Did Christ assume all of our post-fall humanity?

[Evan]

Dear friends,

I am aware that there have been threads in the past that address the question of what it means to say that the Son, when He became incarnate, became like us in every way-- except for sin. However, I'm still struggling to resolve this question in my mind.

From my studies, I've gathered that Jesus, being true man, was tempted, but never sinned, and thus removed the curse of the law from us-- all men who came before Him sinned in some way.

I've also gathered that post-Fall humanity is not the same as pre-Fall humanity. While in communion with God in Paradise, Adam and Eve did not suffer from diseases or physical pains; their flesh did not suffer corruption; and they did not have a sinful "disposition." Their passions were not disordered and misdirected but served to glorify their Creator. Their thoughts, words, and deeds were eucharistic acts, acts of thanksgiving.

Finally, I've gathered (and, well, observed) that post-Fall humanity suffers corruption and pain, and is infected by sin-- not that we are personally guilty of anything simply by being born, but we are, insofar as we are in the flesh, prone to sin in ways that Adam and Eve were not, prior to the Fall. Insofar as we abide in the Spirit and conform ourselves to Christ, we may become gods by grace, but we are not naturally such, not now. By contrast, Christ is God by nature, His divinity being that of His Father.

So, my question is this: When we say that Christ, as Man, was made like us in every way, save for sin, do we mean that He assumed EVERYTHING we are post-Fall? Was His humanity pre-Fall humanity-- capable of sin, but not infected by it? Or is there no clear-cut distinction-- did He assume some, but not all of our "fallen" humanity?

If I'm proceeding from false premises, I beg your patience. I am still learning. However, please correct me if need be.

In Christ,
Evan

[Herman Blaydoe]

St. Gregory of Nyssa writes: What God has not assumed, has not been saved.

Herman the assumed Pooh

[Evan]

Herman,

Does that mean that when St. Paul says He became like us in every way, except sin-- he is affirming that He personally did not sin while on earth, whereas all of us do sin constantly?

In Christ,
Evan

[Alex Haig]

Dear Evan

I think perhaps here it would be good to go back to our understanding of sin: it is not the breaking of a rule or law but rather our breaking of communion with God. When we ignore, forget about or replace God with something else we sin. If I replace God with anything then I sin, if I do not at all times and in all places bring glory to God, I sin.

Christ, in his humanity, at all times kept himself in a relationship with his Father, no matter what the consequences. His complete loyalty, at all times, is why he was without sin.

Is this possible for us to do this as well? With man it is impossible, but with God all things are possible.

In Xp

Alex

[Herman Blaydoe]

Sin is not a "thing". The Greek word for sin literally translates as "missing the target". Christ did not "miss the target", by definition, since He IS the target.

Herman the near-sighted archer Pooh

[Anna Stickles]

Evan,

I don't know if this will help, but maybe one way to think about this is that He bore all the consequences of Adam's sin, without it separating Him from the Father.

For example - He was hungry in the desert, but that hunger did not cause him to complain or compromise, whereas what do we do in our hunger... well we might just break the fast or at least complain that God called us to this fast.
Christ healed all kinds of people, they wanted to make him king. What fallen person in this situation wouldn't at least feel a tiny bit of pride or temptation to attribute this to themselves?

Christ's body and soul and mind suffered sin like a ship beaten up by the waves of the sea, but the ship didn't flounder or sink because the Divine life held them steady.

The Fathers talk about the fact that the passions when acted on can become second nature, but this is a state of hardened sin, and is a result of the willed rebellion of the individual person. It happens over time as we give in to temptation. No one is born this way.

I don't think that we can say of Christ that he was in this state. So I think it would fit to say that Christ was not infected by sin in this way. However, even the dispassionate still suffer from sin as a cosmic force let lose at the fall. However, like Christ, they are not moved by this force.

[Nina]

Dear Evan,

Highly recommended book about these dogmatic and Christological questions is the book of Metropolitan Hierotheos of Naupaktos "The Feasts of the Lord". Met. Hierotheos summarizes perfectly the thought of the Fathers about Christological matters, or dogmatic matters pertaining Christ.

