1. §22. Individuality §23. My Flesh, and the Other’s §24. Eroticization as Far as the Face §25. To Enjoy §26. Suspension §27. The Automaton and Finitude §28. Words for Saying Nothing Concerning the Flesh, and Its Arousal

2. §22. Individuality Goal: to establish the radical individuation of the lover “Here I am!”—this puts the lover into play as radically individualized and unsubstitutable By Desire We are defined more by what we lack than what we possess. “That which I lack defines me more intimately than everything that I possess.” (108) By Eternity We are defined by a desire for eternity. “At the moment of love loving, the lover can only believe what he or she says or does under a certain aspect of eternity.” (109) By Passivity The oath makes me depend upon the other. “The advance opens the floodgates of intuition.” (111) The risk rids oneself of the activity of the ego.

3. §23. My Flesh, and the Other’s Ipseity: phenomenon of the flesh (not a body, not a thing, which does not act), a new sort of passivity Your flesh is only yours; no one can experience it like you can. “I do not have flesh, I am my flesh, and it coincides absolutely with me.” (112) “My passivity provokes their [things’] activity, not the inverse.” (113) “auto-affection alone makes possible hetero-affection” (114)

4. §23. My Flesh, and the Other’s And such the other’s flesh is its own; no bodies can ever touch: there is no such thing as a caress. “Still one flesh never touches another flesh, because the one immediately draws back and fades away.” (120) As the world resists you, you rely on the other flesh to let you in, give you a place. “Since the world makes no room, another flesh must do it for me…By entering into the flesh of the other, I exit the world and I become flesh in her flesh, flesh of her flesh.” (118- 119) How do two fleshes interact? The opposite of physical bodies—by not resisting, by withdrawing, by opening itself Pleasure: “my reception of the other’s flesh, such that it gives me my own flesh” (119)

5. §24. Eroticization as Far as the Face “The other gives me what she does not have…And I give her what I do not have.”—that is flesh, which is neither seen nor touched (120) “Strictly speaking there is never anything erotic to see…” (121) “Pleasure exists only in my experiencing taking flesh.” (122) A philosophy of the kiss [baiser] The kiss “inaugurates the infinite taking of flesh” “…by touching one another mouth to mouth, our two mouths set off a wave that traverses our two bodies” “My flesh does not experience a part but rather the totality of the other.” (124)

6. §24. Eroticization as Far as the Face In the eroticization of the face the lovers “have left the universal, even the ethical universal, in order to strive toward particularity.” “And with the universal, the ethical also loses its privilege.” (126) “The other’s transcendence stands out like never before.” (126)—an “accomplished transcendence of the other” (127) Upbuilding examples (127)

7. §25. To Enjoy/To Climax [Jouir] Through the crossing of fleshes one enjoys the other, and is not simply using the other. Enjoyment: giving each other his/her flesh, in which your enjoyment becomes your partner’s enjoyment, back and forth pleasure, the “erotic reduction fully accomplished.” (128) Where are we? Outside of the world in an erotic environment of pure flesh. “I situate myself exactly here, there where my embrace goes.” (130) When do we find ourselves? Outside of the world’s time Future: the expectation of an elsewhere: “Come!” Present: the passage of the elsewhere: advancing without resistance: “I am coming!” Past: “the elsewhere has passed beyond the moment of its presence”: “Again!”

8. §26. Suspension Flesh crosses without merging. “Orgasm is not a summit…it resembles a cliff…where one falls all at once.” “All at once nothing remains”(135). But “no thing” has disappeared. Death of Eroticized Flesh: losing my access to another flesh Why are we only aware of our nakedness after orgasm? Prior to orgasm, we are outside the physical world. After, we become physical beings once again. We experience shame—we “cover our bodies in order to hide from ourselves and from others.” Orgasm: the only miracle we can experience, an erased phenomenon (138)

9. §27. The Automaton and Finitude How does eroticization provoke finitude and attest to it? Off We Go: an automatic desire of my flesh No control—”the flesh is aroused of its own accord.” (139) “I eroticize myself and I climax by abandoning myself to the automatic eroticization of my flesh by the flesh of the other, above all by doing nothing, by allowing everything to be done in me without me—and the same goes for the other.” (141) Unconscious (142) Finitude My flesh eroticizes itself on its own initiative, but it cannot do so infinitely. Thus I must act to repeat the erotic reduction. “Eroticization’s finitude assures me the infinite repetition of the erotic reduction itself.” (143)

10. §28. Words for Saying Nothing On erotic language There is a difference between the erotic language and the communicative language. Recall the erased phenomenon: erotic language literally describes nothing. “Lovers speak without saying anything in order to accomplish the erotic reduction.” (148) There are three different lexicons: obscene, puerile, and theological, but they do not contradict each other.

11. Concerning the Third Party, and Its Arrival

12. §36. Faithfulness as Erotic Temporality “Faithfulness becomes the condition for the persistence of the erotic phenomenon. More precisely, the actuality of the erotic phenomenon depends upon its temporality…” (184) Faithfulness requires eternity. “Faithfulness thus temporalizes the phenomenon of love, by assuring it its only possible future.” (185) Even in its lackings… I must respond to the question “Do you love me?” for the lover. “You love me truly, I know, I assure you.” The lovers give one another this present for as long as their present lasts. (190)

13. §38. The Advent of the Third Party §39. The Child, or the Third Party of the Point of Leaving “A question thus cannot not be posed: couldn’t we lovers entrust my lover’s oath…to a third party, who would assure it more durably than we can?” (196) The third phenomenon is the (possibility of the) child, who makes visible the oath and thus renders the lovers “themselves visible to themselves…The child appears as their first mirror.” (197) But this visibility doesn’t last, and the oath must again repeat itself.

14. §40. The Adieu, or the Eschatological Third Party Looking for assurance, again. Here is the eschatological precept: “Love as if the next instant of your erotic reduction constituted the final instance of your oath. Or again, love now as if your next act of love were to accomplis your final possibility of loving. Or finally: love this instant as if you no longer had any other in which to love, ever.” (208) This “accomplishes the promises of eternity in the present instant.” (209) The adieu / à Dieu (see page 212)

15. §41. Even Oneself I cannot love myself without the mediation of the other. “Loving oneself henceforward signifies that insofar as I discover myself to be a lover, and thus lovable, I will be able to end up by loving even myself.” (213) An inversion: “You loved me first.” I admit that the other loves me more than I hate myself. In the end, I love even myself, because the other lover, through her own advance, has made me a lover, and thus lovable in her eyes….” (214)

16. §42. The One Way “Love is said and is given in only one, strictly univocal way.” (217) Objections considered: What about love of money, drugs, sex, or power? (This doesn’t concern love.) What about friendship? (“If it remains within the erotic reduction, let us conclude that it does not exclude itself either from love’s one way.” 220) What about eros and agape? (These are not two different loves, but “two names used to think and to say the one love.” 221) What about God’s love, isn’t it a different love? (No, “God loves in the same way as we do,” but “he loves to perfection.” 222)