Sweaty Trysts

The next time Rhonda and I met after our first liaison was class. She sat where she usually sat, across the room from me. She acted quite nonchalantly, not acknowledging me at first. Only when she caught me glancing at her halfway through class did she flash me a knowing smile.

Rhonda and I had commenced a relationship of sweaty trysts and indeterminate definition. It couldn’t be said that we were “significant others” to each other. But “friends with benefits” somehow understates the intensity of our coupling. Out different interests and values precluded us from becoming “soulmates.” We tried to be discreet, but our companionship outside of class made its way into the school’s rumor mill. (The noticeable age difference between us surely prompted some tittering among our classmates.)

I maintained a certain reserve through it all. I cared about Rhonda, but I was unable to allow myself to fall in love with her. Some of it was the age difference. Her being a single mom complicated matters for me. Much of it had to do with my inability to express intimacy with her in a non-sexual way. There were occasional public displays of affection — she snuggled up to me on a park bench in Union Square; she touchingly held my hand when we strolled through an artisan fair. It was sex, though, that kept us together. We had an undeniable erotic chemistry. There was a genuine emotional connection between us, but it was subsumed by the sheer physicality of our coupling. Rhonda had a keen interest in “sacred sexuality,” so there was sometimes a contemplative dimension to our “lovemaking.” But most of the time we fucked.

“Fucking involves a unique tone of engagement and experience. Fucking embodies a lusty, lascivious eagerness for pleasure… a delicious, desirous wantonness. It is…sex embellished with erotic virtuosity. There is deliberate intent to arouse (and satisfy) passion.”
David Schnarch

When we fucked, we accessed each other’s “dark” side — that debased side of us that abandoned any pretense to social niceties or propriety. Unable to resist our urges, we fucked after class in the backseat of her sedan on more than one occasion. There was nothing polite and restrained about it. Our fucking was raw, energetic, and aggressive as we channeled our primitive sexuality. In order to fuck Rhonda, I had to establish some emotional distance from her and approach her with a certain carnivorous intent. Lust precluded love.

Once upon entering her apartment, Rhonda pulled me close to her and passionately kissed me. As I stared into her crystal blue eyes, I saw the power of a woman’s raw lust. She whispered how badly she needed to feel me inside her. This wasn’t a desire on her part. It was a need. I pinned her against the wall, pulled off her sweater, hiked up her skirt, and pulled down her panties. Neither of us was capable of reining in our passion. After I quickly stripped off my jeans and boxers, I turned her body around and positioned myself directly behind her. She let out a moan of pleasure when I slid my cock inside her. I grabbed her hips and thrust deep into her. Now wasn’t the time for gentle kisses. I pounded deeper into her wetness as her body convulsed. Digging my fingers deeper into her hips, I fucked her harder and faster, yielding myself to sexual abandon. There was nothing dignified about it. It was raw and dirty, and I convulsed as I emptied myself inside her.

“Harder!”

I first met “Rhonda” in an ethics class. She was a petite lady in her early 40’s with short dirty blonde hair and a distinct Jersey accent. Quiet and smart, she was a psychotherapist. I became acquainted with her when we were assigned as partners on a class project (something about religious humanism). The first time we got together in the seminary library, she was a bit shy. Our conversation was limited to our coursework. When we met again, she invited me to join her for coffee after we wrapped up our work. At the cafe, Rhonda opened up about herself. She was a single mom with a young son. She was a vegan, animal rights activist and UFO enthusiast. She did tarot readings. Her compassion and empathy impressed me. She enrolled in divinity school in order to integrate spirituality into her work as a therapist. Here beliefs were a weird amalgam of liberal Protestantism, Eastern religion and New Age Spirituality.

As I surreptitiously peeked at the tiny bit of cleavage that peeked out of the top of her shirt, I sensed that Rhonda possessed an intense sexual energy. She wasn’t sexy in a conventional sense — she wouldn’t draw many stares on the street with her pageboy hairstyle and long skirts — but I was definitely sexually attracted to her.

