CHAPTER 5
LECTURE 9
28b He that loveth his wife loveth himself.
29 For no man ever hated his own flesh, but nourisbeth and cherisheth it, as also Christ doth the church;
30 Because we are members of his body, of his flesh and of his bones.
Above he urged husbands to love their wives, he appealed to Christ and to the example of Christ’s love for the church (5:25). Here he demonstrates the same thing from the point of view of the husband himself. He makes two points:
First, he gives the reason.
Secondly, he verifies it through an example (5:29b).
The reason is as follows. A husband and wife are somehow one; hence, as the flesh is subject to the soul, so is the wife to the husband; but no one ever held his own flesh in contempt, therefore neither should anyone his wife. Whence he states He who loves his wife loves himself . “Therefore, now they are not two, but one flesh” (Mt. 19:6). just as a man sins against nature in hating himself, so does he who hates his wife. ‘With three things my spirit is pleased, which are approved before God and men: the concord of brethren, and the love of neighbors, and man and wife that agree well together” (Sirach 25:1-2).
He proves that they ought to love one another in saying For no man ever hated his own flesh . This love is evident in what happens since “love is verified when it is expressed in action.” For we love anything whose powers we sustain. But everyone nourishes and cherishes his own flesh in order to sustain it. “But, having food and wherewith to be covered, with these we are content” (1 Tim. 6:8).
But is not this contrary to Luke 14 (26): “If any man come to me, and hate not his father and mother and wife and children and brethren and sisters, yes and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple?” I reply. The Apostle affirms that a man ought to love his wife as he does himself; but he must love himself less than God; hence he should also love his wife less than God. In stating “he who does not hate his wife,” he is not commanding that she be hated—which would be to command a mortal sin—but that she be loved as the man loves himself. Now love in a lesser degree is like a certain hatred in comparison with whatever is loved most or to a greater degree, in this case, God.
Likewise, no man ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it. But there are objections to this. When anyone loves something he never wants nor desires to be separated from it. Yet the saints wanted to be separated from the flesh. “Unhappy man that I am, who shall deliver me from the body of this death?” (Rom. 7:24), “having a desire to be dissolved and to be with Chrisf’ (Phil. 1:23). Besides, nobody afflicts what he loves, but the saints punished their flesh while they were in this world. “I chastise my body and bring it into subjection” (1 Cor. 9:27). Moreover, some people even kill themselves, as is frequently heard of. Judas did it.
I reply. The flesh, when considered in itself, is not held in contempt, but everyone naturally wants it to exist and nourishes it for this end. On the other hand ‘ the flesh can be considered as an obstacle to what we will, and thus, through circumstance (per accidens), it can be detested in a certain way. For everything that we will is either good or evil. If good, it may be the ultimate end, eternal life, from which we are held back by the flesh. “While we are in the body we are absent from the Lord” (2 Cor. 5:6). And since we naturally desire our fulfillment and well-being—nor can we enjoy these while we are in the flesh—we will to discard it, not as an evil held in contempt, but as a good we love less than the greater good it impedes. The authoritative texts quoted above, and others like them, are to be explained in this way.
Or, we may will a good that is not the end, but disposes for the end; for example, virtuous habits. But this type of good is opposed by the immoral tendencies of the flesh. On this account do the saints discipline and punish their flesh in order that it might submit to the spirit for the curbing of sensual desires. For, in desiring such, the flesh blocks our acquisition of the virtues which dispose us for the ultimate good. Therefore, whoever punishes his flesh that it might submit to his spirit does not hate it, but rather obtains its own good which is that it be subject to the spirit-just as the good of man is to be subject to God: “it is good for me to adhere to my God” (Ps. 72:28). “I chastise my body...” and similar passages are to be understood in this way. This would not have been necessary in the state of innocence as long as man was subject to God, and the flesh totally submissive to the spirit; the gift of original justice consisted precisely in this mutual submission.
On the other hand we sometimes will what is evil. Hence, just as holy persons discipline, or wish to discard, their flesh inasmuch as it is an obstacle to the good they desire, so also the wicked, insofar as the flesh blocks the evil they desire, will kill it and commit suicide, as Judas did.
Then he indicates that a man must love his wife through an example. Thus he says, Christ also loved the Church as something of his very self because we are members of his body . “For we are members one of another” (Eph. 4:25). He mentions of his flesh on account of his sharing the same nature with us. “For a spirit hath not flesh and bones, as you see me to have” (Lk. 24:39). Or, he says this mystically so that of his flesh refers to the weak who are of the flesh, and of his bones would refer to the strong who are hard as bone.