Editorial February 13, 1965 Issue

True Embodiment

Helen Wood Bauman

Generally speaking, mortals think of body as merely physique, as so many pounds of organized matter, and this largely water. But such a concept of body is entirely materialistic. A step in advance of this limited concept is the understanding which Christian Science gives that, even humanly speaking, body is conscious embodiment and that it includes all that one embraces in thought, either knowingly or unknowingly.

Body and embodiment are closely related in meaning; in fact, one meaning of the verb "body" is "to embody." Touching on the subject, Mary Baker Eddy says in "Miscellaneous Writings" (p. 61): "Mortals are the embodiments (or bodies, if you please) of error, not of Truth; of sickness, sin, and death. Naming these His embodiment, can neither make them so nor overthrow the logic that man is God's likeness."

While Christ Jesus had a clear realization of the unreality of the transient flesh—indeed, he said plainly, "The flesh profiteth nothing" (John 6:63)—he always helped the human bodies of people, healed them, and purified them. In other words, he uplifted the temporary, human sense of body; he did not despise it.

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