As I would later discover, Rhonda was very intuitive. I’m sure she sensed what I was thinking.

“I haven’t had much luck in dating recently,” she confessed. “It’s tough being a single mom.” She confessed to having a series of dysfunctional relationships. She took off her black-rimmed glasses and leaned forward. “My king size bed gets awfully empty.”

I got the sense that Rhonda desperately needed a man inside her.

“You know, my son is with his father this weekend. Care to join me for some wine at my apartment?”

I followed her home, hoping throughout the 45 minute drive that I what I thought would happen would happen.

Once at her place, she poured me a glass of wine. After a few sips, she leaned her body against mine.

“Are you okay with this?” she asked.

I eagerly assured her that I was.

She smiled. “I’m glad,” she said. She reached up, draped her arms around me, leaned up and hungrily thrust her tongue in my mouth and gave me the wettest French kiss, crushing our lips together.

I tugged at her black dress. She lifted her arms up, allowing me to pull it off her. She reached around her back and unhooked her bra. I caressed her lovely breasts, then planted a wet kiss on her mouth.

“Shall we go to my bedroom?” she asked invitingly.

Rhonda led me by the hand to her bedroom. She pulled down her black leggings and her panties. I rapidly undressed. She hopped on her bed and beckoned me to join her. We embraced and passionately kissed. I rolled her over onto her back.

She grinned. “I like missionary. I love watching facial expressions.”

I eased my body down onto hers and kissed her again. After what seemed like an eternity, she guided my manhood inside her. She moaned as my cock slowly penetrated her. She was so wet. She raised her hips to meet mine. I began to suck on her nipples. She was squealing, moaning, grinding her clit against me. She grabbed my ass and pulled me as if to bring me yet deeper inside her. Pressed against her, I felt the grip of her pussy tighten around me. Her lust seemed unquenchable. “Harder!” she cried amidst her wails and moans. I could hold out no longer. A few frenzied thrusts later, I exploded into her depths.

We held each other tenderly afterwards and talked, her lovely fragrance wafting into my nostrils. Our collaboration now went beyond the academic.

New Year’s Eve

I knew Rev. “Lindy” from our mutual involvement in an ecumenical social ministry. She’s the youth pastor of a local Congregational church. She’s very cute–tall, with long dark brown hair she usually wore in a bun or ponytail. Occasionally she wears glasses. She is about my age but looks younger. She’s married with two young children. I admired her for her intelligence, good humor and compassion. We knew each other for several months, but our encounters were brief.

We found ourselves together on New Year’s Eve. Her church’s young adult group was having a party in the church’s Fellowship Hall, and she had invited me. A lot of alcohol was being consumed (I don’t drink much). Rev. Lindy was there by herself; her husband and kids were at her mother-in-law’s. It became apparent that she had too much to drink–she was quite tipsy. I was sitting on a couch along the wall when Lindy sat down right next to me, her leg pressed up against mine. As we talked, I could smell alcohol on her breath. She soon put her hand on my thigh and moved in even closer to me. I started to get aroused. She undid her ponytail and leaned in to kiss me, then whispered, “You’re cute.” Another kiss followed. “I’m up for hooking up tonight.” She suggested we go to her office. We then got up and excused ourselves from the party.

We headed for her office. I couldn’t resist temptation. My hands briefly shook as I contemplated what I was about to do. When we got to there, we immediately started making out. The alcohol on her breath was almost overwhelming, but we continued to French kiss. I hurriedly removed her sweater, unbuttoned her blouse, and unclasped her bra; I rubbed her breasts and felt how hard her nipples were. She undid her long skirt and let it drop to the floor. Then she pulled down her panties. (She didn’t remove her wedding ring.) I guided her to the couch. Soon I was on top of her, penetrating her in her deepest places. I shouldn’t be doing this, I thought. But it felt too good to stop. I surrendered to the moment, and pleasure washed away any tinge of guilt. I was fucking a woman of the cloth, and I loved it. I was defiling her marriage bed, and it was delicious. Then….

Jouissance

I emptied myself inside her.

