centeredness in that meeting.

That very act of letting go, fueled by the mating urge (Eros), renders us vulnerable. Eros is no respecter of the conventions of society, as necessary as they are. Passion draws us into the abyss, with that curious mixture of pain and longing--that strange bittersweet feeling we never outgrow--and we risk that we might find ourselves in the beloved. Our reason tells us we are only foolish, and it is half right. There is only a thin line between 'puppy love' and the passion of the mating bond. The proof lies in the return to the world of obligation and role. Have we glimpsed in the mystery of love that which enables us to live out our life with a deeper compassion for ourselves and those whom we serve?"

No thin veneer

do you think
the purple passion of my love
a thin veneer?
easily cracked?
my love is miles high
and oceans wide
my love is layers thick
and fathoms deep
and any rain of hurt that falls
will water the fruit
which ripens on love's peak

--Chantelle Franc

Lead him not into temptation

"She loved him passionately and selfishly enough to want to lead him into temptation, but truly and deeply enough to want him delivered from evil. And she chose the better desire and prayed that God would make use of the rest, holding back her passion like a race horse forced to merely canter."

--Chantelle Franc

She washed his feet with her tears

(Luke 7:36-50)

Their voices carry through the door; the sound of men in the absence of women.

My heart pounds. Do I dare?

I take a breath and push the door open. The room falls silent as one by one the men realize I'm not a servant bringing food or more wine.

Their expressions tell a story. Some of them know me and scowl their disapproval and surprise. Those who don’t know me look puzzled; my robes and ornaments confuse them. I can’t think about them now, because he is before me.

I cross the room to where he reclines, his eyes smiling a soft and silent welcome. If only I could sit at his side, and bend my face to his lips! But it's impossible, even for one as brazen as me. Instead, I kneel at his feet, reaching out my hands, unfit as they are, and unfasten his sandals, dusty and worn.

Why has no one washed them?

The tears I swallowed begin to flow. They drip onto the feet of my beloved, leaving tracks in the dust. I cry harder, wishing my broken heart could melt and seep from my eyes to wash him. I dare not look at his face, and simply watch as the tears fall, dripping the dirt of the road away.

I unclasp my hair, and it falls clean, shining, and perfumed. I wrap his feet in its length, winding my head closer until my lips touch the top of one beautiful foot. I wipe away the tears and dust with my hair, wishing I could be washed clean as easily.

When his feet are dry, I twist my hair back, and pull the vial from the bag hanging at my waist. When I snap off the top, the expensive scent of weddings and burials reaches him. He smiles again as he watches me, his eyes speaking love and restraint.

It's hard to look away, but the grumbles of men break through and I turn to finish.

The oil is cool in my hand, and I rub my palms together before picking up the first perfect foot. My hands caress him, sliding from the soft curving arch to his road-roughened heel. I want to give him pleasure, to anoint him with my love. My fingers part each pair of toes, sliding slippery between them. Every touch is a concert of passion, every caress a request.

I want to flood him with kisses but that would go too far; it's a miracle I've been allowed this much. I pour more oil instead, and gently lift the second foot, sorrowing that my time with him is so short. Knowing I must go.

The tears flow faster as I force myself to release him. I rise to leave before it is demanded, and lift my eyes to his again. His gaze pierces me with promise.

I move to the door, holding his gaze, knowing that however long my life before that promise is fulfilled will be too long.

His lips move in a farewell but make out no words.

My heart hears him though. He says, “Goodbye, beloved.”

And I leave.

How do I Love Thee?

How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.
I love thee to the depth and breadth and height
My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight
For the ends of Being and ideal Grace.
I love thee to the level of everyday's
Most quiet need, by sun and candle-light.
I love thee freely, as men strive for Right;
I love thee purely, as they turn from Praise.
I love thee with a passion put to use
In my old griefs, and with my childhood's faith.
I love thee with a love I seemed to lose
With my lost saints, --- I love thee with the breath,
Smiles, tears, of all my life! --- and, if God choose,
I shall but love thee better after death.

Aquinas Responds: Does Passion Wound the Lover?

In reply to the objections, it is to be observed that four proximate effects may be ascribed to love: viz. melting, enjoyment, languor, and fervor. Of these the first is "melting," which is opposed to freezing. For things that are frozen, are closely bound together, so as to be hard to pierce. But it belongs to love that the appetite is fitted to receive the good which is loved, inasmuch as the object loved is in the lover, as stated above (Article 2). Consequently the freezing or hardening of the heart is a disposition incompatible with love: while melting denotes a softening of the heart, whereby the heart shows itself to be ready for the entrance of the beloved. If, then, the beloved is present and possessed, pleasure or enjoyment ensues. But if the beloved be absent, two passions arise; viz. sadness at its absence, which is denoted by "languor" (hence Cicero in De Tusc. Quaest. iii, 11 applies the term "ailment" chiefly to sadness); and an intense desire to possess the beloved, which is signified by "fervor." And these are the effects of love considered formally, according to the relation of the appetitive power to its object. But in the passion of love, other effects ensue, proportionate to the above, in respect of a change in the organ.

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