AT THE ROOTS OF "THE MOST
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The surprisingly high soar in the prostitution rating is a graphic
proof of an acute deficit of morality, typical of the present-day Russian
society. Prostitution, delicately named by the most bashful citizens as
the "services of an intimate nature", now seems to be
counted among quite honourable trades. Newspaper columns are full of this
kind of highly unambiguous advertisements: "Beautiful girls required.
A high remuneration in the hard currency." And we see this as
normal. But why should we worry anyway? That must be the concern of the
beautiful girls' parents. By the way, according to the statistical studies,
"the most ancient of trades" stands third for its prestige in
the eyes of Moscow and St. Petersburg schoolgirls. It is only representatives
of the older generation that are indignant on account of the general immorality.
However, they link up the upsurge of prostitution in Russia exclusively
with the development of market relations, having learned by heart the lesson
about the "pernicious impact of the West".
Prostitution is a social evil of an unbelievable vitality. It is impossible
to fight it, if you don't go to the roots of this phenomenon. And to do
this, you must turn to history. Early in this century, such an attempt
was made by German scholar Johann Bloch, who arrived at an unequivocal
conclusion: the admittance and legalization of prostitution is inseparably
linked up with the humiliation of woman.
The material, presented below, is based on Dr. J.Bloch's book, "A
History of Prostitution". A revised and adapted edition of J. Bloch's
"A History of Prostitution" is included into "A History
of Morals" series.
Prostitution is in a certain sense the sexual intoxication of the humanity,
which is a reaction against the organization and the regulation of the
sexual life in society.
The monetary remuneration, or the payment, was not initially an
essential feature of prostitution. This was pointed out by the Roman
lawyers, who saw as typical features of prostitution the promiscuity,
an indiscriminate sexual mixture in the absence of any individual relationship
between man and woman, and finally, the general, public and unrestricted
satisfaction of the sexual instinct. The economic aspect of the prostitution,
moved to the fore today, is in fact the secondary product of the cultural
evolution, which is of an equal, if not of a greater, importance for marriage.
If no individual marriage existed, the economic moment would never occupy
such a prominent place in the prostitution.
While an unbridled promiscuity, common wives and the community marriage
prevailed in the sexual union of the primordial times, the economic factor
could not play an essential part in the sexual relations. It assumed a
great importance only with the inception of the abduction and the purchase
of wives, as a result of which the concept of an individual ownership and
possession took shape, while formerly women were the common property of
all the clan members.
If we look upon the marriage by way of purchase or upon love as an
object of value, we are bound to find that the refusal from a greater sexual
freedom must also be duly remunerated. If a member of the sexual union
demanded that a certain girl would belong to him alone and would reject
the freedom of the sexual relations with all the rest of the men in the
horde, he should have to pay a certain remuneration for this. Today's money-based
marriage with its "dowry" is just a modern variety of the same
principle: man enjoys an unrestricted freedom in the sexual relations with
women, and he is deprived of it, when he enters a marriage, because of
the bride's dowry, by which she imposes conjugal brakes on him and obliges
him to maintain the marital faithfulness. So today the wife buys a husband,
in the same way as in the past the husband used to buy a wife.
The purchase, which was a way to conclude an ancient marriage, was
undoubtedly the prototype of the payment, received by the prostitutes.
If we call prostitution "a marriage for an hour", this connection
may be easily traced. This briefest "marriage" also has its purchase
price. On the other hand, the remuneration, paid to the prostitute, is
explained by the widely spread custom to pay a monetary fine for the extra-
marital sexual relations. We can also trace the payment for the temporary
sexual relations in the custom of borrowing wives. This custom is a fine
proof that the primordial woman was for her husband just an item of the
property, which he alienated for a time for the sake of the remuneration.
Meanwhile, he saw an unpaid-for use of this item as a violation of the
right of its use; this called forth his anger and presupposed an atonement.
It is here that we must look for the grass roots of jealousy.
