{"id":5093,"date":"2018-08-02T20:17:48","date_gmt":"2018-08-03T04:17:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/glenandpaula.com\/wordpress\/?p=5093"},"modified":"2018-08-02T20:17:48","modified_gmt":"2018-08-03T04:17:48","slug":"the-four-loves-charity","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/glenandpaula.com\/wordpress\/archives\/2018\/08\/02\/the-four-loves-charity","title":{"rendered":"The Four Loves: Charity"},"content":{"rendered":"
The Four Loves by C. S. Lewis<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Blog read\u00aders: Chi Alpha @ Stan\u00adford is engag\u00ading in our annu\u00adal sum\u00admer read\u00ading project. As we read through three books by C. S. Lewis, I\u2019ll post my thoughts here (which will large\u00adly con\u00adsist of excerpts I found insight\u00adful). They are all tagged sum\u00admer-read\u00ading-project-2018<\/a>. The sched\u00adule is online<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n

I hope you\u2019ve been enjoy\u00ading the read\u00adings as much as I have. I send these week\u00adly reminders out both as a lit\u00adtle nudge to remind you to pick up the book and also as a quick overview of some of Lewis\u2019s best insights in case you\u2019re hope\u00adless\u00adly busy and unable to get to this week\u2019s read\u00ading.<\/p>\n

This week we fin\u00adish up The Four Loves <\/em>with Lewis\u2019s thoughts on agape (\u00e1\u00bc\u20ac\u00ce\u00b3\u00ce\u00ac\u00cf\u20ac\u00ce\u00b7<\/span> \u2014 benev\u00ado\u00adlent love)<\/a>. Old\u00ader Bible trans\u00adla\u00adtions some\u00adtimes ren\u00addered this word as char\u00adi\u00adty, as does the King James in 1 Corinthi\u00adans 13<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Inter\u00adest\u00ading\u00adly to me, Lewis does not use the word agape at all in this chap\u00adter. He assumes his audi\u00adence is well-edu\u00adcat\u00aded enough to know that agape is the word under\u00adly\u00ading his com\u00admen\u00adtary on char\u00adi\u00adty.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m feel\u00ading a lit\u00adtle under the weath\u00ader today, so I\u2019ll con\u00adtent myself with three quotes from the chap\u00adter and some very brief com\u00admen\u00adtary on them.<\/p>\n

I\u2019ll begin with what may be Lewis\u2019s most famous obser\u00adva\u00adtion in The Four Loves<\/em> \u2014 the inher\u00adent risk\u00adi\u00adness of love. If you read noth\u00ading else, read this and pon\u00adder it. It\u2019s straight fire and stands on its own apart from the chap\u00adter.<\/p>\n

To love at all is to be vul\u00adner\u00ada\u00adble. Love any\u00adthing, and your heart will cer\u00adtain\u00adly be wrung and pos\u00adsi\u00adbly be bro\u00adken. If you want to make sure of keep\u00ading it intact, you must give your heart to no one, not even to an ani\u00admal. Wrap it care\u00adful\u00adly round with hob\u00adbies and lit\u00adtle lux\u00adu\u00adries; avoid all entan\u00adgle\u00adments; lock it up safe in the cas\u00adket or cof\u00adfin of your self\u00adish\u00adness. But in that casket\u2014safe, dark, motion\u00adless, airless\u2014it will change. It will not be bro\u00adken; it will become unbreak\u00adable, impen\u00ade\u00adtra\u00adble, irre\u00addeemable. The alter\u00adna\u00adtive to tragedy, or at least to the risk of tragedy, is damna\u00adtion. The only place out\u00adside Heav\u00aden where you can be per\u00adfect\u00adly safe from all the dan\u00adgers and per\u00adtur\u00adba\u00adtions of love is Hell. (pages 823\u2013824)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I also found this obser\u00adva\u00adtion both help\u00adful and chal\u00adleng\u00ading.<\/p>\n

It remains cer\u00adtain\u00adly true that all nat\u00adur\u00adal loves can be inor\u00addi\u00adnate. Inor\u00addi\u00adnate<\/em> does not mean \u201cinsuf\u00adfi\u00adcient\u00adly cau\u00adtious.\u201d Nor does it mean \u201ctoo big.\u201d It is not a quan\u00adti\u00adta\u00adtive term. It is prob\u00ada\u00adbly impos\u00adsi\u00adble to love any human being sim\u00adply \u201ctoo much.\u201d We may love him too much in pro\u00adpor\u00adtion<\/em> to our love for God; but it is the small\u00adness of our love for God, not the great\u00adness of our love for the man, that con\u00adsti\u00adtutes the inor\u00addi\u00adna\u00adcy. (page 824)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

When\u00adev\u00ader I love some\u00adone or some\u00adthing more than God it is very like\u00adly the case that I do not love the rival too much but that I love God too lit\u00adtle. There are excep\u00adtions, of course. There are some bro\u00adken impuls\u00ades which I might mis\u00adtak\u00aden\u00adly label love and the solu\u00adtion there is not mere\u00adly to love God more but also to repent of my aber\u00adrant attrac\u00adtion.<\/p>\n

And I thought his obser\u00adva\u00adtion on what the rare Bib\u00adli\u00adcal com\u00admands to hate mean was quite insight\u00adful:<\/p>\n

Con\u00adsid\u00ader again, \u201cI loved Jacob and I hat\u00aded<\/em> Esau\u201d (Malachi I, 2\u20133). How is the thing called God\u2019s \u201chatred\u201d of Esau dis\u00adplayed in the actu\u00adal sto\u00adry? Not at all as we might expect. There is of course no ground for assum\u00ading that Esau made a bad end and was a lost soul; the Old Tes\u00adta\u00adment, here as else\u00adwhere, has noth\u00ading to say about such mat\u00adters. And, from all we are told, Esau\u2019s earth\u00adly life was, in every ordi\u00adnary sense, a good deal more blessed than Jacob\u2019s. It is Jacob who has all the dis\u00adap\u00adpoint\u00adments, humil\u00adi\u00ada\u00adtions, ter\u00adrors, and bereave\u00adments. But he has some\u00adthing which Esau has not. He is a patri\u00adarch. (page 825)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The entire sec\u00adtion from which this last excerpt is tak\u00aden is quite good \u2014 I rec\u00adom\u00admend it high\u00adly even if you skim the rest of the chap\u00adter.<\/p>\n

Next week we begin The Screw\u00adtape Let\u00adters<\/em>!<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Blog read\u00aders: Chi Alpha @ Stan\u00adford is engag\u00ading in our annu\u00adal sum\u00admer read\u00ading project. As we read through three books by C. S. Lewis, I\u2019ll post my thoughts here (which will large\u00adly con\u00adsist of excerpts I found insight\u00adful). They are all tagged sum\u00admer-read\u00ad\u00ading-project-2018. The sched\u00adule is online. I hope you\u2019ve been enjoy\u00ading the read\u00adings as \u2026 Con\u00adtin\u00adue read\u00ading \u201cThe Four Loves: Char\u00adi\u00adty\u201d<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"wp_typography_post_enhancements_disabled":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[8],"tags":[230,229,232],"class_list":["post-5093","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-resources-reviews","tag-c-s-lewis","tag-summer-reading-project-2018","tag-the-four-loves"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6Ded-1k9","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/glenandpaula.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5093","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/glenandpaula.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/glenandpaula.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glenandpaula.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glenandpaula.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5093"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/glenandpaula.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5093\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5097,"href":"https:\/\/glenandpaula.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5093\/revisions\/5097"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/glenandpaula.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5093"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glenandpaula.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5093"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glenandpaula.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5093"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}