Afterwards, we cuddled on the couch a while. I started to feel somewhat depressed. “I have to get home,” she said softly. She was in no condition to get behind the wheel, so I drove her home. We didn’t talk during the drive, only a perfunctory “Happy New Year” when I dropped her off at her house.

The next couple times we met, our interactions were extremely awkward. If word about our encounter got out, we would both be liable to discipline by our churches. We didn’t talk about our hookup, but I could tell she felt ashamed over what she did–she blushed during one of our halting conversations. I decided to resign from the social ministry to spare us any further embarrassment.

Sex without Love

“Lindsay” is beneath me, our bodies covered in sweat after an extended round of aerobic sex. Her legs are spread as she receives me. My body strains as I approach climax. But before I come, she lets out a shriek, then she cries out:

“Fuck me like you love me! Fuck me like you love me!”

But I couldn’t love her.

Sex and love mean different things for me. I think I have a “Madonna/whore complex.”

Growing up I learned that sex was dirty and should be saved for someone I love. I’ve always been romantically attracted to “good girls.” As Deborah Tollman states, “Good girls are not sexual.” The last young lady I dated was smart, funny and resolutely chaste. I found her physically attractive. I became quite fond of her. Yet I struggled to become sexually attracted to her. Sex for me has become detached from emotional commitment. The “whore” arouses me.

Perhaps the the idea that love and sexual fulfillment fit neatly together is fallacious. Theodore Reik says, “I believe that love and sex are different in origin and nature.” Objectification is inherent in sex. Immanuel Kant posited, “For the natural use that one sex makes of the other’s sexual organs is enjoyment, for which one gives oneself up to the other. In this act a human being makes himself into a thing.” According to Kant, “[S]exuality is not an inclination which one human being has for another as such, but is an inclination for the sex of another. . . . [O]nly her sex is the object of his desires.” When I find myself aroused by a woman’s breasts, buttocks or legs, I’m not attracted to her as a person but as a bundle of sexual stimuli. Philosopher Alan Soble hints at the darkness of sexuality: “The sexual act itself is peculiar, with its uncontrollable arousal, involuntary jerkings, and its yearning to master and consume the other’s body.” Sex, with its intense passions, eviscerates reason and volition, reducing us to subhuman mammals. Kant wrote:

[When] a man wishes to satisfy his desire, and a woman hers, they stimulate each other’s desire; their inclinations meet, but their object is not human nature but sex…. They make of humanity an instrument for the satisfaction of their lusts and inclinations, and dishonour it by placing it on a level with animal nature.

The sheer bestial nature of the sexual act suggests that sex and love aren’t intrinsically linked. Sex can be reduced to a biological instinct designed only to release physical tension. “Most animals do not experience anything like intimacy as they mate,” writes Robert Solomon. Upon reflection, it seems quite odd that the aggressive manner of penetrative sex should signify tenderly affection. Philosopher Russell Vannoy writes, “Indeed, just how does a penis that is vigorously thrusting up and down in a vagina express anything at all, with the possible exception of dominance…?” In his book States of Desire, Edmund White argues, “S&M sex may merely be a more frank expression of the dynamics underlying all sex.” A vigorous session of sex, for me, holds no romantic connotations, unless one thinks hair-pulling and ass-slapping romantic. It satisfies my animalistic passions. In stripping sex of its romantic veneer, we see sex as it really is. “The sexual sophisticate advocates sex without love,” writes Alexander Lowen. That’s why I despise the phrase “making love.” “Fuck,” in its vulgar and obscene way, more truthfully captures the essence of sex.

Moreover, the fact that I am aroused by total strangers, including women I encounter only digitally, would appear to validate the argument that delinks the sexual instinct from committed love. Robert Solomon writes:

The fact that excitement is essential to sexuality explains how it is that many people find danger highly sexual… It allows us to understand one of the most apparent anomalies of our sexual behaviour, the fact that our most satisfying sexual encounters are often with strangers, where there are strong elements of tension, fear, insecurity, guilt, and anticipation. Conversely, sex may be least satisfying with those whom we love and know well and whose habits and reactions are extremely well known to us.

