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The Four Glenview Bible Study March 25, 2021 C. S. Lewis

Clive Staples Lewis (1898–1963) was one of the intellectual giants of the twentieth century and arguably one of the most influential writers of his day. He was a Fellow and Tutor in English Literature at Oxford University until 1954, when he was unanimously elected to the Chair of Medieval and Renaissance Literature at Cambridge University, a position he held until his retirement. The Four Loves

• First delivered as radio talks in 1958 • One of more than thirty books, including , , . • Identified as an atheist until 1929, then a theist • Became a Christian in 1931 – • The Four Loves is the best example of Lewis’ writing as both a classicist and philologist. The Four Loves

• Lewis chose four words from Ancient Greek. (Other scholars say there are up to eight words for in AG.) • στοργή - storgē - “Affection” • ἔρως - érōs - “” • Φιλία - - “” • ἀγάπη - agapé – “” (as in KJV) • philia and are used in New Testament Greek, which has a limited vocabulary The Four Loves

• The book is first an extended reflection on the nature and experience of love. • Lewis then shines a Christian light on all four loves. • Of the four words, agape is the least common in Ancient Greek. • In Greek mythology, Agape is goddess of divine love. • Lewis’ four loves provide a popular framework for writing about love. στοργή - storgē - “Affection”

“Affection almost slinks or seeps through our lives. It lives with humble, un-dress, private things; soft slippers, old clothes, old jokes, the thump of a sleepy dog’s tail on the kitchen floor, the sound of a sewing- machine…” It’s the familiarity of “the people with whom you are thrown together in the family, the college, the mess, the ship, the religious house.” The affection for the people always around us, in the normal day-to- day of life, is the majority of the love we experience, even if we don’t label it. στοργή - storgē - “Affection”

• Name some things you might say you “love”. • What do you mean when you say that? • Think about “the people with whom you are thrown together”. • How would you describe the storgē love in your family, workplace, etc.? What does it look like? • Can you share storgē love with someone you don’t like? ἔρως - érōs - “Eros” - Attraction

“By Eros I mean of course that state which we call ‘being in love’; or, if you prefer, that kind of love which lovers are ‘in’… I am not going to be concerned with human sexuality simply as such. Sexuality makes part of our subject only when it becomes an ingredient in the complex state of ‘being in love’.” Eros “honoured without reservation and obeyed unconditionally, becomes a demon.” Eros demands full attention to the beloved and can displace love for God. We are as likely to “fall out of love” as we are to ”fall in love”. ἔρως - érōs - “Eros” - Attraction

Lovers, “are always talking to one another about their love” and “are normally face to face, absorbed in each other.” Érōs is not sexual desire. It’s possible to have sex without it. With érōs the purpose of sex is fulfilled. Érōs can be an aspect of love for God. It can also displace love for God.

• Why do you think Lewis said érōs is so dangerous? Φιλία - philia - “Friendship” “To the Ancients, Friendship seemed the happiest and most fully human of all loves; the crown of life and the school of virtue. The modern world, in comparison, ignores it.” “… few value it because few experience it.” “It is essentially between individuals; the moment two men are friends they have in some degree drawn apart together from the herd.” “Friendship must be about something, even if it were only an enthusiasm for dominoes or white mice. Those who have nothing can share nothing; those who are going nowhere can have no fellow-travellers.” Lewis thought friendship likely has closest resemblance to Heaven where we will be intertwined in our relationships. φιλία - philia - “Friendship” φιλαδελφίᾳ - philadelphia - “Brotherly love”

Romans 12:10 Love one another with mutual affection (philadelphia); outdo one another in showing honour.

Hebrews 13:10 Let mutual love (philadelphia) continue. Φιλία - philia and ἀγάπη - agapé

John 15:12-17 My command is this: Love (agapé) each other as I have loved (agapé) you. Greater love (agapé) has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends (philōn). You are my friends (philoi) if you do what I command. I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business. Instead, I have called you friends (philous), for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you. You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you so that you might go and bear fruit—fruit that will last—and so that whatever you ask in my name the Father will give you. This is my command: Love (agapé) each other. • What does friendship with Jesus mean to you? ἀγάπη - agapé – “Charity”

The of God demonstrated to humanity in the gift of God’s Son. “Herein is love. This is the diagram of Love Himself, the inventor of all loves.” “God, who needs nothing,” creates in and to love. “Need-love cries to God from our poverty; Gift-love longs to serve, or even to suffer for, God; Appreciative love says: “We give thanks to thee for thy great glory.” Need-love says of a woman “I cannot live without her”; Gift-love longs to give her happiness, comfort, protection – if possible, wealth…” “… we are mirrors whose brightness, if we are bright, is wholly derived from the sun that shines upon us.” ἀγάπη - agapé – “Charity” 1 Corinthians 13:4-8a, 13 Love (agapé) is patient; love is kind; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth. It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends. And now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; and the greatest of these is love. • This is an example of a “Virtue List”, common in NT times, expressing ideals of “virtuous” behaviour. Is it really possible to love like this? ἀγάπη - agapé – “Charity”

• Why do you think Lewis believed agape is the greatest love and the others were insufficient, even tainted without it? To love at all is to be vulnerable. The great thing to remember is that though our feelings come and go God's love for us does not. You cannot love a fellow creature fully till you love God. Love is not affectionate feeling, but a steady wish for the loved person's ultimate good as far as it can be obtained.

The Christian does not think God will love us because we are good, but that God will make us good because He loves us.