Duclow2014 the Sleep of Adam, The Making of Eve_sin and Creation in Eriugena

8/19/2019 Duclow2014 the Sleep of Adam, The Making of Eve_sin and Creation in Eriugena

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THE SLEEP OF ADAM, THE MAKING OF EVE :SIN AND CREATION IN ERIUGENA

donald f. duclow

The Lord cast a deep sleep upon Adam : and when he was fast asleep,he took one of his ribs, and filled up flesh for it.

And the Lord built the rib which he took from Adam into a woman.(Genesis 2 :21-22)

In Genesis, Adam sleeps, and the Creator removes a rib to form Eve.Commenting on this text, Eriugena links sexual difference, sin andcreation in new and striking ways. The sleeping Adam turns his atten-tion from God to “the love of a carnal spouse.” Since in Genesis Evedoes not yet exist, his fantasy leads to her creation – and therebysplits human nature into male and female, and adds the sexual, mor-

tal body to humanity’s original status as imago Dei. Sexual divisionalso marks the pivotal point in Periphyseon’s dialectic of processionand return. Following Maximus the Confessor, John identifies sexualdivision as the final stage of nature’s division. And its overcoming inthe resurrected Christ – in whom “there is neither male nor female”(Gal. 3 :28) – begins the return to divine unity. This article analyzes Periphyseon’s dialectic in terms of sexual division. It first examinesEriugena’s commentary on the sleep of Adam and the making of Eve,and how it differs from his sources. It then considers three issues : thiscommentary’s place within John’s exegetical program ; the role of sinand sexual division within Periphyseon’s account of creation ; and thecontroversies surrounding Eriugena’s views of sexual difference thatemerged within Periphyseon and figured in its condemnation.

The story is familiar. Adam sleeps, and the woman who will benamed Eve is made. Both of these scenes appear in a remarkablemosaic from the Creation cupola of San Marco in Venice. [Fig. 1]On the left, Adam reclines on a grapevine with his right hand sup-

porting his head, as the cross-nimbed, beardless Creator removesa rib from his left side. On the right, the making of the womanis nearly complete, as the Creator grips her wrist and molds her

Proceedings of the International Conference on Eriugenian Studies in honor of E. Jeau-neau, ed. by W. Otten, M. I. Allen, IPM, 68 (Turnhout, 2014), pp. 235-261.

© DOI 10.1484/M.IPM-EB.1.102063


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right shoulder.1 This image is among the few from the MiddleAges that follow Genesis in separating the two scenes of Adam’ssleep and the creation of Eve.2 I begin with this image becauseEriugena too distinguishes these scenes in his commentary onthe Genesis narrative, and focuses on the sleep of Adam as ini-tiating the making of Eve. John’s detailed exegesis of the two

scenes links sexual difference, sin and creation in new and strik-

1 On this mosaic, see Kurt Weitzmann and Herbert Kessler, The CottonGenesis : British Library Codex Cotton Otho B. VI (Princeton : Princeton Uni-versity Press, 1986), 54 ; and Penny Howell Jolly, Made in God’s Image ? : Eveand Adam in the Genesis Mosaics at San Marco, Venice (Berkeley : University ofCalifornia Press, 1997), 30-41.

2 The thirteenth-century mosaics of the creation cupola are based on theCotton Genesis, an early Christian illuminated manuscript. See Weitzmann

and Kessler, Cotton Genesis, 18-20. They further note that “A distinctive fea-ture of the CG family is the depiction of Eve’s creation in two phases” (p. 54).Medieval iconography usually conflates the two scenes into one, as in the topimage of Fig. 2.

Figure 1. Creation of Eve. Detail of the Creation Cupola, San Marco,Venice. Otto Demus’ San Marco Mosaics, Department of Image Collections,

National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC.


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237sin and creation in eriugena

ing ways. Humanity’s division into male and female also marksa key moment in Periphyseon’s dialectic of creation. FollowingMaximus the Confessor, John identifies this division as the finalstage of nature’s division. And its overcoming in the resurrectedChrist – in whom “there is neither male nor female”3 – begins thereturn to divine unity. Sexual difference thus becomes the pivotalpoint for Periphyseon’s dialectic of procession and return. HereI propose to analyze this dialectic in terms of sexual division, andto do so I shall take the view from below – indeed, from the lastand lowest vantage point available to us. I shall begin by looking

at Eriugena’s commentary on the sleep of Adam and the makingof Eve, and then consider three broad issues : first, this commen-tary’s place within John’s exegetical program ; second, the role ofsin and sexual division within Periphyseon’s account of creation ;and finally, the controversies surrounding Eriugena’s views of sex-ual difference that emerged within Periphyseon itself and figuredin its condemnation in the thirteenth century.

Genesis and Gendering Humanity

Before exploring John’s exegesis, let us review the two accountsof creating humanity in the book of Genesis. In chapter 1, on thesixth day God creates man in his image and likeness. AlthoughGod here creates humanity “male and female,” we must turn to theaccount in chapter 2 for details. God forms man from clay of theearth, breathes life into his face, and places him in paradise. Say-ing that “it is not good for man to be alone,” the Lord makes thebeasts of the earth and birds, which Adam names as they parade

before him, yet none of them provides him “a helper like him-self.” So God tries again, “casts a deep sleep upon Adam,” takesone of his ribs, and forms it into a woman. [Figs. 1 & 2] Adam isdelighted with his new companion, whom he declares to be “boneof my bones and flesh of my flesh.” But of course, things quickly gowrong – with the serpent, eating the forbidden fruit, and eviction

3

On the resurrection, see Periphyseon II, 537D-538A, CCCM 162 : 18-19,citing Gal. 3 :28. I shall cite the English translation of I. P. Sheldon-Williams,revised by John J. O’Meara, in Eriugena, Periphyseon (The Division of Nature) (Montreal & Washington : Bellarmin / Dumbarton Oaks, 1987).


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Figure 2. Creation of Eve & birth of the Church. Bible moralisée, French,thirteenth century. The Bodleian Libraries, The University of Oxford,

Bodl. 270b, f. 6r, detail.


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from paradise. Indeed, the woman receives her name “Eve” – asmother “of all the living” – only when they exit paradise (Gn. 3 :20).

While Eriugena plays with both Genesis accounts, in Periphy-seon IV he seizes on the second, longer narrative. Commenting onAdam’s lame attempt to shift blame for eating the fruit to Eve,“the woman you [God] gave me to be my companion,” the Teacherconstructs a dramatic dialogue, where he himself cross-examinesAdam – and thereby takes on God’s role in Genesis 2-3. Adamacknowledges that the Lord gave the woman to him, but stumblesbadly when asked why God made her and gave him this gift. The

Teacher loads his long question with his own answers, which cen-ter on Adam’s sleep and responsibility. He asks,

Why, when you were sleeping, that is to say, when you were turn-ing the attention of your mind from the contemplation of truth to the love of a carnal spouse, did He take the rib from your side andmake of it a woman and give her to you when you were sinningand abandoning him ? Why did He not make the woman… in thesame way He made yourself ? You yourself, as is fit for one whochose earthly things for heavenly things, were made of the dust ofthe earth. It is fitting that the woman should have been taken out

of your side, seeing that the cause of your transgression originatedfrom yourself.4

Elsewhere Eriugena attributes the Fall to the first man’s “turnto himself before he turned to God,”5 but here this turn is sexu-ally charged. For Adam’s sleep consists of shifting his attention to“the love of a carnal spouse” (amorem carnalis coniugii).6 Yet inthe Genesis narrative, this desire is sheer fantasy because womanhas yet to be created. Rather, Adam’s sleep and fantasy lead to

the making of Eve from his own side. Adam thus conceives – inmore senses than one – and gives birth to Eve.

