Sexuality and the Christian Self: Michel Foucault’s Reading of the Church Fathers
This article discusses Michel Foucault’s “last” book, the recently published Les aveux de la chair. In the first part, an analysis is provided of Foucault’s understanding and treatment of the patristic texts he decides to mine for his theory of sexuality. Foucault finds in the church fathers a gener...
| Published in: | Toronto journal of theology |
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| Subtitles: | Celebrating the 50th Anniversary of the Toronto School of Theology, [Part 1] |
| Main Author: | |
| Format: | Electronic Article |
| Language: | English |
| Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
| Journals Online & Print: | Drawer...
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| Fernleihe: | Fernleihe für die Fachinformationsdienste |
| Published: |
School
[2020]
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| In: |
Toronto journal of theology
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| RelBib Classification: | CA Christianity NBE Anthropology ZA Social sciences |
| Further subjects: | B
Michel Foucault
B Modernity B history of sexuality B Church Fathers B Late Antiquity |
| Online Access: |
Presumably Free Access Volltext (Verlag) Volltext (doi) |
| Summary: | This article discusses Michel Foucault’s “last” book, the recently published Les aveux de la chair. In the first part, an analysis is provided of Foucault’s understanding and treatment of the patristic texts he decides to mine for his theory of sexuality. Foucault finds in the church fathers a general view of sexuality not too different from that of contemporaneous philosophers. The novelty that Christianity brings does not, therefore, consist in a more restrictive sexual ethic. Foucault goes so far as to argue that even the Christian notion of virginity was unexceptionable from a Greek point of view. The novelty of Christianity, rather, was the way sexuality was related to the self. Therefore, as discussed in the article’s second part, Foucault includes in his presentation the baptismal catechesis and the institution of confession. The article concludes, however, that Foucault does not fully succeed in integrating patristic views of sexuality with the early history of church discipline. It is therefore proposed that this alignment was plausible to Foucault on account of his preconceived, teleological interpretation of patristic Christianity. Ultimately, he discovered in the church fathers the ideas his interpretation of early modern Catholicism led him to suspect there. The article’s final part inscribes Foucault’s newly available interpretation of the fathers into his broader thesis about the genealogy of the modern self and the role of Christianity in this history. |
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| ISSN: | 1918-6371 |
| Contains: | Enthalten in: Toronto journal of theology
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| Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.3138/tjt-2020-0098 |