Valentine’s day

1.     Valentine’s day is approaching. I have friends who work in motels (like Sogo) and they say that it will be a very busy day for them.

2.     I do not want to spoil the fun of Valentine’s day, but I would like to talk about Sarah and Abraham. Corny nu?

3.     Remember that Abraham was about 100 years old and Sarah was about 90 years old. Sarah could not anymore bear a child at that age. Well, when she learned that she will have a child, she laughed. She laughed not only because she knew she was old she also knew that her husband Abraham was…well, old too. They were both too old for anything to do with things like a “Sogo motel”, so to speak. Let me cite the verse: “Sarah laughed to herself and said, ‘Now that I am worn out and my husband is old, am I still to have sexual pleasure?’” (Gen.18/12).

4.       To have “sexual pleasure” can remind us of the Garden of Eden. The garden is “eden”…and pleasure is, according to those who know Biblical Hebrew is, “edna”. The verse goes this way: “The LORD God planted a garden in Eden” (Gen.2/8). Eden, according to Bible language experts, is (Aramaic) associated with the sense of “being fruitful”.  The Bible authors at certain moments liked to blend names together when the names sounded the same.

5.       The garden of Eden connotes joy, pleasure and also the fun of sexual pleasure. All that were given to the couple Adam and Eve.

6.       When Sarah laughed she was, at the same time, also considering the link between the pleasure and being fruitful—that is, procreating.

7.     In the book of wisdom we read, “…And in my mother’s womb I was molded into flesh in a ten-month period—body and blood, from the seed of a man, and the pleasure that accompanies marriage” (Wis.7/1-2). The text was written in Greek and the word used for pleasure, according to those who know Biblical Greek, is edone. It means pleasure. (Recall the word “hedonism”?). The verse tells us about the link between sexual pleasure and conception.

8.     Today with our modern minds conception is not necessarily linked with the sexual pleasure. But let us listen too—or dialogue with—ancient texts. We can note that pleasure of the flesh, in those ancient texts, played a role in procreation.

9.       Recently, with my students, we looked at the notion of “natural law” and how it was used in Church Magisterium texts. Pope Paul VI, for example, was an “old school” and “ancient times” thinker, “not modern enough” said his critics. Pope Paul VI associated sexual pleasure with conception and he could not see them separated. For modern minds this looked rather odd.

10.   My Buddhist friends say that there are five important Buddhist precepts two of which intrigue me. One precept says that there should be no sexual promiscuity. Another precept says not  to tell a lie. Well, the Buddha’s teaching is very old and pre-modern. But it is interesting to see how both precepts can seriously go together. Do sex without telling a lie. Curious indeed, eh?

11.   Valentines day is really, also, a time for corny people like me to think Biblically and see things in an odd way. But it is worth doing it too.