4 Periphyseon IV, 845B-C, my emphasis, CCCM 164 : 147 : Cur te dormi-ente (hoc est mentis contuitum a contemplatione ueritatis in amorem car-nalis coniugii coniuente) costam de latere suo traxit, de qua mulierem fecit,quam tibi peccanti seque deserenti dedit ? Cur non eodem modo, quo te fecit,mulierem quam tibi daret fecerit ? Tu ipse de terreno limo merito, qui caeles-tia deserens terrena eligisti, factus es.

5 Periphyseon II, 582C, CCCM 162 : 77.6 See also Periphyseon IV, 835D, CCCM 164 : 134, where the Teacher

describes Adam’s trance as carnalis copulae appetitus.


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Continuing his cross-examination, the Teacher asks why Godmade a woman for Adam ? For companionship and help, we mayask – as did Augustine7 – why not another man, perhaps Adamand Steve ? Like Augustine, Adam replies, “for assistance inprocreation and the multiplication of human nature.” However,the Teacher disagrees. Citing Genesis’ first creation account, heasserts that sexual reproduction is not inherent in human nature,but results from Adam’s choice. For if human nature, “created inthe image of God,” had retained its original integrity, it wouldbe sexless and multiply like the angels, not like the beasts of the

field. However, thanks to Adam’s fantasies and desires, human-ity “chose (elegit) to propagate the species ingloriously among theother animals.” Foreseeing this decision, the creator undertookdamage control and “added to his nature the twofold sex (duplicemsexum) to enable him to breed like the beasts.” The Teacher thenrebukes Adam for trying to shift his guilt to Eve, when his “ownpride and contempt and… desertion of God” led to her creation.She did not initiate sin, he did – and she is its living consequence.The Teacher underlines this point with an extraordinary commen-

tary on what he calls “God’s ironical words : ‘It is not good forman to be alone. Let us make him a companion like unto him.’”(Gn. 2 :18) He explains these words’ irony by paraphrasing themin vivid detail :

Man whom we have made to our image and likeness does not thinkit good to be alone, that is, to be simple and perfect nature abid-ing everywhere without the division of his nature into sexes, beingwholly in the likeness of the angelic nature, but prefers to tumbledown headlong into earthly couplings like the beasts…. Let us

then make for him a companion like unto him through whom hecan perform what he longs to do, that is to say, a woman who isfragile and unstable like the male, and is eager for earthly lusts.8

7 Augustine, De Genesi ad litteram, IX, 5, CSEL 28, 1, 293.8 Periphyseon IV, 846B-C, CCCM 164 : 148 : Non uidetur homini, quem

ad imaginem et similitudinem nostrum fecimus, bonum esse solum (hoc estsimplicem atque perfectum) uniuersaliterque diuisione naturae in sexus, adsimilitudinem angelicae naturae, absolutum permanente, sed pronum procli-

uumque ad terrenos coitus pariter cum bestiis ruere…. Faciamus ergo ei adiu-torium simile, quo id quod appetit peragere possit, feminam uidelicet, quaesimiliter ut masculus fragilis ac lubrica terrenas appetat concupiscentias. Onthis irony, see E. Jeauneau, “Jean Scot et l’ironie,” in Jean Scot Écrivain, ed.


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Although ventriloquizing God’s voice, the Teacher’s very lan-guage tumbles and spins, suggesting the instability and intensityof sexual desire. Foreseeing Adam’s sleepy desires and fantasies,God grants him his wish. Sexual difference splits human nature intwo,9 and Adam’s claim that God gave him the woman to multi-ply the species becomes true. The Teacher finds this point antici-pated in Genesis’ first chapter when it says, “‘Male and female hecreated them,’ vessels, that is, for carnal procreation of offspring,since the dignity of the spiritual propagation and of the DivineImage is now despised.”10

Eriugena supports this view in his earlier allegorical readingof the making of Eve (Gn. 2 : 21-22). In the removal of Adam’srib, he sees “the tearing (scissura) of his nature into two sexes,”and the removal of his “guardianship of the universal inner vir-tue which was within him before he had sinned.”11 Similarly, theflesh which the Creator puts in place of the rib signifies a devas-tating exchange of “the guardianship of virtue and blessedness...for the deadly folly of vice and wretchedness.” Echoing Paul andAugustine, John sees here “a prophetic prefiguring of Christ and

the Church.” Specifically, Adam’s sleep and the making of Eveparallel Christ’s death and the birth of the Church.12 As Christ isthe new Adam, the Church becomes the new Eve. This parallelhad a long history, as we can see in the thirteenth-century Biblemoralisée, which places Eve’s creation above a crowned Ecclesiaemerging from the wound in the crucified Christ’s side [Fig. 2].13 Eriugena stands within this tradition when he describes Adam as

G.-H. Allard (Montreal /Paris : Bellarmin / J. Vrin, 1986), 15-17 ; reprinted inJeauneau, Études érigéniennes (Paris : Études augustiniennes, 1987), 326-327.9 See Periphyseon IV, 817D, CCCM 164 : 108.10 Periphyseon IV, 846C, CCCM 164 : 149.11 Periphyseon IV, 836B-C, translation modified, CCCM 164 : 134-5.12 Periphyseon IV, 836D, CCCM 164 : 135, citing Augustine, In Iohannis

evangelium tractatus IX, xx, 33-36 (CCSL 36 : 96).13 The top image combines both scenes from Genesis 2, as the Creator’s

right hand holds Adam’s rib while his left grips the emerging Eve’s wrist.Similarly, the image below retains details of the crucifixion – the sun and

moon above the cross, and Mary and John mourning on the right – as theCreator receives the Church from Christ’s wound. See A. Laborde, La Biblemoralisée illuststrée, conservée à Oxford, Paris, et Londres (Paris : Pour les mem-bres de la Société, 1911-1927), vol. 1, fol. 6r ; and Gertrud Schiller, Ikonogra-


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“an inverse figure” of Christ – the one bringing exile, weaknessand death, and the other bringing reconciliation, strength and life.But John adds his own spin when he includes two other compar-isons : Adam introduces the split between the sexes which Christovercomes ; and in Adam “human nature puts on tunics of skin(Gn 3 :21), that is to say, mortal bodies,” while Christ removesthese tunics and restores humanity to its naked, original state.14 By taking these comparisons together, we see the key point ofJohn’s entire gloss : sex becomes the marker for the fallen and cor-ruptible body.

