He responds to my inquiry:
There is an ancient strain of Hebraic sources which are sometimes called the Mystery of the Cherubs which talk in elliptical terms about what I call – integrating the erotic and the ethical.
By erotic here I do not mean sexual but that rather Eros in the sense that Plato uses it; a kind of vital life force or energy. Aspects of this traditions finds later expression in Christianity and the Da Vinci code novel is an inaccurate popularization of this moment in spiritual moment in Christianity. The reason this idea was important to me is because it has huge ethical implications. My basic teaching was and is – all failures in Ethics are based in a collapse of Eros. That is to say – when a person feels empty on the inside – they will try and fill up that emptiness. Emptiness is another way of saying non-erotic in the way I am using the word. So when i feel empty I try to fill up with Eros – but if I cannot find real Eros -because real Eros demands work, discipline and commitment I fill up with what I have sometimes called pseudo eros. Examples of pseudo eros might all forms of rage and hatred and persecution.
I feel empty do I fill myself up by attacking you? My righteous indignation fills up my emptiness. That is why self righteous people always seem so puffed up or full of "hot air".
In true Eros a person is deeply on the inside of existence. When a person cannot access true Eros – truly being on the inside – they fill themselves up by making someone else on the outside. "If you are on the outside then I must be on the inside." This is the beginning of hatred and war. That is why accessing true Eros is so important to me from an ethical perspective.
