On Ostler: The Conditions of Unconditional Love
I’ve been invited to do some posts here. For those of you who don’t know me, I have no favorite color. I like sunshine, orange juice, and my life mainly revolves around my 3 year old. I go to church every sunday, have family home evening every week, and daily chastise myself for being not as good as I would like in personal prayer and scripture study. I am, in other words, the stereotypical 29 year old LDS father.
Last night I was going through Chapter 1 of Blake’s Book 2 (as there was a mishap in my Amazon.com order and I received book 2 instead of book 1, and, to make matters worse, the cover was torn upon delivery, so I can not return it.)
Anyway, I don’t want to belabor the point here, but I am not sure I understand Blake fully. Or rather, I think he is over-complicating things.
Is God’s unconditional love conditional? I’d say yes. Is it still unconditional love being offered? I’d still say yes.
How can this be?
1. In order for love to exist, it must be bi-directional. In other
words, If both parties are not participating, it is not love. (One teacher I had called it cathexis, stating that we can not love our car, as our car can not love us back.)
2.While God may offer love to us unconditionally, if that love is unrequited and not reciprocated, then a loving relationship can not exist.
3.So the condition of God’s unconditional love is our accepting it.
Does it really need to be any more complicated than this?
Ahhh… quibbles over the ever-squirrelly word “love”. Sure, if you insist that it is not really love if it is unidirectional then your definition works — but I think you’d have a monumental task convincing a loving mother that she doesn’t really love her wayward grown child because it isn’t real love until the child loves her back…
In other words, I think you are trying to put a straitjacket on the word “love” and it doesn’t really work…
Comment by Geoff J — February 13, 2007 @ 9:39 am
Geoff J,
Excellent point. I think I under-explained my point of view (which may be why Blake went so in depth in his POV) Unrequitted love is still love, it would seem, BUT are there any benefits in either direction to unrequitted love until that love becomes requitted love outside of the potential that said love will eventually pay off and be requitted?
Perhaps my #1 should have read: “In order for a loving relationship to exist, it must be bi-directional.”
Comment by Matt W. — February 13, 2007 @ 9:48 am
For a further thought on Ostler’s Chapter 1, and to clarify that I don’t think I am disagreeing with him so much as trying to succinctly express his idea in a more simplified format (as I am much more simplifed than he), I will add that my favorite point in here is that Ostler notes the purpose of this life is to have a loving-relationship with our Father, where the purpose of the lover is the welfare of the beloved (I am paraphrasing here).
With that in mind, I would say, Geoff, that 99.9% of the time with everyone, love is unrequitted, and we are not in a loving relationship with our Father, as 99.9% of the time, I do not believe that we, as the lover, have the welfare of our Beloved (The Father)as our central purpose.
Comment by Matt W. — February 13, 2007 @ 9:59 am
Seems to me your focus is on “relationship” rather than love.
For what it’s worth, Russell Nelson doesn’t believe in unconditional love either: “While divine love can be called perfect, infinite, enduring, and universal, it cannot correctly be characterized as unconditional.”
“Divine Love,” Feb. 2003 Ensign.
Comment by Peter — February 13, 2007 @ 12:03 pm
Peter: Ostler, in speaking about unconditional love, is actually responding to Nelson’s Text.
A key point is that Nelson goes on to equivocate:
Ostler takes the view that this means that love is on a graded scale, where general love can be universal, but to have the “fullness of love” is conditional. (At least I think that is his view. He can correct me if he wishes)
And what value is love, without a relationship? Can we really love someone we have no relationship with? Or do we imagine a relationship to make that love viable? Like a man loving his car?
Comment by Matt W. — February 13, 2007 @ 12:20 pm
I thought I would add this quote, also from the Ensign.
-Russell M. Nelson, 1991
The New Search feature on LDS.org can produce a lot of material on “Unconditional Love”…
Comment by Matt W. — February 13, 2007 @ 12:30 pm
I am no expert here, but it seems to me love has many levels to it. And that perhaps unconditional love is a lower level. Maybe not. I don’t know.
