A theology of love: Love as AgapeJustin SandsTrevor Maine

Radu Iacob

November 19, 2010

Chapter layout: four perspectives of love

Kierkegaard• humans must

strive to love as God loves, without preference

• the person must be emptied before God

Nygren• humankind

dreams of a holy fellowship with God

• humans are always related to God as sinners

Barth• theology of love

based on theologies of creation and election

• affirms the human potential to love as the work of the holy spirit

Jüngel• ‘love as God’s

own identity’ and the human correspondence

• connection between eros and agape

Søren Kierkegaard: Works of Love(1813-1855)

• Came from an affluent family in Copenhagen, Denmark(only left the city twice in his life)

• Influenced by: • The Romantic Movement (die Romantic) – Schlegel and

Schillers• German Idealism – Schelling and Hegel• But most notably, Socrates

• Wrote over 30 works, many under ironic pseudonyms• Used “indirect communication”• Believed in three “stages along life’s way”

Søren Kierkegaard, The Kierkegaard Reader, ed. Jane Chamberlain and Jonathan Rée (Oxford:  Blackwell Publishing, 2001), 381-383.

Positive contributions

Asserts that human persons really can love (contra Augustine)› Humans can actively relate to God and

neighbor Preserves focus on the human body,

it’s natural desires, and emotions Love is work which must be done. It

must be enacted.› Love as praxis

Critique of Kierkegaard

Distinguishes between different sorts of love Rejects preferential love as Christian love

› The Christian must love all equally (even the self)

Christian love is a love of self denial› Persons must be emptied before God; they are

unworthy subjects Kierkegaard does not draw on Jewish

conceptions of love Kierkegaard’s neglect of society/institutions

› The self isolated from society and ecclesia

“Going further” with KierkegaardKierkegaard’s system and further conception of love

Stages Along Life’s Way

The Aesthetic

The Ethical

The Religious

Tips for understanding

Kierkegaard and 19th Century Lutheranism› “Saved by Grace through Faith”

Experiential character of love› Love, like faith, cannot be taught. Both

must be experienced and enacted (shared). Intellectual influences

› German Idealism, Die Romantik, Socrates Existential

Positives in Kierkegaard

Biblically relevant› Utilizes both Hebrew Bible & New

Testament Self love Other regard A Theology of Trust Existence as Given

Anders Theodor Samuel Nygren(1890 – 1978)

• Swedish, Lutheran theologian• Professor systematic theology at Lund University from 1924

• Ordained Priest in 1912 and served as parish minister for almost 9 years in Diocese of Gothenburg

• Elected bishop of Lund in 1948• Appointed as first president of Lutheran World Federation

• Active in both ecumenical affairs and in resisting Nazism before WWII

Agape and Eros: The Christian Idea of Love

› The most successful and influential

theological book on love in the twentieth

century

› Christian love stands in radical opposition to

the Greek eros and the Jewish love as nomos

› The uniqueness of Christian love as agape

Anders Nygren ‘s Theology of Christian Love

Human eros and divine agape

Radical separation between human eros and divine agape.

There is a problematic mixture, synthesis of eros - religion

and agape – religion.

Aim: to restore the purified Christian understanding of love

by searching what is characteristic for all Christianity.

Doesn’t mention any manifestation or practical achievement

of agape by the human persons, but only the formal aspects:

› God comes from the outside

› Only God and neighbor can be loved with God’s love

› Self-love is ruled out

Platonic

eros

Christian

agape

Major non-Christian motifOld

  

Human form of egocentric and desiring love

By its

own strength

  

Aim: to reach the divine sphere

Major Christian motifcompletely revolutionary,

entirely new

Particularly Christian meaning

Love that comes from God

Human attitude:

receptivity,passivity

 

To receive God’s love

Jewish religion of the law

Christian – agape religion

Law is the bound between people

Love commandment  

Pharisees – religion of law:

Jewish legal righteousness

Newly constituted fellowship with God

Jesus

New content

Jesus – religion of love:

Includes all human beings, even the sinners

Self-love understanding Agape excludes all forms of self love (eros).

Self love is man’s natural condition and the reason for the

perversity of his will.

Nygren’s aim: to expose and overcome the self-seeking

eros-motif and to identify and reject all love discourses

that do not build on God’s absolute sovereignty.

Augustine: synthesis of eros + agape = caritas

caritas needs to be exposed as a polluted manifestation of

the original Christian idea of love.

Conclusions Nygren, like Augustine and Luther, approaches love from

anthropological and theological presuppositions: God vs.

imperfect creation.

Since Christian love comes from God only He can be

conceived as its subject. Consequently, the human being

becomes a “mere object of this divine love that employs

man as its instrument and organ”.

All human desire is in opposition to the divine gift of love.

Faith is a precondition of the receiving of God’s love: if you

don’t believe you cannot love in a Christian way.

Karl Barth(1886 – 1968)

• Swiss Reformed theologian

• Among the most important Christian thinkers of the 20th

century

•  From 1911 to 1921 he served as a Reformed pastor in

the village of Safenwil

• Professor of theology in Göttingen (1921–

1925), Münster (1925–1930) and Bonn (1930–1935)

• Forced  to leave Germany in 1935 after he refused to

swear allegiance to Adolf Hitler

• Professor in Basel (1935–1962)

Christological Concentration

Any  consideration of faith, love and hope must be rooted in Christological reflection.

