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Tuesday, May 12, 2009

amazing definition of 'erotic'

'Everything that is distinctively human gets formulated in our prayers:
our pathos, our nobility, our creativity. Also, interestingly, everything that is disreputable in us--lust, avarice, pride. pettiness--disguises itself in prayer in order, if possible, to get us credit instead of shame. But either way, whether in disguise or reality, prayers show us at our best.

Except for the Psalms. The psalms set their faces against this lush eroticism, this rank jungle growth of desire seeking fulfillment..

The erotic ( our human pathos, nobility, and creativity seeking for that which it does not have) is not absent from the Psalms. It would not be possible to have authentically human speech here without it; but it is not encouraged--it is wrestled into obedience."

-Eugene Peterson, Answering God: The Psalms as Tools for Prayer pp 6-7

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