Miley Cyrus and the Picture of Dorian Gray


Earlier this week, on some ridiculous award show, people witnessed the meltdown of a 20 year old girl, Miley Cyrus.  We have all seen the snippets of her pathetic performance.  It wasn’t so much offensive as it was tremendously sad.  I am not defending her but she must be terrified.  While most people hit their maximum income earning potential in their 40’s, Miley is living her life knowing that she has already passed her expiration date before her 21st birthday. 

This girl’s implicit debasement of her body put me in mind of an article by Rabbi Hyim Shafner.  The Rabbi writes both a blog and a column for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.  Like many people who make faith their line of work, he is wise, comforting and offers a kinder and gentler look at many of the world’s ills.  On Saturday, July 9, 2011 he had a column entitled, “Framing Physical Beauty in a New Light.”  He postulated that physical, relational and spiritual beauty are all fundamentally connected.  Rabbi Shafner advocates, “…not jettisoning the physical for something deeper but seeing it in a new light, illuminated by the person himself.”  He thinks we should neither ignore, nor deny the sexuality of our being, or physical attraction, but instead fold them in to the context of the whole person.  He wants us to see not just biology, but humanity, and all the best things that stands for.

He talks about the Biblical story of Sarah, who at 66 is described as physically beautiful—so beautiful, in fact, that Abraham is afraid she may be appropriated by Pharaoh as a concubine.  Rabbi Shafner’s raises two points.  First, Abraham was probably seeing his wife through the eyes of love.  But, even more powerfully, Sarah looked and behaved like a woman who knows her worth on a level far deeper than the surface of her skin.  Sarah is a good woman who knows how to love life, her husband and herself.  That is a trifecta hard to beat in any age. 

            I think Rabbi Shafner would be a good nudist.  What is more, I think visiting a few nudist parks would reinforce the argument he makes in his article.  Social nudism celebrates a natural lifestyle safe from the objectification of a world too preoccupied with the body and not enough with the mind, heart and soul.  Nudists certainly don’t deny their sexuality.  But we do see nudity as just the top layer in a much more complicated picture.  To us, a nude body is no more related to sexuality than a scale of notes is to a cantata.  We are too comfortable in our own skin to see ourselves as something to be bought, sold, traded or used in any way.

The best built man in the world is just a jumble of rocks without character and humility.  The most beautiful woman becomes a hollow and tinny echo chamber when what comes from her mouth is lewd, rude or malicious.  We have all seen people who we originally thought were beautiful who then said something so outrageous that our entire picture of them contorted before our eyes.  Everyone’s soul is like the picture of Dorian Gray.  It shows who we really are.  All the goodness shines through and all the corruption blots out the light.  Maybe that is why some people are beautiful at 90 and others seem, “used up” at 20.  As nudists we very quickly learn how to look below the layers of superficiality and into the soul. 

Learn to love yourself a little more, Miley, and keep the faith.

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