After Met. Hierotheos speaks about kenosis (self-emptying) of Christ, he continues thus:

"[...] in taking on human nature, Christ also took on what are called the natural and blameless passions. Since the Son and Word of God took on human nature, it follows that He also assumed all that belongs to man, without sin.

When we speak of blameless passions, we mean those that do not depend on us, that are not a matter of choice and preference, but those that came in after the transgression. They are hunger, thirst, fatigue, pain, tears, decay, shrinking from death, fear, anguish, assistance from the angels because of our weak nature. These things are not sin, but they are results of sin.

Since, in order to conquer death and the devil, Christ assumed mortal and passible flesh, and He is a true man and not imaginary, this is why He also assumed the so-called natural and blameless passions. Thus we see that He was hungry, thirsty, tired, that He wept, shrank from death etc.

But Christ did not also assume the seminal, as it functions in the masculine nature. This relates to the fact that He was conceived by the Holy Spirit and not seminally. Moreover, the seminal, which is associated with the sexual instinct, is related to thoughts, desires rebellions of the flesh, etc. Christ never had such problems, because "He committed no sin, nor was guile found in His mouth" (I Peter 2, 22). Moreover, as we said before, He assumed the natural and innocents passions, but not the sin. When Christ was tempted by the devil, He was tempted from outside, not within His thoughts. "The evil one attacked from without, not through thoughts..."

Christ was the New Adam, "the only thing that was new under the sun", the Godman Christ, and that is why the innocent passions He assumed functioned according to nature and above nature. They moved according to nature, that is to say He was hungry and thirsty like all men, but "when He Himself permitted the flesh to suffer what was roper to it." The innocent passions functioned in Christ above nature, because it was not possible for them to take precedent over His will. There was nothing compulsory in Christ. Therefore it was by willing that He hungered, by willing that He thirsted, by willing that He was afraid, and by willing that He died. In other words the passions did not govern Christ, but Christ goverened them (St. John of Damaskos)." pp. 53-54

[Father David Moser]

Highly recommended book about these dogmatic and Christological questions is the book of Metropolitan Hierotheos of Naupaktos "The Feasts of the Lord".

Nina - is this available in English?

Fr David Moser

[Nina]

Nina - is this available in English?

Fr David Moser

Yes, Father David. It is translated by Esther Williams. ISBN 960-7070-47-X

I purchased mine in one of Elder Ephraim's monasteries, and from what I have seen they carry it and other books from Met. Hierotheos. So if you need the book fast and have a monastery of Elder Ephraim nearby, the chances are they have it.
It is an amazing book and each time I read it I discover something new(!!!) although I have been reading this book often for the past years. It is so sobering for me also now during Lent to read it as to understand with my poor mind in substance, what God did for us by His Incarnation, Passion, Death and Resurrection.

[Shawn Lazar]

Can we distinguish between nature and behavior, and say that while Christ assumed human nature (and thus, everything that we are), but not human behavior, and thus everything that we do?

I'm thinking of human nature as a universal form that is distinct from biology. One complaint that feminist theologians make is that if Christ was a man, then he did not assume female human nature, and therefore did not save women. It seems to me that this is to crudely interpret the nature of human nature.

[Nina]

Can we distinguish between nature and behavior, and say that while Christ assumed human nature (and thus, everything that we are), but not human behavior, and thus everything that we do?

I'm thinking of human nature as a universal form that is distinct from biology. One complaint that feminist theologians make is that if Christ was a man, then he did not assume female human nature, and therefore did not save women. It seems to me that this is to crudely interpret the nature of human nature.

There is something about this in the book mentioned above. I will post it tomorrow when I have some time.

[Paul Cowan]

. One complaint that feminist theologians make is that if Christ was a man, then he did not assume female human nature, and therefore did not save women.

Women is man.

What a stupid complaint. Because He did not have female genitalia does not mean He did not save mankind. So if He did come as a woman does that mean He, I mean She, would not have saved man? oops, there's that word again.

Feminist theologians. Now there's an oxymoron.

[Nina]

Paul, maybe the "feminist theologians" :) should read St. Maximus the Confessor.

