Paul in Love. Several well-known Protestant theologians claim that Paul is the intellectual equal of the Greek philosophers. “Paul ranks with Plato and Aristotle as a thinker,” says N. T. Wright.* I don’t think so, but it hardly matters. Paul has his own great idea. Paul loves love. Nothing is more important than love.
The ancient Greeks had a lot to say about love, but almost always they were talking about eros (ἐρεῶ), passionate erotic love. If not, they were talking about philia (φιλία) based on a strong ongoing relationship. What Paul calls agape (ἀγάπη) is more and less than eros. Agape may be as intense as eros, but it is not as personal. It is hard to be erotically in love with more than one or two people. (Like the Greeks, I’m talking about love, not just sexual attraction.) Agape has room for more. Latin generally translates agape as caritas. When Paul speaks of charity (a translation from Latin), he is talking about agape.
What is agape? Sometimes people use the term to suggest a self-sacrificing love, the type of love Jesus had for humanity, and humans sometimes have for each other. But Paul’s meaning is broader than this. Agape is love that is concerned above all with the welfare of another. Faithfulness and commitment, as well as sacrifice, characterize agape. Eros, as the Greeks well knew, is fundamentally selfish (Plato, Symposium, 198c-213e); philia is more personal.
Love threatens Rome
When Paul talks about love, he begins with agape but doesn’t end there. Not only does love bind a community; it threatens the Roman empire. But why should it? Consider Paul’s famous evocation of love.
If I speak in the tongues of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing.
Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.
Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when completeness comes, what is in part disappears. When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put the ways of childhood behind me. For now we see only a reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known. And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love. (1 Corinthians 13)
Paul goes on here, and in doing so he transforms the law of the Jews into one sentence.** Love your neighbor. Paul never mentions the Great Commandment, which includes loving God as well as your neighbor (Mark 12: 28-34; Matthew 22:35-40; Luke 10: 25-28;). Writing decades before the gospels were composed, Paul devoted himself to love among humans. But make no mistake, Paul always thought of himself as a Jew. Not that he had much choice. There were no Christians at the time Paul wrote, two to three decades after the death of Christ. Paul was the original Jew for Jesus, and Christ the Messiah.
Love versus the Roman Empire
For Paul, love was not just a personal relationship. Love was also a social critique. “For Paul, love had (for want of a better word) a social meaning as well. The social form of love for Paul was distributive justice and nonviolence, bread and peace.” (B&C, p 204)
As he spoke about love to the different communities he visited, it became clear that love was a critique of empire, as well as communities like Corinth, which did not share their wealth with Christian communities in need. Love threatens empire and social order. Herbert Marcuse would understand (Eros and Civilization).
Jesus and Paul were not executed for saying “love one another.” They were executed because love meant more than compassion; it meant standing against the “domination systems that ruled their world.” (B&C, p 205) Love and justice go together. Justice without love can be careless and pitiless. Love without justice is irresponsible, lovers caring little for the larger social world . Herbert Marcuse (Five Lectures, p 82) thought it romantic that the park benches in Hanoi had room only for two. It’s easy to get carried away by eros; North Vietnam was not an erotic regime. Probably they’re not any, though some regimes are more hostile to love than others.
Does Paul waffle on love?
While these generalization about love are true, they present an incomplete picture of Paul’s view. Paul accepted the current social order. Slaves should continue to be good slaves, men and women should follow their leaders. Love was a spiritual and intellectual achievement, for it means that there are values beyond this world.
That may seem simple but it’s not. People who have become cynical, that is people who can imagine no social order but this one, are easily ruled. It is potentially revolutionary to recognize that the values of society are not the highest values. Transcendent values look beyond this world to a truer, higher, and better one. To know this is the first step toward a better world, and love its most powerful expression in this world now. However, to act on this knowledge, Paul evidently believed, was too dangerous at that time. He also evidently believed that it was unnecessary. The Parousia (the Second Coming) was near at hand, and might even happen during his lifetime (1 Thessalonians 4:13–18; 1 Corinthians 15:51–52; Romans 13:11–12).