Sex severed from romantic affection may just be hotter. Vannoy’s conclusion is that “on the whole, sex with a humanistic nonlover is far preferable to sex with an erotic lover.”

I have difficulty establishing close relationships with people; I distance myself from others. This certainly colors my perspective. A session with an escort or casual sex with an acquaintance makes few demands on me, allowing me to satisfy my sexual cravings while investing little emotion or affection. Coupling sex and love would summon all those insecurities my lust keeps at bay.

“Where such men love they have no desire, and where they desire they cannot love.”
Sigmund Freud

“I know you want to fuck me”

She glowed. “Lindsay” had just come back from a run. Perspiration glistened off her body. Her sports bra and shorts were soaked in sweat. She undid her ponytail, then gave me a come-hither look. “I know you want to fuck me,” she said with a smile. She lay on top of me. I felt the slickness of her body. She let out a laugh as I grabbed her round ass. In an uncharacteristic act of assertiveness, I flipped her over and pinned her to the bed. Staring into her deep blue eyes, I kissed her deeply, wrapping my tongue around hers. I felt her hand reach into my shorts and slowly start to stroke me. I gently nibbled her ear, then kissed her neck, tasting her sweat. She raised her hands as I lifted her bra off her. I immersed my face in her full breasts. Her nipples were hard. Her left nipple was the most sensitive, so my mouth went there. Then down her chest, her flat but soft stomach, down to her shorts. I yanked off her shorts and panties, putting my mouth on her bare pubic mound. (She had impulsively shaved her hair off the night before.) Then I tasted her, inserting my tongue deep inside her before I flicked it over her clit.

(She didn’t always climax through penetrative sex, so she needed to have attention paid to her in other ways. As Lindsay taught me, dicks may go limp, but fingers and tongues don’t.)

“I’m so close!”

My mouth continued to work on her. She sounded like she was going to cry. Then she screamed.

She lay still for a minute. “How do you want me?” Lindsay sighed.

She got on her hands and knees. She tantalizingly waved her ass, her thick pussy lips inviting me.

“Mount me.”

Then came the incredibly satisfying moment when my cock entered her soaking wet pussy. I grabbed her hips. She grabbed onto the headboard. I fucked her hard.

“I want to be your whore…” she moaned.

Lindsay was a grad student in linguistics. She was doing a project on language and religion and asked the divinity school for assistance. I agreed to help, and, when we first met at the library, was mesmerized by a pretty girl with pale skin and brown hair. The second time we got together, she confessed, “I have the biggest crush on you!” Not accustomed to prompting such reactions from women, I blushed. She found it endearing. We had sex at her place that night. So started a short but intense relationship.

She was smart, athletic and sensitive. She liked music and superhero movies and playing word games after sex. The product of a Jewish father and a Catholic mother, her spirituality was vague and undefined. (She enjoyed “Chrismakkah” gifts, though.) Her girl next door appeal was married to a high sex drive. Raised in a strict military family, she confessed to blowing boyfriends in their pickup trucks when she was a teenager. She said she was attracted to shy guys, which accounts to why she drawn to me.

Sitting side by side in the library, Lindsay’s fingers ran up and down my thighs before caressing the bulge between my legs. She discretely unzipped my pants and slid her hand down to my stiff cock. She bent down beneath the table; suddenly her head was in my crotch. She took me into her mouth. I stifled a moan of pleasure….

I was very attracted to Lindsay and cared about her. She was born, in her words, “with a broken heart” (she had a heart condition), and that lent her, despite her athleticism, a certain fragility. I liked her a lot. But I couldn’t entirely open my heart to her. “I’m going to crack that shell!” she promised early on, but she wasn’t prepared for how hard that would be. She ended up frustrated by my inability to share myself with her. Just before we broke up, she broke down and cried, “I don’t know why you won’t open up to me.” The sexual intensity of our relationship couldn’t overcome my emotional distance.

“We’re going to fuck, right?”