Shawn, here is the passage:

"According to St. Maximos the Confessor, there are five divisions in the creation of the world and man. These are between uncreated and created, angels and men, heaven and earth, paradise (the tangible paradise of Eden) and the universe, male and female. Adam, by the grace of God and his own personal struggle, was supposed to overcome these divisions. What the first Adam did not succeed in doing, the new Adam, Christ, achieved. Thus He gave to every man the power to overcome these divisions himself, when he unites with Him." p. 51 The feasts of the Lord, by Metropolitan Hierotheos of Nafpaktos

[Shawn Lazar]

Yes, that is what I've heard them say, Paul. In my more sympathetic moments, I don't think its an unreasonable question, if one takes seriously and too literally the patristic claim that Christ did not heal what he did not assume. But, like I suggested before, I suspect that the kind of nature Christ was said to assume (and to heal) was human nature in a metaphysical sense, not a biological one. Though his assuming human nature does, of course, affect biological life too.

I wonder if such concerns (the concern that women have somehow been left out of the incarnation) have led to the development of Mariology in East and West, where female human nature is thought to be somehow healed or made anew in Mary?

In any case, I'm glad we don't have too many such academic theologians in the Orthodox Church, but I suspect there are more than a few.

[Shawn Lazar]

Nina, does the Metropolitan explain how Adam was supposed to overcome the division between men and women?

[Nina]

Nina, does the Metropolitan explain how Adam was supposed to overcome the division between men and women?,

Sorry, I can't think of a quote right now, but if I run into one I will post it. I would venture and say that it follows from the quote of Saint Maximos that Adam should have been like Christ for Adam to overcome these divisions like Christ did.

[Daniel Smith]

Hey guys, I have a question that Pertains to this: SOme of the Miaphysite Theologians like Severus of Antioch and Philoxenus Taught that The Word assumed the Pre-Fallen Nature of Man, not the Post-fall, because he was like us in all things but Sin. HOWEVER He willfully went through all the EXPERIENCES of Post-fall humanity without it touching his humanity. So, his hunger, his suffering, his weeping, these were not the disordered compulsions of a fallen human nature, but the Willful experience of the Unfallen nature, being the second Adam. IS this the Orthodox and Roman Catholic position?

I.E. Did Christ assume a fallen or unfallen nature?

[Herman Blaydoe]

He took flesh from the Virgin. The Roman Church appears to teach that she was somehow in a different state than the rest of us, I would assume that she is supposedly in a "pre-fallen" state as well. The Orthodox Church says that she is the same as us, born INTO sin but she did not herself actually sin. Christ assumed our fallen humanity and perfected it, restored it in Himself. As we draw near to Him, we also take on that perfected, restored state, which is the basis of theosis. If He did not assume our fallen nature, then our fallen nature is not transformed.

[Owen]

That is precisely the point St. Athanasius makes in On the Incarnation when he says, "That which has not been assumed cannot be healed."

[Paul Cowan]

Have you guys (and gals) been reading along in the Great Canon of St. Andrew service book the last two days? This topic and a couple other threads are SO spelled out in there. I could only think of Monachos and this thread in particular as the Chanters read their versus. Well, ok.

Not only Monachos, but you guys did come to mind.

Once

[Olga]

Like I've said many a time, Paul, the answers to just about any theological question can be found within our liturgical deposit. :)

[Ryan]

I often wonder why so much focus is given to translating prose works of the Fathers, but not their hymns and poetry. For instance, why don't we have a volume, in English, of hymns and poems of St. John Damascene (I know a lot of these are in various liturgical books), or, where are the hymns and poems of St. Theodore the Studite?

[Fr Raphael Vereshack]

I'm not sure of the answer to this- but it could be that translations reflect first needs and interests; which in our situation here in the west has definitely been towards theological expositions. Most of these were written as prose treatises or delivered in homily form.

It could also be though that poetry is a lot more difficult to translate.

In Christ- Fr Raphael

[Brian Patrick Mitchell]

Paul, maybe the "feminist theologians" :) should read St. Maximus the Confessor.