Comment by Eric Nielson — February 13, 2007 @ 12:39 pm
While I think that love having levels is also what Blake and Geoff, and even I intend, it is, as Geoff notes, ever-squirrelly. (Which should be the name of a band.)
Some issues I have are:
1. How is love quanitified and measured? Is it not totally subjective? If it has levels, does that mean love is not infinite? (I’d say no, as time is infinite and has subsets, and levels and subsets are equivilant to me.)
2. What is love? In modern culture, we love our cars, our children, our spouse, our friends, the simpsons, football, and barbeque brisket. So tomorrow, when I give my wife flowers or whatever and tell her I love her, am I only saying she is enjoyable to me? Do I only love her when she is enjoyable, or is it that she is enjoyable on average, so I love and tolerate when she is not enjoyable. Is that my relationship with God?
Comment by Matt W. — February 13, 2007 @ 1:15 pm
There is some emotion which is generally labelled “love” that God feels for all of his children unconditionally. Such love is a blessing in and of itself, and is not linked to any other blessing.
Some (presumably including Elder Nelson) would define God’s love for us in terms of the blessings he provides. As those blessings are (excepting the above) conditional, his love must also be conditional.
Personally, I prefer to keep God’s love distinct from the blessings he provides.
Comment by Last Lemming — February 13, 2007 @ 1:50 pm
LL, so the problem is that “love” means a myriad of different things and we fail to differentiate and qualify what those things are. After all, the Lord loves all little children, and mothers love their babies, but Babies do not have the capacity to reciprocate. (Yes, I am abandonning my bi-directional requirement of love in general, while I still think it is a requirement of the fullness of a loving relationship.)
Comment by Matt W. — February 13, 2007 @ 2:00 pm
I tend to come down on the side of – love is unconditional. I would really hate to think there is something I can do that would make God love me less, or if I do something really neat, God would love me more. I like the idea that I can come just as I am, and that through that relationship, I can change into something more like God – more loving and more lovable.
If it were not for an agape kind of love, I do not think we would see the story of Hosea and Gomer in the scriptures. I really think there is something to be learned about God from that story.
Comment by CEF — February 13, 2007 @ 2:03 pm
CEF, while I agree with your sentiment of wanting God to love me as I am, I have some reservations with it. If I can come just as I am, why do I need to change into something more like God? And if God can neither love me more or less, how does changing into something more like God make me more “lovable”?
I am beginning to have major problems with this term “love” as it seems to be somewhat dificult to define. But Love, much like Happiness and Faith, is a word with deep roots in my identity, so I am wont to give it up.
Comment by Matt W. — February 13, 2007 @ 2:34 pm
Hi Matt,
Just because God accepts me just the way I am now, does not imply that the Lord does not have something greater in mind for me. A diamond in the rough has intrinsic value, but it is capable of so much more. God would be less than God if he did not want me/help me to be my best.
I had something more in line with my wife in mind when I said more lovable. I am borrowing from something I read in a book by Covey years ago. It might have been the “Divine Center.” Something along the lines of – the more one loves God (God being the great fountainhead of all love) then the more one can love someone else, and I think I added, be more lovable.
Comment by CEF — February 13, 2007 @ 3:01 pm
Does God love Satan unconditionally? If not then the more I become like Satan…by following him, the less God loves me?
Or if He does love Satan, then how does that work? Does that love have any value to Satan, or to God for that matter?
Love is an interesting word, we have one word to describe so many different things – love. I’m not sure of the exact numbers but there are like 5 or 6 different words for love in the Greek.
Comment by don — February 13, 2007 @ 5:42 pm
How interesting that the main speaker in Sacrament meeting this past week had a talk called something like, The Conditions of God’s Unconditional Love, or, God’s Love is Conditional. The woman who spoke is intelligent and well versed, and she rattled off a number of scriptures that supported the fact that God’s love is conditional. I couldn’t help feeling a little bad about this concept and was minorly taken aback (offended) at the notion that HF only loves us when we keep His commandments, but that was the gist of her talk. I think these may have a couple of the scriptures that supported her argument
John:
21 He that hath my commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me: and he that loveth me shall be loved of my Father, and I will love him, and will manifest myself to him.