Eriugena’s Exegesis

This interpretation of Adam’s sleep and the making of Eve isremarkable both for its unusual exegesis of Genesis, and for its rolein Periphyseon’s speculative program. Let us first examine it moreclosely as exegesis. Eriugena agrees with today’s biblical scholarson one basic point : that Genesis contains two creation accounts.But while these scholars carefully sort out different textual and

historical strands – e.g., P and J, Priestly and Yahwist – patristicand medieval commentators sought to harmonize these accountsinto a single, coherent narrative and interpretation. And Eriugenadoes this in ways that are peculiar, even by medieval standards.With Augustine, he sees the paradise story as charged with sym-bolic meaning, but he disputes Augustine’s reading of this story asa history of actual events in an earthly garden. Claiming to followAmbrose, John interprets paradise as human nature, and all thatoccurs within it as allegory. Within this exclusively symbolic focus,

he insists that the paradise narrative adapts to human “sluggish-

phie der christlichen Kunst (Gütersloh : G. Mohr, 1976), vol. 4, pt. 1, 89-92 &plates 217-220.

14 Periphyseon IV, 836D-837A, CCCM 164 : 135-6 ; see Periphyseon II, 584A,CCCM 162 : 79, and Periphyseon IV, 818C, CCCM 164 : 109-10, where Johncites Origen, In Genesim (PG 12, 101A) and Epiphanius, Ancoratus 62 (PG 43,128-129), and mistakenly claims that “Almost all authors, Greek and Latin,follow Origen.” In La tradition de l’allégorie de Philon d’Alexandrie á Dante

(Paris : Etudes augustiniennes, 1987), vol. II, pp. 158-159, Jean Pépin saysthat Eriugena finds Origen’s gloss in Epiphanius ; tracing the gloss to Philoand gnostic sources, he suggests that although Origen’s critics often attributethe gloss to him, he actually discusses it “avec les plus grandes réserves”.


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ness,” and narrates “as though in space and time” what actuallyoccurs simultaneously.15 This view frees Eriugena to re-arrangetexts and events into a larger – some might say arbitrary – theo-logical scheme, as he compresses humanity’s creation, sin and itsconsequences into a single, timeless event. For example, we haveseen him claim that when Genesis 1 :27 declares that God createdhumanity “male and female,” it does not insert sexual differenceinto God’s image, but anticipates the fleshly, gendered making ofAdam and Eve in chapter 2. John justifies these transpositions byemphasizing a crucial difference of perspectives :

When we say ‘before and after sin’ we are demonstrating the mul-tiplicity of our thought processes which is due to the fact that weare still subject to temporal conditions : but to God the foreknowl-edge of sin and the consequence of sin itself are contemporaneous[simul]. For it is in man, not God, that sin was a future event.16

Hence, not only were Adam and Eve in paradise for no time atall, but their creation in all its facets – in God’s image and asearthly, sexual beings – occurred all at once. For within God’sforeknowledge, “at the same time [simul] as He created man,He created the consequences of sin even before he had sinned.”17 Indeed, the term “fore-knowledge” is a misnomer, since it suggeststhe human perspective of looking toward the future, rather thanholding everything in a simple, eternal present.18

Eriugena’s discussion of creation and Paradise also differs fromcontemporary Bible scholarship on another, more specific score :the feminist struggle against interpretations reflecting biasesagainst women. In her influential commentary, Phyllis Trible con-

siders it a sexist mistake to speak of creating “man” in Genesis.For in Genesis 2, the Lord simply forms an “earth-creature” (hā-’ ādām) out of dust, and sexual differentiation first occurs whenEve is made from Adam’s rib. Only with the making of the woman

15 Periphyseon IV, 848A, CCCM 164 : 151.16 Periphyseon IV, 808A-B, CCCM 164 : 94 : Nam cum dicimus ‘ante’ et

‘post’ peccatum, cogitationum nostrarum mutabilitatem monstramus, dumadhuc temporibus subdimur. Deo autem simul erant et peccati praescientiaeiusque consequentia. Homini siquidem, non deo, futurum erat peccatum.

17 Periphyseon IV, 807B-C, CCCM 164 : 93-4.18 See Boethius, Consolatio philosophiae V, pr. 6 (CSEL 67 : 122-124).


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does Adam become male.19 This reading could fit within Eriuge-na’s scheme, if he too considered human nature sexless until Eve’screation. But he tells a different story. Earlier in Book IV, henotes that his favorite sources – Ambrose and the Greek Fathers –distinguish “two creations of man” in Genesis. The first highlightssexless human nature as created “in the Image of God, in whichthere is neither male nor female but only universal and indivisiblehumanity most like the angelic nature.” So far, so good. But thesecond creation, “added as a result of the foreknowledge of the Fallof the rational nature,” makes Adam indisputably male. For this

creation, from the clay of the earth, occurs outside Paradise andadds “the male sex… to the nature created in the Image of God.”20 Similarly, at San Marco the Creator shapes a male Adam, whosemasculinity is on full display when he receives his soul and entersParadise [Fig. 3].21 Thus, for Eriugena, it is a male Adam who isplaced in Paradise where “the second sex, called by the name ofwoman, and drawn from the side of the first, is added to it as anassistant in the procreation of offspring.”22 Familiar sexual poli-tics follow. In line with his broader exegesis of the paradise nar-

rative, Eriugena insists that Adam’s creation as male has prioritynot in time, but in honor and rank. Therefore, he concludes that“the man, although made outside Paradise (that is, outside thedignity of his primordial creation), is better than the woman whowas created, as it were, within Paradise (that is, after the unionthat added sex to the simplicity of the divine image).”23 Prioritythus confers on men a superior, ruling position, and on women asecondary and submissive one. Disappointing as this patriarchal

19 Phyllis Trible, God and the Rhetoric of Sexuality (Philadelphia : FortressPress, 1978), 79-81 & 96-99.

20 Periphyseon IV, 817A-B, CCCM 164 : 107-8.21 Weitzmann and Kessler (Cotton Genesis, 53) note that the unusual Ani-

mation of Adam scene reflects “antique depictions of the Prometheus legend,”which portray “Athena holding a butterfly over the newly formed man.”

22 Periphyseon IV, 817B, CCCM 164 : 108.23

Periphyseon IV, 817B-C, my translation, CCCM 164 : 108 : …uirum,etiam extra paradisum (hoc est extra primordialis conditionis dignitatem)conditum, meliorem esse muliere, quae ueluti intra paradisum (hoc est postsuperaddititi sexus simplicitati diuinae imaginis adunationem) condita est.


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outcome may be for us, it is hardly surprising in medieval exegesisand theology.

More unusual – and perhaps truly “erigenal”, as James Joycemight say24 – is John’s commentary on Adam’s sleep. Here hegives a striking, minority view that does violence to the Genesisnarrative.25 Where Genesis says that the Lord puts Adam to sleep,

Eriugena attributes this sleep to Adam’s own distraction andfatigue. Acknowledging this problem, John looks closely at thetext of Genesis 2 :21 and notes a two-stage process : “After God

24 Joyce puns on “Erigena” several times in Finnegans Wake ; see R. J. Schork,Greek and Hellenistic Culture in Joyce (Gainesville : University of FloridaPress, 1998), 155.

25 Another example occurs at Periphyseon V, 859D, where John glossesGenesis 3 :22b not as forever banning humanity from Paradise, but as prom-

ising “the Return of human nature to that same bliss which in sinning it hadlost.” See D. F. Duclow, “Denial or Promise of the Tree of Life ? Eriugena,Augustine and Genesis 3 :22b,” in Duclow, Masters of Learned Ignorance : Eriu-gena, Eckhart, Cusanus (Aldershot : Ashgate, 2006), 85-100.