Shawn, here is the passage:

"According to St. Maximos the Confessor, there are five divisions in the creation of the world and man. These are between uncreated and created, angels and men, heaven and earth, paradise (the tangible paradise of Eden) and the universe, male and female. Adam, by the grace of God and his own personal struggle, was supposed to overcome these divisions. What the first Adam did not succeed in doing, the new Adam, Christ, achieved. Thus He gave to every man the power to overcome these divisions himself, when he unites with Him." p. 51 The feasts of the Lord, by Metropolitan Hierotheos of Nafpaktos

St. Maximus the Confessor is, of course, quite good on a lot of things, but he says very little about gender and when he does he relies too much on pagan Greek philosophical speculation, which is where the notion of sex as an unfortunate "division" originates. Maximus got it from St. Gregory of Nyssa, who (according to Johannes Zachhuber) got it from Plato via Philo via Origen. The obvious problem with the "division" thesis is that it is very hard to square with Scripture and the patristic consensus on sexual distinction. The Fathers taught that dissension and disunity followed after the fall, but the distinction of gender was ordained by God before the fall as part of the creation God declared "very good." (Gen. 1:31)

In Christ, Dn. Patrick

[Fr Raphael Vereshack]

Dear Fr Dn Patrick,

I am under the impression that St Maximus does not think of the distinctions as being fallen (he has five I think: Uncreated & created, angelic & material, heaven and earth, male & female: I forget the other one right now). He considers these as God created and therefore 'good'.

Evil though creates a division within and between each distinction. In other words we have disfigured the God created distinct categories made for the purpose of achieving harmony so that they are now instead divisive relationships. To say it in a way closer to St Maximus since he thinks in terms of the God created end of creation (telos); through our sin we distort the original purpose of creation and we turn what was created to be distinct and in harmonious relationship into something divisive and acrimonious.

In Christ- Fr Raphael

[Brian Patrick Mitchell]

I am under the impression that St Maximus does not think of the distinctions as being fallen (he has five I think: Uncreated & created, angelic & material, heaven and earth, male & female: I forget the other one right now). He considers these as God created and therefore 'good'.

You might be right, Father, but it's hard to tell from the little that he says about it. Here's part of his Difficulty 41 (Louth):


God-made-man has done away with the difference and division of nature into male and female, which human nature in no way needed for generation, as some hold, and without which it would perhaps have been possible. There was no necessity for these things to have lasted forever.

Here he speaks not only of division but of difference "in nature." So he's not just talking about the disunity between the man and the woman. He seems to regard the "difference and division of nature into male and female" as a condition of the fall -- if not a result of it, then something created presciently by God as a provision for reproduction in the fallen state. As such, it is overcome entirely by Christ and no longer exists in glorified humanity. This essentially negative view of gender does sound a lot more like Plato than St. Paul.

I'll check the context tonight, but I don't recall him saying much more about it.

In Christ, Dn. Patrick

[Fr Raphael Vereshack]

Thanks Father for the quote from Louth. I have found similar misunderstandings in other interpretive texts also. Not sure what the source is but I suspect it may have something to do with not grasping that in theology distinction does not equal division.

In Christ- Fr Raphael

[Brian Patrick Mitchell]

I’m not sure I understand you, Father. The quote I provided was from Louth’s translation of Maximus’s Difficulty 41, not from Louth’s interpretation of it. Throughout Difficulty 41, Maximus himself equates distinction (or differentiation) with division. He writes:
In order to bring about the union of everything with God as its cause, the human person begins first of all with its own division. … It accomplishes this by shaking off every natural property of sexual differentiation into male and female by the most dispassionate relationship to divine virtue. This sexual differentiation clearly depends in no way on the primordial reason behind the divine purpose concerning human generation. Thus it is shown to be and becomes simply a human person in accordance with the divine purpose, no longer divided by being called male or female. It is no longer separated as it now is into parts …

Of Christ’s role in this process of reunion, Maximus writes:


First he united us in himself by removing the difference between male and female, and instead of men and women, in whom above all this manner of division is beheld, he showed us as properly and truly to be simply human beings, thoroughly transfigured in accordance with him, and bearing his intact and completely unadulterated image, touched by no trace at all of corruption.

