A self-loving God?

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thinkandmull

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For awhile I’ve been uncomfortable with saying that God loves everything (infants, garbage cans) with the same intensity. It just seems unnatural. So I don’t think I agree with Aquinas on that. However, Christian have long argued against Muslims in debates that Allah is a lonely God and had nobody to love, and is therefore imperfect. Yet the Summa, First part, Q 32 obj 3 and re 3 shows that Aquinas did not believe in this argument. I have two questions to present.
  1. If God’s nature could theoretically be perfect and complete without someone to love, than His nature doesn’t necessarily have to be Love. But can’t we know from reason that love is the greatest virtue?
  2. In the same treatise he write that the Father begets the Son by knowing His own nature. If God is Love, shouldn’t the Son be begotten by a desire to share His nature, as with humans?
 
thinkandmull said:
For awhile I’ve been uncomfortable with saying that God loves everything (infants, garbage cans) with the same intensity. It just seems unnatural. So I don’t think I agree with Aquinas on that. However, Christian have long argued against Muslims in debates that Allah is a lonely God and had nobody to love, and is therefore imperfect. Yet the Summa, First part, Q 32 obj 3 and re 3 shows that Aquinas did not believe in this argument. I have two questions to present.
  1. If God’s nature could theoretically be perfect and complete without someone to love, than His nature doesn’t necessarily have to be Love. But can’t we know from reason that love is the greatest virtue?
  2. In the same treatise he write that the Father begets the Son by knowing His own nature. If God is Love, shouldn’t the Son be begotten by a desire to share His nature, as with humans?
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Without delving into the brilliant writings of Aquinas, on which I am completely incompetent, I would first point out that if, by nature, you mean human nature, animal nature, the nature of life on earth and the nature of the universe, then G-d is indeed unnatural. G-d created nature as part of the laws of the universe, but G-d Himself is beyond nature and beyond His creation, including time, space, human drives and failings, and so on. At the same time, G-d’s OWN nature cannot be fully comprehended by the natural human mind. Thus, as inspiring as it sounds, Judaism is reluctant to say that G-d IS love, because even such a supremely noble attribute appears to be limiting G-d’s nature and essence, while presupposing that we can somehow define it. Indeed, we prefer to speak of G-d in terms of what He is NOT rather than what He is.
 
meltzerboy said:
Without delving into the brilliant writings of Aquinas, on which I am completely incompetent, I would first point out that if, by nature, you mean human nature, animal nature, the nature of life on earth and the nature of the universe, then G-d is indeed unnatural. G-d created nature as part of the laws of the universe, but G-d Himself is beyond nature and beyond His creation, including time, space, human drives and failings, and so on. At the same time, G-d’s OWN nature cannot be fully comprehended by the natural human mind. Thus, as inspiring as it sounds, Judaism is reluctant to say that G-d IS love, because even such a supremely noble attribute appears to be limiting G-d’s nature and essence, while presupposing that we can somehow define it. Indeed, we prefer to speak of G-d in terms of what He is NOT rather than what He is.
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You’re right, St John’s description might’ve been limiting, as any attribute we try to use or designate must be. But could it be that love is the central and chief aspect of God, that this centrality is a most relevant revelation for man even while we still don’t yet know love anywhere near as well as we may think we do, just as we don’t know God as well as, hopefully, we will? Could it be that love is limitless?
 
fhansen said:
You’re right, St John’s description might’ve been limiting, as any attribute we try to use or designate must be. But could it be that love is the central and chief aspect of God, that this centrality is a most relevant revelation for man even while we still don’t yet know love anywhere near as well as we may think we do, just as we don’t know God as well as, hopefully, we will? Could it be that love is limitless?
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Yes, it could be that love is as close to a definition of G-d as we humans are able to understand. However, how we limit the meaning of love, according to several definitions, may differ from love as G-d embodies it. I think we should keep that in mind. Even though we are created in the image and likeness of G-d so that we may gain a glimpse into the majesty of G-d’s Being, our own divinely inspired attributes of kindness, mercy, and love are but a pale reflection of those of G-d Himself, not only quantitatively but qualitatively as well.
 
meltzerboy said:
Yes, it could be that love is as close to a definition of G-d as we humans are able to understand. However, how we limit the meaning of love, according to several definitions, may differ from love as G-d embodies it. I think we should keep that in mind. Even though we are created in the image and likeness of G-d so that we may gain a glimpse into the majesty of G-d’s Being, our own divinely inspired attributes of kindness, mercy, and love are but a pale reflection of those of G-d Himself, not only quantitatively but qualitatively as well.
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Yes, it’s just that we have to strive to understand God better I think-that is, in part, what revelation is for. And for myself, placing an emphasis on love brings us a bit nearer to knowing this Reality we call God-I can’t help but think its a very important emphasis.
 
I think I found the answer to my first question. The processions arise “as God understands and loves His own essence, truth, and good” (Q XXVII Art 5) . Aquinas says this in response to the objection “goodness seems to be the greatest principle of procession, since goodness is saed to be self-giving”. So Aquinas would seem to agree that it is the Father reflecting on His **nature of givingness **from which proceeds His Word.

I still disgree with Aquinas and agree with Chesterton and others on the Muslim thing. Aquinas was very concerned that we do not try to prove articles of faith from reason. But what about the resurrection of the body? That article of faith is a natural correlate of the immortality of the soul if one accepts Aquinas’s body-soul
 
meltzerboy said:
Without delving into the brilliant writings of Aquinas, on which I am completely incompetent, I would first point out that if, by nature, you mean human nature, animal nature, the nature of life on earth and the nature of the universe, then G-d is indeed unnatural. G-d created nature as part of the laws of the universe, but G-d Himself is beyond nature and beyond His creation, including time, space, human drives and failings, and so on. At the same time, G-d’s OWN nature cannot be fully comprehended by the natural human mind. Thus, as inspiring as it sounds, Judaism is reluctant to say that G-d IS love, because even such a supremely noble attribute appears to be limiting G-d’s nature and essence, while presupposing that we can somehow define it. Indeed, we prefer to speak of G-d in terms of what He is NOT rather than what He is.
Click to expand...
How a meaningful relation with a God we cannot understand is achievable?
 
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