Carrie Frederick Frost's Maternal Body: A Theology of Incarnation from the Christian East is an insightful and subtle exploration of the Incarnation. Staying true to the Eastern tradition, she has organized her analysis around her own lived maternal experience, following the natural progression of conception, pregnancy, giving birth, postpartum, and breastfeeding. Frost leads the reader on a journey of incarnational discovery. Through the experience of embodied maternity, drawing on liturgical ritual, iconography, and an astute reading of history and Scripture, she has gifted the church with a refreshing and long overdue perspective on the theology of the Incarnation.
This theology draws on the inherently positive image of the human body found in Christianity. By taking a human body, “Jesus Christ became what we are so that we may become what he is” (xxiv). It is from this starting point, through theosis, that Frost leads us into a deeper understanding of the Incarnation of Christ by way of our own incarnation. “God became human, became embodied, in order to experience a new intimacy with us, so that we might experience a new intimacy with him—within our bodies, which are now blessed afresh by his incarnation” (xxv). By walking the reader through the converging tracks of Jesus’ incarnation through the maternity of Mary and her own maternal experiences, Frost lays out the fundamentally positive anthropological relationship between the human person and the Word made flesh.
In each chapter she weaves connections through maternal biology, Scripture, liturgy, and iconography. She both challenges the accepted theological conclusions (oftentimes written by celibate men) while also providing exciting insight into a theology of incarnation that builds on the tradition, advancing that theology forward with fresh perspective. The tradition is by its very nature a living one and one that must be explored, confronted, and understood. By bringing to bear her own maternal experience, Frost has brilliantly shifted the conversation into a key we can all understand.
For example, in her chapter on giving birth, Frost begins with her own experience of giving birth, and by way of this deeply personal yet universal experience of motherhood she draws us into a deeper experience of Mary as Theotokos. She is also quick to point out, and right to do so, that most theological discussions of Mary's own birth experience through history were written by celibate men. Showing her deep and firm grasp of the tradition, Frost presents the richly varied approaches taken toward Mary's birth experience as witnessed in both iconography and hymnody.
This text is a treasure and a valuable resource going forward with any discussion of the Incarnation. Accessible to undergraduates and useful at this level for its insights into the history and reference to patristic resources, the deepest conversations may well come at the level of adult discussions conducted through the human experience of the participants, whether these be at the graduate level or with adult parishioners.
