Chapter I. Love: essence and manifestation
Love, the Bible and Thomas of Aquinas
During the Middle Ages, naturally, love was tied to God, and this development merits somewhat more detailed discussion, since this connection retains its actuality to this day.
It is common knowledge that the Bible speaks very often of fear of God and of love of Him. This topic of fear and love permeates practically all theology books, including those by such great philosophers as Thomas of Aquinas or Nicholas of Cusa. This was absent in the ancient Greek philosophers’ writings. The emergence of the topic of fear in the Middle Ages is not accidental. The collapsing Roman Empire could not be held together by just fire and sword. What was needed was an ideology of a single God whom everyone would fear and love at the same time. Both fear and love were becoming increasingly important structure-forming elements that cemented the nascent new states. The Greek notions of love, directed toward the personality or toward the beauty of cognizance and creativity, with their interpretation of “good,” practically exhausted themselves back in the time of the Roman Empire. My opinion may appear to be a stretch, but it seems to me that the emasculation of the concepts of friendship and love, even if it was not one of the main reasons of the Empire’s downfall along with the political and economic factors - it did at least reflect the process of the Empire’s decay. This became particularly evident in the time of Caligula and Nero, when debauchery, especially in the upper strata of society, started corrupting the Empire. I want to stress that by the place – and the interpretation thereof – occupied by love in society, one can make judgments about the society and its future.
The Bible’s ideological power in its time rested, among other things, in the fact that it stated clearly what love is and, most importantly, what love means. But since the savage peoples who were bringing down the Roman Empire, and the depraved Romans themselves, could not realize the phenomenon of love, fear of the Almighty was necessary as a means to teach the savages to love. To this end was the supreme postulate established: God Himself is love. On the one hand, it means that God’s attitude toward everything – including, naturally, people – is permeated with love; on the other hand, it means that if your attitude toward someone or something lacks love, you are thus in opposition to God (since it is He who is love). This kind of attitude involves inevitable punishment. From this flow the main theses of the Ten Commandments, including the famous one: do not unto others what you would not want done unto you. But here is the interesting thing: St. Paul makes a clear statement in his Epistle to the Romans: “Love does not work evil to one’s neighbor; therefore love is the law’s fulfillment.” (Romans 13:10) That is, in the Bible already love is not simply a personal feeling – it is a social phenomenon tied to laws. I omit here the biblical interpretations of love toward wife, toward family (I will discuss them in the appropriate section); here I want to draw your attention to the fact that in the Bible love is affirmed as action, not as some sensuous passion, gust of heart or soul. This is evident in a particularly striking way in the New Testament: Nowhere here does one find the expression “fall in love” – the word used almost throughout is “to love”, very often in the imperative tense.
Love is stated in the Bible as a phenomenon, as a given. For the early Middle Ages’ flock, that was quite sufficient, especially since supreme love was identified with God Himself, who is omnipotent and who is accordingly to be feared. It is specified in detail in the Bible what to love and how to love. It says clearly in St. John’s 1st Epistle: “By this we gain the knowledge that we are loving the children of God, when we are loving God and doing his commandments. For this is what the love of God means, that we observe his commandments; and yet his commandments are not burdensome.” (1 John, 5:2,3) It is precisely through the Ten Commandments that man could appraise his deeds: whether they were pleasing to God or not, meaning whether he loved God or not. According to the New Testament, love must be universal, for God Himself is universal. It thus becomes clear why one must love even one’s enemy: the enemy, too, is a child of God. By the way, this humanism is absent in the Old Testament which expressed the national interests of the Jewish people only.
It is worth noting also that the Bible makes no distinction between “agape” (self-sacrifice) and “philia” (friendship) – words used in the Greek version of the Bible. These words are interchangeable here. It is no accident therefore that in the Russian and English versions just one word – love – is applied to all subjects of love (husband and wife, parents and children, God and man, friends and enemies).
However, while the authors and compilers of the Bible viewed love through the religious-social prism, the theologian-commentators sought to impart to the word a social-philosophical content.
The preeminent philosopher and theologian Thomas Aquinas (13th century) analyzes the topic of love in detail in his magnum opus Summa Theologica.[1] In that work he made, for example, a clear distinction between love of concupiscence and love of friendship. In his opinion, love of concupiscence is acquisition of sexual gratification for oneself; the man in this case (Thomas wrote of man) cares little what the woman acquires from such love. Love of friendship must benefit the other. The question arises naturally: what kind of benefit can be given to God who already has everything? Aquinas gives a fortunate answer: such a benefit to Him is His glorification and the life which He conceived.
Quite interesting is Thomas Aquinas’ reasoning about love and goodwill, which leads us to some very important conclusions. Goodwill is an act of will that induces us to wish good to the other. He specifies: “goodwill is neither friendship nor love, but beginning of friendship.” Such feeling can emergence perfectly by chance.
“Actual love is not only as being in the sensitive appetite but also as being in the intellective appetite or will. And the passion of love is not aroused suddenly, but is born of an earnest consideration of the object loved.” Love requires time for familiarizing; it implies knowledge about the loved one. Love is not blind, because “love is the term of knowledge.” One cannot love someone or something unknown, unfamiliar, since “unknown cannot be loved” – a conclusion everyone should better learn.
Of extreme importance is Thomas Aquinas’ reasoning on the topic of whom and how to love. The question is posed: who is worthy of greater love? The preliminary answer is: he who possesses the greatest charity.[2] Those who have lesser charity are therefore to be less loved. This question is subsequently developed into a broader topic: can a worse (in the sense of human qualities) person get to love a better one, and a better one – a worse one?
