Abstract

Decisive for the meaning of “body” is whether it is understood in the context of a dualistic or of a monistic anthropology. According to Plato, body is the soul fallen out of the prison of God’s existence. For Descartes, who formulated the dualism between body and soul, body is reduced to a machine which stirs the human mind. Distinguished from these dualistic approaches are those concepts which start from the unity of life, from a bodily being which can only distinguish its internal aspects and its external aspects. This phenomenological approach corresponds with the Judeo-Christian anthropology. The different concepts of the body generate different ethical consequences.