{Love, Sex and Marriage [continued (16)]}[27th August 1990]

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[continued]

This* lack of education of and among women about men** arises, I presume, from the lack of openness in speech about sex throughout our society – I mean, at an everyday ordinary level, not in the media – and from a failure to empathise with the opposite sex, which would once again involve a loss of self for the sake of the other*** (and which women are likely to be better at, etc....).****

*[See last previous entry]

**[& vice versa, as the previous journal entry makes clear]

***[[Redbook7:261-262][19900827:1050k]{Love, Sex and Marriage [continued (9)]}[27th August 1990]]

****[See last previous entry but one, [Redbook7:263-264][19900827:2250]{Love, Sex and Marriage [continued (11)]}[27th August 1990]]

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{Love, Sex and Marriage [continued (15)]}[27th August 1990]

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[continued]

Looking at it* in a less symbolic way, the argument for self-restraint in men is based on a fundamental misconception about men, which can be identified in the term ‘sexual desire’. Sexual desire can be felt by man or woman for a particular woman or man, but what underlies it, far more strongly it seems in men than in women, is sexual need for woman (or man) in general. Sexual desire is emotional and may be restrained; sexual need is physical and can only be suppressed, and only at cost to the psyche: and many men are simply incapable of this suppression.

Judges, being mostly male, understand this only too well, which may well be why they sometimes make comments{,} apparently condoning rapists and even blaming the victim{,} which understandably infuriate women. What the judges do not seem to realise is that most women do not themselves understand the nature of male sexual needs. (I am not suggesting that many men understand the nature of female emotional desires, merely that in this case it doesn’t make much difference.)

*[See last previous entry]

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{Love, Sex and Marriage [continued (14)]}[27th August 1990]

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It might be asked,* why should not loss of self for the sake of the other require that men give up their sexual desire for women except when women also desire and accept it?

This can be explained partly in C[ircles] A[nalysis &] S[ynthesis] terms by the tendency of the G~ and M~ side to be associated** with female and male respectively, at least initially. This implies that the self-sacrificing I[nner] C[ircle] rotation is naturally easier for females, and the self-destructive O[uter] C[ircle] rotation is naturally easier for males; *** and observation seems to bear that out.

The I[nner] C[ircle] arrives at j~ – Creation, and ἐρως – sexual love, just as the O[uter] C[ircle] arrives at U~ – Complication, and lust. If the I[nner] C[ircle] has primacy over the O[uter] C[ircle] in a relationship, sexual love can overcome lust, but it is likely to be the female who is in the best position to bring this about.

*[See last previous entry]

**{but not identical with}

***(This is old ground, of course)

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{Love, Sex and Marriage [continued (13)]}[27th August 1990]

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[continued]

As it generally seems to be Men who are most urgently and sharply driven by sexual needs, it falls on women to make the greatest sexual adjustment – but men have to make it too, in (for example) ceasing to regard any women as their personal property, or as objects in general.

The burden of this can best be borne by women in general if they share it, forming a community* – a sacred priesthood, if you like – part of whose function is to preserve the balance in Society by ‘draining’ the excess of male sexual need and drive, before it can unbalance the whole culture.

This in fact puts women in a strong position – even stronger than now, when they are individually able to manipulate men, because they will then be able to do so collectively. The consequence of such ** manipulation would be, after a while, a reassertion of power by men collectively and a collapse of the balance, resulting in a return of patriarchal society, just as at present we see a collapse in individual male restraints which had inhibited sexual violence against females.

It is possible – although this is pure speculation – that such an exploitation and collapse is behind the *** move from more matriarchal to more patriarchal Western societies in antiquity.****

*[See [Redbook7:264][19900827:2250d]{Love, Sex and Marriage [continued (14)]}[27th August 1990]]

**[collective, presumably]

***[suggested?]

****(Interrupted by 2^nd {house} viewers)

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{Love, Sex and Marriage [continued (12)]}[27th August 1990]

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[continued]

The solution* begins from Unity at C (acknowledging its outer principle{,} as Attraction), achieved through Harmony – so it requires a population far more refined than we have now, although as with most Human affairs** it*** will also help to bring that requirement about: it is not a question of achieving one before starting the other.

The solution passes through pure Love and Revelation in Loving-kindness (Charity) to its physical Creation in sexual Love as well as other physical expressions of Love.