Thomas answers these questions dialectically. He says that the presence of charity is already in itself a virtue, which is predisposed to correct actions. He believes that two types of actions should be distinguished here: to love, and to be loved. Unlike the former, the latter is not a manifestation of charity. For example, a mother loves her child regardless of the charitable qualities the child possesses. Through such reasoning Thomas Aquinas wanted to stress two things. Firstly: the strength and depth of love depend first and foremost on the person who loves. The second point following implicitly from the first: love is not a passive state of the soul – it is action by the loving one. Love only manifests itself in deeds; without deeds it is unrecognizable. This, in principle, is an old maxim (a man is known by his deeds, not his words), quite appropriate in conceptions of love. It applies equally to a mother and father’s attitude toward their child. When parents say that they love their child, without having applied any efforts to raising and educating him, there is no love here to speak of. It is an elementary truth that Thomas Aquinas explained on the conceptual level.
Pursuing this topic, Thomas Aquinas is compelled to answer more exactly the question: whom and how to love? He writes: “A better man, through being better, is more lovable; but through having more perfect charity, loves more. He loves more, however, in proportion to the person he loves.” The word proportion, as well as the word measure, becomes in his conception a yardstick for measuring the depth (maturity) of love. That is, the man of greater merits cannot love the person of lesser merits in the same measure as if he loved a person of greater merits. The man of lesser merits cannot adequately love a person of greater merits.
In such abstract form Thomas Aquinas essentially posed the question which in a simplified form can be formulated thus: can a good person love a bad one, and a bad one – a good one? In this case under “bad-good” we mean not only the totality of moral qualities, but also the level of intellect. The answer is this: a good person can get to love a bad one in the hope that through his love he will elevate the bad one at least to his own level. The bad one is not likely to come to love the good one, since he simply does not have sufficient intellect (knowledge) to realize the volume of the other’s positive qualities. This answer explains why intelligent people are capable, crudely speaking, of loving fools, but fools can never love intelligent people. There is a multitude of examples to confirm this.
Another bunch of questions emerges in connection with love for God, for others and for oneself. This one, for example: why should one love one’s fellow man (“neighbor”)? Thomas Aquinas answers: since we all have been created by God, it is our duty to love everyone “in general,” but we must always be prepared also to love someone “in particular.” It is precisely the “general” that involves love-as-boon, while the “particular” involves love that is greater than any boon. Thomas specifies at this point that the difference between love and boon is this: when I love someone, I seek to join myself to that person. That is, in love I appraise the value of that “someone,” I respond to that value with my desire to do good to the one I came to love, and to become one with that person.
What is union between the lover and beloved? Aquinas’ answer: there exist the real union and the formal union. A real union is achieved when the lovers are constantly in interaction with each other. A formal union is built on affections, when one, compelled by will or by emotions, seeks to do good to the other “as to oneself”; this is what is usually called friendly love. Thomas believes that a union based on affection ensues from a notion or an understanding. Thus, in friendly love I recognize intellectually the value, say, of a certain individual. This is a union based on a notion. My object entered my brain, and here we became one with him in my intellect (more precisely, in my consciousness). He became part of me, and, therefore, when I am doing good to him I am also doing this good to myself. However, having become one with him, I became part of him; as a result, whenever he experiences good or bad, it is reflected on me.
Leaving aside the topic of the real union, which applies mainly to man and woman, let us decode the essence of the formal union, which is important not only from the perspective of so-called friendly love. The idea of formal union explains well the phenomenon of love for one’s Motherland, which appears to be too vastly different from love between man and woman, even though in their foundation they are the same.
The matter is, love for one’s Motherland is not just something desirable or expected; it is a condition of the individual’s own existence, at least at a certain historical stage of mankind’s development, or the development of a particular state. When the feeling of love for the Motherland emerges in the consciousness, the Motherland becomes part of your consciousness, i.e. of your self, an important aspect of your thinking. Your union with your Motherland took place in your head. On the strength of your love for it, you always seek to do good to it. Whenever it doesn’t work out, you are experiencing dissatisfaction, since this love is inside you, and you are inseparable from your Motherland. This reminds me of a military term from the era of the balance of powers: the system of Mutual Assured Destruction (MAD). In the sphere of love this would be called the system of Mutual Assured Love (MAL): harm or good done to one party means the same for the other party. At the same time, however, you too are a part of your Motherland, if only on the strength of your physical location in its territory. Therefore the Motherland (= state) is objectively obligated to love you, i.e. create all the good things necessary for your existence (protect your safety, above all). Whenever it fails to deliver these goods to you, it inflicts harm not just on you, but also on itself, since you are part of it. This kind of love, which may be called philopatria (or patrophilia), is a union based, to use Aquinas’ expression, on a notion and an understanding. Note: for as long as states exist, this type of love – philopatria – is the highest of all; its absence leads to the mutual collapse of the individual and the state, and subsequently all other forms and types of love lose all opportunity to manifest themselves. Therefore, unlike Aquinas, I call this union, based on love for one’s Motherland, a vital union rather than a formal union.
[1] Thomas Aquinas. Summa Theologica. Thomas analyzes the concept of love in Part II-II, articles 22-48.
[2] The word mercy in the works of Thomas Aquinas means the highest love for God, i.e. the totality of all the best qualities of man.
On Love, Family, and the State
(Philosophical-sociological Essay)