Maximus claims that this knowledge has been handed down by the Fathers, but his main source is Gregory of Nyssa, whose main source was Origen. The view is patently platonic. It depicts Christ principally as an agent of androgyny, making Gal. 3:28 (“neither male nor female”) the key to our salvation. That just doesn’t make sense in view of everything else the Holy Apostle Paul said about men and women — and everything else the saints have said about our salvation. Only very recently has anyone in the Church paid much attention to this particular “Difficulty.”

In Christ, Dn. Patrick

[Fr Raphael Vereshack]

Oh sorry- I thought the quote was Louth himself. At first sight though I would think it means that in Christ the sinful divisions between male and female cease. Not the distinction between male and female which I have always taken as God created, not a result of the Fall.

But it's difficult for me to comment further without seeing more of the work and understanding its context. Is this found in the book that is part of the SVS Patristic series? I have this book and could perhaps take a look at it.

In Christ- Fr Raphael

[Brian Patrick Mitchell]

Sorry, Father. I didn't make my first citation clear. I don't know about the SVS volume. I've quoted pretty much all he says about male and female. I wish we had more to go on, but nowhere that I know of does Maximus draw these things out further.

I do think Maximus makes great sense of other things, but in Difficulty 41 he seems to deny all diversity to glorified humanity, as if we'll all be tenors in heaven, or perhaps altos. Maybe the angels will take all the other parts, but wouldn't we still be missing something?

In Christ, Dn. Patrick

[Grace Singh]

Women is man.

What a stupid complaint. Because He did not have female genitalia does not mean He did not save mankind. So if He did come as a woman does that mean He, I mean She, would not have saved man? oops, there's that word again.

Feminist theologians. Now there's an oxymoron.

do these "feminist theologians" forget that before Eve was seperated from her husband, that she was literally one with him? and that all humans are created in God's image, after their own kind of flesh? (Genesis 1:27, 1 Corinthians 15:38-39)

[Paul Cowan]

Its a "power" thing with them. It is not a relational concept with them.

[Fr Raphael Vereshack]

This is why a proper theological understanding is so important.

Christ took upon Himself the fullness of human nature apart from sin.

I suppose there is no way to prove this rationally- but it is a given fact that can be understood in Christ that through our humanity we connect to all of the rest of humanity. The fact of female or male; or of being distinct people does not deny this reality.

Of course though sin is divisive.

In Christ- Fr Raphael

[Evan]

I wanted to revive this discussion if only to address a recent podcast I listened to in which an Orthodox priest, speaking to college students, speculated that Jesus would have been tempted to gaze at attractive women during his early adult years-- that this was part of what it meant to be "tempted even as we are tempted." Is this a proper exegesis of this passage in Hebrews? I have always understood it as referring to His temptations in the desert and His developing understanding, which culminates in the agony in the garden, that He would finish His earthly life nailed to a cross, thus shouldering the burden of the ancestral sin --death-- that He might deliver us from it.

To me, the abovementioned priest's exegesis seems somehow inappropriate. But I'm not sure I haven't lapsed into some sort of Docetism. I'd appreciate some assistance.

In Christ,
Evan

[Fr Raphael Vereshack]

No- this is most incorrect since passions were foreign to Christ's nature. This is precisely why in the Gospel that it is the evil one who presents Christ with temptations. In other words such temptations could only come from the 'outside' not from within Himself. And then He rejected such temptations from the Evil One.

I suspect that the description you heard comes from a misunderstanding concerning Christ's taking on human nature.

In Christ- Fr Raphael

[Evan]

No- this is most incorrect since passions were foreign to Christ's nature. This is precisely why in the Gospel that it is the evil one who presents Christ with temptations. In other words such temptations could only come from the 'outside' not from within Himself. And then He rejected such temptations from the Evil One.

I suspect that the description you heard comes from a misunderstanding concerning Christ's taking on human nature.

In Christ- Fr Raphael

Father, your blessing:

Thank you for this clarification. Would it be appropriate to consider that Christ was tempted by the Evil One in the garden, as well as in the desert, and that His agony was a product of His struggle against temptation to not submit to die on the cross? We read in Luke 4:13 that "when the devil had ended every temptation, he departed from Him until an opportune time."

In Christ,
Evan

[Guillermo M.L.]

