Is Love really the greatest? (1 Corinthians 13:13)

[spockrates]

I think trust is part of faith, but only part. Faith goes even beyond that in an area that is unreachable by trust. They are not one in the same.

Trust is usually built upon by knowledge and experience.
The apostles certainly couldnt fully trust in all that Jesus because they didnt have the knowledge of what He ment by resurrection. All they had to go upon was faith.

… It seems only after Pentecost, and not before, was their faith and trust made perfect.
Which means, only after the reception of the Holy Spirit.
Being with Christ during His ministry, and even after His resurrection and ascention , they still had doubts…

(Matt 28:16-17)

So no, I dont think faith and trust are the same thing. Faith is an act of the will. Trust is based on knowledge of experience.

Well, perhaps this will help us both understand Faith:

Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see.

(Hebrews 11:1)

Let’s say that the Apostles *hoped *Jesus was the Messiah (or Christ) predicted by the Old Testament prophets. Now actions speak louder than words. So did the fact that they deserted Him when He was arrested show they were sure, or show that they were unsure, of their hope for Him?

 

[spockrates]

Dear Spock,

possibly we’re ( also) told in Ephesians 3 that, since mere human knowledge by itself cannot conceive the greatness and depth of His Love, it is just hearts where He dwells through faith and that are rooted in love which can know what surpasses human knowledge, ie His Love.

That seems to show us that faith AND love have so much to do with knowledge as to allow us to reach what our human wisdom could not.

Usually Saint Paul’s points are not trivial.

Does that sound reasonable ?

Yes, Pneuma, I agree there is a difference between Wisdom (of the world) that causes someone to doubt the truth and Wisdom (from God) that causes someone to understand the truth about God, Christ, morality and the Church.



The former, Socrates said, was a false, and no Wisdom at all. The true philosopher abhors the former, and loves the latter, for the latter is an attribute of God Himself.

Wherefore, we ought to fly away from earth to heaven as quickly as we can; and to fly away means to become like God, as far as this is possible; and to become like him, means to become holy, just and wise. But O, my friend, you cannot easily convince mankind that they should pursue virtues or avoid vice, not merely in order that a man may seem to be good, which is the reason given by the world.

(Theaetetus, 176)

And there is, it seems, a difference between Wisdom (from God) that causes us to understand the truth and know why it is true, and Faith (from God) that causes us to put our trust in the truth. It seems to me (and perhaps it seems to you, too) that such godly Wisdom will help to increase one’s Faith, and even one’s Love.

And I don’t think Saint Paul disagrees, for he writes of this Wisdom in the very passage you mention:

I became a servant of this gospel by the gift of God’s grace given me through the working of his power. Although I am less than the least of all God’s people, this grace was given me: to preach to the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ, and to make plain to everyone the administration of this mystery, which for ages past was kept hidden in God, who created all things. His intent was that now, through the church, **the manifold wisdom of God should be made known **to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly realms, according to his eternal purpose which he accomplished in Christ Jesus our Lord. In him and through faith in him we may approach God with freedom and confidence.

(Ephesians 3:7-12)

And since we are to pray that His will be done on earth, as it is in heaven, I’d say that God wants it to be true for me and you that “the manifold wisdom of God should be made known” to us. For is not receiving godly Wisdom something that is “according to His eternal purpose which he accomplished in Christ Jesus our Lord”?

But I’m curious why you seem at odds with the Wisdom of God. Perhaps it is something about the Catholicism I’m longing to embrace that I don’t yet understand. Is Wisdom thought a merely human virtue by the Catholic Church, and less divine than Faith, Hope and Love? Do you think God in no way helps to develop the strength of this virtue in you and me, as he does the other three?

 

[spockrates]

Your insights here were ignited by a typo of mine. Ie “trust” for thrust.

We could probably say that the thrust of the Gospel is about Love , ie that God Loves us and we should Love. This makes Agape IMHO the greatest Christian virtue.
Wouldn’t you somehow agree on that ?

I dare not go into speculative thoughts about God’s attributes here, I’d rather remain on the virtues which are proposed to us. What I could say is that we are the fruits of His Love ( acting through Wisdom ) , not of His Justice.

Interesting. I admire your desire to not inadvertently slander God. But I wonder if it is possible to know Christ without trying to understand the virtues (or attributes) of God. Wouldn’t considering God’s virtues help you and me to get to know Him better?

I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, and so, somehow, to attain to the resurrection from the dead.

