Montoya The Theology of Food ~ Eating the Eucharist

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41
Ibid.
42
Ibid.
43
Ibid., 301 2 n. 3. Bulgakov is here citing Johannes Claassen, Baader, 2: 63.
44
Ibid., 104.
96 BEING NOURISHED: FOOD MATTERS
In this sense we can say that the holy food of the Eucharist, the
medicine of immortality & is food, but potentialized food; it
nourishes immortal life, separated from our life by the threshold of
death and resurrection & In this sense we can say that the greatest
Christian sacrament is anticipated by such a simple act of daily life
as eating.45
For Bulgakov, the holy food of the Eucharist is a healing communion.
It is anticipated by a natural consumption of the flesh of a world already
graced by God, and which incorporates humanity into a life of commu-
nion a metaphysical communism with the universe: just as the
Eucharist activates a deeper human incorporation into communion with
God. And at the heart of this communion there is, for Bulgakov, Sophia,
the Wisdom of God that invites and nurtures human desire for a greater
unity with God.
4 The Sophianic Banquet
Sophia is not only crucial for understanding Bulgakov s general philoso-
phy of economy, but also for articulating the relationship between a
Christian understanding of creation and alimentation and particularly
from a perspective of eucharistic nourishment. In this section I will first
provide a brief outline of the figure of Sophia taken from few selected
sapiential texts.46 Given that Sophia is a complex scriptural notion, I do
not offer a thorough analysis, but rather concentrate on the scriptural
relationship between Sophia and God s creation, and in a fashion that
mostly relates to food.47 I will then revisit Bulgakov s articulation of
Sophia with the hope of bringing light to why nourishment is so central
to a Christian eucharistic discourse, as well as for building a theological
ground for a non-dualistic account of Being and materiality.
45
Bulgakov, Philosophy of Economy, 104 5.
46
For further research on biblical wisdom literature see Metzger and Coogan (eds.), The
Oxford Companion to the Bible, 801 3.
47
The main source of inspiration for this biblical reading of Sophia comes from Maurice
Gilbert and Jean-No�l Aletti, La Sagesse et J�sus-Christ (Paris: Editions du Cerf, 1980).
See also John Barton and John Muddiman (eds.), The Oxford Bible Commentary
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001), and Metzger and Coogan (eds.), The Oxford
Companion to the Bible. For a postcolonial reading of Sophia, see Mayra Rivera, God
at the Crossroads: A Postcolonial Reading of Sophia, in Catherine Keller, Michael
Nausner, and Mayra Rivera (eds.), Postcolonial Theologies: Divinity and Empire
(St. Louis, MO: Chalice Press, 2004), 186 203.
BEING NOURISHED: FOOD MATTERS 97
In the Hebrew Scriptures, Sophia is the personification of wisdom, or
hokhmah. At times wisdom means skillfulness, ability, or crafts-
manship in general; at other times, it is an achieved skill for intellectual
penetration and eloquence of speech in particular. Related to intellect
and speech, wisdom could also mean knowledge, insight, and instruc-
tion (an ability to live a disciplined life). In addition, wisdom is a divine
gift that provides a foundation for fear of the Lord. 48 But, more than
a noun, wisdom in the Bible (particularly within the context of wisdom
literature) is personified as a woman. Among her many public roles,
Sophia is depicted as a sister, prophet, wife, counselor, and teacher of
wisdom.49 In the book of Proverbs, for instance, she first appears as a
messenger raising her voice in the streets, crossroads, and public squares,
and at the city gates.50 Mayra Rivera rightly points out that there is
something about Sophia s figure that is perplexing and ambiguous. She
is a woman taking a public stand usually the exclusive domain of
males in a patriarchal society. Also, this strange woman might not be
a native of Israel, but a foreigner, for nobody knows exactly where she
comes from. Rivera also observes how some scholars have noted that
Sophia appears to be the daughter of somebody else s goddess, be it the
Canaanite love goddess Maat, the Semitic mother goddess & the
Hellenized form of a Egyptian goddess Isis. 51 To add to this list of
Sophia s unsettling characteristics, she also appears to be riskily crossing
the border between being a creature and being God. In the book of
Ecclesiasticus, Sophia comes from the mouth of God.52 In the book
of Wisdom, she is portrayed as being with God, a fountain of divine
spirit, and the emanation of the glory of the Almighty & she is a reflection
of the eternal light, untarnished mirror of God s active power, image of
48
See esp. the didactic discourses in Proverbs 1:1 9:18. Most of these descriptions of
Wisdom are taken from K. T. Aitken, Proverbs, in Barton and Muddiman (eds.), The
Oxford Bible Commentary, 405 22.
49
See, Prov. 1:20 33, 7:4, 8:6 10, 14, 31:10.
50
Prov. 1:21, 8:1 3.
51
Rivera, God at the Crossroads, 188. Rivera is here quoting Elizabeth Johnson, She
Who Is: The Mystery of God in Feminist Theological Discourse (New York: Crossroads,
1992), 92. Regarding these possible goddesses influence on the construction of Sophia,
Mary Joan Winn Leith also points out that the biblical figures of the foolish woman,
the seductive/adulterous woman, and the woman who brings about death are Sophia s
counterparts, which may have been used as a deliberate tool to undercut the neighbor
goddesses imagery (see Prov. 2:16, 18 19, 5:3 20, 6:24 35, 7:5 27, 9:13 18). Mary Joan
Winn Leith, Wisdom, in Metzger and Coogan (eds.), The Oxford Companion to the
Bible, 800 1.
52
Ecclus. 24:3.
98 BEING NOURISHED: FOOD MATTERS
his goodness. 53 Sophia stands at the crossroads, at the borders between
male and female, native and foreigner, creature and God, god and goddess. [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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