ON LOVE; PART MCCXXVI
ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ
GoodWill IS Love in Action
ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ
FIRST IS THE GREAT COMMANDMENTS: “The first of all the commandments is, Hear, O Israel; The Lord our God is one Lord: And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength: this is the first commandment. And the second is like, namely this, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. There is none other commandment greater than these” (Mark 12:29-31).
ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ
WHAT THEN IS LOVE? In a general sense love is benevolence, good will; that disposition of heart which inclines men to think favorably of their fellow men, and to do them good. In a theological sense, it includes supreme love to God, and universal good will to men. While this IS from an older definition of Charity, which IS rendered in the King James Bible from the same Greek word agape which IS generally rendered as Love, we should amend our own definition here to include the idea that in the reality of Love a man will accord to ALL men ALL things that he would accord to himself and to say that Love IS our thoughts and attitude of the equality of ALL men regardless of their outward nature or appearance…that ALL ARE equally children of Our One God
ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ
PLUS THE EVER IMPORTANT AND HIGH IDEAL TAUGHT TO US BY THE CHRIST: “Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them” (Matthew 7:12).
In the last essay we discussed again the way that the Greek words of the New Testament have been translated and interpreted according to the doctrines of men rather than the Truth that IS behind them from a spiritual perspective. Generally the words we cite in this discussion ARE the True ideas behind pistis and pisteuo, rendered into the nebulous ideas of faith and believing rather that the True force of them which IS KNOWING; charis and charisma which for us should always refer to grace, to ALL that comes from the Godhead rather than the assortment of doctrinal ideas that range from a ‘free gift‘ to the idea of thanks; and agape which IS seen in terms of Love but understood in the common understanding of Love rather than the deeper message that comes forth in the idea that “Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself“.
There ARE many other words that help to distort the Truth of the gospels and the writings of the apostles and a key group of these words ARE those that ARE translated and interpreted in terms of sex. We have been discussing four of these, two in some detail, with the intent of seeing them through the prism of the Great Commandments….how that it IS the way that the ideas of adultery and fornication ARE sins because they ARE contrary to these commandments and NOT because the ARE the sexual offenses that ARE innate human behaviors. This sense of sin IS easy to see if one were to Truly look at the scope of the Great Commandments which ARE again at the top of our essay; against the first commandment these ideas ARE ALL carnal thoughts, attitudes and actions that ARE contrary to the fullness of one’s focus upon the things of God.
Here we have two problems; first that both adultery and fornication ARE the thoughts attitudes and actions of men that ARE contrary to the idea of one’s focus on God be with “all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength” and we should note that these Greek words, moicheia and porneia, as well as their Hebrew counterparts, ARE frequently used in the bible to denote such ideas. The second part here IS that men DO NOT understand and doctrines DO NOT teach the True meaning of agape….especially as this IS used in reference to God. In this context especially the True idea of agape CAN NOT be found in the common understanding of Love as that emotional and mental attachment and attraction to others and to the things of this world.
The True context of agape IS found in the Truth of God which the Apostle John shows us saying that “God is love” (1 John 4:8, 16) as well as in the Master’s clarifying words that ARE the third part of our trifecta and, in a more succinct way, in Jesus words saying “If ye love me, keep my commandments” (John 14:15). These ideas ARE contorted by the doctrines of men which, while they say that “God is love“, try to interpret this in human and carnal terms. The reality of this can be clearly seen when tied to the Will of God; surely if He IS Love, His Will is to Love. Here then we can see the idea that Jesus presents as the second part of our trifecta regarding the “will of my Father which is in heaven“, that it IS those who DO His Will that shall receive the reward.