“April” was my first hookup. She was the girlfriend of a fellow student at divinity school. She’s outgoing, tall, athletic and incredibly pretty. We had gathered one Saturday night with a few classmates at a local watering hole. I don’t socialize easily, but I had acceded to their invitation that night. I was admittedly smitten with April, but I was too shy to approach her. Besides, she had a boyfriend.

But her boyfriend wasn’t there that night. (He was out of town.) April had quaffed a considerable amount of beer, and she started to flirt with me at the bar. I erased any consideration about her boyfriend from my mind and became totally engrossed with her. In high school, I was the shy, somewhat nerdy, repressed Lutheran kid who couldn’t imagine being with the pretty, popular girl, and here I was with her.

“Want to share a drink at my place?” she asked. I immediately took her up on her offer.

I drove us to her apartment (I had imbibed less). Once there, we starting making out on the couch. She soon made her intentions known. April pulled off her shirt, unbuttoned her jeans, then blurted out, “We’re going to fuck, right?”

I answered affirmatively. We went to her bedroom.

I nervously tore open the condom wrapper and sheathed myself. She climbed on top and rode me cowgirl, her tight, athletic body undulating on top of me.

We woke up the next morning in her bed. It was awkward. “Please don’t tell anyone about this!” she beseeched me.

I just did.

Sex and the Seminary

After college and a year of volunteer service in New York City, I enrolled at a mainline Protestant divinity school with the intention of pursuing a divinity degree and ordination in my Lutheran denomination. I knew it would be very different than my experience at my small evangelical college. I intentionally chose the school in order to broaden my theological horizon. My conservative background did little to prepare me for what I encountered. The sexual ethics discussed at seminary were (to me) unabashedly liberal. Classmates mocked “Sunday school” prohibitions against pre-marital sex as unenlightened and judgmental. A student-led discussion group devoted itself to the topics of kink and sexual fantasy. A popular seminar examined queer theology. Traditional Christian teachings were dismissed as outdated or, even worse, bigoted. Arguments in favor of monogamy were dismissed as “heteronormative.” One ethicist I read defended the morality of casual sex, approvingly quoting psychologist Albert Ellis that “personal growth” is “abetted and enhanced by sexual adventuring.”

It was outside the classroom, however, where I discovered the sexual ethos of the school. At a party I attended during my first semester, condoms were available on the kitchen counter. I overheard a faculty member say that since seminarians will spend the rest of their lives in service to others, they should have some fun now. I discovered that hooking up was common among my peers. There was a good chance that you’d wake up next to a classmate over the weekend. (Unless you banged her in a cramped bathroom beforehand.) A classmate from my denomination, referring to our church’s statement that sexual intimacy was reserved for marriage, dismissed it as a pious fantasy from a less enlightened time. As long as you’re not caught fornicating, it shouldn’t impact your candidacy. “You can be smart or you can be celibate,” she quipped.

One classmate put it this way: as “holy” men and women preparing for ministry, some sexual indulgence is permissible because all the good we do outweighs it. That is, committing ourselves to service in the church excuses us from having to follow the rules, at least until ordination. I’ve probably internalized this attitude. There is little consideration of how spirituality informs our sex lives, no connection between the bedroom and the pulpit. I haven’t been able to build a bridge between my religious study and my sexual self.

Sex and the City

sexy_girl_at_the_window_looking_at_new_york_by_alexpotapov-d9gtpop

“New York City is all about sex. People getting it, people trying to get it, people who can’t get it. No wonder the city never sleeps. It’s too busy trying to get laid.”
“Carrie Bradshaw,” Sex and the City

Between college and divinity school, I served for a year as a volunteer in a parish in Manhattan. When I arrived at the church I served at, I resolved to rededicate myself to purity. I innocently believed that one who serves in the church should conduct oneself accordingly. In fact one of the conditions of volunteer service was that we would refrain from sexual immorality. Yet nothing could prepare me for New York. For a repressed Midwestern Lutheran, it was an intoxicating environment. The city oozes sex. Leggy models strutting in the fashion district, sexy secretaries on Wall St., corporate women in fuck-me pumps in Midtown — it was too much to resist. After three months of struggling to remain abstinent, I succumbed to my lust and started seeing call girls again.