Figure 3. Animation of Adam. Detail of the Creation Cupola, San Marco,Venice. Otto Demus’ San Marco Mosaics, Department of Image Collections,

National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC.


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sent the trance (soporem) upon Adam, Adam slept (obdormiuit).”First comes the trance, then Adam sleeps. Eriugena describes thetrance as “both the cause of sin and also sent, or rather permit-ted, after sin.”26 A crucial shift in wording occurs here – from‘sent/immissus’ to ‘permitted/ permissus’ – which allows John toinvoke an exegetical rule : Scripture’s use of “a figure of speechwhich describes what God permits as though He Himself doesit.”27 With this rule, Eriugena can finesse Genesis’ literal meaning,and attribute the trance to Adam’s doing and God’s permitting.The trance thus becomes “the deflection of the mind’s intention”28

from the creator to worldly pleasures and sexual desire. The sleepthat follows completes this deflection, as Adam “separates him-self entirely from the vigour of eternal and blessed contemplationand... falls into the delights of sensible things, abandoning com-pletely the spiritual senses.”29 With this reading of Adam’s tranceand sleep, Eriugena again shows his exegetical dexterity.

To see how unusual John’s exegesis of Adam’s sleep is, let ussee what his sources say. Eriugena’s principal authority on sex-ual division is no help here. As Jeauneau has shown, John relies

heavily on Gregory of Nyssa when discussing humanity’s creationand sexual division.30 In De opificio hominis, Gregory distinguishessharply between humanity’s creation in God’s image, and its dis-tinction into male and female.31 He attributes sexual difference to

26 Periphyseon IV, 836A, translation modified, CCCM 164 : 134.27 Periphyseon IV, 835C, CCCM 164 : 133.28 Periphyseon IV, 835C-D, CCCM 164 : 134 : animi intentionis... reflexio. At

San Marco, Adam’s posture and reclining on a grapevine [Fig. 1] echo Noah’sdrunkenness, which is portrayed nearby ; see Weitzmann and Kessler, CottonGenesis, 54, and Jolly, Made in God’s Image ?, 32.

29 Periphyseon IV, 836A, CCCM 164 : 134.30 E. Jeauneau, “La division des sexes chez Gregoire de Nysse et chez

Jean Scot Érigène,” in Eriugena : Studien zu seinen Quellen, ed. W. Beier-waltes (Heidelberg : C. Winter, 1980), 33-54 ; reprinted in Jeauneau, Étudesérigéniennes, 343-354 ; and E. Jeauneau, “Érigène et Grégoire de Nysse,” inJeauneau, “Tendenda vela” : excursions littéraires et digressions philosophiques àtravers le moyen âge (Turnhout : Brepols, 2007), 204-209. On these issues in

Gregory, see also Peter Brown, The Body and Society (New York : ColumbiaUniversity Press, 1988), 293-296.31 Gregory of Nyssa, De opificio hominis, XVI-XVII (PG 44, 177D-192A) ;

trans. W. Moore and H. A. Wilson in Select Writings and Letters of Gregory,


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God’s foreknowledge of human sin, but does not discuss Adam’ssleep in this context. Rather, Gregory focuses his analysis exclu-sively on Genesis 1 :27 – “God created man to his own image : ...Male and female he created them.” When he later discusses themaking of Adam from the earth in Genesis 2, he sees the creatorresponding not to Adam’s dreamy turn toward sex, but to human-ity’s general “bias towards evil” and “voluntary fall from equalitywith the angels,” and on this basis adding the distinction betweenmale and female.32 By focusing on Adam’s sleep, however, Eriu-gena describes a human failure that precedes the unfortunate inci-

dent of the forbidden fruit.33

When Gregory identifies divine fore-knowledge of sin as the source for human sexuality, he providesEriugena with a basic insight. But John goes further when he rollsthis insight into his account of Adam’s sleep, and re-thinks themaking of Eve in his own provocative way.

Nor does Eriugena cite Augustine’s discussions of Adam’s sleep –and with good reason. For Augustine sees nothing worldly or sex-ual in Adam’s sleep. Rather, he emphasizes the opposite, viewingthis sleep as given by God and revealing wisdom and prophecy to

Adam. In the early De Genesi contra Manicheos, Augustine claimsthat Adam’s sleep signifies “hidden wisdom,” which one sees moreclearly by “withdrawing from these visible things into the interiorrealm of the intelligence.” 34 His later work De Genesi ad litteram interprets Adam’s sleep as an ecstasy, given to him “so that hismind… might participate with the host of angels, and entering

Bishop of Nyssa, Select Library of Nicene & Post-Nicene Fathers, 1892 ;

reprint edition (Grand Rapids : Eerdmans, n.d.), 404-407.32 Gregory of Nyssa, De opificio hominis, XXII, 3-4 (PG 44, 204C-205B),

trans. Moore and Wilson in Select Writings, 411-412.33 See also Periphyseon IV, 811C-D, CCCM 164 : 99-100.34 Augustine, De Genesi contra Manicheos XII, 12, 16 ; PL 34, 205 ; trans.

R. Teske, in Augustine, On Genesis (Washington, DC Catholic University ofAmerica, 1991), 112-113. Here Augustine discerns the “knowledge by whichwe understand that what rules within us by reason is distinct from whatobeys reason.” Identifying reason as masculine and bodily desires and sensesas feminine, he describes self-rule as “presiding over the marriage in oneself”

where flesh is “subject to the spirit.” The Pauline hierarchy follows, with manas the head of woman, and Christ the head of man (1 Cor 11 :13). The Glossaordinaria (PL 113, 90A-B) picks up this interpretation, and cites Gregory theGreat’s Moralia in Iob XXX, xvi, 54 ; CCSL 143B : 1528.


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into the sanctuary of God, understand what was finally to come.”When he awakes, Adam declares the woman to be “bone of mybones and flesh of my flesh,” and proclaims that “a man shallleave his father and mother and shall cleave to his wife ; and theyshall be two in one flesh.”35 Augustine comments that out of hisecstasy, Adam spoke “as a prophet under divine guidance.” In bothof Augustine’s commentaries, Adam falls asleep to the world, notto God. The contrast with Periphyseon could not be clearer.

However, Eriugena’s reading does echo Ambrose’s De paradiso,which he had previously cited describing Adam’s sleep as “turn-

ing our mind for a while to sexual intercourse, when we seemto fall asleep to divine matters.”36 But John seems to misreadAmbrose, who views these thoughts of sex more positively. Dis-cussing the parade of animals before Adam while he named them,Ambrose says that he would observe the distinction of male andfemale among them all, and learn that for him too “associationwith a woman was a necessity.” Ambrose then links Adam’s sleepto thoughts of sex, but unlike Eriugena he moves immediatelyto Eve’s creation and the good that follows from it – namely, the

household of man and wife, which points toward “a state of fullperfection.”37 On this view, sexual difference, marriage and pro-creation build God’s kingdom. Yet Eriugena disregards this widercontext, and instead invokes Ambrose’s authority to support hisown idiosyncratic account of the sleep of Adam.

