Chastity is Antiquated

A subscription to chastity has long been considered a virtue. The main proponents of keeping chastity a virtue died centuries ago and chastity has fallen from the philosophical debate in recent times. However, the issue is still relevant. In the United States, religious groups claim an increase in promiscuity and decry promiscuity as an immoral act. Aristotle contemplated virtues that should be promoted for human flourishing. Religious literature asserted that chastity should be included as one such virtue. When compared to other examples of temperance, chastity is shown to be excessively taxing on self-restraint and deficient in causing good, promoting other virtues, and encouraging human flourishing. Religious literature incorrectly portrays chastity as an Aristotelian virtue that exercises temperance.

Aristotle[1] defined a moral virtue as a state of character instead of a passion or a faculty[2]. This means that a virtue is a character trait that is demonstrated to the outside observer by repetition and promotes general welfare. Aristotle proposed that a virtue is the choice of the "intermediate between excess and defect,"[3] or, the middle ground between two extremes. He narrowed his definition by claiming that all virtues must include temperance (the triumph of rationality over natural urges) lest they "be destroyed by defect and excess."[4] For example, if honesty is to be considered a virtue it is easy to see that too little honesty yields a liar and too much honesty yields a gossip or even a Judas. A modicum of temperance must be practiced. Aristotle allows that each individual may have their own relative ideal moral proportions of a trait in order for it to be virtuous.[5]

The question arises of whether chastity should be considered an Aristotelian virtue. First it is necessary to define chastity. It is, in its most formal form, complete abstinence from sexual activity until marriage. The Catholic Church claims that "the virtue of chastity therefore involves the integrity of the person and the integrality of the gift."[6] This means that "in the complete and lifelong mutual gift of a man and a woman" sexuality does not destroy chastity nor does sexuality destroy chastity for the offended party if the sexuality was not wanted. Another prominent religious figure, Thomas Aquinas, defined chastity as refraining not just from physical temptation but also from the temptations of mental contemplation of lewd physical acts[7]. Thomas Aquinas felt that "the marriage act that is done out of sensuous pleasure is a lesser sin" but the sexual act committed out of wedlock is a mortal sin.[8] While a precise definition of chastity is not completely settled even among religious thinkers, by picking a liberal definition and critiquing it from the left, the more conservative definitions can be equally critiqued. For these purposes the virtue of chastity will be defined as the general tendency to postpone all sexual behavior beyond the timeframe of natural urges.

Thomas Aquinas tries to paint this type of chastity as an Aristotelian "mean between two vices."[9] He states that "one copulation may result in the begetting of a man, wherefore inordinate copulation, which hinders the good of the future child, is a mortal sin as to the very genus of the act, and not only as to the inordinateness of concupiscence."[10]

This portrayal is not compatible with Aristotle's temperance. Aristotle's examples of not eating too much or too little food[11] serves as an appropriate equivalent. To say that because only one sexual act is necessary for the creation of life and that sex should be limited to the bare necessity for sustenance of the human race is like saying that one must only eat tasteless, unseasoned food in as quick and mechanical way as possible. The fundamental discrepancy regards luxuries. Aquinas seems to argue that all superfluous actions that do not promote either life or religious principles are sinful (though some less sinful than others).[12] Aside from the arbitrary nature of picking religion as an end in itself, Aquinas' argument is not consistent with the ultimate goal of Aristotle's virtue system: happiness.[13] Aristotle considered happiness (he called it eudaimonia) to be the human flourishing propagated by rational thought.[14] Human flourishing allows for a degree of luxury above necessity but below extravagance.

If a trait can stay between the Aristotelian vices of excess and absence there is no reason why it should be considered injurious or extravagant. A state of character may have variably proportionate passions. Just as one man may exercise every day to be in peak physical shape while another man's physique may permit minimal exercise, they can both consider what makes them happy and stay virtuous as long as the first man avoids exhaustion and the second man avoids bad health. Different people may be virtuous at different proportions to the extreme; so it should be with sexuality. As long as a person can contain their sexual desires so that they do not blot out their responsibilities to society and they can stay healthy, industrious participants in life, there is no feasible reason why sexuality differs from watching television in moderation or playing a sport for enjoyment a few hours a week.