“Jacqueline” was a fortysomething brunette who rode me to the sounds of Enigma. There was the French girl with the Spanish accent. The fashion student with long, pointy nipples. The full-figured girl who confessed to seducing her accounting professor and tied my hands with a pillowcase. The aspiring actress who didn’t pass the audition. And a few more.

One evening in my church office shortly before Valentine’s Day, I noticed a brief ad online:

Emma Sinclair – Beautiful. British. Upscale. Midtown. Private.

I hesitated. I had pledged to subdue my bestial instincts to loftier spiritual ideals. “But I am carnal.” I called the number listed in her ad. Unexpectedly, a woman with a refined English accent answered. I expressed my interest in arranging an engagement. She seemed a little hesitant after I provided some details about myself, but she agreed to make an arrangement for a last-minute appointment. I hurriedly prepared myself and made my way uptown in the winter night.

As instructed, I called her when I arrived at Bloomingdale’s. She gave me the address of her residence a few blocks away. I arrived a few minutes later and was buzzed into the building. An intoxicating blend of anxiety and arousal propelled me up the stairwell to her apartment. I heard the door unlock.

“Philip?”

A tall blonde in a black robe discreetly ushered me in her small apartment and invited me to sit down. The soft romantic lighting did nothing to diminish her pretty face. She asked if I had a girlfriend. My nervousness was apparent. “I won’t bite, unless you want me to,” she assured me. Her friendliness was comforting. She appreciated my politeness and good manners and the roses I brought her. I appreciated her round breasts that protruded from her robe. She engaged me in conversation to assuage my nerves. She had moved to the U.S. a few years earlier, teaching at a private school in Manhattan before taking the plunge into escorting. I complimented her on her athletic body. She credited it to the work she did with a personal trainer. Her sexiness was irresistible. Then she stood up and removed her robe, revealing a pair of black stockings and a bare mons pubis. Taking her cue, I undressed and revealed a raging hard-on.

“You are quite horny!” she said teasingly.

She put on Andrea Bocelli to set the mood. We moved to the bed. Her breasts proved irresistible. She signaled her approval as I sucked on her nipples.

“Juicy,” she sighed.

She lay me on my back. “I’m going to give you the best blowjob you’ve ever had,” she promised. She delivered on her promise as her mouth pleasured my bare cock. Sensing that I was about to come, she disengaged and reached for her bottle of Astroglide on her nightstand (upon which was also stationed a bottle of holy water). She retrieved a condom, covered me, then guided my turgid manhood inside her. I felt her grab my ass as I thrust.

“You’re cock is so hard,” she moaned.

I could feel her pussy clench my cock. My body convulsed in orgasm.

“Shall we try doggie style next time?” she tantalizingly offered afterwards.

I dressed and put my glasses back on. “Now you’re a good boy again,” she teased me. She kissed me on the cheek as I departed her apartment.

And, yes, I returned to fuck her doggie style.

“You’re so young!”

“You’re so young!” she exclaimed in her high pitched voice. She had greeted me at the door in a white babydoll and matching white stockings. Inside her cozy apartment, we shared a bottle of wine before we retired to her bedroom. I nervously undressed and reclined on the bed. She noticed my nervousness and promptly asked, “Are you religious?”

I told her I was.

She got on the bed and straddled me. “I was raised Catholic,” she said as she put the condom on me.

“Are you married?” she asked. I replied that I wasn’t.

“I’m not married,” she said to alleviate my guilt.

She lowered her body on top of mine.

“Ooooooh…” she moaned.

“Leigh” was the first escort I developed an ongoing relationship with. “Angel in the Attic,” according to her ad. She was a cute brunette in her 40’s who was an art student. She had a very attractive daughter in college. (I saw her photograph.) Inspired by the movie Dangerous Beauty, she had become a “courtesan.” I must have seen her a dozen times. Now that I think about it, she was my de facto sex education instructor, initiating me into the mysteries of sex. She was sweet, if a bit flaky. And it was apparent that she loved sex.