In this idea of reward we again run contrary to the doctrinal view which claims charis and charisma as the ‘free gift‘ of God and this because they DO NOT understand the True relationship between man and God; they DO NOT see that the intermediary IS the Soul who reveals the Truth as the reward to those who will keep His words.…this IS according to the first part of our trifecta. The doctrinal energy that has gone into the nearly universal effort to remove responsibility for his own ‘salvation‘ from the man in this world has created much of the great illusion, the vanity, in which men live yet today. In the Old Testament doctrines predicated their version of ‘salvation‘ on the sacrifice of animals and other ritual ideas while in the New Testament much of the resulting doctrine has made the Master into that same sacrifice removing from men the opportunity to see the Truth which IS our trifecta which we repeat here again:
- “If ye continue in my word, then are ye my disciples indeed; And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free” (John 8:31-32).
- “Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven” (Matthew 7:21).
- “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. Judas saith unto him, not Iscariot, Lord, how is it that thou wilt manifest thyself unto us, and not unto the world? 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. He that loveth me not keepeth not my sayings: and the word which ye hear is not mine, but the Father’s which sent me” (John 14:21-24).
These ARE the Master’s words and here we reflect upon the way that these words ARE ignored by the doctrinal approach to God which bases their ‘salvation‘ in the words of His apostles rather than the words of Jesus. We should add here the Greek word sozo and its derivatives to that list of misunderstood and misinterpreted words and realize that there ARE many more word ideas that have been hijacked by the doctrines of men and used to support and promote those doctrines over the Truth of the Master’s words. Too much of the translations of scripture, the rendering of words and the interpretations of ‘scholars’ IS doctrinally oriented and there IS a clear example to this from the Old Testament Book of Proverbs which we stumbled across in our daily reading. Proverbs 11:30 reads, according to the King James Version, “The fruit of the righteous is a tree of life; and he that winneth souls is wise” (Proverbs 11:30) and in this the meaning IS presumably clear. Other translations however tell us that:
- “Righteousness gives life, but violence takes it away” as rendered by the Good News Translation which gives us a very different message.
- “The fruit of righteousness is a tree of life, but violent behaviour takes away souls” according to The Bible in Basic English and this gives us yet another message.
- “The fruit of the righteous is a tree of life, and the wise gather lives” as rendered by the Common English Bible; here, while similar to the King James, the text speaks of lives and in this one should wonder what Life IS meant and what it means to ‘gather‘ them.
- The Septuagint offers us yet another perspective rendering this as “Out of the fruit of righteousness grows a tree of life; but the souls of transgressors are cut off before their time“. In this Hebrew to Greek to English translation of the Old Testament we have yet another idea.
Our point here IS that there IS confusion in the words of the bible and much of this confusion IS doctrinally oriented, that IS that translators and interpreters ALL have there own doctrinal leaning which gives them their own understanding of the message. It IS into this understanding that many try to fit the ideas thereby changing some, diluting some and distorting still others. But this IS NOT the end of the confusion for the average Christian who IS beholden to the translators and the interpreters for his own understanding of the Truth; the average Christian looks to those who have taken authority over the spiritual lives of others and in this loses light of the essential message which IS most clearly stated but ignored in favor of the doctrinal ‘Truths’ espoused by those authorities.
In the end the average Christian sees pistis and pisteuo as the nebulous ideas of faith and believing rather the that sense of KNOWING that IS the result of keeping His words; they DO NOT see that this sense of KNOWING comes according to the first part of our trifecta nor DO they see the Power, the spiritual Power, that such KNOWING can unleash. The average Christian sees the ideas of adultery and fornication ONLY according to the doctrinal model that IS built for them; they DO NOT see these ideas in regard to their own relationship with God; a relationship that many tout from a different perspective. The right relationship IS the Great Commandment which says that a man should channel ALL toward God and the things of God but this IS NOT taught, likely for several reasons but primarily because those same authorities DO NOT understand what this means in human terms.
