The Letter of Athanasius to the Monk Amun

This is the letter numbered forty-eight among the letters of Athanasius. [a]

Involuntary emissions in the night are not sinful. To this summary the English editor adds the saint’s own words: “For what sin or uncleanness can any natural excretion have in itself? Think how absurd it would be to make a sin of the wax that comes from the ears, or of the spittle from the mouth. We might add many more things, and explain how the excretions of the belly are necessary to animal life. But if we believe that man is the work of God’s hands, as we are taught in holy Scripture, how can it be supposed necessary that we do anything impure? And if we are the children of God, as the holy Acts of the Apostles teaches, we have nothing unclean in us,” and so on. Nor is marriage unclean, though virginity, “which is angelic, and than which nothing can be more excellent,” is to be preferred to it. [b]