Toward a Theology of Eros.

Burrus, V., & Keller, C., (Eds.). (2006).

Toward a Theology of Eros: Transfiguring Passion at the Limits of Discipline. New York: Ford-ham University Press. Paper. 469 pp. ISBN 0-823226360.

Virginia Burrus, Ph.D., has taught in Drew University's Theological and Graduate Schools since 1991. Dr. Burrus's teaching and research interests in the field of ancient Christianity include: gender, sexuality, and the body; martyrdom and asceticism; ancient novels and hagiography; constructions of orthodoxy and heresy; histories of theology and historical theologies.

Catherine Keller, Ph.D., has taught at the Theological School of Drew University since 1986, where as Professor of Constructive Theology she teaches courses in systematic, process, ecological, postcolonial and feminist styles of theology. Dr. Keller has authored or edited numerous articles, monographs, and books.

When discussing friendship in his book The Four Loves, C.S. Lewis notes that "kisses, tears and embraces are not in themselves evidence of homosexuality." If the centurions in the histories of Tacitus long for last kisses as the legion disperses, Lewis cannot countenance that these affectionate displays render these soldiers as "pansies." Lewis retorts: "If you can believe that you can believe anything."

The eighteen carefully crafted and assiduously researched essays in Toward a Theology of Eros ask the reader to do what Lewis was not willing to do: to suspend belief. The essays present more telling--more erotic--evidence than "kisses, tears and embraces" in their attempts at "Transfiguring Passion at the Limits of Discipline." Since the methodology of these essays is explicitly cross and trans-disciplinary, incorporating theology, philosophy, history, art and a host of others, "the limits of discipline" may mean at least two things: 1) to transcend traditional boundaries of academic disciplines and hence create new disciplines; 2) to celebrate the love of eros and hence transcend or even obliterate conventional sexual rules and expectations.

Most of these presentations arose at an academic conference sponsored by Drew University in 2004. All of these authors are interested in reclaiming for Christianity a healthy eroticism, in other words, to overthrow the received opposition between eros and agape described by Anders Nygren's renowned 1953 book Agape and Eros.

This collection's reclamation project is staged in five parts, with part one's investigation of Platonic love and part five's reconsideration of the Song of Sons serving as bookends. Part two takes "queer desires" into account. Suffering and seduction are investigated in part three, and part three engages the triad of "cosmos, eros, creativity,' anchored by an essay recommending Mary Magdalene, written by one of the co-editors, Catherine Keller.

The authors interrogate several famous figures from the history of Christian thought and spirituality, and reach different than orthodox conclusions. As a whole, these sometimes inflammatory essays regard orthodoxy less as some trusted guardian of a sacred tradition than as a straitjacket. In today's climate of pioneering theologies a common strategy is to mine the past to turn quasi or outright heresy into something progressive or even radical. These essays are consistent with this procedure and this goal.

Here are some examples. Karmen MacKendrick estimates that Augustine never really surmounted his sensuality, nor did he want to. Instead, Augustine fixed his eroticism upon the divine, "continuing a seduction too enticing to make turning away again a tolerable option" (p. 208). Derek Krueger argues that much of the imagery of Symeon the New Theologian (949-1022) is frankly homoerotic. Diana Swancutt eroticizes the Apostle Paul to the point where the crucified Christ is "the androgynous last Adam" (p. 84) and the cross is made to be effeminate. Indeed, by the standards of Roman gender, Jesus and his disciples were girls. As many of Swancutt's conclusions may require of many readers nearly a conversion to her mindset, she drops her scholarly guard and exclaims "I am not kidding." Even this may not ease the hunch that her interpretation of 1 Corinthians 6:16-20, that to become one with the Lord is to have sex with the Lord (p. 93), is tawdry sensationalism.

None of these essays is vain posturing. In some sly ways these authors have it right. The erotic has too frequently been ignored as inconsequential, a cause for embarrassment or noble sublimation. There likely never was the sort of wall between eros and agape and Nygren found. Every Christian persuasion had more of the erotic in it than it was willing to admit. Forty years ago, the youth of church summer camps stood to their feet and declared their desire to "go all the way" with Jesus Christ. A few years later, perhaps, or maybe only a few months, the ambiguity of this phrase may have dawned on them.

These eighteen essayists are, of course, not at all interested in turning back the clock of erotic progress. More likely they are subtly promoting an "anything goes" perspective on human sexuality. More traditional sensibilities will not be nearly as eager to build the sort of bridge between eros and agape that Nygren thought impossible. Chastened souls will continue to regard eros, if not as in Nygren's view "vulgar," then at least dangerous.

REVIEWERS FOR THIS ISSUE

REX JOHNSON, PsyD., teaches pastoral care and counseling at Talbot School of Theology, Biola University. He also ministers to church leaders in Europe, Asia, Africa and Latin America as well as in the U.S.

RODERICK T. LEUPP holds a Ph.D. in Theological and Religious Studies from Drew University as well as an MLIS degree in library science from the University of Oklahoma. He is the author of Knowing the Name of God and will soon publish another work. He has also taught with the Asia-Pacific Nazarene Theological Seminary in the Philippines.

Reviewed by RODERICK T. LEUPP, PhD.