And most importantly the average Christian DOES NOT KNOW the True meaning of agape; the average Christian and his teacher ONLY see the carnal view of Love and while many DO try to connect this to the reality of agape, it DOES NOT work. When we can connect the ideas together, the two parts of the Great Commandments, the Golden Rule, and the words of Jesus and His apostles that tell us how it IS that one can KNOW if he Truly Loves God, the inconvenient Truth will shine through. To DO this however one must let go of ALL his doctrinal leanings, ALL of his prejudices and preferences and much of the nurturing and indoctrination that has led him to this point in Life….a point that must become one of desire to KNOW and to understand the deeper Truth.
Perhaps to properly understand the reality of agape we should NOT translate it into Love; perhaps if we can see agape as unique word we can better understand the meaning of Jesus words and the words of His apostles regarding this most important idea. ALL the help that we need to understand this unique word IS given to us in the New Testament where much of the reality of agape IS clearly stated. Can we see the difference between Jesus admonition to “Love your enemies” and the more unique saying that men should “agape your enemies“? Can we see how that in the latter context the rest of His words can be more sensible and more doable as He tells us to “bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you” (Matthew 5:44).
The difference IS likely difficult for most Christians to see because the automatically relate agape to that common idea of Love which IS an emotional and mental attachment and attraction to others and to things in this world. In this defining idea it IS near impossible to “Love your enemies” and this because if you DID so, they would NOT be enemies; but yet they ARE and this idea of enemy need NOT be a specific person but can be any and ALL things against which one IS prejudiced….and this in a good or a bad sense. If then one CAN NOT “Love your enemies“, how can one “bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you“?
This same idea can be easily applied to the Truth of the Great Commandments and the Golden Rule; using the common idea of Love these ideals ARE NOT even understandable. Changing our view of this as we have done in our selections from Paul’s words IS perhaps the starting point from which we can begin to understand and to teach the deeper reality that must be applied, a reality that IS NOT so emotional nor mental and DOES NOT include the ideas of attachment and attraction; repeating our selections again we read:
“Owe no man any thing, but agapao one another: for he that agapao another hath fulfilled the law. For this, Thou shalt not commit adultery, Thou shalt not kill, Thou shalt not steal, Thou shalt not bear false witness, Thou shalt not covet; and if there be any other commandment, it is briefly comprehended in this saying, namely, Thou shalt agape thy neighbour as thyself. Agape worketh no ill to his neighbour: therefore agape is the fulfilling of the law. And that, knowing the time, that now it is high time to awake out of sleep: for now is our salvation nearer than when we believed” (Romans 13:8-11).
“covet earnestly the best gifts: and yet shew I unto you a more excellent way” (1 Corinthians )Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not agape, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries, and all knowledge; and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not agape, I am nothing. And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, and have not agape, it profiteth me nothing” (1 Corinthians 12:31, 13:1-3).
“Agape suffereth long, and is kind; agape envieth not; agape vaunteth not itself, is not puffed up, Doth not behave itself unseemly, seeketh not her own, is not easily provoked, thinketh no evil; Rejoiceth not in iniquity, but rejoiceth in the truth; Beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things. Agape never faileth: but whether there be prophecies, they shall fail; whether there be tongues, they shall cease; whether there be knowledge, it shall vanish away” (1 Corinthians 13:4-8).
In these sayings above agape IS the noun and agapao IS the verb form of the Greek idea which, while it IS related to the more spiritual idea of Love, IS NOT used to express the common idea of this most cumbersome of human emotion. In the end we must come to see that to “agapao one another” IS to see another as we see ourselves; this IS the reality of the commandment to “love thy neighbour as thyself” and the Master’s explanatory of this which we call the Golden Rule. This ‘rule’ IS much ignored in everyday living as it IS NOT applicable as a carnal pursuit….it requires some degree of spiritual intervention. And the Golden Rule IS much misunderstood by ALL who see this in terms of reciprocity and those who regard this as merely an ethical saying. It IS Jesus’ words and therefore His commandment.