35 Augustine, De Genesi ad litteram IX, 19 ; CSEL 28,1, 294 ; trans. J. H. Taylor,in Augustine, The Literal Meaning of Genesis (New York : Newman Press,1982), vol. 2, 95.

36 PP IV, 835D, citing Ambrose, De paradiso, XI, 50 ; CSEL 32, pt. 1, 307 ;trans. J. Savage, in Ambrose, Hexaemeron, Paradise, and Cain and Abel (NewYork : Fathers of the Church, 1961), 328-329. On Eriugena’s use of this text,see E. Jeauneau, “Le De paradiso d’Ambroise dans le livre IV du Periphy-seon,” in Jeauneau, Tendenda vela, 219-229.

37 Ambrose, De paradiso, IX, 50 ; CSEL 32, pt. 1 : 307 ; trans. Savage, Ambrose, Hexaemeron, 329. See Elizabeth A. Clark, Ascetic Piety and Women’s

Faith : Essays on Late Ancient Christianity (Lewiston, NY : Mellen Press, 1986),376 : “In De Officiis Ministrorum, Ambrose’s interest in explaining the Edentale revolves around social commentary : God’s creation of a woman for theman shows the divine intent that humans live in society.”


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Sin, Sex and Cosmos

If John’s discussion of Adam’s sleep and the making of Eve isnovel exegesis, so are its theological implications. For it shifts sin’sorigin from Genesis’ fruit tree incident to Adam’s sleep. John con-firms this displacement in a commentary on the Good Samaritanparable, where the Teacher says that “man fell himself before hewas tempted by the devil,” and finds it incredible that the sameman could both have been abiding in the contemplation of eter-nal Peace and also have fallen at the persuasion of a woman cor-

rupted by the poison of a serpent ; or that that serpent, I meanthe Devil... could have prevailed over a man who was not yet in astate of sin and was not himself already falling from the sublimityof the divine image.38 As we have seen, Adam’s sleep signals thisinitial fall – a narrative shift that alters the relation between sinand creation. For in this account, sin is no longer simply a humanfailing that leaves the created order pristine and intact. Rather,since Eve has yet to be made, sin becomes – quite literally – afault line within creation itself.

This fault line shapes Eriugena’s conception of the humanbody – or more precisely, of human nature’s two bodies. In BookII of Periphyseon, he tells us that the first, “essential” body wascreated with the rational soul, and “would have adhered eternallyand coeternally with soul had it not sinned.”39 This spiritual, incor-ruptible body endures, and is the one in which human beings willbe resurrected. The second, more familiar body is the “corruptibleand material body,” made from the earth. Once again Eriugenaglosses Genesis 2 :7, but adds two peculiar details : this making

occurs “after sin and as a punishment for sin,” and is the workof the human soul.40 Here too John alters Genesis’ sequence ofevents, but views the mortal body itself – not only its sexual divi-sion – as a consequence of sin. The other detail seems even moresurprising. This body “was created and is daily being created asthough (veluti) by some proper action of the soul.” Although Gene-

38 Periphyseon IV, 811C-D, CCCM 164 : 100-1 : Non enim credibile est eun-dem hominem et in contemplatione aeternae pacis stetisse, et, suadente femi- na serpentis ueneno corrupta, corruisse.

39 Periphyseon II, 582A-B, CCCM 162 : 76-7.40 Periphyseon II, 582C, CCCM 162 : 77.


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sis says that God formed the human body from clay, John consid-ers it reasonable “that the action of the creature should be referredto Him from whom every natural action originates.”41 To supportthis claim, he appeals to the celestial and ecclesiastical hierar-chies, where God acts through angels and bishops. More basically,he finds it no surprise that the first man, once he turned from the“spiritual body created by God,” should “create for himself fromthe clay of the earth a fragile and mortal habitation on the adviceof Divine Providence.”42 In addition, Periphyseon offers systematicreasons for extending human creativity to its own mortal flesh.

For dwelling among the primordial causes, humanity too createsand is created. This creativity displays God’s image in the “trin-ity created in our nature” – namely, intellect, reason and inte-rior sense. Yet precisely as a created image, human nature doesnot create out of nothing, but rather arranges existing realitiesin a novel way, by assembling incorporeal qualities into a mortalbody.43 Hence, Eriugena includes the qualifying term “as though /veluti” in describing this creating. He adds that this making andongoing care of the mortal body mirror God’s providential care

for all creation.44As we have seen, the corruptible body begins as male, and

divides into the two sexes. This division takes on cosmic impor-tance in John’s discussion of Maximus the Confessor, his secondGreek authority for linking sin and human sexual difference. BookII of Periphyseon includes a long commentary on Maximus’ cosmicscheme of five divisions : first, uncreated and created nature ; sec-ond, creation’s division into the intelligible and sensible ; third, thesensible realm’s distinction into heaven and earth ; fourth, earth’s

separation between paradise and the inhabited world ; and fifth,the division of humanity into male and female.45 This last division

41 Periphyseon II, 582C-D, CCCM 162 : 78. Other texts assert that God cre-ates both bodies ; see Periphyseon IV, 802A, CCCM 164 : 85.

42 Periphyseon II, 583B, emphasis added, CCCM 162 : 79 : fragile atque mor-tale de luto terrae sibimet habitaculum crearet diuina prouidentia admonitus.

43 Periphyseon II, 580B, CCCM 162 : 74. Concerning the mechanics of thismaking, see Periphyseon II, 581B-C, CCCM 162 : 75-6.

44 Periphyseon II, 581C-582A, CCCM 162 : 76.45 Periphyseon II, 530A-C, CCCM 162 : 9-10 ; and Eriugena’s translation of

Maximus the Confessor, Ambigua 37, CCSG 18 : 180 ; translated as Difficulty


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is problematic, because Maximus writes that it does not conformto “the divine intention ( propositum) [that] there would be simplyman, not to be divided by the names male and female.”46 Createdas the officina, the workshop or agent unifying and mediating allcreation, humanity was designed to harmonize creation’s oppositesand turn them toward their divine source. But instead it acts “con-trary to nature [and] is voluntarily moved in ignorance aroundthose things that are beneath it… and has abused the naturalpower of uniting what is divided.”47 The results will now be famil-iar to us. Foreknowing that man would sin, God permits human

nature to split into male and female. If humanity is to multiplybut refuses “the divine mode of multiplying itself,” God providesthe alternative of sexual reproduction. But this is a compensatingmechanism, not part of humanity’s original program. Still follow-ing Maximus, John notes another, larger compensating move : theIncarnation, as Christ assumes the task of restoring human natureand all creation to God. His resurrection begins this process byovercoming sexual division, as Maximus confirms by citing Gala-tians 3 :28, “In Christ there is neither male nor female.”48 But

where Maximus gives a crisp summary of Christ’s reintegration ofthe remaining four divisions of his scheme, Eriugena expands onthe implications of sin, divine foresight and sexual division.

In Periphyseon, sin and sex signal only the start of a very busygame. When Maximus says that in God’s original plan human-ity would not be “divided into those sections which now exist inhim,” Eriugena extends these “sections” to all human variety anddifference :

The diversity of men among themselves by which the form of eachis distinguished from the others and the measure of stature is var-ied does not proceed from nature but from defect and the diver-sity of places and times, of lands, of waters, of airs, of diets, and

41 in A. Louth, Maximus the Confessor (London : Routledge, 1996), 156-162.See Jeauneau, “La division des sexes,” 52-3.