(Philippians 3:10-11)

Moreover, I wonder how it is possible to obey the Apostle’s command without trying to first become more wise about who God is and how He rolls:

Be imitators of God, therefore, as dearly loved children and live a life of love, just as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.

(Ephesians 5:1-3)

But I suppose wondering is how I roll!

 

[spockrates]

… It seems that prudence as “charioteer of virtues” , and as “image and likeness of the Providence of God” ( the term prudentia comes from Providentia), Providence being ultimately His loving care, has a particularly strict relationship with Love.

Agreed!

 

[spockrates]

True and true, i’d say.

Now, from a secular point, it appears quite a common element of …wisdom, that love and knowledge should walk together. And this was eg the great persuasion expressed by the non-religious Bertrand Russel. Obviously knowledge can hurt without love, and love itself can hurt, without knowledge.

This granddaughter committed sin out of sincere love. Not up to us judging her. About how that was unwise it depends on the specific case.

Yes, her love was sincere, yet sincerely wrong. For it resulted in a great and mortal sin of murder, on her part, and suicide on the part of her grandmother! It seems, then, that you and I find ourselves in the same boat with Socrates:

I have long been wondering at my own wisdom, finding it beyond belief, and I think that I ought to stop and ask myself, “What am I saying?” For, there is nothing worse than self-deception, where the deceiver is always at home and always with you. It is quite terrible, and therefore I ought often to retrace my steps and endeavor to “look fore and aft” in the words of aforesaid Homer.

(Cratylus, 428)

We should be wondering at our own wisdom and each stop and ask ourselves, “What am I saying?” For we were, just a few posts ago, saying that Love is wise. It seems, now, that we were self-deceived. While it is true that Wisdom guides Love to make her actions more wise, Love herself has no wisdom of her own. Wisdom, on the other hand, might be wise in her actions, but her deeds are useless in God’s eyes if done out of a selfish motive, rather than out of love. Love needs her sister virtue just as much as her sister needs her. Apart from one another, they can do no consistently good thing. Don’t you think?

http://t1.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:...estar-galactica-1140282_1441_1920-580x772.jpg

Love and Wisdom need one another?

 

[spockrates]

… Both situations do appear to severely test St. Augustine’s words:* love and do what you will*.

But surely he meant, “Love and do what you believe is God’s will,” didn’t he?

… In both situations above we are probably inclined to consider the granddaughter’s and Kenneth’s love for the neighbour. They did love.
But what about the first part of the commandment of Love ?
Did they love God ?
It is likely that we often forget this aspect, which is IMHO fundamental also for our exploration of the relation Love-Wisdom.

Let’s say the granddaughter loved God immensely, but still did not know any better. Let’s say she genuinely thought the most loving thing she could do is help her grandmother kill herself. What she lacked was *not *love, but the wisdom to know how to express it the way God desires. It is ignorance, not enmity, that caused such a great and mortal sin.

So at this point in our thinking this through, I’d say that an act of Love that is unwise (and against the will of God) is perhaps as tragic as an act of Wisdom that is unloving (which is also against the will of God). Wouldn’t you say so, too, Pneuma?

 

[Marie5890]

Well, perhaps this will help us both understand Faith:

Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see.

(Hebrews 11:1)

Let’s say that the Apostles *hoped *Jesus was the Messiah (or Christ) predicted by the Old Testament prophets. Now actions speak louder than words. So did the fact that they deserted Him when He was arrested show they were sure, or show that they were unsure, of their hope for Him?

And to add to that, why did they continue to doubt even after they had seen Him resurrected and even as He ascended ? St Thomas even touching His wounds.

Makes one wonder what faith is based on, what hope is based on, what truth and even wisdom and knowledge is based on, huh?

Something seems to be missing. They witnessed and touched The Risen Lord, and they doubted still.

 

[ryanoneil]

The burden of proof is on you, Ryan. Without evidence indicating that Christ is Wisdom, you are making an argument from ignorance. Me, I find it difficult to believe that I should call Jesus my sister.

Say to wisdom, “You are my sister,”
and call understanding your kinsman;

(Proverbs 7:4)

I don’t think there is any need to call Jesus your sister. The feminine gender is grammatical. How could the OT writers have anticipated or fully understood that this Wisdom was the pre-existent Messiah until his Advent. This is no different than their failure to understand Messianic prophecies.

