Erasmus' voluminous writings give us a clear
image of his attitudes towards sex in general and homosexuality in particular.
It is a remarkably modern, tolerant view. He rejects the common belief that
chastity is morally superior to marriage. What is important, in his eyes, is
integrity: priestly vows of chastity should either be abolished or enforced.
Romance, love, and marriage are good and healthy things, but sexual pleasure
should not be the purpose of marriage, only an incidental benefit of the
necessity of procreation. Erasmus' descriptions of sexuality might best be
described as "naughty"; I'm sure his readers would smile (but not
guffaw) at the liberties he sometimes took. But his treatment of homosexuality
was certainly less easygoing. His work with the Adages, presenting classical
expressions and turns of phrase, often forced him to explain homosexual
references. In every case, he writes with embarrassed delicacy and occasional
explicit disapproval. For example, in the De Copia, Erasmus presents an example
of a writing technique with this quotation from Cicero:
"When
a military tribune, a relative of the commander, indecently assaulted a soldier
in the army of Gaius Marius, he was slain by the one to whom he offered
violence. For the virtuous youth preferred to act dangerously rather than
submit shamefully, and that great hero set him free, absolved of crime."
In the Apophthegmata, Erasmus takes several
opportunities to editorialize on the nature of love. Commenting on a saying of
Socrates, Erasmus observes that a lover seeks to derive personal pleasure from
his partner, while a friend seeks to make his partner ever better.
Of course, classical civilization celebrated
homosexuality; inasmuch as the dividing line between content and style can be
blurred, it should come as no surprise that Erasmus' writing occasionally
reflects this classical outlook.
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