[From Part II Chapter IV, "Love Sees Not Its Own"]
“Love… does not seek its own.” ~ 1 Corinthians 13:4-5 (NASB)
“Justice is recognizable in that it gives to each his own, just as each requires its own in return. This means that justice is concerned with what is one’s own: it partitions and divides; it determines what each one has the right to call his own; it judges and punishes if anyone does not make the distinction between mine and yours. With this contentious and yet legally-entitled mine, the individual has the right to do as he pleases, and when he seeks his own on no other basis than that which justice grants, justice has nothing to reproach him for and no right to upbraid him for anything.”[1]
Political theory divides justice
into two types: retributive, which is
how we respond to crime, and distributive,
which is how distribute wealth and power in society. Here Kierkegaard is
concerned with distributive justice—an issue that is admittedly far more loaded
for generations before mine, than it is for me, as I have no memory of the Cold
War. But distributive justice was, perhaps, the defining political issue of the
twentieth century—and continues to be a hotly-debated aspect of domestic
policy, if not as often of foreign policy. An important thing to note, however,
is that no matter where you fall on the political scale—from the staunchest
capitalist to the most brazen communist—we are always concerned with the
fundamental issue: what belongs to me, and what belongs to you? Our political
system, no matter the type or persuasion, is fundamentally an answer to this
question.
Again, my generation, for whom
the main issue was terrorism, may not be aware of just how crucial distributive
justice has been to Western history. Going back to the French Revolution,
however, there are dozens and dozens of rebellions and wars that have been
fought over it. The revolutions of 1848, South American revolutions, the
Mexican Revolution, the Russian Revolution, the Chinese Revolution, the Cuban
Revolution—all of these were essentially attempts by those who had little to
redistribute the wealth of their nation by force: to change the balance of mine and yours.
For Kierkegaard love is also a
revolution, insofar as it changes the way we look at yours and mine—but it is
a very different type of revolution:
“Love is a revolution, the most profound of all but the most blessed! Therefore with love, too, there comes confusion; in this life-giving confusion there is no distinction for the lovers between mine and yours. Remarkable! There are a you and I and yet no mine and yours! For without you and I there is no love, and with mine and yours there is no love; but mine and yours (these geographical co-ordinates of possession) are in fact formed out of you and I and consequently seem necessary wherever you and I are. This holds true everywhere, except in love, which is the fundamental revolution. The deeper the revolution, the more the distinction between mine and yours disappears, and the more perfect is the love; love’s perfection consists essentially in not revealing the initial and continuing distinction between mine and yours hidden at the base; therefore it consists essentially I the depth of the revolution. The deeper the revolution is, the more justice shudders; the deeper the revolution is, the more perfect is the love.”[2]
Love is a revolution, but it is
not a revolution that takes from yours
and gives to mine. Rather, it is a
revolution that abolishes the distinction entirely. When I truly love a person,
I am not concerned with what belongs to me. If I love a person and they need
something I have, they are welcome to it!
For example, I have a friend
named Zoe. When I am over at Zoe and Tyler’s house, they often have Pepsi in
the fridge. For a long time, I would always
ask before I took one from the fridge—always. After a while, though, this got
on Zoe’s nerves. Why would I bother to ask? Of
course I should know that I am welcome to their soda, because we are close
friends—they have love for me. Now, I
was raised to ask permission (and as a younger sibling, respecting possessions
is a high priority for me), so it was difficult for me to stop asking, but
eventually I learned.
Admittedly, this is a small-scale
example. But it demonstrates the revolution that happens with love: when you
truly love someone the distinction between mine
and yours becomes unimportant. I want to help those I love, and therefore
of course they are welcome to what I
have. That is the ideal of love, of course. And we see it as well in marriage,
so we not? That relationship which we uphold as the paragon of love (for better
or worse[3])
involves at its core the abolition of the distinction between his and hers. He belongs to her. She belongs to him. They hold everything
together—hopefully with the exception of the toothbrushes.
Now, in marriage we find this
idea acceptable—encouraging, even!—but, despite what 9 out of 10 weddings want
you to believe, 1 Corinthians 13 is not
specifically about romantic love. When Paul says that love does not seek its
own, he means real love, the love of God, which we are commanded to show to all
people. So that distinction between yours
and mine ought to be abolished, not
just between you and your spouse, or between me and my friend, but between each
of us and each of our neighbors. As Americans this will be difficult to
unlearn, but the lesson is this: acting out of love means abandoning my
obsession with protecting “my rights” or getting “my dues.” Love is the
opposite of entitlement. Love is a revolution.
Dear Father,
I obsess over my rights. I obsess over what belongs to me. In that obsession I fail to love. In that obsession I uphold the status quo of this world. Make me a part of your revolution. Grant me a love that abolishes mine. Freely I have received from you. Make me to freely give to others. Bring me into the revolution of your kingdom that advances on this planet.
In the name of the king who truly loves,
Amen.
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