**For Jews demand signs and Greeks look for wisdom, but we proclaim Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to those who are called, Jews and Greeks alike, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. (1 Cor 1:22-24)

Therefore, the wisdom of God said, ‘I will send to them prophets and apostles; some of them they will kill and persecute’ (Luke 11:49)

Therefore, behold, I send to you prophets and wise men and scribes; some of them you will kill and crucify, some of them you will scourge in your synagogues and pursue from town to town (Mt 23:34)**

Holy Mary, perhaps, might be Wisdom, but Jesus the Son of God? However, let’s say that you are correct, and Christ is the woman called Wisdom described in the first chapters of Proverbs. If He is, then doesn’t that mean that He is not eternal, but had a beginning?

"The LORD brought me forth as the first of his works,
before his deeds of old;

I was appointed [d] from eternity,
from the beginning, before the world began.

When there were no oceans, I was given birth,
when there were no springs abounding with water;

before the mountains were settled in place,
before the hills, I was given birth,

before he made the earth or its fields
or any of the dust of the world.

(Proverbs 8:22-26)

What other explanation of these words could there be? Christ is either a created god (as the Jehovah’s Witnesses and Mormons claim) or He is not the Wisdom that did not exist until God the Father created Him.

Does the trinitarian idea of Jesus being God’s first born son suggest those two options? Wouldn’t an attribute of God be an extension of Himself? Should we believe that God was without Wisdom at some point?

**He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. For in him were created all things in heaven and on earth, the visible and the invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers; all things were created through him and for him. He is before all things, and in him all things hold together. (Col 1:15-17)

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came to be through him, and without him nothing came to be. What came to be through him was life, and this life was the light of the human race; (John 1:1-4)**

I don’t have a good answer, so I can only say more was revealed in the NT.

 

[fisherman_carl]

But is not *reason *(or the virtue of Wisdom) a prerequisite for genuine Faith? Isn’t it necessary to first learn the truth before one can put one’s faith (or trust) in that truth?

Is wisdom a prerequisite for genuine faith? It depends on whose wisdom we are talking about. There is a difference between man’s wisdom and God’s wisdom. If you are talking about man’s wisdom then I would disagree since man’s wisdom is made foolish by God’s wisdom. The natural mind can not comprehend spiritual things for they are foolishness to him. “Now the natural person does not accept what pertains to the Spirit of God, for to him it is foolishness, and he cannot understand it, because it is judged spiritually.” (1 cor 2:14).

If you are talking about God’s wisdom I would say that his wisdom precedes our faith but we do not yet attain it until after faith has been planted in us. For the bible says that, 'The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom." (Proverbs 1:7). Who fears what one does not believe in? First one believes then they come to fear what one believes in.

Yet his wisdom precedes our faith and is contained in his word that is given to us. His reasoning is planted into us through his word and that word produces fruit, faith. So faith is not a result of our reasoning but is a result of God’s reasoning planted in us.

His thoughts become our thoughts as we eat his word.

 

[spockrates]

And to add to that, why did they continue to doubt even after they had seen Him resurrected and even as He ascended ? St Thomas even touching His wounds.

Makes one wonder what faith is based on, what hope is based on, what truth and even wisdom and knowledge is based on, huh?

Something seems to be missing. They witnessed and touched The Risen Lord, and they doubted still.

Well, Tomas does not appear to doubt after he saw and touched the resurrected Jesus. But you have not answered my question: Doesn’t their deserting Him show they were unsure they could trust Him? And doesn’t their willingness to suffer and die for Him after His resurrection show they were sure they could trust Him?

If you agree, then I suppose we have come to the conclusion that faith is *trust *(or being sure of that for which we hope and certain of the God we do not at the moment see).

 

[spockrates]

I don’t think there is any need to call Jesus your sister. The feminine gender is grammatical. How could the OT writers have anticipated or fully understood that this Wisdom was the pre-existent Messiah until his Advent. This is no different than their failure to understand Messianic prophecies.

For Jews demand signs and Greeks look for wisdom, but we proclaim Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to those who are called, Jews and Greeks alike, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. (1 Cor 1:22-24)

Therefore, the wisdom of God said, ‘I will send to them prophets and apostles; some of them they will kill and persecute’ (Luke 11:49)

Therefore, behold, I send to you prophets and wise men and scribes; some of them you will kill and crucify, some of them you will scourge in your synagogues and pursue from town to town (Mt 23:34)
…

Ryan:

Are you saying, then, that the author of Proverbs, who was King Solomon, did not have the Wisdom of God? If so, then how do your reconcile that claim with this passage?

