fig leaf

Here in Italy fig trees seem to grow well, and seeing the leaves on the fig tree, with the curious shape and generous size, I am reminded of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. The first thing Adam and Eve did, when they fell from grace, was to clothe themselves with a fig leaf. So for me a fig leaf is symbolic of clothing.

Clothing has a certain utility. In cold places it can help us to keep warm. But mostly we wear clothes out of a habit, a mass habit of society at that. We wear clothes because everyone else is wearing clothes. It’s not necessarily a good reason for doing something. In fact it’s often a bad reason because unfortunately almost everybody has got into a mess. The whole of society is a little bit messed up, a little bit neurotic, unnatural.

So we wear clothes just because everyone else is wearing clothes, but also we wear clothes to hide our body. We feel this subtle need to hide the body because deep down in our psychology there are parts of ourself which we have not accepted, that we feel bad about. We feel guilt and shame about who we are. Most of this is unconscious of course, but that just means it has a greater grip on us, a greater effect on our life. So clothing is itself symbolic of the need to hide ourself, and that need its coming from a non-acceptance of something within us.

Of course, in the Garden of Eden a part of the body which Adam and Eve first decided to cover was the genitals, the sex. Perhaps more than anything else, we humans have become neurotic about sex. We have taken this most natural of bodily functions and made it something sinful. With that, we have all become sinners. Even if we do not have sexual intercourse, that energy is within us. That urge, that desire, doesn’t go away. So we feel guilty, shameful about our sex, and we need to hide it. Everything about sex becomes a little bit taboo, a bit naughty, to be kept private, to be kept secret. All of that is symbolised by the fig leaf and the use that Adam and Eve made of it. So seeing the fig leaf, I am rather saddened. It reminds me of our fall from grace. And I know that we will only truly, as a species, have returned to our natural state when we no longer need to clothe ourselves and we no longer need to hide our sex with a fig leaf.