The Creation of Man and Woman

A Study of the Biblical and Patristic Teaching on the Origins and Nature of Sexuality, focussing especially on the Genesis account of the Creation of Man and Woman.

1988

The creation accounts (Gen 1-2) coupled with the portrayal of disruption and divine judgment presented in Gen 3 have been described as of seminal character and determinative for a biblical theology of human sexuality. In a previous article we focused upon the theology of sexuality in the creation accounts. Now we will explore the theological insights on sexuality emerging from Gen 3. Two basic issues related to sexuality call for our attention in Gen 3. The first concerns the contention by some scholars that Adam and Eve's "knowledge of good and evil" and their knowledge "that they were naked" (3:5, 7) both refer to the awakening of their sexual consciousness. The second issue involves the debate over the correct interpretation of the divine judgment on Eve (3:16).

HTS Teologiese Studies/Theological Studies, 2021

1990

Journal of Sex Research, 2008

The emergence of the ‘human’ from hominidae, and of ‘human nature’ from nature, must surely have involved the emergence of a human sexuality from a ‘natural’ sexuality. Paradigms rooted in Christian theology and Darwinian evolution have precluded the conceptual separation of human sex/uality from reproduction, and have therefore prevented social anthropologists from engaging usefully with the human origins debate. A distinctly human sexuality, however, can be clearly distinguished from the sex/uality of other mammals by re-envisioning sex as a distinct form of social action/agency, and by recognising that, for humans, sex and reproduction are different forms of (social) action, even as they are often culturally conflated. Many Enlightenment debates revolved around the utility and rationale for ‘marriage’ as a sort of proxy for human sexuality, even as they necessarily failed to grasp the significance of the sexual. I argue that the emergence of a specifically human sexuality, together with tool-making, fire, language, etc., in the original human skill set, was one of the enabling conditions for the emergence of humanity per se. If the emergence of a distinctly human, culturally-configured sexuality can be seen as part of the original human skill set, then sex (as social action) had already separated itself from reproduction (and therefore natural selection). This perspective allows social anthropology to re-enter the discussion of human origins, and provides new perspectives on the relation between sex, religion, and human evolution.

Yearbook of Physical Anthropology

The aim of this review is to put core features of human sexuality in an evolutionary light. Toward that end, I address five topics concerning the evolution of human sexuality. First, I address theoreticalfoundations, including recent critiques and developments. While much traces back to Darwin and his view of sexual selection, more recent work helps refine the theoretical bases to sex differences and life history allocations to mating effort. Second, I consider central models attempting to specify the phylogenetic details regarding how hominin sexuality might have changed, with most of those models honing in on transitions from a possible chimpanzee-like ancestor to the slightly polygynous and long-term bonded sociosexual partnerships observed among most recently studied hunter-gatherers. Third, I address recent genetic and physiological data contributing to a refined understanding of human sexuality. As examples, the availability of rapidly increasing genomic information aids comparative approaches to discern signals of selection in sexuality-related phenotypes, and neuroendocrine studies of human responses to sexual stimuli provide insight into homologous and derived mechanisms. Fourth, I consider some of the most recent, large, and rigorous studies of human sexuality. These provide insights into sexual behavior across other national samples and on the Internet. Fifth, I discuss the relevance of a life course perspective to understanding the evolution of human sexuality. Most research on the evolution of human sexuality focuses on young adults. Yet humans are sexual beings from gestation to death, albeit in different ways across the life course, and in ways that can be theoretically couched within life history theory.

Reproductive BioMedicine Online, 2009