In practice what this means is that sex should no longer be considered as something to be offered according to the needs of the Self, but according to the needs of the Other – any other. This loss of Self for the sake of the other is the essence of Love, and indeed is the Turning-Point [sic] of the whole Circles process.****

*[See last previous entry]

**[ie matters]

***(the solution)

****[ie the C[ircles] A[nalysis &] S[ynthesis] process]

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{Love, Sex and Marriage [continued (11)]}[27th August 1990]

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[continued]

On the whole,* I return to a very early model of mine** which has been tried out really only in liberal Scandinavian and Anglo-Saxon societies, I think, and then only briefly (in the sixties), and without a sufficient framework; but there are hints of it in the Temple Prostitutes of antiquity, so detested by Old Testament authorities.

Anglo-Saxon morality swung ‘over the top’ and back to the right after the Sixties, and Aids [sic] has changed basic perceptions. But morality in detail is generally based on misconceptions,*** and Aids is a medical problem which will be solved, by prevention or cure, without the necessity to change our thinking about sex.

*[See last two previous entries; & [Redbook7:254-266][19900827:1050c]{Love, Sex and Marriage}[27th August 1990]ff]

**[]

***[As it were]

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{Love, Sex and Marriage [continued (10)]}[27th August 1990]

[Redbook7:261][19900827:1050i]{Love, Sex and Marriage [continued (10)]}[27th August 1990]

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[continued]

I have referred* to the French solution – the public wife, the private wife, and the mistress – although this suffers from similar defects to polygamy.

(The casual prostitute, of course, is represented as far as the man is concerned mainly by U~, lust.)

*ref VI... []?

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{Love, Sex and Marriage [continued (9)]}[27th August 1990]

[Redbook7:260][19900827:1050h]{Love, Sex and Marriage [continued (9)]}[27th August 1990]

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[continued]

One solution to this* is polygamy – but that depends on a society, like that of many animals, where the majority of men are killed in battle or are condemned to the status of outsiders (or possibly slaves), so it would hardly suit contemporary Western aspirations.

I have some admiration for the ancient Celtic model, as I understand it, where there were no permanent couplings but the women as a group brought up the children who resulted from casual couplings with warriors selected by each woman.

I believe that this is also [sic] similar to some African models; and it also seems to be appearing in our own inner cities: except that the single Mums have not yet got together to live communally.

And I do happen to believe that children are** brought up in a more balanced way in the presence of both parents (although not necessarily their equal presence).

*[See last previous entry; & [Redbook7:254-266][19900827:1050c]{Love, Sex and Marriage}[27th August 1990]ff]

**[generally? typically? – ideally? (– depending on the parents)]

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{Love, Sex and Marriage [continued (8)]}[27th August 1990]

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[continued]

There’s an old saying that each man wants to love all women and every woman wants to love one man. There is some truth in this, if one allows for the love appropriate to the type of the lover, but only some truth.

What is fairly clear is that in most lasting marriages women who have had two or three children tend to want, and even be able to endure, far less sexual love (if any) than their husbands; and although it is arguable that no man should be driven by simple lusts to seek out women when he is in a single state – because to do so evidences a self-destructive lack of self-control – it would take a saint instead of a normally sexual man to lie nightly with the woman he loves and not feel ἐρως for her, erotic love, and not want to make love to her, as frequently as his own sexual potency allows.

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{Love, Sex and Marriage [continued (7)]}[27th August 1990]

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[continued]

Nor* do I believe it certain that Jesus taught that sex outside the limits of formal marriage was wrong: bearing in mind that marriage in his time (and still more in the time of Moses) was differently constituted, limited, and dissolved from today, and considering the quality of his teaching generally, I think he was saying that any lustful thought was equivalent to adultery, and that lust was an inhibition to entering the Kingdom of Heaven.

