Which Is Greatest?

  • Thread starter Thread starter spockrates
  • Start date Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
spockrates said:
So, perhaps wisdom is as great as love? I mean, it’s both wise and loving to show mercy! Right?
Click to expand...
Mercy is from the Latin Misericordia, which is the love a parent gives its child even in the face of misery which is heartfelt sadness.h
 
Last edited:
Lee1 said:
Not just empathy but you would have to have compassion to understand me, love would give empathy and compassion and believe me I would need both those from you if you were to ‘get’ me.
Click to expand...
Perhaps I’m lacking the necessary compassion, since I don’t yet get your meaning. Maybe if you give one example, I’d feel you?
 
It seems to me that St. Paul’s words are pretty clear on their face. Without love wisdom is of ZERO value. No, not “great too”, but “greater”. No way to twist his words to mean anything else.
[/quote]

Yeah, I get that. But without wisdom is love of value? Maybe an example will help.

A girl loves a boy, and wants to show her love, so she makes love to him, because he doesn’t want to wait to be old enough to get married. She becomes pregnant. He wants her to get an abortion, because he wants to finish high school before he becomes a daddy. Since she loves him so much, she does what he wants.

Doesn’t this mean that just as wisdom without love is nothing, so too love without wisdom is, at least in some cases, also nothing?

It seems to me the wise thing to do - and also the most loving - would have been to wait to have sex. Right?
 
Last edited:
not sure you read this spockrates?

If you look around what do you see? A world lacking in wisdom or a world lacking in love?
Would our world be better if we were all wise? Yes but cold.
Would our world be better if we all truly loved our neighbour? Yes and warm.

We could be wise to keep our harvest to ourselves to safeguard our survival through winter but how would we feel living alone next spring?
If we share our harvest with love we at least gain merit with God, which is priceless.
[/quote]
 
Lee1 said:
not sure you read this spockrates?

If you look around what do you see? A world lacking in wisdom or a world lacking in love?
Would our world be better if we were all wise? Yes but cold.
Would our world be better if we all truly loved our neighbour? Yes and warm.

We could be wise to keep our harvest to ourselves to safeguard our survival through winter but how would we feel living alone next spring?
If we share our harvest with love we at least gain merit with God, which is priceless.
Click to expand...
I’m sure the fictional Vulcan or the Ancient Greek Stohic would agree that a world devoid of emotion would be of greatest value. 🖖

But, since God is 100% loving and 100% wise, it seems to me the perfect life consists in imitating him. That is, the only wise thing to do is to love. So, it’s impossible to be wise and unloving, though sometimes one must choose to love one at the expense of withholding love from another. 🙂
 
Last edited:
spockrates said:
Doesn’t this mean that just as wisdom without love is nothing, so too love without wisdom is, at least in some cases, also nothing?
Click to expand...
The wisdom is choosing the the greater love and abortion is most certainly the lesser in all circumstances.
 
hergratefulchild said:
40.png
spockrates:
Doesn’t this mean that just as wisdom without love is nothing, so too love without wisdom is, at least in some cases, also nothing?
Click to expand...
The wisdom is choosing the the greater love and abortion is most certainly the lesser in all circumstances.
Click to expand...
Agreed! I mean, it seems to me that without wisdom one cannot know which is the greater love. So, I’m thinking both are necessary, and neither is greater. Indeed, without love, wisdom isn’t as wise as it should be. Without wisdom, love is not as loving as it could be. Like a wife completes her husband, so wisdom perfects love. They are greater together than they might ever be apart.
 
Wisdom is the perfection of love because it is love in the hands of God.
 
We need to imitate the love God has for us and we can only do that through the word made flesh which is the essence of wisdom.
 
hergratefulchild said:
We need to imitate the love God has for us and we can only do that through the word made flesh which is the essence of wisdom.
Click to expand...
Yeah, yeah! As St. Paul also writes in Corinthians:

The person with the Spirit makes judgments about all things, but such a person is not subject to merely human judgments, for, “Who has known the mind of the Lord so as to instruct him?” But we have the mind of Christ.

(1 Corinthians 2:15-16)

Though I suppose one has to be wise enough to discern when what she thinks is from Christ’s mind and not her own. 🙂
 
hergratefulchild said:
40.png
spockrates:
hough I suppose one has to be wise enough to discern when what she thinks is from Christ’s mind and not her own
Click to expand...
By listening to Jesus
Click to expand...
I wonder exactly how one gets ears to hear him. I mean, I’m of the opinion (though in no way certain) that wisdom is as great and desirable and wonderful as love. In effect, that she is love’s equal. But a good many Catholics might disagree with me. How then can I tell who has heard from Jesus and who is hard of hearing?
 
Last edited:
As a child I remember loving long before I got any wisdom. And I imagine that I may well love after I’ve lost that wisdom.
 
Lee1 said:
As a child I remember loving long before I got any wisdom. And I imagine that I may well love after I’ve lost that wisdom.
Click to expand...
As a child, I remember constantly asking, “Why?” and so desiring wisdom. Everytime an adult answered my question I became a little wiser, I think.

I’ve heard of people who get Alzheimer’s that they become angry and less loving. Maybe losing one’s wisdom makes it harder to love?
 
Wisdom is also a cerebral thing, we learn wisdom but love I see a far harder thing to feel in my opinion. Agape is easier, a charitable disposition towards ours and wishing them only well, but actual love is tricky.

Even the love I felt for my parents was conditional after all, if I’d been beaten or starved I may well have still felt a need for them but not love. Love is a complex thing compared to wisdom.
 
Yes, I agree people who get dementia also can become paranoid and aggressive. I believe our souls do not get dementia! That probably sounds odd but I think the soul is quietly in the background and is in touch with the Almighty and I’m sure it is aware and loving since it is our foundation.
 
Agape is perhaps closest. But to be more clear than mud, let me give a more precise definition of he kind of love I have in mind:

Love is an emotion of compassion which is demonstrated by a compassionate action by which one selflessly puts the needs of another above her own.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top