Chapter 20

Incarnation as Embodiment

The central fact of Christianity is the Incarnation, literally “the taking on flesh”
by God. The result of God’s embodiment, Christianity claims, is Jesus Christ.
Yet, in the long history of Christian hermeneutics, the Incarnation is hardly
ever addressed as embodiment. It may be that the early influence of Platonic
and Neo-Platonic philosophy contributed to this. Plato, for example, asserted
that “the philosopher more than other men frees the soul from association
with the body” (“Phaedo” 65a). This is because the body is taken as the realm of
error. In Plato’s words, the philosopher frees “himself as far as possible from …
the whole body, because the body confuses the soul and does not allow it to ac-
quire truth” (“Phaedo” 66a).1 We can see the same prejudice in Descartes, who
writes that it is not through our bodily senses, but through “the understanding
alone” that we attain truth.2 These philosophical positions are matched by an
extended history of Christian asceticism emphasizing the denial of the body.
Yet to assert, as Christians do, that “the Word became flesh” is to claim that
God, himself, became embodied. This implies that, to understand the Incar-
nation, we have to understand embodiment. Since the Incarnation is also an
intertwining, we must grasp embodiment in terms of this. The task, in other
words, is to interpret the Incarnation in terms of the intertwining definitive of
embodiment.

Embodiment as Intertwining

By definition, to embody is to incarnate or enflesh. As such, it means to provide

a place for the presence of the embodied. For sentient beings, this is to give it
a place for its appearing. This can be put in terms of Merleau-Ponty’s asser-
tion that “our flesh lines and even envelops all the visible and tangible things”
through its bodily senses.3 This lining, which is an incarnation, allows them to
appear to us. Does this mean that the color that we see is only in the eye or that
the sound that we hear is just in the ear? What prevents us from saying this
is that embodiment, as providing a place of presence, is always twofold. The

1 “Phaedo” in Plato, Five Dialogues, p. 101.

2 Meditations on First Philosophy, p. 30.
3 The Visible and the Invisible, p. 123.

© koninklijke brill nv, leiden, 2018 | doi 10.1163/9789004375840_022

Incarnation as Embodiment 301

embodiment that allows the world to come to presence in our flesh positions
us in the world. The result is an intertwining taken as a reciprocal placing: a
being placed in what one is placed in. Such placing is also a reciprocal disclo-
sure. Our embodied selfhood does not only allow the world to appear to us;
selfhood, as embodied can also be examined as part of the world. It appears,
is present, as part of the world that appears both to us and to other sentient
beings.
Given that appearing presupposes twofold embodiment taken as a double
placing, the beings that appear have to be understood in terms of it. This means
that the world that appears and the embodied selfhood to whom it appears are
essentially intertwined. As such, neither is intelligible without the other. Thus,
we cannot understand the world’s being in us except in terms of our being in
the world, and vice versa. This implies that color exists neither in the eye nor
in the colored object, but rather in the intertwining of the two. It is neither
inside nor outside of us; its reality is, rather, constituted through the intertwin-
ing of the inside and the outside. The same holds for our body, which as our
body, is both internal and external, both a place of disclosure and a disclosed
object. The body, itself, is structured by the intertwining of both sides. Accord-
ing to Merleau-Ponty, at work here is “a relation of the visible with itself that
traverses me and constitutes me as a seer.”4 This relation involves more than
the form of our embodied selfhood. What we confront here, Merleau-Ponty
writes, is “the formative medium of the object and the subject,” which means
that “we must think of it … as an element, as the concrete emblem of a general
manner of being.”5 The “manner” is the world-form of being’s appearing. This
form (which is that of the intertwining) both informs our own bodily appear-
ing and determines our body’s role in the appearing of the world. The relation
between our embodiment and this general manner of being can be specified
by saying that our embodiment, as an instance of the intertwining, is the con-
dition of the possibility of our knowing this world-form—knowing it as the
rule, of which our embodiment is a particular instantiation. Reciprocally, the
world-form is the condition of the possibility of the being of our embodiment
as a place of disclosure.
If the reality of what appears is constituted by the intertwining, then we
avoid the question of the remainder. This is the question: what is the entity in
itself, once we subtract the categories that we impose on it? The question as-
sumes that our categories only serve to conceal the entity in itself. If we pursue

4 Ibid.
5 The Visible and the Invisible, p. 147.
302 Chapter 20

this Kantian line of reasoning, we are left with the thing as an empty “X.”6 It be-
comes an essentially unknowable referent of our thought. We can, Kant claims,
only “think” or intend this referent; we cannot really “know” it.7 To know it, we
would have to grasp it in terms of its inherent categories. If, however, the inter-
twining is a world-form, then the question of inherent categories is moot. The
very presence that allows us to say that something exists or “stands-out” from
its environment is unthinkable apart from the intertwining.