46 Periphyseon II, 532C, CCCM 162 : 12-3.47 Maximus, Ambigua 37, CCSG 18 : 180 ; trans. in Louth, Maximus, 158 ;

cited at Periphyseon II, 536D-537A, CCCM 162 : 17-8.48 Periphyseon II, 537D-538A, CCCM 162 : 19. See Periphyseon V, 894A-895C, CCCM 165 : 49-52, where John discusses Maximus’ account of Christ’srestoration of all five divisions.


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of other circumstances of this sort of their birth and breeding. Ofthe diversity of manners and opinions it is superfluous to speak

for it is obvious to all that these took their origin from the divi-sion of nature after sin.49

Sexual propagation not only produces millions of people – sevenbillion and counting – in all their physical variety, but also yieldsthe many societies and cultures that they develop and require inorder to flourish. We thus owe all our diversity – of environment,breeding, culture and opinion – to sin, or more precisely to God’sprovisions for dealing with it.

Eriugena suggests still wider consequences when he links sin notonly to sexual division, but to the two prior divisions of Maximus’scheme : between Paradise and the inhabited globe, and betweenheaven and earth. He finds “very obscure / ualde obscura” theGreek Father’s claim that “by bringing together... paradise and theinhabited globe, he [Christ] would make the earth one, not dividedin him by difference of parts, but rather so gathered together thatnone of its parts suffers loss.”50 Eriugena suggests two ways tounderstand Maximus’ text, and both highlight division as a con-

sequence of sin. In the first, the entire inhabited globe in all itsparts becomes paradise, just as unifying human nature “recallsthe division of the sexes into the simplicity of man.”51 For bothcases follow the rule that lower divisions move into a higher, bet-ter unity – namely, male and female into human nature, and theinhabited globe into paradise. John’s second reading suggests uni-fying two of Maximus’ divisions at once, so that paradise and theinhabited globe become one earth – namely, the earth that Maxi-mus’ third division distinguishes from heaven within sensible cre-ation. This earth “will be recalled into a simplicity of nature soas to be believed to be a spiritual rather than a corporeal nature

49 Periphyseon II, 533A-B, CCCM 162 : 13 : Siquidem diuersitas hominuma se ipsis, qua uniuscuiusque species ab aliis discernitur et staturae modusuariatur, non ex natura prouenit sed ex uitio et diuersitate locorum et tempo-rum, terrarum, aquarum, aerum, escarum caeterorumque similium in quibusnascuntur et nutriuntur. De diuersitate morum cogitationumque superfluumest dicere, cum omnibus manifestum sit ex diuisione naturae post peccatuminitium sumpsisse.

50 Periphyseon II, 533C, emphasis added, CCCM 162 : 13-4.51 Periphyseon II, 534A, CCCM 162 : 14.


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such as it would be if man were not in a state of sin.”52 On thisaccount, sin extends the very dialectic of nature’s division intothe material universe. As Eriugena goes on to say, “This worldwould not have burst forth into its variety of both sensible speciesand the divers multiplicities of their parts if God had not foreseenthe fall and ruin of the first man when he abandoned the unity ofhis nature.”53 Here not only human sexual difference but much of Periphyseon’s third division of nature – created and not creating –results from the creator’s efforts to compensate for human sin.54

We may ask what motivates such far-reaching efforts to com-

pensate for sin. Eriugena gives two answers. Unlike his Greeksources, he speaks of the corruptible, sexual body as punishment. 55 He tells us that like the demons’ aerial bodies, “the earthly andmortal members of men” must be understood as “the penalty fortransgression ( poenam peccati), which has been added (adiuncta)to the simplicity of the nature created by God.”56 Invoking sin’scosmic consequences, Eriugena asserts that God “superimposed /supermachinatus” sexual propagation on human nature, so that“this world might be extended in space and time to allow man to pay

for his general offence a general penalty ( poenam), by being bornlike the rest of the animals from a corruptible seed.”57 The entirespatio-temporal world thus becomes the arena and vehicle forrepentance. Following Gregory and Maximus more closely, Johnemphasizes a second motive when he argues that the creator actsnot from anger, but out of

52 Periphyseon II, 534A-B, emphasis added, CCCM 162 : 14.53

Periphyseon II, 540A. See Avital Wohlman, L’homme, le sensible et le péché dans la philosophie de Jean Scot Erigène (Paris : J. Vrin, 1987), especially24-41.

54 These cosmic implications apparently disturbed the scribe of Peri- physeon’s Paris manuscript (Bibl. Nat. Lat. 12964), who attempted to con-fine their impact to humanity. Where the other manuscripts attribute “thecause of the division of nature” to Adam’s sin, this scribe inserted the wordhumanae into the phrase to make it read “the cause of the division of humannature” (diuisionis humanae naturae causam) ( Periphyseon II, 537B, VersionIV, CCCM 162 : 183).

55 See P. Brown, Body and Society, 296 : Gregory of Nyssa “never spoke ofit [sexual difference] in any way as a punishment for the fall.”

56 Periphyseon IV, 852B-C, CCCM 164 : 157.57 Periphyseon IV, 799B-C, emphasis added, CCCM 164 : 82.


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a kind of ineffable teaching and incomprehensible mercy, so thatman, who, by the judgement of his free will, had refused to main-

tain himself in the status of his nature, might, having learnt fromhis punishments, seek the grace of his Creator, and by becomingthrough it obedient to the Divine Laws.... might return to hisfirst state.58

Sexuality, corruptible bodies and the entire physical universe thusboth mark humanity’s descent and become the school for workingout creation’s return to its divine source. Here the dialectic of cre-ation and nature’s divisions becomes history – a saturated, sacred

history whose course moves toward fulfillment at the end oftime. This eschatology will complete nature’s dialectic of return,but its course is perilous and uncertain. For running the projectof nature’s return – like its creation – through humanity incursenormous risks.59 Today we have hardly outgrown Adam’s sleepydistraction, phantasy life and desires, which make it so difficultfor us to see clearly, order our lives rightly, and move towards arenewed paradise. To describe our efforts in this direction, Eriu-gena again turns to Genesis. In the penalties imposed on Eve,

he sees the “labors of study, which Scripture calls the sorrows ofwoman,” through which the mind achieves “many conceptions,that is, the rudiments of an understanding of intelligible beings,and the procreation of sons, that is to say, of right judgments con-cerning nature.”60 Within this allegorical scheme, Eve may be pun-ished, but her sorrows and labor effect humanity’s return. Indeed,they mark Periphyseon’s path to the eschaton, a hallmark of whichwill be the erasure of the sexual, mortal body. For the end mir-rors the beginning, and only natures or substances will endure in

the return – not compensatory accidents added to human nature.

58 Periphyseon II, 540B-C, emphasis added and translation modified :‘mercy’ rather than Sheldon-Williams’s ‘clemency’ for misericordia, CCCM162 : 22 : …sed modo quodam ineffabilis doctrinae incomprehensibilisquemisericordiae, ut homo qui libero uoluntatis arbitrio in suae naturae dignitatese custodire noluerat conditoris sui gratiam suis poenis eruditus quaereret etper eam diuinis praeceptis oboediens…..ad suum pristinum statum…. rediret.