Prostitution, the same as the primordial marriage through purchase
and the modern money-based marriage, implies the woman's lack of freedom
and of independence. The same as in a marriage through purchase, in the
prostitution, too, the woman's personal valuableness is suppressed-woman
is seen here as a capital, as a commodity like all other commodities.
Prostitution is Janus-faced: its one face is turned to nature and
the other-to culture. However, the primitive instinct is not linked
up with the prostitution by a natural need and can be satisfied outside
of it. The actual evil of the prostitution, its negative, destructive
aspect, if you take a close look at it, proves to be a vestige of the ancient
culture.
SOCIAL PREREQUISITES OF THE ANCIENT PROSTITUTION
The ancient prostitution developed on the basis of dualism between
a strict forcible monogamic marriage, on the one hand, and an unimaginable
sexual freedom of men, on the other. It is worth mentioning that in Homer's
times women knew almost nothing about prostitution, in spite of the proved
polygamy and a comparatively great freedom they enjoyed. It is only
after the firm enforcement of the patriarchal monogamy and the restriction
of the married women's activity to the home alone as a result of this,
that prostitution made its appearance.
The Greek marriage was mainly aimed at the birth of handsome and healthy
children and at making women keep the house. The individual love between
the spouses was of no significance. The Greek marriage was always that
of convenience in the worst sense of the word. Material considerations
were of decisive importance. The woman's state of health and the other
characteristics, essential for reproduction, were also taken into account.
This resulted in a complete subjugation of women in the family and in their
alienation from all men's interests outside of the home.
The Roman marriage was much closer to its modern variety because of
the greater freedom and respect, enjoyed by the Roman matrons. However,
here, too, the main goal was the childbirth. The future spouses seldom
knew each other before the marriage. Still, women were relatively independent.
A wide spread of the prostitution in Rome in the 3rd century B.C. should
be almost exclusively ascribed to the Greek influence and not to the Roman
way of the family life.
The contrast between the stringent principles of the Greek and the
Roman legislation on the extra-marital sexual relations with the married
and the unmarried female citizens, on the one hand, and with the prostitutes,
on the other, is really striking. It makes us see the ancient prostitution
as the reverse and necessary side of the marriage or as the safeguard of
the "sexual honour" of the women of a certain class.
All the Greek laws permitted revenge for the seduction of one's mother,
sister, daughter and even concubine. The culprit, caught red-handed, could
be killed on the spot. In Rome, the husband, who had caught his wife in
the act of adultery, had the right to kill her and to do anything he liked
with the guilty man (to kill or castrate him, to mutilate his nose, etc.).
Such cruel legislation in itself pushed men into the sexual relations with
the prostitutes, as the most convenient way to abide by the laws.
PROSTITUTION'S ROLE IN THE ANCIENTS' SOCIAL LIFE
The views on prostitution in those times and its importance in the
ancient life rely on an erroneous, false principle of the dual morality.
On the one hand, they emphasize the necessity and the expediency of prostitution
for the social regulation of the sexual life: prostitution has an important
role to play in society and in the state. On the other hand, it occupies
the lowest rung of the social life ladder and is branded with the stamp
of infamy and disgrace, with the gravest legal and social consequences
ensuing for its servants.
The fact that the prostitutes played a much bigger role in the ancients'
social life than the honest hostess or the daughter of the house, whose
duties were limited to the domestic sphere, stands in flagrant contradiction
with the social contempt of the prostitutes. The wives and daughters of
the Greek families lived in complete seclusion from the outer world, the
same as in the Orient, and were not educated either in mental or in artistic
terms. Such education was available only to the women, who led a public
life, which in Greece spelled public dissoluteness), i.e., only to the
hetaeras, prostitute dancers and prostitute musicians.
The prostitute, or haetera, was really a "public" woman.