• • •
23 Jesus answered and said unto him, If a man love me, he will keep my words: and my Father will love him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode with him.
Proverbs:
17 I love them that love me; and those that seek me early shall find me.
or D&C 95:12 If you keep not my commandments, the love of the Father shall not continue with you, therefore you shall walk in darkness.
Basic point: if we don’t love him, he won’t love us back. I kind of disagree with this, again due to the definition of what exact kind of love are we talking about here? I suppose that if we don’t keep the commandments and follow Christ, we won’t have the unconditional love of the Father in terms of exaltation and those kinds of blessings, but regular old love, well, I think that’s pretty unconditional. If it isn’t then the whole meaning of life is kind of turned upside-down, isn’t it?
Comment by meems — February 13, 2007 @ 6:38 pm
Well if nothing else this thread proves that the simplified version of what Blake said in his book is not a good idea. This concept is too complex to oversimplify. I think Blake did an excellent job of covering this issue in the book and I posted on this chapter some time ago.
Blake specifically quoted the Nelson talk in the book. Here is a quote from my post on chapter 1:
Comment by Geoff J — February 13, 2007 @ 9:08 pm
Geoff, very true, I guess there is a necesity for depth here that had not initially occurred to me. I think we are closer to a simplified axiom of it than when we started, though. Love, as can be seen in my comments, has left me with more questions than answers. The most profound idea in Chapter 1 for me was this concept that a loving relationship is when the lover has focused on only the interests and welfare of the beloved, which would be Heavenly Father. I think there are few of us who want to get to heaven only because that is what our Father wants and needs to be happy.
Meems: That talk must have been directly quoting from the Russel M. Nelson talk mentioned above. Just try to remember there are definitely differnt loves.
Don, I only know of eros, agape, filia, and storge, as CS Lewis reviewed them. If there are others, I’d love to learn from you.
CEF, I believe that Idea originated with PP Pratt in his “key to science and theology”, though I can not quickly find the reference. Basically he says that having the spirit with us enlarges our capacity to feel emotions and sensations, such as love, because we are tapping into the infinite.
Comment by Matt W. — February 14, 2007 @ 8:41 am
Matt, what foundational premise does Blake root God’s unconditional love? And does he see love as the overarching attribute of God? (what defines God above all else?)
And Matt can agape be uniquely God and not original or even a capability among His creatures?
Comment by Todd Wood — February 14, 2007 @ 10:21 am
Todd, Blake begins his book with the basic intent “God is Love.” (See an excerpt here) He definitely sees it as an overarching attribute. I am a little confused by your first question.
Also, as I do not speak Greek, and assume it is not your first language, can you please define what you mean by agape? I would say that Agape was a word, and that it was used before Christians used it in connection with god, so there is probably something more to it than it being uniquely God. And it’s been quite a few years since I’ve read “The four loves”. Perhaps I ought to add it to my list for revisiting.
Comment by Matt W. — February 14, 2007 @ 10:47 am
Hi Don,
You ask a very good question. One that has been asked since the early church. I believe it is attributed to Origen, that he thought, given free will, that even the devil and his angels might someday repent. Others thought something along the lines of “restoration of all things†could mean there might be hope for the truly lost. Some even held that punishment in hell was for a corrective purpose.
If God is truly love as John says, and he teaches one to love their enemies, as the Christ taught, then I believe God does love Satan. How does that affect Satan? It could either pull at his heart strings, (something I have not seen any evidence for) or it could make him (Satan) hate God even more. I would think God is saddened over the loss of anyone. If God could not love Satan, then that one act could convict him of being unloving, and therefore, not God.