59 See Willemien Otten, The Anthropology of Johannes Scottus Eriugena

(Leiden : Brill, 1991), 113-116.60 Periphyseon IV, 854D-855B, CCCM 164 : 160-1. Jeauneau notes the orig-inality of Eriugena’s “optimistic” reading of Eve’s penalties in Periphyseon IV(Dublin : Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies, 1995), 337, n. 309.


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These will be so thoroughly transformed as to vanish – or moreprecisely, to “be dissolved and changed into... spirit and stablesubstance.”61 But the sexual body will not endure, because it iscontingent and inherently perishable.

Controversies and Condemnations

Eriugena knew that his views on the human body and sexualitywere controversial. Let us note two instances within Periphyseonitself. Following the Teacher’s dialogue with Adam, he respondsto those who see an attack on marriage and procreation in his

teaching that sexual distinction and begetting are penalties forsin. He affirms “wedlock so long as it is for the procreation ofchildren and not for the gratification of lust.”62 But he realisticallynotes the impossibility of intercourse without “the lustful itch ofthe flesh,” and reaffirms that sexual reproduction results from thehuman decision to multiply like beasts rather than like angels.63 Another, more dramatic and detailed objection occurs in Book II.After the Teacher discusses Maximus’ five-stage cosmic scheme of

division and return, the Student raises a question that would bewidely shared. He strongly objects to the claim that the divisioninto male and female “did not proceed from the first creation ofman in the image of God but from the punishment for sin, andthat again after the general resurrection of all bodies… at the endof the world the division will no longer remain but will return tothe unity of the primordial creation of nature.”64 He asks “whowould not be horrified” to hear this, and is especially alarmed by

61 See Periphyseon V, 884A-885C, CCCM 165 : 35-7 : Mortal bodies “shall bedissolved and changed into something better (solvetur et in melius mutabitur),into spirit and stable substance.” As concentrations of incorporeal qualities,these bodies will “return to the condition of an incorporeal object.” See also Periphyseon V, 986C-987C, CCCM 165 : 177-8, and the more detailed accountglossing Gregory of Nyssa, at Periphyseon IV, 800D-803A, CCCM 164 : 84-7 :the external body will resolve into the elements, and its species, hoc est, notio will remain in the soul.

62 Periphyseon IV, 846D-847A, CCCM 164 : 149.63

Periphyseon IV, 847A, CCCM 164 : 149. He echoes Augustine when headds that children thus “inherit the guilt of everlasting death from whichthey are freed only by baptism into the Catholic Church.”

64 Periphyseon II, 542C-D, CCCM 162 : 24-5.


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the notion of a sexless humanity following the resurrection. Hereminds the Teacher that “all or almost all holy masters of theLatin tongue… unanimously declare that after the resurrection ofall things each sex will have its integrity, so that man returns intothe form of a man, woman into the form of a woman.”65 Similarly,he rejects the claim that the resurrected Christ is neither malenor female, and affirms the common faith to the contrary : “Webelieve that Christ rose again in the same sex in which He lived inthe flesh, and that He remains in it eternally.” Here the Studentgives voice to critiques that were to haunt Periphyseon and even-

tually lead to its condemnation.Eriugena’s most sympathetic readers shared the Student’sconcerns. In the twelfth century, Honorius Augustudonensis isstrangely schizoid on these issues. As Caroline Walker Bynumnotes, his Clavis physicae faithfully reproduces Periphyseon’saccount of sexual difference, but his popular Elucidarium presentsvery different views. Here Honorius explains the resurrection inmaterialist terms and imagery, and portrays a heaven populatedby beautiful men and women who will “appear with their ‘eyes

and faces’ and ‘all their interior and exterior members’.”66 Anothersympathetic reader was Nicholas of Cusa (1401-1464) who leftus extensive marginal comments to manuscripts of Periphyseon’sBook I and Honorius’ Clavis. These glosses usually note texts thatattract Nicholas’ attention ; they occasionally praise Eriugena, butrarely criticize him. Yet Cusanus writes “error” beside passagestracing the origin of sexual difference and procreation to sin.67 Similarly, he writes “nota quod male” when Eriugena claims that

65 Periphyseon II, 543B-C, CCCM 162 : 25.66 Caroline Walker Bynum, The Resurrection of the Body (New York :

Columbia University Press, 1995), 150, citing Honorius, Elucidarium, Bk. 3,q. 106, 467-470.

67 Paolo Lucentini edits Nicholas’ glosses to Clavis physicae in Platonismomedievale : Contributi per storia dell’ Eriugenismo (Florence : La Nuova Italia,1980, 2nd revised edition), 108, n. 115 ( Periphyseon IV, 799B) & n. 118 ( Peri-

physeon V, 896). On Nicholas’ marginalia to Periphyseon I, see D. F. Duclow,“Coinciding in the Margins : Cusanus Glosses Eriugena,” in Eriugena Cusa-nus, ed. A, Kijewska, R. Majeran and H. Schwaetzer (Lublin : WydawnictwoKUL, 2011), 83-103.


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sexual division will vanish “when human nature shall be restoredto its pristine state.”68

In the thirteenth century, harsher critics noticed Periphyseon’sviews on sexual division, and – rightly or wrongly – linked themto the doctrines of Amalric of Bène.69 Almaric’s teachings werecondemned at the 1210 synod of Paris, and Pope Honorius IIIcondemned Periphyseon in 1225.70 Although the documents of 1210and 1225 affirm no link between Amalric and Eriugena, Henryof Ostia later traced Amalric’s teachings to “the book of MasterJohn the Scot called Periphyseon,” and highlighted three con-

demned doctrines. The third is that at the end of time “there willbe a union of the sexes, or there will be no distinction of sex,which union he says to have begun in Christ.”71 The fusion or abo-lition of sexual difference here ranks just behind major charges ofpantheism – “that all things are God” – and that the primordialcauses’ creative activity compromises God’s exclusive power tocreate. Matthew of Poland provided a longer list when discussingInnocent III’s condemnation of Amalric, and included not only theend of sexual difference, but also its source : “that if man had not

sinned he would not have been divided into the twofold sexes.”72 Both Henry and Martin thus considered Periphyseon’s deviant sex-ual views a major doctrinal threat, serious enough to condemnalongside the ontological error of identifying creatures with God.

68 Lucentini, Platonismo medievale, 90, n. 36 ( Periphyseon II, 532A-B).69 Whether Amalric and his followers used Periphyseon is a disputed ques-

tion. For affirmative views, see Maïeul Cappuyns, Jean Scot Erigène, reprint

ed. (Brussels : Culture et Civilisation,1969), 247-250 ; and G. C. Capelle, Amaury de Bène : Étude sur son panthéisme formel (Paris : J. Vrin, 1932), whichincludes relevant Latin texts, 89-111. For more critical views, see M. Th. d’Al-verny, “Un fragment du procès des Amauriciens,” AHDLMA (1950-51) : 325-336 ; and P. Lucentini, “L’eresia di Amalrico,” in Eriugena Redivivus, ed. W.Beierwaltes (Heidelberg : C. Winter, 1987), 174-191.

