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| Chapter III.—If the members rise, must they discharge the same functions as now?
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Chapter III.—If the members rise,
must they discharge the same functions as now?
They say, then, if the body shall rise entire,
and in possession of all its members, it necessarily follows that the
functions of the members shall also be in existence; that the womb shall
become pregnant, and the male also discharge his function of generation,
and the rest of the members in like manner. Now let this argument stand
or fall by this one assertion. For this being proved false, their whole
objection will be removed. Now it is indeed evident that the members
which discharge functions discharge those functions which in the present
life we see but it does not follow that they necessarily discharge the
same functions from the beginning. And that this may be more clearly
seen, let us consider it thus. The function of the womb is to become
pregnant; and of the member of the male to impregnate. But as, though
these members are destined to discharge such functions, it is not
therefore necessary that they from the beginning discharge them (since we
see many women who do not become pregnant, as those that are barren, even
though they have wombs), so pregnancy is not the immediate and necessary
consequence of having a womb; but those even who are not barren abstain
from sexual intercourse, some being virgins from the first, and others
from a certain time. And we see men also keeping themselves virgins, some
from the first, and some from a certain time; so that by their means,
marriage, made lawless through lust, is destroyed.2615
| 2615 That is to say, their lives are a protest
against entering into marriage for any other purpose than that of
begetting children. | And we find that some even of the lower
animals, though possessed of wombs, do not bear, such as the mule; and
the male mules do not beget their kind. So that both in the case of men
and the irrational animals we can see sexual intercourse abolished; and
this, too, before the future world. And our Lord Jesus Christ was born of
a virgin, for no other reason than that He might destroy the begetting by
lawless desire, and might show to the ruler2616
that the formation of man was possible to God
without human intervention. And when He had been born, and had submitted
to the other conditions of the flesh,—I mean food, drink, and
clothing,—this one condition only of discharging the sexual
function He did not submit to; for, regarding the desires of the flesh,
He accepted some as necessary, while others, which were unnecessary, He
did not submit to. For if the flesh were deprived of food, drink, and
clothing, it would be destroyed; but being deprived of lawless desire, it
suffers no harm. And at the same time He foretold that, in the future
world, sexual intercourse should be done away with; as He says,
“The children of this world marry, and are given in marriage; but
the children of the world to come neither marry nor are given in
marriage, but shall be like the angels in heaven.”2617
Let not, then, those that are unbelieving marvel, if in the world
to come He do away with those acts of our fleshly members which even in
this present life are abolished.E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
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