I am a little troubled to see a reluctance in our church to believe that God loves us unconditionally. I realize there seems to be a tension in the scriptures over the issue, but if I am going to error, then I think I had rather error on the side of a loving God and not a God who withholds his love if I am not so righteous, and loves me more if I somehow manage to perfect myself. That does not give people like me much hope for reaching heaven.
My daughter recently won a very prestigious title in this state. Do I now love her more than I did before she won it? No. Very proud of her, but that is just a flaw in my character.
Comment by CEF — February 14, 2007 @ 12:55 pm
CEF: Does God allow Satan as he is into the celestial kingdom because he “loves” him?
Are you equating love to acceptance?
Perhaps we can hash out a list of alternative words to love, similar to the list Geoff J hashed out for alternative words to atonement, so that we can communicate more effectively?
Comment by Matt W. — February 14, 2007 @ 1:51 pm
Love is not something we feel, or do, instead it is something we are.
Comment by Doc — February 14, 2007 @ 1:57 pm
Doc: But when we say things like “She is the Love of my life” or “God is love” aren’t we speaking of a state of being rather than an act of doing or feeling? Thus the problem with love in general. nope, I’m afradi love has got to go.
Comment by Matt W. — February 14, 2007 @ 2:05 pm
Matt – Do I think God will allow Satan into heaven because he loves him? No. Where did I say I thought he would? I love my daughter, but last summer, I was ready to ship her off to the Marine Corp just to get her out of the house. (not literally) Did I love her less then than I do now? No. But she was not living certain rules (laws) of the house that she knew she was required to live. Had she continued on her destructive course, she would have had to leave home. That would have pained me a great deal, but I would have still loved her, and continued to search for her return “a long way off.”
I am not sure that changing the word love to something else would solve the problem. A rose by any other name is still a rose. Here is the problem I have with love being conditional. After a quick side note.
When I read Blake’s book, I thought he was being very charitable to Elder Nelson” talk. I just did not think Elder Nelson was remotely talking about different levels of love in that talk. But again, it was kind of Blake to give him the benefit of the doubt. Of course I could be wrong.
Matt, if God’s love is conditional, like I believe the same people would understand grace to be, (after all you can do) then at what point do you see yourself having done enough to have earned God’s love? Are you there yet? Or is there something else that you feel you have to do to arrive at the point that God accepts you/loves you?
I think the answer you will come up with, is that you will never be sure just where you stand with God, having not done all you can, and you haven’t died yet, so there is still more to do. As I said, that kind of thinking just does not work for me. Nope, I like the way Alma explained things. He knew in the here and now that God had forgiven him/loved him and that he would go to heaven. I like that.
Comment by CEF — February 14, 2007 @ 3:46 pm
CEF: I wasn’t assuming you had said that, I was asking more of a leading question. You are saying if she continued in her disobedient destructive course, she would have had to leave home. Do you believe her disobedience showed a lack of “love” for you? Do you feel Satan’s disobedience shows a lack of “love” for the Father? I don’t know about your daughter, and I doubt her motivation was really lack of “love”. Satan, on the other hand, definitely “loved” God less. Satan did not see God as an equal peer, but, being self-deceived, saw God as an object. God, I beleive, has the intrinsic quality of never being self-deceived, which is what I think of as unconditional “love”. He always sees the intents of our hearts, and who we really are. So, reverse from tangent, you loved your daughter, but this does not mean she is allowed to do whatever she wants, and it does not mean you will give her anything and everything that she wants, when she wants it. Were you less dedicated to her well being? No, you were still equally dedicated to her. Were you less attached to her? I would say yes, in that she was less attached to you (she was rebelling, I would assume, thus showing a lack of attachment. I could be wrong here.), and thus it was harder for you to be attached to her at the same amount of effort.
Now, I am not suggesting we just replace the word love with another word, but that we subdivide love into the different possible meanings it can have, and thus qualift what we mean. (See here.) Thus we are not talking about a “rose” but a petal of the rose, or the stem, etc.
I also thought Blake was charitable to Elder Nelson’s talk, and I have pondered a letter to Elder Nelson on this very topic, as to what specifically he meant by love, or if he meant a loving relationship, as I am supposing.