She alone was of consequence in society. She alone enjoyed the right to
take part in the symposia. She alone could be the subject and the object
of conversation. The prostitute alone was a real companion of man in
the social life. And the only merit of an "honest" woman was
to be silent and to lead such a secluded life that nobody could utter a
single word about her. This contradiction is the product of the dual
morality. The ancient world has not resolved it; the contemporary world
has not succeeded in this either. And if we wish to overcome and resolve
this contradiction, we must study its roots.
THE SEXUAL QUESTION IN ANCIENT TIMES
In the ancient times, the sexual life, on the one hand, had a religious
hue: it was dedicated to a deity and was seen as holy, which was manifest
in the religious prostitution and in the phallic cults and symbols. On
the other hand, there is an opposite view, according to which the sexual
life is seen as something dirty, unworthy of the deity, and so its official
envoys on the earth, the priests and the priestesses, are obliged to stay
chaste.
We find the contraposition of the clean and the dirty, of the soul
and the body as far back as in the Greek mythology. Very illustrative in
this respect is the concept of the heavenly and the earthly goddess of
love-of Aphrodite Urania and Aphrodite Pandemos. These religious concepts
were closely adhered to in the philosophical studies, which exerted a great
impact on the development of dualism between the "flesh" and
the "spirit". In particular, Plato evolved a theory of the heavenly
and the earthly Eros. He was the first proponent of the theory of the transformation,
the sublimation of the sexual processes into spiritual phenomena; later,
it was developed by Nietzsche and by Freud. According to Plato, all genuine
creativity is connected with the sexuality. But he considered the purely
physical manifestation of the sexual instinct to be of less value than
its spiritual essence. This is probably explained by the Greeks' aversion
to any victory of the sexual over the reasonable, to any suppression of
the Reason, which is particularly manifest in the sexual act. Plato called
the sex organs "rebellious and self-willed, like an animal, which
would not listen to Reason"; they "are trying to subjugate everything
to their wild lust". Hippocrates called the sexual act "a
mild epilepsy" in order to emphasize the temporary loss of consciousness
during it.
In the later period of the antiquity, widely current became the concept
of the sexual life as something dirty and sinful, and almost hostile to
nature. Two rather important phenomena resulted from this view, which since
that time prevail in the relationships between the opposite sexes: we are
speaking of the sexual hypocrisy, on the one hand, and of the contempt
of women, or misogyny, on the other. Misogyny, or the woman-hatred,
is largely a product of the Greek culture and is connected with the complete
exclusion of women from the public life and with a long-record opinion
that the female nature is an evil in itself.
Such disrespect of women was initially alien to the Romans; however,
here too, under the influence of the Greek literature and philosophy, misogyny,
like an all-consuming poison, permeated society and finally contaminated
the newly-emerged doctrine of Christianity.
The close link between Christianity and Hellenism and the Greek culture
was exposed in the latest theological and historico-philosophical studies.
Presently, we can confidently interpret Christianity as an integral component
part of the antiquity. On the other hand, we must not forget that the ancient
impacts told only in the times of Apostles and in the subsequent evolution
of the Christian doctrine and cult, while Christianity's grass roots lie
in Judaism: Jesus himself was a Jew and resolutely upheld the Judaistic
theory of unity between the divine essence and love of one's neighbour.
The joy, felt on account of the birth of man into the world and the
joy on account of children presupposes the assertion of the sexual life.
That is why Jesus looks upon woman without any prejudice, without any ascetic-misogynist
trend, as upon a natural companion in life, entitled (to a certain extent)
to equal rights with men. Jesus built an ideal marriage on the divine law:
on the basis of the complete mutuality, aimed at the inseparability of
the family life.
Speaking about the sexual ethics of Jesus, we must refer to His attitude
to the prostitutes and the extra-marital sexual relations, which at that
time were widely spread among the Jews, too. The fine scenes from the Gospel
according to St. John (8; 3-11) and to St. Luke (7; 36-50) demonstrate
Jesus' genuinely human, unprejudiced view of prostitution: "He
that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her."
"Neither do I condemn thee: go, and sin no more".
