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| Chapter XIV. On the different grades of love.
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Chapter XIV.
On the different grades of love.
It is possible then for all to
show that love which is called ἀγάπη, of which the blessed
Apostle says: “While therefore we have time, let us do good unto
all men, but specially to them that are of the household of
faith.”1982
And this
should be shown to all men in general to such an extent that we are
actually commanded by our Lord to yield it to our enemies, for He says:
“Love your enemies.”1983
But διάθεσις,
i.e., affection is shown to but a few and those who are united to us by
kindred dispositions or by a tie of goodness; though indeed affection
seems to have many degrees of difference. For in one way we love our
parents, in another our wives, in another our brothers, in another our
children, and there is a wide difference in regard to the claims of
these feelings of affection, nor is the love of parents towards their
children always equal. As is shown by the case of the patriarch Jacob,
who, though he was the father of twelve sons and loved them all with a
father’s love, yet loved Joseph with deeper affection, as
Scripture clearly shows: “But his brethren envied him, because
his father loved him;”1984
evidently not
that that good man his father failed in greatly loving the rest of his
children, but that in his affection he clung to this one, because he
was a type of the Lord, more tenderly and indulgently. This also, we
read, was very clearly shown in the case of John the Evangelist, where
these words are used of him: “that disciple whom Jesus
loved,”1985
though
certainly He embraced all the other eleven, whom He had chosen in the
same way, with His special love, as this He shows also by the witness
of the gospel, where He says: “As I have loved you, so do ye also
love one another;” of whom elsewhere also it is said:
“Loving His own who were in the world, He loved them even to the
end.”1986
But this love
of one in particular did not indicate any coldness in love for the rest
of the disciples, but only a fuller and more abundant love towards the
one, which his prerogative of virginity and the purity of his flesh
bestowed upon him. And therefore it is marked by exceptional treatment,
as being something more sublime, because no hateful comparison with
others, but a richer grace of superabundant love singled it out.
Something of this sort too we have in the character of the bride in the
Song of Songs, where she says: “Set in order love in
me.”1987
For
this
is true love set in
order, which, while it hates no one, yet loves some still more by
reason of their deserving it, and which, while it loves all in general,
singles out for itself some from those, whom it may embrace with a
special affection, and again among those, who are the special and chief
objects of its love, singles out some who are preferred to others in
affection.E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
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