“You’re too conservative!” she complained. Previous encounters had been mostly limited to the missionary position. She stood at the edge of the bed and beckoned me to stand behind her. The she grabbed my cock and slipped it inside her. At this point instinct took over.

“This feels good,” she sighed.

“You’re opening up to me!” she exclaimed. After a few encounters, my reserve was slowly melting away. We had developed a relationship, albeit one of a peculiar sort.

She lay down on the bed and literally opened herself up to me. As I rocked on top of her, I heard her cry out.

“Go for it! Go for it! Go for it!”

Erotic Saints

“The original whore was a priestess, the conduit to the divine, the one through whose body one entered the sacred arena and was restored.”
Deena Metzger

In ancient religion, prostitution was sacralized. We find evidence of sacred prostitution in the Epic of Gilgamesh and the Code of Hammurabi. Herodotus wrote, “Women of the land…sit in the temple of love and have intercourse with some stranger…. After their intercourse, she has made herself holy in the sight of the goddess.” The ritual practice of sacred sexual intercourse within the temples of Innana and Ishtar in Mesopotamia was understood to unleash divine fertile energy upon the land. The temple of Aphrodite in Corinth, according to the Greek historian Strabo, had over 1,000 prostitutes. Hesiod, a poet in the 8th century B.C.E., observed that the prostitutes’ sensual gifts “mellowed the behavior of men” by bringing sexual joy. Sexual intercourse with a temple prostitute was ritualized, the union of male and female in a fertility rite or the hieros gamos (ἱερὸς γάμος), the divine marriage between the god and the goddess. According to Julius Evola, “Ritual sex was the instrument for man’s participation in the sacram.” Sexual union was communion with the divine. Nancy Qualls-Corbert writes, “Desire and sexual response experienced as a regenerative power, were recognized as a gift or a blessing from the divine. Both a man’s and woman’s sexual nature together with their religious attitude were inseparable.” The sacred prostitute herself, according to Qualls-Corbet, was an image of the eternal feminine, “a woman, who, through ritual or psychological development, has come to know the spiritual side of her sexuality, her true Eroticism.” She consciously used sex as a means of enlightenment. The sacred prostitute was a sexual priestess who empowered men desirous of the “wondrous vulva” to connect with spiritual realities through pleasure. The French philosopher Georges Bataille noted, “The prostitutes in contact with sacred things, in surroundings themselves sacred, had a sacredness comparable with that of priests.” Prostitutes retain to some degree this consecration; they are votaries of sex. They are priestesses of the sacred sexual mysteries. “Erotic saint,” one writer suggests, is a term that should be applied to any “woman decent enough to service a man sexually.”

“Sex was brought openly and with reverence to the very altar of the goddess. In her temple, men and women came to find life and all that it had to offer in sensual pleasure and delight.”
Nancy Qualls-Corbett, The Sacred Prostitute: Eternal Aspect of the Feminine

Bataille also wrote, “Not every woman is a potential prostitute, but prostitution is the logical consequence of the feminine attitude.” Women, insofar as they make themselves objects of desire, are conditioned to provoke a male response. The prostitute merely adds a commercial aspect to the feminine disposition and embraces the objectification which other women more subtlety accept. “Prostitution made them into objects of masculine desire; objects which at any rate heralded the moment when in the close embrace nothing remained but only a convulsive continuity.” The prostitute is the protagonist in this drama. Feminist critic Camille Paglia writes, “The prostitute is not, as feminists claim, the victim of men, but rather their conqueror, an outlaw, who controls the sexual channels between nature and culture.”

“With prostitution, the prostitute was dedicated to a life of transgression,” Bataille continued. “The sacred or forbidden aspect of sexual activity remained apparent in her, for her whole life was dedicated to violating the taboo.” If the heart of eroticism is in transgression, as Bataille contends, prostitutes are priestesses of transgression. That is their vocation and allure.