I only feel that the benefit of God’s love is available to me only if I accept it, just like God’s grace is only available to me in those conditions. As Blake wrote, God loves me enough to allow me that Freedom.
And as for your last paragraph, I am more a follower of the old “Operation Ivy” paradigm. “All I know is that I don’t know nothing.” That said, I am not ready to rest on my laurels and say, “I’m done. I am Godlike, and there is nothing more I can do.” That doesn’t satisfy me.
Comment by Matt W. — February 15, 2007 @ 8:22 am
Matt –
I think we have arrived at the same conclusion. This morning while brushing my teeth, I realized what we are really talking about is not so much about love, but having a relationship. Relationships are built upon trust and faith. My daughter broke that trust we had and therefore created a distance in our relationship. She moved away from me. And my being not so perfect, I probably moved away from her also. I did not stop loving her, but our relationship was broken/not what it should have been.
I would like to think that God, being perfect, does not move away from us, but we move away from him through our disobedience. The relationship is broken. God’s disappointment with us does not mean that he does not love us, but would not be able to bless us as much, because it seems that blessings are based on the law of the harvest.
I would rather of had Elder Nelson’s talk be about how God cannot bless us if we destroy our relationship with him through our disobedience. I think that is something Mormons, and Christians in general, can be comfortable with.
Just because Alma, Paul and anyone else who believes in grace, no longer worry about what they have to do to please God, doesn’t mean that they are content to sit back and let others do all the work. It has been my experience that those touched by the grace of God are much more valiant (brave, not afraid) in their testimony, and willing to work for the right reasons, than people that have not accepted Gods grace as sufficient for their salvation. Maybe when we have that discussion about grace and Blake’s enlightenment on the same, we can work out a better understanding of such things.
Comment by CEF — February 15, 2007 @ 12:28 pm
CEF, I believe we now are truly on the same page in these regards.
Comment by Matt W. — February 15, 2007 @ 12:38 pm
OpIvy was a great band.
Comment by Jacob J — February 15, 2007 @ 10:01 pm
Here is a potential problem that I see with Ostler’s theology. I did not know where to post it, but thought that here is as good a place as any. If anyone thinks that someplace else would be better, please feel free to move it. To those that have read Ostler’s books, this argument should be self-explanatory. However, if you would like me to explain it a bit more, let me know and I will be happy to do so. Essentially, the argument is that his concept of trust and the Godhead as a perichoretic relationship are inconsistent.
(1) If X trusts Y to do A then Y has the ability to do the contrary of A.
(2) Therefore, If X trusts Y to be honest with X then Y has the ability to deceive X.
(3) If Y has the ability to deceive X then X cannot know the intention(s) of Y.
(4) If X cannot know the intention(s) of Y then Y’s mind cannot be completely open to X.
(5) Therefore, if X trusts Y to be honest with X then Y’s mind cannot be completely open to X.
(6) The Father trusts the Son to be honest with him and vice versa.
(7) Therefore, the Son’s mind cannot be completely open to the Father and vice versa.
(8) If Blake’s LDS God exists then the Father and Son are in a perichoretic relationship.
(9) If the Father and the Son are in a perichoretic relationship then Son’s mind is completely open to the Father and vice versa.
(10) Therefore, if Blake’s LDS God exists then the Son’s mind is completely open to the Father and vice versa.
(11) Therefore, Blake’s LDS God does not exist.
Comment by John — May 27, 2008 @ 11:13 am
John,
That is an interesting point, I’ll be curious to read Blake’s response.
Incidentally, if the email address you listed is your real email, I am very impressed you were able to get it :)
Comment by Jacob J — May 27, 2008 @ 12:36 pm
John, there are a couple of gaps in your logic for me.
1. Why does Trust imply the ability to do the contrary? (Example: I trust Gravity to exist on earth because it always has existed.)
