This philosophical essay on the Eucharist is the third in a “triptych” from Falque, whose first two books examined, in turn, the anxiety of death (suffering) and the phenomenology of birth (resurrection). Those earlier themes are important here as Falque works to take seriously the body in philosophical and theological thought. The ultimate goal of the three books together is a reflection on what it means to “abide” (50), and so the Johannine corpus is particularly important to him.
Jean-Luc Marion—Falque's dissertation adviser—has resolutely endeavored to stay within the contours of philosophical discourse even as he has been associated with the “theological turn” in French phenomenology. Falque methodologically disagrees. One of the unique aspects of this book is that it drives toward the explicit integration of philosophy and theology because Falque himself is convinced that the distinctions between them are overwrought or maybe even entirely contrived. Thus, the study begins with our “animality,” moves to the fundamentally human flowering of eros into agape (Benedict XVI is a key source for Falque here), and lastly turns to explicit theological reflections on eucharistic presence in the theological tradition. While the first two sections are more properly philosophical and the last more properly theological, the integration in fact runs throughout.
Falque thinks that in rejecting modern body-soul dualism continental philosophy has created another dualism between body and flesh (1). This dualism does not take seriously our “animality,” in other words, the openness, obscurity (chaos/tohu-bohu), and, indeed, desire that is at the heart both of ourselves and of the entire created order. In this, there is some polemic against both phenomenology, which cannot approach that obscurity in us (19, 21), and the turn to the symbolic in theology, which Falque suggests overlooks precisely what is strange about the Eucharist (38, 186–87). Animality is a key aspect of our humanity, and therefore of what Christ took on in the Incarnation. Our animality, along with our eros, is then integrated, transformed, incorporated into God in the Eucharist.
The nuptial feast is obviously central for Falque, and serves as the primary philosophical ground for his reflections on “this is my body,” an act he finds fundamental to the human experience, particularly manifest in the gift of one spouse to another. In an Augustinian-Anselmian mode common in French Catholic thinking, desire for the other opens up to desire for God, who in turn says, “This is my body.” Here, readers might quibble with Falque's gender categories, which can be overdetermined (e.g., 78, 161), as the author leaves readers wanting examples of eros, or ascending love, that are not nuptial.
Falque's challenging text handsomely rewards its persevering readers with a profoundly sophisticated and creative account of the Eucharist that succeeds in its aims to push—maybe even blur a little—the disciplinary boundaries of philosophy and theology. It is ably translated in that it reads well despite its sophisticated concepts, and it helpfully includes cross-references to other sections of the book, so that the reader can follow the strains of the argument more easily. Scholars in the fields of sacramental theology, phenomenology, and philosophical theology should devour The Wedding Feast of the Lamb. The book is suitable for the graduate classroom, especially in courses on the Eucharist and on contemporary philosophy. It is one I see myself coming back to again and again.
