On further reflection, and addendum is necessary. Father asserts: "The wearing of a veil in church is therefore not a question of purity or modesty but of adoration, of homage rendered to God." This is not generally true. Father seems to have forgotten that in the old days women always kept their heads covered in public. If you look at old paintings, you will notice that it is only after the French Revolution that you see women widely portrayed with their heads uncovered. Little Jacinta and Lucia of Fatima nearly always had their heads covered. The Mennonite women, to this day, always cover their heads in public. Perhaps this custom of covering the head in public, for both men and women, is a part of modesty to which we should return.
"For the record, this Wolf thinks that man and the animals, before the Fall, were entirely spiritual and elevated. Even St Thomas Aquinas doubts that the so-called "vegetative processes" existed. No digestion, composting, or death of any sort existed before the Fall. Man and the Animals got nourishment merely by contemplating the fruits of the earth."
Unfounded speculation surely? If Aquinas doubted such, what is the basis for his speculation? Why should we elevate his speculation above scripture? What is the plain meaning of Genesis chapter 2 verse 16 to 25 if not that it speaks plainly of corporeal realities concerning eating, generating future generations, fleshly human bodies? All before the fall.
I'm baffled, and I haven't even got half way through your post.
Thanks for the question. Firstly, that was just a little side note that distracts somewhat from the main thrust of my critique, but you ask a fair question and it deserves a fair answer. If you look at the verses just above those you cite, it talks of the Grand Spring dividing into the Four Great Rivers at the top of Paradise, and these flowing, respectively, through the lands of Hevilath (Russia), Ethiopia, and the Assyrians. Now, needless to say, when Adam and Eve were first made, none of these nations, properly speaking, existed. Moses was basically trying to describe to his contemporaries (who were not dimwitted in the least, by the way, as more modern scholars often assert or imply) realities by relating them to the familiar. In the same way, Moses was describing the fruits of Eden and the fact that Adam and Eve were naked and yet not ashamed in terms they, and we, can understand.
In Traditional Language, Adam and Eve had the gifts of Integrity, that is, full control of their passions of our lower nature, Impassibility, which means that they were not subject to the changeableness of the air from warmth to frost and etc, in such a way that they suffered cold and heat, Illumination, which served to clothe their nakedness and made them, in essence, bright as the sun in Grace, and Immobility, insofar as they could go anywhere at the speed of thought. These are the famous "Four I's" of the glorified body. (Taylor Marshall labels the last two Clarity and Agility.)
St. Thomas Aquinas summarized: “thus also will the body be raised to the characteristics of heavenly bodies — it will be lightsome (clarity), incapable of suffering (impassible), without difficulty and labor in movement (agility), and most perfectly perfected by its form (subtlety). For this reason, the Apostle speaks of the bodies of the risen as heavenly, referring not to their nature, but to their glory.”
Very few people have taken the trouble to inquire deeply into what the nature of creation was like before the Fall, but I think we can safely assume that a wholly different set of "natural laws" existed, which did not subject creation to death or decay, nor were there any predator animals, nor disorder in creation.
Now, your opinions may be different from mine, which is why I made very clear that those were my opinions. When I said man and the animals were "entirely spiritual", in retrospect I do think that phrase somewhat sloppy. I am not intimating that they were angelic. Far from that. We and the animals most definitely had corporeal bodies before the fall that could be held and hugged, as it were. But they were bodies that walked in mid-heaven, so to speak, and not subject to the earthy, uncleanliness that we have today, which is constant need of renewal by the elements and micro-organisms.
Dare I say that so intimate is death to the maintainence of all life and all order in the world today that we can scarcely- especially in the natural sciences- imagine a world devoid of the vegetative processes, and digestion by destruction of food and its assimilation into our bodies.
On further reflection, and addendum is necessary. Father asserts: "The wearing of a veil in church is therefore not a question of purity or modesty but of adoration, of homage rendered to God." This is not generally true. Father seems to have forgotten that in the old days women always kept their heads covered in public. If you look at old paintings, you will notice that it is only after the French Revolution that you see women widely portrayed with their heads uncovered. Little Jacinta and Lucia of Fatima nearly always had their heads covered. The Mennonite women, to this day, always cover their heads in public. Perhaps this custom of covering the head in public, for both men and women, is a part of modesty to which we should return.
"For the record, this Wolf thinks that man and the animals, before the Fall, were entirely spiritual and elevated. Even St Thomas Aquinas doubts that the so-called "vegetative processes" existed. No digestion, composting, or death of any sort existed before the Fall. Man and the Animals got nourishment merely by contemplating the fruits of the earth."
Unfounded speculation surely? If Aquinas doubted such, what is the basis for his speculation? Why should we elevate his speculation above scripture? What is the plain meaning of Genesis chapter 2 verse 16 to 25 if not that it speaks plainly of corporeal realities concerning eating, generating future generations, fleshly human bodies? All before the fall.
I'm baffled, and I haven't even got half way through your post.
Thanks for the question. Firstly, that was just a little side note that distracts somewhat from the main thrust of my critique, but you ask a fair question and it deserves a fair answer. If you look at the verses just above those you cite, it talks of the Grand Spring dividing into the Four Great Rivers at the top of Paradise, and these flowing, respectively, through the lands of Hevilath (Russia), Ethiopia, and the Assyrians. Now, needless to say, when Adam and Eve were first made, none of these nations, properly speaking, existed. Moses was basically trying to describe to his contemporaries (who were not dimwitted in the least, by the way, as more modern scholars often assert or imply) realities by relating them to the familiar. In the same way, Moses was describing the fruits of Eden and the fact that Adam and Eve were naked and yet not ashamed in terms they, and we, can understand.
In Traditional Language, Adam and Eve had the gifts of Integrity, that is, full control of their passions of our lower nature, Impassibility, which means that they were not subject to the changeableness of the air from warmth to frost and etc, in such a way that they suffered cold and heat, Illumination, which served to clothe their nakedness and made them, in essence, bright as the sun in Grace, and Immobility, insofar as they could go anywhere at the speed of thought. These are the famous "Four I's" of the glorified body. (Taylor Marshall labels the last two Clarity and Agility.)
St. Thomas Aquinas summarized: “thus also will the body be raised to the characteristics of heavenly bodies — it will be lightsome (clarity), incapable of suffering (impassible), without difficulty and labor in movement (agility), and most perfectly perfected by its form (subtlety). For this reason, the Apostle speaks of the bodies of the risen as heavenly, referring not to their nature, but to their glory.”
Very few people have taken the trouble to inquire deeply into what the nature of creation was like before the Fall, but I think we can safely assume that a wholly different set of "natural laws" existed, which did not subject creation to death or decay, nor were there any predator animals, nor disorder in creation.
Now, your opinions may be different from mine, which is why I made very clear that those were my opinions. When I said man and the animals were "entirely spiritual", in retrospect I do think that phrase somewhat sloppy. I am not intimating that they were angelic. Far from that. We and the animals most definitely had corporeal bodies before the fall that could be held and hugged, as it were. But they were bodies that walked in mid-heaven, so to speak, and not subject to the earthy, uncleanliness that we have today, which is constant need of renewal by the elements and micro-organisms.
Dare I say that so intimate is death to the maintainence of all life and all order in the world today that we can scarcely- especially in the natural sciences- imagine a world devoid of the vegetative processes, and digestion by destruction of food and its assimilation into our bodies.
Hope that helps.