2. What does the ability to do the contrary imply the lack of knowing the intentions? (example, I trust my watch to tell time. MY watch may have the ability to not function, this does not imply I do not know the intentions of my watch)
I’ll stop there for now
Comment by Matt W. — May 27, 2008 @ 1:23 pm
Matt,
Allow me to take a stab while we wait for John to respond.
Why does trust imply the ability to do the contrary?
I think the point is that trust implies some amount of uncertainty. In your example, it is reasonable (in some sense) to say that you trust that gravity will exist in the future because the future is uncertain. It is conceivable that gravity could cease to work as you expect it to and you can’t be sure what will happen in the future.
It doesn’t make sense, I would claim, to say that you “trust” me to put up a post on the war chapters of the Book of Mormon on May 6th of this year, because you already know that I did that. There is no uncertainty, so there is no need for trust. In the example from John, trust is used in a interpersonal context, which means the example about gravity is not necessarily a perfect fit because there seems to be more going on in our trust of people than in our trust of physics.
What does the ability to do the contrary imply the lack of knowing the intentions?
John’s (3) says “If Y has the ability to deceive X then X cannot know the intention(s) of Y.” This is different than what you ask about above. It is not the ability to do the contrary that implies a lack of knowing the intentions of another person, but the ability to deceive someone that requires this.
I suppose it would be more precise to say that you cannot deceive someone intentionally if they know your intentions. This would leave open the possibility that they can deceive you to the same extent they are self-deceived.
However, this leads me to question point (2) which begins “Therefore, If X trusts Y to be honest with X.” What reason do we have to suppose that the Father must trust the Son to be honest? I don’t see any reason we must assume this, which might be a fairly big problem for the rest of the argument, as currently framed.
Comment by Jacob J — May 27, 2008 @ 4:31 pm
Interesting point John. The whole “calling it trust makes no sense if the members of the Godhead enjoy a perichoretic relationship” argument does have merit I think.
It seems to me that one way out of that problem is to hedge on the perichoresis claims and say that the members of the Godhead can have “maximal indwelling unity” but not really absolute perichoresis or something. That way a level of trust is still required between the members of the Godhead.
Perhaps a better argument is to lean on the idea of agent causal liberterianism and simply point out that members of the Godhead may not now intend to ever deceive or betray each other but since they are free they could at some point change their mind and intend to do so in the future. The trust they exhibit is that none will ever choose to change their intentions.
Comment by Geoff J — May 27, 2008 @ 6:47 pm
Good points Geoff. Your last option was the one I was thinking of when I said we need not assume the Father has to trust the Son to be honest (deception may not be possible given their level of indwelling, but trust may be required for something else). However, I like your other option better, personally. I have never been comfortable with the level of indwelling Blake has argued for so I am not sure that is the direction Blake would go. I would dig up our disagreement on that from the archives here, but I can’t remember when it came up.
Comment by Jacob J — May 28, 2008 @ 10:37 am
Doesn’t rejecting the Trinity in and of itself reject absolute perichoresis?
Comment by Matt W. — May 28, 2008 @ 10:48 am
Funny, I just started the section in Blake’s newest book where he addresses this concept of indwelling love.
Comment by Kent — May 28, 2008 @ 11:36 am
By the way, it looks like John is actually having the conversation on Clark’s blog and is responding there if you wanted to check it out.
Comment by Kent — May 28, 2008 @ 12:16 pm
Premise (2) is false. The fact that one has power to do otherwise than trusted to do does not entail that one has the ability to deceive another as (2) assumes. Because the divine persons are totally transparent to each other, they don’t have the ability to deceive each other. Thus, the argument is invalid. Knowing one’s heart or intentions presently is enough to know whether Y is being deceptive. Whether Y will ultimately change his mind in the future will be a fact immediately known to X if Y changes his mind.
Comment by Blake — May 28, 2008 @ 3:14 pm
Sorry that I did not respond here. I got involved over at Clark’s blog and forgot about this one. From here on, for those that are interested, I will discuss this topic over there.
Comment by John — May 29, 2008 @ 9:17 am