Incarnation as Intertwining

Given that the Incarnation is an embodiment, it should exhibit the reciprocal

disclosure that characterizes embodiment. The intertwining allows us to say
that “the world and I are within one another” and that each side appears in
terms of the other. Christianity does, in fact, have texts that express this rela-
tion in theological terms. St. Anselm of Canterbury, for example, describes the
Incarnation as follows: “The whole universe was created by God, and God was
born of Mary. God created all things, and Mary gave birth to God. The God who
made all things gives himself form through Mary, and thus he made his own
creation” as part of the world.8 Thus, given that Mary gave birth to God, we have
to say that God is in Mary. Mary, however, was created by God. She is in God’s
creation. God’s being in Mary in the person of Jesus is, therefore, his being in
the world he creates, the very world that is within God as his creative concep-
tion. Anselm’s description recalls the account that we find in the Gospel of
John. To Philip’s demand, “Show us the Father,” Jesus answers “Anyone who has
seen me has seen the Father.” The claim is that God is present in the world as
Jesus himself. We find the assertion of the intertwining when Jesus challenges
Philip, “How can you say ‘show us the Father’? Do you not believe that I am in
the Father and the Father is in me?” (John 14:8–10).9 This claim, which appears
here as a question, is later repeated as a definite assertion (14:11).
If God is in Jesus, then to see Jesus is to see God. Jesus, in other words, is the
place where God is disclosed. The same holds if Jesus is in God. God would

6 Kant, Critique of Pure Reason, A250.

7 See Kant, ibid., B110–111.
8 Oratio 52, Ad sanctum virginem Mariam, in Patriologia Latina, ed. Jacques-Paul Migne, Paris,
1862, vol. 158, p. 956. An English translation can also be found in The Liturgy of the Hours (New
York: Catholic Book Publishing Company, 1975), vol. 1, p. 1229.
9 Unless otherwise noted, the translations from the Bible are taken from The Revised English
Bible with the Apocrypha (Avon: Bath Press, 1989).
Incarnation as Embodiment 303

be the place where Jesus is disclosed. The world-form of the intertwining de-
mands this reciprocal disclosure. The reality that is set by it is the being-in-the-
world of that which is disclosed. For Merleau-Ponty and Husserl, the premier
example of this is, as we saw, that of hand touching hand. The touching hand
reveals the touched hand as a touched object, an object among other tangible
objects that are part of the world that is disclosed by touch. The touching hand
does this by bringing the touched to presence within itself. The touched hand,
insofar as it senses its being touched, is not just a tangible body, but an em-
bodied sensing, a place of presence. As such, it also places the touching hand
within the same tangible world. Both hands thus serve as places of disclosure
for the other. In the back and forth of their disclosive intertwining they reveal
themselves as parts of an incarnate subject. Each displays its inherent identity
as part of an embodied sensing, that is, as a place of presence within the world.
In the theological parallel, God as a subject can initially be thought of as the
touching hand that brings the touched hand to presence. God as object can be
thought of as the hand that is touched. Sensing its being touched, the touched
hand brings the touching hand to presence within itself. It also becomes a sub-
ject. As a subject, God, initially, is the Father; as an object, he is the Son. As
God-incarnate, he exists as the intertwining of the two. As embodied, his iden-
tity is analogous to that of the animate body.
To see the Biblical parallel to this view, we must first note the opposition
between what may be called the earthly and heavenly economies. By the for-
mer, is meant that system of exchange whereby our flesh maintains itself in
the world. Our bodily metabolism with its organic needs is an example of this
economy; so are our normal, everyday commercial transactions. They point to
our dependence on the world, i.e., to the fact that as embodied we live only
through a constant process of exchange with it. As self-directed, our freedom
expresses this dependence. The heavenly economy dispenses with this quid
pro quo. Transcending it, this economy manifests action without reciprocity.
The paradigm here is the act of creation. To assert that God created the world
from nothing is to claim that the freedom of his creative action cannot have
worldly constraints or conditions. He is both prior to and independent of the
world he creates. His creative act thus transcends the world’s economy. It is an
act of free generosity. The heavenly economy that manifests this thus exceeds
the economy of the world. Ontologically, it transcends the categories of cre-
ated being. Morally, is consists of free acts of selfless generosity.
God’s incarnation is his entrance into the earthly economy; it is his as-
sumption of flesh, both in its needs and vulnerabilities. This is the flesh that
is hungry and thirsty, that is subject to the assaults of the world. As such, it
is the flesh that is capable of suffering and dying on the Cross. Entering into
304 Chapter 20