Paul and Plato
Like Paul, Plato believed in a soul (the Greek term is psyche [Ψυχή]) that was independent of the body, higher than the body, and destined to live on after the death of the body. Some scholars have seen Plato’s form of the Good as an abstract way of talking about God (Republic 508e-509c). What’s missing in Plato, and the ancient Greeks in general, is any sense of agape. There is hardly any suggestion, by any of the ancient Greek philosophers, that love is a social relationship. While Paul did not think as deeply as Plato, he helped bring Christ’s teachings about social love into the world, rendering it a revolutionary force. Paul’s expansion of love is as important as Plato’s depth.
The Western tradition, when it was still healthy, was the conjunction of Greece and Jerusalem. Now both seem an endangered species. Small spaces for love and friendship remain in the most repressive regimes. Loss of love of neighbor will be the irreplaceable loss.
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* https://derekvreeland.com/2014/09/n-t-wright-faithfulness-paul-part-3-pauls-worldview/ ;Vreeland, p 28.
** The Great Commandment is actually first found in Leviticus 19:18.
References
Marcus Borg and John Dominic Crossan, The First Paul. HarperCollins, 2009 [B&C].
Herbert Marcuse, Eros and Civilization. Beacon Press, 1966.
Herbert Marcuse, Five Lectures. Beacon Press, 1970.
Derek Vreeland, Through the Eyes of N.T. Wright: A Reader’s Guide to Paul and the Faithfulness of God. Doctrina Press, 2015.
N. T. Wright, Paul: A Biography. Harper, 2018.
I like this post and the revolutionary meaning you describe.It affected me like seeing a great work of Art unexpectedly.It went right through my defences or thoughts.Thank youm
I find this an interesting post. I think St Paul was a complex character who leaves me with mixed feelings. As a child attending church services, i remember the way that gospel readings caught my interest but St Paul’s letters left me completely cold. Somehow that sense of an aloof character, strongly self-driven to a degree that feels off-putting, has remained with me.
And yet, as you say, his central message was about love or, because the word ‘love’ has become distorted in too many ways, it was about the importance of reacting to our fellow human beings with deep concern for their feelings as well as our own.
This is where written laws and all the tools of government fail and why even those who are no longer regular worshippers still turn to the churches or other religious institutions in times of distress.
I think it all comes down to ‘motive’ – i.e. do we react to our fellow humans through heartfelt conviction or because we feel there may be a benefit to ourselves in some way?
The mediaeval mystics wrote about ‘purification of the motive’. It’s not easy to do that when powerful emotions, such as anger, greed, lust, and so on, keep getting in the way. As T.S.Eliot wrote “For us, there is only the trying. The rest is not our business.”
I agree, Paul is not a particularly likeable character. But without him I don’t know what would have happened with Christianity. Maybe nothing. Often his letters ARE boring because he’s addressing particular problems in particular ekklesia, which mean nothing to us. Still, his remarks on love seem heartfelt and sincere. A complex and daring man. Fred
I remember reading, a long time ago, where someone had attempted to recreate the other side of the conversations between Paul and the various communities. It made it all seem much more interesting.
That sounds interesting.I have not read it.A N Wilson wrote a book about him which I found interesting.Also about Jesus.
Paul’s letters are almost all written in response to particular problems in a particular church. I’ve seen attempts to explain the situation or problem he was addressing, but a epistolary dramatization would be fascinating. I think Paul would have been absolutely amazed that his occasional letters (that is, written for a particular occasion) became part of the Bible, a big part of the NT. Apparently he was not nearly as impressive in person as he was in these letters, which would have been read out before the congregation. Regards, Fred
I find the purity of motive an important idea That we should pause before we respond to other people’s actions or words.
I find this comment very useful.Thank you Mike
I am m not sure if we can live like this in our society
We might be used by others.W we could be martyrs.
It might be good if we were more equal in power
It is easy to have ideals
But hard to learn how to live them.Even the best people put their families first.
Paul was a great poe
Without Eros we would not survive unless it was done in !ab
Can’t oth types of love combine with Eros.?
I agree about Eros, and your comment that without it we would not survive. Trouble is, Eros is exclusive. It generally wants to pair up, and the heck with the world. We need agape too. Why not both indeed. Fred