Explicating Christian existence from its centre – Jesus Christ.

Christian love comes from God through Christ.

In Christ, God loved the world in a concrete-perceptible way.

He showed that He did not will to be God without all men.

He has demonstrated  that all men and each  individual man cannot be without Him.

I Corinthians 13

Jesus is patient; Jesus is kind; Jesus is not envious or

boastful or arrogant or rude. He does not insist on His own

way; He is not irritable or resentful; He does not rejoice in

wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth. He bears all things,

believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. 

(verses 4 - 7)

Universality of love

Neither  the Old Testament nor  the New speak about a love for man as such and therefore for all man; of a universal love of humanity.

Universal love can be thought only as an idea or an attitude.

Christian love is an “act of obedience” which does not “take place always and  everywhere”  but  is  determined  by  time,  place  and  a  concrete demarcation  and  limitation of its objects: a  love  of  choices  and differentiations.

Insists on the concrete historical context.

The “circle of brothers” –  the horizon of Christian  love, may need to be extended beyond what we can see now.

Eros vs. Agape

Sharp distinction between Eros and Agape: 

Which one reflects the “true human nature as created by God”. 

Agape-love  - affinity 

human nature

Eros-love - opposition 

Conclusion: “Erotic love is a denial of humanity”.

Agape is characterized by self-giving: turning wholly to another, although 

the other is only an “object of love”.

Christian love The other kind of  love

The reconciliation between God and humankind, achieved in Jesus Christ 

- a qualitative difference.

The ambiguity of Christian love: due to the ongoing mixture of both loves 

in one human being.

-grasping, taking, possessive love – self-love

Its object: 

-Not necessarily sensual.- It can be directed to the good, the true and the beautiful.-Even in its sexual form it may have reference to the soul and not merely to the body.-It may even include God as its object.

God’s love

Related with human love.

It moves human beings to act accordingly: love is not a feeling but an act.

Human  persons  are  not  simple  channels  of  God’s  love,  but  genuine 

subjects who love in response to God’s prior love.

3 crucial aspects of God’s love: Elective, Purifying, Creative.

There is an inner connection between love for God and for neighbour, but 

they  must  never  be  identified:  they  are  “distinct  and  must  not  be 

confused. But they are also inseparable”.

Old and New Testaments

Originality of Christian love Vs. Continuity between the Old and the New 

Testaments.

There is not a change in God’s love over the years.

We  have  seen  another  manifestation  of  this  love  in  Christ:  God’s 

determination to love humankind totally.

There is a significant difference between the Old Testament and the New 

Testament:  the  emphasis on love for the neighbour and  its  connection 

with love for God, corresponding to the New Testament tradition.

Nygren

“The synthesis between eros-love and agape-love should have come to an end with Luther”

Barth

“Is it not of the very essence of the history that this opposition 

can never be fully overcome?”

No ecclesiological conclusions

Love: God’ action over human passivity

Concrete Christian Church

Love: a human 

response to God’s 

love

Fellowship with God

Nygren’s theology of love Barth’s theology of love

• Rooted in his understanding of the theology of justification.

• God alone can be the loving subject.

• Rooted in his theology of creation and election and based on his biblical interpretation.

• Human being is able to love God and his/her neighbours.

•God’s love – the origin of human love (always  preceding it).

Rejection of self-love

Conclusions

Sharp distinction between Eros and Agape.

God’s love should be understood as related with human love.

Wants  to  prove  both  originality  of  Christian  love  and  the  continuity 

between the Old and the New Testaments.

Any consideration of faith, love and hope must be rooted in Christological 

reflection.

Barth concludes his reflections on Christian love with a praise of love in 1 

Corinthians  13  as  a  parallel  to  the  Old  Testament’s  Song  of  Songs:  it is

love alone that counts. 

Eberhard Jungel: Christology of love

• Born: 1933• Professor of Systematic Theology and Philosophy of Religion at

Tübingen, Germany• Influenced by the German Protestant tradition

• Barth, Bultmann, and Luther • Hegel and Heidegger also influence his work

• Major work: God as the Mystery of the World (1977)• Focuses on a critique of classical theism and contemporary atheism• Centers his Trinitarian account of God on the idea of God as different

aspects of love.

Additional reading sources:Online essays and books: http://www.tyndale.ca/seminary/mtsmodular/reading-rooms/theology/jungelA theological forum dedicated to his thought: http://godasmystery.blogspot.com/Brief biographical data: http://www.theopedia.com/Eberhard_J%C3%BCngel

Jungel: A Johannine based theology

Centers Trinitarian thought around 1 John 4:8: “Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love.”› The Christ event becomes the epitome of God’s self-giving

love› Attempts to theologically demarcate between love and God

while keeping the Johannine identification of God as love Jeanrond will later argue this scope is too limited—

Jungel bases his theology only on John (pg 131) Others, such as J.M Dittberner will argue that this makes

God and Jesus less abstract› “Jungel’s God still comes to us from the Bible. In fact, his very

Being is ‘coming,’ and this is no mere fideism, certainty can emerge…”

Dittberner, J.M. "Vehicle for God: Metaphorical Theology of Eberhard Jungel." Theological Studies December, 1996.