the earthly economy, God exhibits himself as Jesus. Jesus, thus, becomes the
place of his disclosure as human. Intertwined with this presence of God in
Jesus is the presence of Jesus in God. The Incarnation is, thus, also Jesus’s entry
into the heavenly economy. It is his exhibition as divine. Here, flesh reveals
itself as more-than-flesh. This more-than-flesh that is revealed by flesh is flesh
as exceeding the categories of created being. It is Jesus’s being more than the
abandoned wretch that dies on the Cross. It is the flesh that is capable of resur-
rection. The entrance into the heavenly economy also expresses itself in the
deeds of Jesus. He says to his disciples, “Believe me that I am in the Father and
the Father is in me; or else accept the evidence of the deeds themselves” (John
14:11). Here, all his acts of unselfish generosity come into play: his feeding the
multitudes, his curing the sick, and his raising the dead.
A related way to think about Jesus’s entrance into the heavenly economy
is in terms of his being in the Holy Spirit. This is the Spirit that descended on
him after his baptism by John (Luke 3:21–22). John recognizes him by its pres-
ence. He says, “I did not know him; but he who sent me to baptize in water
had told me, ‘The man on whom you see the Spirit descending and abiding …
is God’s Chosen One’” (John 1:33–34). The nature of John’s recognition can be
seen by noting that the Holy Spirit or holy breath πνεῦµα ἅγιον refers back to
God’s creative breath (ruah).10 This is the breath that hovered over the waters
as he began creation (Genesis 1:2). It is also the breath God breathes into Ad-
am’s nostrils to make him a living being (Genesis 2:7). God expends this breath
when he says, “Let there be ...” pronouncing the name of what is to be created
or made alive. As God says to Moses, explaining why the Sabbath or seventh
day is holy, “Between myself and the sons of Israel the Sabbath is a sign forever,
since in six days God made the heavens and the earth, but on the seventh day
he rested and drew breath” (Ex, 31:17).11 This drawing in of breath is a comple-
ment to God’s expending breath on the first six days of creation. The fact that
such breath abides with Jesus means that he possesses its creative generosity.
Exhibiting it, he manifests his being in God. God becomes the place of Jesus’s
disclosure as divine.
In John’s Gospel, the concept of intertwining is not limited to the relation
of Jesus to the Father. It is also extended to his disciples. Thus, the Spirit that
witnesses Jesus’s presence in God will also be sent to his disciples after Jesus’s
death (John 14: 16–17). Announcing this, Jesus adds: “When that day comes,

10 On the relation between πνεῦµα ἅγιον and ruah, see James Mensch, The Beginning of the
Gospel According to Saint John: Philosophical Reflections (New York: Peter Lang, 1992), pp.
64–67.
11 Jerusalem Bible (Garden City, New York: Doubleday and Company, 1966), p. 118.
Incarnation as Embodiment 305

you will know that I am in my Father, and you in me and I in you” (John 14:20).
They too will share God’s creative breath. They will also, by being in Jesus, be
in God. What this means is expressed by Jesus when he tells them that “he
who has faith in me will do what I am doing, indeed, he will do greater things
still” (John 14:12). Thus, Jesus acts to feed the hungry. Those who believe in
him, will do likewise. They will also give drink to the thirsty, clothe the naked,
welcome the stranger, and visit those in prison. Doing so, they will participate
in the intertwining of Jesus and God. Jesus and, hence, God will be their place
of disclosure. Being in Jesus and hence in God, they will be disclosed as such
in their generosity to those whose situation prevents them from offering them
any worldly recompense. As a complement to this, Jesus will be in them. Just
as God in Jesus manifested his human vulnerability, so Jesus in us will manifest
himself in our needs and vulnerabilities. Matthew puts this in terms of the
second coming. Jesus, when he comes again, will admit into his kingdom those
who fed him when he was hungry, who gave him drink when he was thirsty,
who clothed him when he was naked, who made him welcome when he was
a stranger and visited him when he was in prison. When asked by the elect,
“When did we do this?” he will reply that it was when they did it “to one of the
very least” of society—i.e., to those who had no possibility of recompensing
them (Matthew 25:33–40). The notion of the intertwining makes it clear that
the object of their action is Jesus in us. In Paul’s terms, their intertwining with
Christ makes them part of the body of Christ. The tenderness that the body
shows to itself is manifested in the compassion of those who believe in Christ.
These examples could be multiplied. Their point, however, is clear. It is that
we can understand the embodiment of God through embodiment as such, in
particular, through the intertwining that constitutes its reality. In John’s Gos-
pel, the reality of God incarnate is given by the intertwining of God, Jesus, and
ourselves. When we interpret it in this way, the Incarnation refers us back to
the alterity that we ourselves are. We are both bound and unbound, we are
vulnerable and determined, but also capable of acts of spontaneous creative
generosity, acts that allow us to exceed the earthly economy. This, then, is the
“clue” to our ontological condition offered by the account of Christianity.
The question that remains is: how does this condition express itself in our
contemporary social and political context? This context is one where the ac-
count of Christianity has largely been replaced by that of modern science. Un-
der its pressure, not only has the conception of the sacred been reduced to the
margins of our culture, the concept of embodiment has also been transformed.
Medical science understands it in terms of biological functions that can be un-
derstood and manipulated to achieve desired ends. The impulse to the sacred,
understood as the unconditioned or unlimited, has become, correspondingly,
306 Chapter 20

an impulse towards the unlimited mastery that technical science seems to af-
ford us over the processes of life itself. What do such beliefs imply with regard
to the transcendence that is part of our being alive, the transcendence that is
inherent in the intertwining that defines us? The question concerns our self-
hood and our representation of the transcendence that defines it. Is this a pos-
sible or impossible representation?