I'm puzzled by this paragraph from Met. Hierotheos:


But Christ did not also assume the seminal, as it functions in the masculine nature. This relates to the fact that He was conceived by the Holy Spirit and not seminally. Moreover, the seminal, which is associated with the sexual instinct, is related to thoughts, desires rebellions of the flesh, etc. Christ never had such problems, because "He committed no sin, nor was guile found in His mouth" (I Peter 2, 22). Moreover, as we said before, He assumed the natural and innocents passions, but not the sin. When Christ was tempted by the devil, He was tempted from outside, not within His thoughts. "The evil one attacked from without, not through thoughts..."

Why is anything related with "sexual instinct" regarded as "unnatural passion", aside from the other natural passions, like hunger and thirst? Is it not natural to be attracted to the opposite sex? Christ wouldn't have experienced that? I'm not talking about engaging in anything sinful, I'm talking about just feeling the attraction. It puzzles me to regard it as "unnatural", because natural reproduction wouldn't be possible without it...

[Paul Cowan]

It puzzles me to regard it as "unnatural", because natural reproduction wouldn't be possible without it...

Not true. One does not have to feel attraction to the opposite to reproduce.

[Ryan]

I'm puzzled by this paragraph from Met. Hierotheos:



Why is anything related with "sexual instinct" regarded as "unnatural passion", aside from the other natural passions, like hunger and thirst? Is it not natural to be attracted to the opposite sex? Christ wouldn't have experienced that? I'm not talking about engaging in anything sinful, I'm talking about just feeling the attraction. It puzzles me to regard it as "unnatural", because natural reproduction wouldn't be possible without it...

A number of Fathers, such as St. John Chrysostom and St. Gregory Palamas, see sexual reproduction as a result of the Fall, a concession from God to ensure the continuation of man after death had entered the world.

It is further said, by some, that had man not sinned, he would have had some other means of reproducing.

Now the resurrection promises us nothing else than the restoration of the fallen to their ancient state; for the grace we look for is a certain return to the first life, bringing back again to Paradise him who was cast out from it. If then the life of those restored is closely related to that of the angels, it is clear that the life before the transgression was a kind of angelic life, and hence also our return to the ancient condition of our life is compared to the angels. Yet while, as has been said, there is no marriage among them, the armies of the angels are in countless myriads; for so Daniel declared in his visions: so, in the same way, if there had not come upon us as the result of sin a change for the worse, and removal from equality with the angels, neither should we have needed marriage that we might multiply; but whatever the mode of increase in the angelic nature is (unspeakable and inconceivable by human conjectures, except that it assuredly exists), it would have operated also in the case of men, who were "made a little lower than the angels ," to increase mankind to the measure determined by its Maker. From On the Making of Man by St. Gregory of Nyssa

This view is shared by St. Maximus the Confessor and St. John Damascene.

[Fr Raphael Vereshack]

Evan wrote:



Thank you for this clarification. Would it be appropriate to consider that Christ was tempted by the Evil One in the garden, as well as in the desert, and that His agony was a product of His struggle against temptation to not submit to die on the cross? We read in Luke 4:13 that "when the devil had ended every temptation, he departed from Him until an opportune time."

Combining the temptations which the evil one presented to Christ when He began His ministry with Christ's suffering in the Garden may confuse things. The first is the temptation which the evil one presented to Christ. These temptations came from the evil one, and Christ defeats them because He exerts His sinless will to do so.

In the Garden however Christ willingly endures the suffering & fear of death, which are among the blameless passions, since He truly takes on the human condition to save it on the Cross and through His resurrection. In willingly enduring this suffering Christ is not overcome by it but rather redeems it through the Cross & Resurrection.

In Christ- Fr Raphael

[Fr Raphael Vereshack]

Guillermo M.L. wrote:


Why is anything related with "sexual instinct" regarded as "unnatural passion", aside from the other natural passions, like hunger and thirst? Because it is rooted in sensuality which is a sinful or 'unnatural' passion.


Is it not natural to be attracted to the opposite sex? Not according to the Fathers; not in these terms. Community- yes. And there is an important element which includes the created aspect of the person in relating to them. But 'attraction to the opposite sex' has whole connotation in modern terms which is quite different from this and which bases relationship on sensuality.