(This inner emphasis must be so if I am right in ** understanding a major import of his teaching to have been that what counts is not what you do, actions, but what you are: expressed in thoughts, intentions, etc. and revealed in actions. Lust, of course, is sex or sexual desire unmotivated by Love; and Love is at the centre of Jesus’ teaching.[)]

*[See last previous entry]

**ref VI? … []

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{Love, Sex and Marriage [continued (6)]}[27th August 1990]

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[continued]

So what’s to be done?*

Although I accept that higher spirituality is generally not distracted by sex, but that when it is it suffers as a consequence, I have not been able to bring myself** to the ultimate Christian view that sex should therefore be suppressed.***

To everything there is a season.****

*[See last previous entry]

**(despite strenuous and probably misguided efforts)

[See earlier Vol(s), eg []]

***(because)

****Ecclesiastes, 3:1 (A[uthorised] V[ersion])

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{Love, Sex and Marriage [continued (5)]}[27th August 1990]

[Redbook7:258][19900827:1050d]{Love, Sex and Marriage [continued (5)]}[27th August 1990]

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[continued]

What is the reason for the frequency with which this* happens? Well, I think a lot of it has to do with Nature’s purpose for physical marriage – that is, for children. Even if the loss of self in the other was mutual in a couple, which it often isn’t, it is {(}even{)} less likely to be so after the arrival of children: he may or may not be lost in her, but she is likely to be lost, if at all, in the children.

That disposes more-or-less completely of the couple’s pure or romantic Love for each other, which cannot last for ever if unrequited or [if] returned and then withdrawn. All he can do is to turn it** to the children as well. And the sheer tiredness, the utter exhaustion involved in bringing up young children, not to mention the frequent interruptions, generally disposes of ἐρως,*** sexual or erotic Love [sic], even though through sheer frustration lust may actually increase.

#Nature, too, has its own ways – being ignorant of modern contraceptive methods – of saying ‘enough is enough’, by means of physical changes of shape and of chemistry (eg hormonal imbalances), all of which tend to reduce sexual love in one or the other partner.****

#And of course there is the undoubted crippling effect on the Individual’s inner life – inspiration and analysis alike – brought about by the well-evidenced parental inability to complete a conversation or a train of thought without a very high chance of interruption: so that there is little consolation in joint or Individual mental recreation either.

*[See last previous journal entry]

**{(ie Pure Love)}

***eros

****{or both}

#[These two sentences originally written in reverse order, corrected by an arrow in the ms]

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{Love, Sex and Marriage [continued (4)]}[27th August 1990]

[Redbook7:256-257][19900827:1050d]{Love, Sex and Marriage [continued (4)]}[27th August 1990]

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[continued]

I have, of course, seen many marriages* end in divorce. But of those marriages which have lasted, of those I know, I would say that the overwhelming majority are exclusively, or almost exclusively, of the horizontal linear type, ie G~/g~–m~/M~. That is to say that they are held together by willed acts of loving-kindness, and are virtually devoid of both sexual and romantic Love.

That is not to say that they are devoid of sex, but that when it occurs it is quite likely to represent the satisfaction of a basic physical need, to be therefore closer to lust than love. They may even contain a modicum of Harmony, sufficient to keep things reasonably together for the time being: perhaps as a radial resonance from male-dominated Ordination (organisation).

But there is no way that this sad state of affairs, however well-motivated (and it often involves considerable **self-sacrifice on behalf of spouse and/or children), represents anything approaching that **loss of self for the sake of the Other that is the beginning and continuation of all true Love, in marriage as in religion.

*[See last two previous entries]

**{c[ontra]?}

[ie Quaere: whether these two statements marked ** contradict each other. Probably/possibly not, in that self-sacrifice (at least when seen from the inside) does not, or does not necessarily, amount to loss of self.]

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{Love, Sex and Marriage [continued (3)]}[27th August 1990]

[Redbook7:256][19900827:1050d]{Love, Sex and Marriage [continued (3)]}[27th August 1990]

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[continued]

In terms of Love, this* implies that such a narrow marriage involves the Christian model of loving-kindness at g~, but not ἐρως,** sexual love, at j~, – and not that pure Love which is the first degree of Love, at r~. There are two further implications of this:

(1) that because all truth flows from C, loving-kindness which does not include or flow from pure Love at r~ is essentially a hollow form of Love [sic]; and

(2) that a marriage without a balance of sexual love is incomplete (and also of course likely to cause sexual frustration).

I believe that pure love at r~, or the sector c-r~, or perhaps the movement towards r~ generally, is the basis for romantic love, for ‘falling in love’. While the original intensity of this motivating (ie emotional) force presumably cannot last beyond true*** satisfaction in love, some element of romantic love, which is almost a kind of mutual worship,**** needs also to be incorporated in a full marriage.

*[See last previous journal entry]

**[See last previous journal entry but one, & [Redbook7:250][19900826:1728d]{The Three Loves}[26th August 1990]]

***[‘true’ inserted marginally]

****(ie re C?)

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