The Body As Our Temple

Sukhmandir Kaur responded to my previous post, "What Should I Eat?", saying that she liked my definition of temple, but that she was thinking of the body as the temple when she asked the question I was addressing.

Jesus said, "Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up." (John 2:19). In the Christian world this is where the idea of the body as one's "temple" comes from. However, this concept is common in many religions. Perhaps Jesus was employing a concept common in Judaism, I honestly wouldn't know.

But shortly after Jesus made that statement he says, "That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit." (John 3:6)

Mary Baker Eddy says in Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, "...the Christian Scientist takes the best care of his body when he leaves it most out of his thought, and, like the Apostle Paul, is "willing rather to be absent from the body, and to be present with the Lord." (Pg. 383) She also says, "Christ, Truth, gives mortals temporary food and clothing until the material, transformed with the ideal, disappears, and man is clothed and fed spiritually." (Pg. 442)

I once heard of a woman who said, "I treat the body like a little doll. Every morning I dress it, brush its hair, and forget it."

So if the body is your temple, keep it swept and dusted but don't worry that if you don't do it right you'll bring on an earthquake. Fear of the earthquake only helps bring on the earthquake.

"For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind." (II Tim. 1:7)