A Rabbinical Lesson and the Picture of Dorian Gray

Rabbi Hyim Shafner wrote 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.  He once had a column entitled, “Framing Physical Beauty in a New Light.”  In it, he postulates that physical, relational and spiritual beauty are fundamentally connected.  As he says, “…not jettisoning the physical for something deeper but seeing it in a new light, illuminated by the person themselves.”  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 talks about the first Jewish woman, Sarah, who at 66 is described as physically beautiful.  She is so beautiful, in fact, that Abraham is afraid she may be appropriated by Pharaoh as a concubine and kill him to get her.  His point is that Abraham was probably seeing his wife through the eyes of love, but also that Sarah looked and behaved like a woman who knows her worth on a level far deeper 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 such thinkers make good nudists.  What is more, I think visiting a few nudist parks would reinforce the argument he makes in his article.  Nudists don’t deny their sexuality.  Let’s face it folks, we are hardwired to do three things: to eat, to not be eaten, and to pass on our DNA.  That means that the desire to reproduce (in the case of mammals that is a sexual act) is born into us.  We can’t take out what God put in.  But we do see nudity as just one thin part of 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. 

            Nudists are more than just people who don’t like to do laundry.  [Since we always carry and sit on our own towel at a nudist parks that actually amounts to a fair amount of wash, but at least it is easy to fold.]  We are people totally comfortable with ourselves, warts, scars, cellulite and all.  When you are totally nude you are totally vulnerable.  To know that you can be totally accepted at your most vulnerable is an empowering moment.  It also means that we are the least body conscious people in the country. It may be hard to understand but we just don’t care.  It is what you are from the neck up that counts.   

            In an age where much of what is considered beautiful is provided by Hollywood, the media and Barbie dolls, Rabbi Shafner’s thinking is the kind that needs examination and exposure.  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 whom we originally thought were beautiful only to hear them say something so outrageous that our entire picture of them contorts before our eyes.  Everyone’s character is like the picture of Dorian Gray.  It shows who we really are.  All the good that we do 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 35.  As nudists we very quickly learn how to look below the layers of superficiality and into the eyes of the soul.

            Visit a nudist park this summer, you’ll keep the faith.