70 See Chartularium Universitatis Parisiensis, ed. H. Denifle & A. Chatélain(Paris : Delalain, 1889), vol. I, 70-72, 106-107.

71 Cited in Alice Gardner, Studies in John the Scot (Erigena) : A Philosopherof the Dark Ages (London & New York : H. Frowde, 1900), 136 -137 ; Capelle,

Amaury de Bène, 93-94. Interestingly, Henry notes that Eriugena cites “theauthority of a Greek master named Maximus.”72 Gardner, Studies, 137-138, translation modified ; Capelle, Amaury de

Bène, 105.


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Bynum sees the resurrection as central to the condemnations ofAmalric and Periphyseon, and comments that “one of the mostthreatening elements of the Erigenist position was the claim thatwith the loss of materiality and [bodily] integrity there would bea blurring of the sexes at the end of time.” 73 Yet for Eriugena thisproblem goes back to the beginning, since the resurrection willsimply undo the making of the sexual body. The contested issuethus becomes the status of the mortal body – and of sexual differ-ence which is its defining marker. Is this body integral to humannature, or not ? Periphyseon’s thirteenth-century critics said yes,

and Eriugena clearly disagreed and placed humanity above itssexual, mortal body : “homo melior est quam sexus.”74 Surely the ghost behind this controversy is Augustine. His

early De Genesi contra Manicheos asks how to understand sexualdifference and the commands to “increase and multiply,” and pro-poses an answer similar to Gregory of Nyssa and Eriugena : “Weare permitted to understand it spiritually and to believe that itwas changed to carnal fecundity after sin. For there was first thechaste union of male and female” which produced spiritual off-

spring and effortless self-control, and after sin turned to “carnalgeneration.”75 However, around the year 400 Augustine repudiatedthis view for another, more literal reading. In De Genesi ad lit-teram, his emphasis on paradise as history fitted neatly with – ifnot required – his insistence on the concrete, fleshly reality ofAdam and Eve who, if they had not sinned, would have repro-duced sexually in paradise.76 On this view, sexuality, marriage andprocreation form part of humanity’s original program, rather thanbeing added to accommodate a sin-induced handicap. Further, this

same, sexual body will not disappear at the resurrection, but will

73 Bynum, Resurrection of the Body, 155.74 Periphyseon II, 533A, CCCM 162 : 13. See also Periphyseon V, 893D,

CCCM 165 : 49 : …inferior est sexus homine.75 Augustine, De Genesi contra Manicheos 19,30 ; PL 34, 187 ; trans. R. Teske

in Augustine on Genesis, 77. See Teske’s illuminating note.76 Augustine, De Genesi ad litteram IX, 3 ; CSEL 28, 1, 271-272. On Augus-

tine’s changing views, see E. A. Clark, Ascetic Piety and Women’s Faith, 362-373 ; and Gillian Clark, “Adam’s Engendering : Augustine on Gender and Cre-ation,” in R. N. Swanson, ed., Gender and Christian Religion (Rochester, NY :Boydell Press, 1998), 18-21.


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itself become “spiritual.” Peter Brown emphasizes how novel thisexegesis was and the controversies it provoked with Augustine’scontemporaries.77 Yet it became canonical in the Latin West.

Having absorbed his Greek sources, Eriugena struggled againstAugustine’s later view, and nowhere more clearly than when hegives up his attempt to reconcile Augustine and Gregory of Nyssa.The Teacher accurately sums up Augustine’s teaching : “that inthe First Man male and female were created in the image of God,and the animal bodies themselves with which they were endowedbefore the Fall were not the result of punishment for sin, but of

the necessity of nature, that is to say, for the fulfillment by pro-creation of the predestined number of holy men” to complete theheavenly company of angels and saints.78 He then cites De civitate Dei’s lyrical description of the first humans’ emotional lives and“wedlock love” in paradise, including the possibilities of their sex-ual union and begetting children “without the disease of lust” andeventually entering “the bliss of angels.” The Teacher expresseshis “astonishment that it can be believed that animal bodieshave dwelt in such a height of bliss.”79 Here Jeauneau detects theirony – “fine et cruelle” – as Eriugena declares Augustine’s histor-ical account of paradise “too good to be true.”80 Yet this signalsa deeper disagreement. For John not only insists on the animalbody’s limitations, but he also argues that it is added to humannature and will perish at the resurrection. Hence, this body is anaccident, and as such neither substantial nor integral to humanity.Only the original, incorruptible body – created with the rationalsoul – will endure and be restored. Since sexual difference defines

the animal body, it too will perish, just as there is “neither malenor female” in the resurrected Christ.

77 P. Brown, Body and Society, 399-408.78 Periphyseon V, 805A-B, CCCM 165 : 89-90 and 440-441 (Versiones I-II

and IV).79 Periphyseon V, 806A-D, CCCM 165 : 91-2.80 Jeauneau, “Jean Scot et l’ironie,” 23-24, and reprinted in Études érigé-

niennes, 333-334.


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Conclusion

Now that we have completed our pornographic tour of Periphy-seon, it is perhaps surprising to find sex so central to Eriugena’sproject. But when Adam sleeps, interesting things begin to hap-pen. His dreamy desire disrupts the dialectic of nature’s division,inscribes sin into creation, and requires compensating moves byboth God and humanity. Thanks to divine foresight and humancreativity, Eve comes into being, and humanity takes on a sex-ual and mortal body. Further consequences follow : Nature’s third

division extends into the sensible world, and cosmic dialecticbecomes sacred history centered on human dreams, desires, will-ing and knowing. As this story unfolds, it moves towards a con-clusion that will complete nature’s dialectic by leading all thingsinto the divine nature that neither creates nor is created. As antic-ipated in the risen Christ, humanity’s resurrection will completethis transition, when sexual difference will disappear as human-ity attains the paradise intended in its original creation. Hence,while Adam’s sleep initiates human sexuality and the animal

body, the resurrection marks their erasure and the fulfillment ofhuman nature.81

By weaving together exegesis, the Neoplatonic dialectic ofnature’s divisions, and sacred history, Eriugena develops this pow-erful new account of sin, sex, creation and resurrection. This isamong the stranger things in Periphyseon, and leads us to read thework from a different angle. For we observe John not only drasti-cally refashioning the Genesis narrative, but also skewing nature’svery dialectic to accommodate his novel vision of human sexual-ity’s origins and ultimate overcoming. We have seen how contro-versial his revisionist project has been. Indeed, Eriugena invitedcontroversy by pointedly rejecting Augustine’s authoritative viewson the sexual and mortal body. Nor did his frequent appeals toGregory of Nyssa, Maximus and Ambrose do much to quiet thefuror. Already in Periphyseon the Student expresses his alarm, andlater sympathetic readers like Honorius and Cusanus distanced

81 As Otten notes, “Man’s return to his original state in fact involves acontinuing processio rather than an actual return, because man has not yetfully realized his character as imago Dei” ( Anthropology of Eriugena, 153).


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themselves from John’s views on sexual difference. The controver-sies came to a head in the thirteenth century, when Eriugena’saccount of sexuality seems to have figured in the condemnationsof both Periphyseon and Amalric of Bène. Not for the first or lasttime, sex became a burning issue.


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Documents

Duclow2014 the Sleep of Adam, The Making of Eve_sin and Creation in Eriugena