The Lord was pleased that Solomon had asked for this. So God said to him, “Since you have asked for this and not for long life or wealth for yourself, nor have asked for the death of your enemies but for discernment in administering justice, I will do what you have asked. I will give you a wise and discerning heart, so that there will never have been anyone like you, nor will there ever be.”

(1 Kings 3:10-12)

 

[spockrates]

Is wisdom a prerequisite for genuine faith? It depends on whose wisdom we are talking about. There is a difference between man’s wisdom and God’s wisdom. If you are talking about man’s wisdom then I would disagree since man’s wisdom is made foolish by God’s wisdom. The natural mind can not comprehend spiritual things for they are foolishness to him. “Now the natural person does not accept what pertains to the Spirit of God, for to him it is foolishness, and he cannot understand it, because it is judged spiritually.” (1 cor 2:14).

If you are talking about God’s wisdom I would say that his wisdom precedes our faith but we do not yet attain it until after faith has been planted in us. For the bible says that, 'The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom." (Proverbs 1:7). Who fears what one does not believe in? First one believes then they come to fear what one believes in.

Yet his wisdom precedes our faith and is contained in his word that is given to us. His reasoning is planted into us through his word and that word produces fruit, faith. So faith is not a result of our reasoning but is a result of God’s reasoning planted in us.

His thoughts become our thoughts as we eat his word.

Yes, Fisherman, I suppose what you say is true. Interesting, isn’t it, that fear is the beginning (or cause) of the Wisdom of God being planted in us? It’s fear of God (not love for Him)!

One might say that godly Wisdom is then the beginning of Faith and Hope. And perhaps godly Faith and godly Hope are the beginning of godly Love. The chain of causation, then, does appear to move to Love from fear.

Fear → Wisdom → Faith and Hope → Love

That’s just like God to take us from fear to Love, don’t you think?

 

[spockrates]

…

 

[ryanoneil]

Are you saying, then, that the author of Proverbs, who was King Solomon, did not have the Wisdom of God? If so, then how do your reconcile that claim with this passage?

The Lord was pleased that Solomon had asked for this. So God said to him, “Since you have asked for this and not for long life or wealth for yourself, nor have asked for the death of your enemies but for discernment in administering justice, I will do what you have asked. I will give you a wise and discerning heart, so that there will never have been anyone like you, nor will there ever be.”

(1 Kings 3:10-12)

I am not saying that, although he was obviously not the perfect personification of wisdom. I am (and the NT authors are) saying that Jesus is the Wisdom of God.

 

[spockrates]

No. I am (and the NT authors are) saying that Jesus is the Wisdom of God.

So God gave Solomon Jesus?

 

[ryanoneil]

So God gave Solomon Jesus?

Is (1 Kings 3:10-12) speaking only of the attribute or the personified Wisdom?

 

[spockrates]

Is (1 Kings 3:10-12) speaking only of the attribute or the personified Wisdom?

Yes. God is speaking of giving Solomon the virtue of the Wisdom of God so that he has “discernment in administering justice.”

 

[spockrates]

But to say that Jesus is Wisdom is to say that God gave Solomon Jesus, I think.

For if

v = the virtue God gave to Solomon

and

w = God’s wisdom

and

j = Jesus Christ

And if

v = w

and

j = w

then it is also true that

v = j

The upshot is that if what you say is true, then we must conclude that the virtue God gave to Solomon is Jesus. It’s simple logic.

 

[spockrates]

However, I don’t think that’s what you really meant, for that sounds absurd! You must have instead been using a figure of speech (as Jesus Himself often did) when you said “Jesus is Wisdom.” What you must have meant by these words is that Jesus is perfectly and consistently and completely wise. This was your meaning Ryan; wasn’t it?

 

[spockrates]

…

**He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. For in him were created all things in heaven and on earth, the visible and the invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers; all things were created through him and for him. He is before all things, and in him all things hold together. (Col 1:15-17)

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came to be through him, and without him nothing came to be. What came to be through him was life, and this life was the light of the human race; (John 1:1-4)**

I don’t have a good answer, so I can only say more was revealed in the NT.

On the contrary, I believe the words “and without him nothing came to be” are an extremely good answer! Nothing that came to be (or that was created) did so without Him already being (or existing). That is, the Son of God was not created, but was Himself the uncreated creator.

Therefore, it seems unlikely the words of Solomon about Wisdom being the first work of God the Father apply to the person of the Son of God. Though these wise words of the wise king likely do apply to the work of the Son of God.