Christ wouldn't have experienced that? I'm not talking about engaging in anything sinful, I'm talking about just feeling the attraction. Absolutely not. This we need to be very clear on or else we veer towards a heretical understanding of Christ. Feeling the attraction is still to have the sinful passion in one's heart. In terms of Christ then it is to misunderstand how He takes on humanity. Not to say that Christ was not aware of human sin and its consequences. But as Pre-eternal Logos He redeems this human sin in a sinless manner and without engaging in the sin Himself.

In other words Christ's victory is not akin to ours when we struggle with the sin within us. Rather it is the total victory of His allowing sin to encounter Him as deathless God and in this way sin's might being overcome. We have to be careful here not to see Christ's taking on humanity as inferring the same interior relationship to sin that we have.


It puzzles me to regard it as "unnatural", because natural reproduction wouldn't be possible without it... Here the Fathers suggest a number of different options basically amounting to passionless reproduction. Here the main point isn't really the practical aspect of how this could have worked (and remember that the Fathers point to the fact that the Fall never allowed humanity to know what it would have been like anyway). The main point is about a passionless mode of relationship which God created us for.

In Christ- Fr Raphael

[Guillermo M.L.]

Thanks to all of you for your thoughtful answers.

I admit that, when I brought the "sexual attraction" item in this thread, I was thinking in how the animals attract themselves in order to enable reproduction. Birds sing to attract the female, royal turkeys display their tails, etc., and in the end animals seems to engage in a reproduction activity which -to my understanding- seems innocent and blameless. Extrapolating this to humans, it seems to me that there could be a way of behaving sexually but not sinfully, that is, a form of sexual passion that is blameless and devoid of sexual perversions.

But, all of this is my speculation, and I don't know very well the Fathers' thinking about this subject. I just wanted to make clear why I asked about it the way I asked.

[Ryan]

Sexual reproduction is proper to animals, but we should not extrapolate this to human beings. Human beings are meant for a higher form of life; it is because of our degradation that we took on the mode of reproduction which is proper to animals. What is blameless and natural to irrational animals is the result of sin and passion in rational men.

[Anna Stickles]

Can the state the animals are in really be considered innocent and blameless? All of creation was radically effected by the fall and I am not so sure this way of thinking is justified.

Maybe the animals can be considered innocent in the fact that we are at fault for the state that they are in not them, but to consider the state they are in, including the behavior they engage in for sexual reproduction, as being uneffected by sin - this idea of "natural" or "blameless" has to be rejected.

We have hints of this in the Bible when it talks about the animals being vegetarian before the fall and statements about the kingdom of heaven refering to the lion laying down with the lamb.

[Ryan]

Can the state the animals are in really be considered innocent and blameless? All of creation was radically effected by the fall and I am not so sure this way of thinking is justified.

Maybe the animals can be considered innocent in the fact that we are at fault for the state that they are in not them, but to consider the state they are in, including the behavior they engage in for sexual reproduction, as being uneffected by sin - this idea of "natural" or "blameless" has to be rejected.

We have hints of this in the Bible when it talks about the animals being vegetarian before the fall and statements about the kingdom of heaven refering to the lion laying down with the lamb.

I don't see how animals' diet has any bearing on this. Even vegetarian animals reproduce the same way. Yes, the Fall of Man affected the rest of the creation, but we don't need to assume that everything we see in it is a result of this.

This is what St. Gregory Palamas says (Homily 43, "On the Gospel Reading for the Seventeenth Sunday of Matthew About the Canaanite Woman"):

What is the starting point of our coming into the world? Is it not almost the same as for irrational animals? Actually it is worse, because the procreation of animals did not originate from sin, whereas in our case it was disobedience that brought in marriage. That is why we receive regeneration through holy baptism, which cuts away the veil which covers us from our conception. For although marriage, as a concession from God, is blameless, yet our nature still bears the tokens of blameworthy events. For that reason one of our holy theologians calls human procreation, "nocturnal, servile, and subject to passion", and before him David said, "I was shapen in iniquity; and in sin did my mother conceive me" (Ps. 51:5)