Jungel: love’s ontological aspects

A pre-understanding of love: I and Thou› The ‘loving I’ desires the Thou (loved object)

Shows desire is integral to love, cannot be absolute selflessness

This stems from Martin Buber’s book, I-Thou (Ich-Du) and also has traces in the Hegelian Dialectic

› Relationship love has 3 ontological aspects Affection (Zuneigung) Turning to the other person (Zuwendung) Self-giving (Hingabe)

Becomes the more important aspect of Jungel’s thought for Jeanrond

Jungel: love’s ontological aspects

The I surrenders itself to the Thou in a renewal exchange, creating a symbiotic relationship: if no Thou, then no loving I (and vice versa)› Similar to the Hegelian argument of being and

nonbeing Thus love is a totalizing power: love creates

a relationship of being› With no love, neither the loving I nor the Thou

exists

Jungel: Back to God is Love

• God is the ultimate source of love• This identification of God is revealed in the Crucified Christ• As a total loving God, sacrifices his son, drawing in the finiteness

of humanity into his infinite God-self• Post-resurrection, this love is sustained through the Holy Spirit

• This act of sacrificial, ultimate love bonds the (loving) Trinity with humanity throughout history

• Shades of Luther: God makes humanity worthy of God• “The love flowing from the cross makes the ugly person

beautiful in the eyes of God” (Jeanrond, pg 130)

Jungel: God’s love is agape

Humanity’s love is a love of desire (eros) and Hingabe› All genuine love has a desire component› Hingabe is a selfless, surrendering love but still requires a

loving subject and an object › When erotic love is separated from other forms of love, it

becomes selfish and self-centered God is the subject and object of love at once

› Therefore, God’s love is a complete, totally selfless love› A distinction made in faith

Human love is correspondent to the loving God but only through the experience of faith

Faith and love go hand in hand: cannot love without faith, cannot have faith without love

› Only possible with God (as the creator and through the Trinity)

Jeanrond’s criticism of Jungel

• Jungel back to lack of scope:• Does not go into the historical motives of the Johannine

community’s desire to frame God in this way• Jeanrond is right to point out that this is a narrow scope but

Jungel’s thought does not overtly contradict other passages• Never problematizes his understanding of selfhood and

subjectivity• Who is the self? How does the self evolve?• What is the relation between self-giving and self-surrender?

Most problematic: the abstract and the loving self

Jungel’s focus is on understanding God as love, but in many aspects it becomes too abstract:› Where does the body do? Jungel does not discuss the

implications of the Christ-event to the body While he corresponds human love to God’s love,

several anthropological points remain unplotted › Jeanrond sees a lack of understanding in the self

“Who is the self that is to grow into self-relationality and self-giving?”

“How do self-relationality and self-giving relate?” (Pg 131)

Harks back to Jeanrond’s desire for a sound anthropology of love

Most problematic: the abstract and the loving self

Jungel focuses on understanding God’s identity as love› Too Abstract for Jeanrond› Has no sense of “social, ecclesiastical or

communal space” (pgs 132). However, Jeanrond must keep in mind that

Jungel has a different theological task› Jungel’s systematic theology is centered around

the debate of classical theism and atheism With this in mind, Jungel’s theology is focused on a

definite understanding of God that can then be applied to other matters

?Analysis and Discussion

Why these authors?

All four authors carry on Luther’s Christological concentration› Therefore, each of the authors continues

Luther’s separation between human love and God’s love

They typify the tendency to view the human person (and human love) not as divinely inspired, but as unworthy› This is a continuation, specifically, of

Augustine

Why now in the work?

These authors each develop Luther’s theology (from the end of the last chapter) in new ways, moving toward the question of love and desire (in the next chapter)

This task is necessary so that Jeanrond can claim desire as a part of love

These authors, he believes, clearly differentiate between human desire for love and the divine gift of love

Kierkegaard rejects desire, especially in preferential love, but maintains self-love

Nygren rejects eros as a selfish force which desires to reach the divine by its own strength

For Barth, the opposition between eros and agape cannot be overcome; they are always present together in the human person

Jungel sees God’s love as agape and all human love having some component of desire› Desire is only bad when it is separated from other

love

Desire in our four authors

Questions These authors are trying to make sense

of a separation between human and godly love. Why do they need to create these distinctions? Why does Jeanrond push back against them?

Questions Throughout the work, and specifically

in this chapter, Jeanrond has sought to reclaim the sacrality of the body, the place of self love, and of love for the other qua the other in a theology of love. Why do these anthropological and interpersonal concerns factor so heavily into a theology?

Questions

From Augustine to Jungel, we have discussed the problem of desire in Christian conceptions of love. Why is desire so problematic? What does the fact that Jeanrond is giving such stage time to the problem of desire say about his task? How is it a critique of historical Christian conceptions of desire?