And how can we live according to commandments that we DO NOT understand and here we CAN NOT understand this Golden Rule nor the idea of “love thy neighbour as thyself” solely from a carnal perspective. If however we can divorce the idea behind agape from the common understanding of Love, we can then begin to see the reality of the message that has been preached to men since the time of Moses, 3500 years ago. While doctrines place most ALL of their Christian Truth on the death and the resurrection of Jesus, the Master Himself had a much different perspective. Jesus KNOWS that He IS going to die, NOT because the prophets may have prophesied this outcome but because He had full revelation and realization of the Truth that comes in keeping His words.
We should note here that the Master shows us His source of Truth as He tells us how that we too can have revelation and realization of the Truth; we read: “When ye have lifted up the Son of man, then shall ye know that I am he, and that I do nothing of myself; but as my Father hath taught me, I speak these things. And he that sent me is with me: the Father hath not left me alone; for I do always those things that please him…..Then said Jesus to those Jews which believed on him,If ye continue in my word, then are ye my disciples indeed; And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free” (John 8:28-32). Here He tells us of His impending death and, if we read His parabolic idea according to the result, we can see that He tells us how that He will die as well saying “When ye have lifted up the Son of man“.
He tells us also that He keeps His word, the word of the Father, saying “I do always those things that please him” and then goes on to tell us that we too can KNOW the Truth if we keep His words. Our point here IS that while the Master KNOWS the end, He DOES NOT dwell upon it nor give it any special consideration save that He DOES let His disciples KNOW and, from the dialogue of the gospels we also KNOW that they DO NOT understand His reference….even near the end. Jesus’ purpose was NOT to come among us to die and be resurrected; His purpose IS as He tells Pilate saying “Thou sayest that I am a king. To this end was I born, and for this cause came I into the world, that I should bear witness unto the truth. Every one that is of the truth heareth my voice” (John 18:37).
While most doctrinal thinkers see this as Jesus’ admission that He IS a king but the reality IS that He IS simply confirming that Pilate has said this; the next part IS NOT Truly related as He tells Pilate and the world why “came I into the world“. We should understand that while kings and kingdoms were commonplace in this era there was NO king in in the Roman Empire but rather and emperor and there was NO True king in in Israel but rather a ‘client king’ whose allegiance was to the emperor. The ONLY statement in the gospels that Jesus IS “King of the Jews” comes from the “wise men from the east” (Matthew 2:1, 2), Most ALL other references ARE from Pilate who asks Jesus if he is so as we read above. According to the Apostle Mark Jesus’ answer IS simply “Thou sayest it” (Mark 15:2).
Similar to the rendering from John’s Gospel, many translators insert their doctrinal ideas into Jesus answer according to Mark with some rendering His answer as an affirmative; the New International Reader’s Version renders this as “Yes. It is just as you say” while the God’s Word Translation renders this as “Yes, I am“. Even the New American Standard Bible renders this as “It is as you say” taking the words “it is as you” from the Greek word su which means simply you and which IS rendered by the King James as thou. Can we see the doctrinal orientation of the translators at play here? Can we see that it IS doctrines and perhaps the idea of His Kingdom that Jesus presents which lead them to seeing Him as King; and this despite Jesus own words saying that “I am among you as he that serveth” (Luke 22:27).
Even as the idea of the King of Kings IS applied to Jesus we should note that this IS found ONLY in one place in the New Testament Gospels and Epistles and twice in the Apostle John’s fantastical vision which doctrines interpret into fact as they will. Paul uses this idea saying of “our Lord Jesus Christ” that “in his times he shall shew, who is the blessed and only Potentate, the King of kings, and Lord of lords” (1 Timothy 6:14, 15). Here Paul shows Jesus as Potentate, from the Greek word dynastes which means a ruler or officer 9a, according to Strong’s while Thayer’s tells us that this word means powerful 9; the apostle then shows us the idea of this Power showing the Lord as “the King of kings, and Lord of lords“. Paul IS equating ALL these ideas under the word dynastes. Can we see the point here? Can we see that such ideas of Jesus as a King are founded in doctrines?
