PHILOSOPHY OF THE HUMAN PERSONUniversity of San AgustinAY: 2014-2015: First Semester

CHAPTER 1: INTRAPERSONAL DIMENSIONLecture 4: The Human Person as Bodily Being

Primary and Secondary Reflection: The Existential Fulcrum Gabriel Marcel

I Have a Body The word have is a transitive verb, and the word body is a direct object. To have means to possess or to own. The word to have is the verb used to signify possession like when I say I have a house; I have a dog, etc. All things that we possess (i.e. ball pen, bag, notebooks, and car) are distinct and separate from ourselves.

Is our body our possession?

Our body is not our possession since it cannot be separated from ourselves. When we say we have a body it means that our body is just part and parcel of our personal existence. The body is not something one owns. This body is essentially ones self. In external having, possessing and owning in its strong and exact sense have an imperfect unity with the haver or owner. The object that one owns or possesses can be lost, stolen, can be damaged, or decayed while the dispossessed possessor remains. The tragedy lies in our desperate efforts to make ourselves as one with something which nevertheless is not, and cannot, be identical with our beings; not even with the being of him who really does possess it. This is even more tragic in the case of wanting to possess another human person.

Is my body a property?

Owning a body is different from owning or possessing a thing. In the case of the house, I can do whatever I want with this house since this house is mine. As the owner of the house, my own being is totally independent upon what I own. But in the case of the body, there is a big difference. The principle of ownership of the human body cannot be equated with the manner of ownership of any object. Nobody owns my body in place of me. If we take a ball pen as example, we cannot simply throw our body the way we treat this ball pen. Throwing this body will hurt you and it is against the law of life (suicide). Treating this body as an object is definitely wrong. I Am My Body The words I and my body are connected by the linking verb am, which means that myself and my body are just one and the same. Whatever is done to my body is done to my total being (total self). That means the good or evil done to this body is the good or evil done to this self. For example, when a nurse helps to nourish the body of an undernourished child back to health, what she does to that body she does to the person of the child. Similarly when a client uses the body of the prostitute as an instrument of his own gratification, he has treated the person of the prostitute as an instrument, which is not a person but a tool. The client dehumanized the prostitute. What has been done to the body has been done to the total person.The human persons body is both a possession and a being: I have a body and I am my body at the same time. The significance of understanding this distinction and unification of possessing and being make us realize the importance of ones body and others as well. We live in a world full of bodies and we encounter it daily, but at times we fail to recognize the unity of the body to the person possessing it. This is clear in the context of prostitution, labour abuse, murder, medicinal malpractice, physical abuse, etc. In conclusion, the body of the person is the person him/herself. There is no distinction, only unity between the body and the person. 1