The response to this is that extramarital sexuality diminishes human dignity. The Catholic Catechism attempts to lay claim on Aristotle's view of temperance by portraying sex before marriage as an extreme indulgence and thus a vice. It states that people "should reserve for marriage the expressions of affection that belong to married love" and that in doing so "Man gains such dignity (by) ridding himself of all slavery to the passions." The Catholic Catechism also holds that "chastity includes an apprenticeship in self-mastery which is a training in human freedom."[15] and that "the virtue of chastity comes under the cardinal virtue of temperance, which seeks to permeate the passions and appetites of the senses with reason."[16]

Sexuality is not naturally against human dignity. The perception of promiscuous people as not dignified is only valid when sexual acts are committed in moments of rational weakness and followed by regret. Extramarital sexual relations are not necessarily lapses in self-mastery. The resulting religious condemnation is a social construction that chastises a trait that is not a vice. Aristotelian temperance differs from the abstinence advocated by the Church. Abstinence is actually an extreme that does not fit with the Aristotelian ideal of eudaimonia. The reasoning that is essential to eudemonia necessitates free will and choice. Human freedom includes the choice to engage in sexual acts or to refrain from sexual acts. Self-mastery is demonstrated as long as sexual acts and urges do not usurp responsibilities or become a purpose for living. When compared to choices such as smoking the occasional cigarette or drinking a glass of wine with dinner, responsible pre-marital sex is innocuous.

To practice chastity as an "apprenticeship" is absurd and arbitrary. It is akin to deciding that one should practice not breathing for prolonged periods of time as a lesson in restraint from base urges. If a sexual urge is an urge to be squashed, so too are the other urges that sustain life. Eating and breathing could be considered base in their foundation in functionality, but attempts to limit them to bare necessity would be ridiculous and limit life to the mundane and increase the functionality of life. The urges that sustain life are the only definitive good: everything else is a social construct. To put such undue restrictions on any of these urges is to suppress the natural course of life.

Another argument is that premarital sex has potential risks such as sexually transmitted diseases or unwanted pregnancy. This argument is above the fray of the philosophical perspective and Aquinas and the Catholic Church would consider it as evidence added after the case has already been made. Yet it is an important issue to address in a modern discussion. These deleterious effects can be almost universally avoided with proper rational foresight and planning. The sexual acts that fit under the Aristotelian virtue of temperance from emotional decisions would thus have a low occurrence of unplanned side effects. The argument is effectively nullified by the qualifier that rationally planned sexual relations are compliant with Virtue Ethics.

The conventional view of chastity is not the only view of sexuality that can fit into Aristotle's view of virtue. A new definition of acceptable sexuality is in order that is compatible with the view of temperance applied to other natural urges. People should be considered to be within the spectrum of virtuous sexual behavior if they think rationally and safely, refrain from acting rashly or without self control, avoid the regret that lowers human dignity, stop their sexual urges from becoming more important than their other responsibilities, and make sexual activity secondary to more intellectual pursuits.

[1] For this essay, discussions of Aristotle will be from Nicomachean Ethics

[2] Book Two, Section Five

[3] Book Two, Section Six

[4] Book Two, Section Two

[5] Book Two, Section Six

[6] The Catholic Catechism. Vatican: The Holy See, http://www.vatican.va/archive/catechism/p3s2c2a6.htm (Article 6, Section 2, 2337)

[7] "The word "chastity" is employed in two ways. First, properly; and thus it is a special virtue having a special matter, namely the concupiscences relating to venereal pleasures. Secondly, the word "chastity" is employed metaphorically: for just as a mingling of bodies conduces to venereal pleasure which is the proper matter of chastity and of lust its contrary vice, so too the spiritual union of the mind with certain things conduces to a pleasure which is the matter of a spiritual chastity metaphorically speaking, as well as of a spiritual fornication likewise metaphorically so called." - Summa Theologiae II-II, 151,2

[8] Summa Theologiae II-II, 154, 3

[9] Nicomachean Ethics Book Two, Section Six

[10] Summa Theologiae II-II, 154, 3

[11] Nicomachean Ethics Book Two, Section Two

[12] In Summa Theologiae II-II, 153, 3 Aquinas states that "just as the use of food can be without sin, if it be taken in due manner and order, as required for the welfare of the body, so also the use of venereal acts can be without sin, provided they be performed in due manner and order, in keeping with the end of human procreation."

[13] "Since happiness is an activity of soul in accordance with perfect virtue, we must consider the nature of virtue; for perhaps we shall see better the nature of happiness." Nicomachean Ethics Book One, Section Thirteen.

[14] Nicomachean Ethics Book One

[15] The Catholic Catechism (Article 6, Section 2, 2339)

[16] The Catholic Catechism (Article 6, Section 2, 2341)