That the Master IS King IS NOT clearly stated but to see Him as Lord IS shown and by His own admission as He tells us “Ye call me Master and Lord: and ye say well; for so I am” (John 13:13); this we should ever see through His rhetorical question that asks “why call ye me, Lord, Lord, and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46). We should add here that it matters NOT that we see Him as King but we should see Him as Lord and in both ideas we should see the necessity to DO as the King and the Lord, the dynastes, commands and this IS our basic premise as we write about keeping His words.
Is this difficult? Yes and extremely so; this IS why the doctrinal approach to the Lord changes, dilutes and distorts the Truth of His words as they have created and still maintain a human enterprise of religion where men can ‘feel’ good as the Jews ‘felt’ good about their relation to the Lord. The way that Jesus destroyed their view using the Truth has been pigeonholed and IS seen as words ONLY against the Jews; His words of Truth have been diluted and changed to meet the religious needs of men and there seems NO way to brake this rolling illusion that the church calls salvation. From our perspective the ONLY change can come in the right understanding of the Greek word agape, an understanding that will allow men to understand the reality behind such sayings as “Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself“, “And as ye would that men should do to you, do ye also to them likewise” (Luke 6:31) and “if ye have respect to persons, ye commit sin, and are convinced of the law as transgressors” (James 2:9).
When we can understand these ideas as the reality of agape perhaps then we can move forward in our spiritual connection to the Truth that comes to everyman who will “continue in my word” as Jesus tells us and understand as well the dynamic at play through Paul’s words saying “all the law is fulfilled in one word, even in this; Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself” (Galatians 5:14). In our expression of agape as our expression to the world of men we can begin then to see the reality of these other words that ARE changed, diluted and distorted by the doctrines of men; we can begin to properly realize that we ARE NOT disciples, nor saints, nor even ‘saved‘ based in a nebulous doctrinal approach but rather in our approach to the Truth….the Truth that IS agape.
Saying this we will now get back to our selection from the words on agape from Paul to the Corinthians where he first shows us the importance of agape and then proceeds to define it for us in yet another set of Greek words that IS misunderstood and misapplied according to the doctrinal leanings of men. Before we begin this we should show again how that to come to believe and protect one’s doctrinal view IS a human problem and NOT a personal one and here we again use the words of Mark Twain which most appropriately say that: “In religion and politics people’s beliefs and convictions are in almost every case gotten at second-hand, and without examination, from authorities who have not themselves examined the questions at issue but have taken them at second-hand from other non-examiners, whose opinions about them were not worth a brass farthing“**.
While Mark Twain, Samuel Langhorne Clemens, was NOT a particularly Christian man nor very political save for his anti-imperialistic crusade, his words above DO ring True and this for most ALL people who DO NOT take the time and make the effort to discover the Truth of their own beliefs. We should understand here that this human tendency to believe whatever agrees with one’s own myopic view as Truth afflicts ALL men and IS a major component of the vanity, the illusion and glamour, that IS Life in this world.
We will continue with our thoughts in the next post.
| Aspect |
Potency |
Aspect of Man |
In Relation to the Great Invocation |
In relation to the Christ |
|
GOD, The Father |
Will or Power |
Spirit or Life |
Center where the Will of God IS KNOWN |
Life |
|
Son, The Christ |
Love and Wisdom |
Soul or Christ Within |
Heart of God |
Truth |
| Holy Spirit |
Light or Activity |
Life Within |
Mind of God |
Way |
Quote of the Day:
Let the peace of God rule in your hearts
- 9a The New Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible on blueletterbible.org
- 9 Thayer’s Greek Lexicon on blueletterbible.org
- ** Autobiography of Mark Twain, Volume 3 (University of California Press, 2015)
Those who walk on the well-trodden path always throw stones at those who are showing a new road.
Voltaire, Writer and Philosopher
