ABSTRACT
The following text analyzes Cassian’s notion of the battle for chastity in monastic life against the spirit of fornication in both the Institutiones and Conferences. Fornication, the consequence of pride, is studied as having its own position in the table of vices. Not only is it rooted in the flesh but it is also created by the images born from the movements of the mind. Beyond the sphere of carnal passion and physical relationships, Cassian characterizes this struggle against fornication as one that is essentially non-sexual. Pollution functions as the yardstick of concupiscence in that it helps measure the role played by the will in its generation. This battle is described as a “chastity-oriented asceticism” that enacts a process of subjectivization in which self-knowledge is articulated as a form of truth. This text originally appeared in a special issue of Communications 35 (1982) [“Sexual¡tés occidentales] edited by Philippe Aries and André Bejin where it was presented as an extract from the forthcoming third volume of the History of Sexuality. In fact it doesn’t appear there and it is most likely to be part of the unpublished volume 4, Les Aveux de la Chair (Confessions of the Flesh). The English version, translated by Anthony Forster, originally appeared in Western Sexuality (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1985).