But has Christianity, in its struggle against prostitution, followed
the road, shown it by Jesus? Since the moment when the Apostles announced
the Christ's doctrine to the Greko- Roman world, and when the traditions
of classicism came out in full ammunition against the simple teaching of
Jesus, rendered in simple words, reaction has started its all-out onslaught
in this sphere.
Subsequently the entire Christian sexual ethics were permeated with
the Hellenistic spirit, and the initial views underwent a change towards
recognizing the dual morality and misogyny, prevailing in the antiquity,
and towards consolidating the principles of ascetism and of branding the
sexual life. The Church doctrine saw woman as an unclean element and
a sexual temptation. Misogyny was called to instil not only contempt
of the individual love but a sheer dread of woman in general. This
branding of woman as the carrier of the sexual essence and the instilling
of the fear of her serve to explain the specific features of the Christian
witchcraft mania and of the witch-hunt.
In the Islam we find the same situation as in Christianity: under the
impact of the views and customs, borrowed from the antiquity, the more
noble ethical-sexual concepts were modified towards an ever deeper disrespect
of woman. All the students and researchers of the Arab culture history
and of the Islam agree that woman was held high and enjoyed a vast freedom
among the Arabs before Mohammed, while prostitution was not, and could
not be, spread so widely as afterwards.
The personality of the Arabian prophet Mohammed, known for his exceptional
sexuality, is as far distanced from the asexual Jewish founder of Christianity,
as the sky from the earth. Mohammed's love of women is noted for its sexuality
and is deprived of any lofty view or any high estimate of the female essence.
He sees woman as a "field" for her husband: "Your
wives are your field; go to your field whenever you like."
Such a view of women as an object of amorous pleasures alone precluded
a high individual assessment of woman and assigned to her a lower position
compared with man.
Though an object of pleasure, woman is in the eyes of a Moslem the
source of dirt, so after touching her the true Believers must wash up,
like after a visit to a lavatory. The Moslems believe that woman is related
to Satan and to the Hell. The fettered position and the sexual slavery
of the Mahommedan woman is seen from the fact that she alone is punished
for adultery and also from the strict instructions that women should be
kept apart from men. Here we see the emergence of the harem imprisonment,
which had such a dipraving effect upon the entire female half of the Mahommedan
world, and upon the male half as well.
The prohibition of prostitution, pronounced in the Koran, and the branding
of the prostitutes were of little consequence, however, because in the
final end the Arab men, like once upon the time the Greeks, sought the
pleasures, which they could not receive from the enslaved harem women,
among the prostitutes-the only "public" women.
All the aspirations and ideas of the antiquity, aimed against prostitution,
could not bring about a radical sexual reform, not only because they were
not systematically interlinked and not homogeneous, but also because they
had sprouted on the old soil of the dual morality, different for men and
for women, rooted in the enslavement and in the regular suppression of
woman.
A profound and surprising revelation of the link between the humiliation
of woman and prostitution, and the realization of the insufficiency of
any governmental regulation and of any tolerance of the vocational profligacy,
as well as of the destructive impact of the legalization of profligacy
on the social life may be found in Dio Chrysostom of Prusa, a rhethorician
of the first age of Christianity: "One cannot be indifferent, when
speaking of those, who maintain prostitution and the prostitutes. No ruler
and no legislator should permit or regulate this trade by legislation.
It is very important to take care that the criminal abuse of the body of
contemptible people and of slaves were not looked upon in complacence and
aloofness, first of all because the Heavenly Father has created every one
human being as worthy of respect and of equal rights, and everybody carries
in himself the features, showing that he is in all justice worthy of respect
and is capable of understanding what is moral and what is immoral; and
also because it is difficult to put an obstacle in the way of the impudence,
enormously expanded because of our own indulgence, which it would not dare
to overcome for fear. By habitually practising the permitted things,
the impudence turns into an unbridled force and power, and henceforth it
will leave nothing untouched."
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