Post Edited (One Love) : 10/12/2010 12:55:33 AM (GMT-5)

Asher,

Thanks for clarifying. I honestly don’t think there’s any REAL disagreement between you and me. I just don’t. I hope I can convince you of why that’s the case. So…

Asher: …and there is literally not one sentence that I disagree with. But then someone will say something like this: D: I'd say that God's activities are "dispassionately selfless"...meaning "freely, lovingly gracious." First...no, they do not MEAN the same thing.

Tom: I’m sure D will comment on what he meant, but I’d like to say what I think D means (and what “I” would mean if I said it). The essential point is that God’s reaching out to us in grace and love isn’t motivated by some emotional lack or dysfunction, so that God’s using us to constitute his own fullness as a self. God’s fullness as a self is MET triunely. IN THIS SENSE God’s actions toward us are “dispassionate.” This is the better part of patristic thinking on the matter (if Paul Gavrilyuk is right), viz., God is not motivated by emotional dysfunction (i.e., overcome by emotions) to act as he does. That’s not to say God doesn’t FEEL. It’s just to say that “how God feels” or “needs to feel” doesn’t displace other concerns (like reason or the true good of another) AS IT DOES WITH US. THAT is what we mean by “dispassionate.”

Would you fundamentally disagree with this and say instead that God is “overcome” by emotions in the dysfunctional way we are?

On to “selflessness.”

Tom: "I've never met a person who thought "selfless" meant anything other than the opposite of "selfish""

Asher: So, one mode of being a self is called being self - less?!?

Tom: Not at all. And I made it clear that selves aren’t full selves by being less than or other than selves. This is the point about how language is USED. By “selfless” people (OK, a LOT of people) do not mean “self-LESS” in any psycho-analytical way. You insert the hyphen and keep saying that “selfless” means “without a self.” But that’s not how most people use the term (outside of academic discussions between psychologists and psychiatrists). See what I mean?

So no, being “self-LESS” is not a mode of being a “self.” But being selfless (i.e., not objectifying people by treating them as subservient to my own personal needs—i.e. not being selfish as the term is commonly used) IS a mode of being a self.

Asher: And are you just assuming this knowledge? Because when directly asked in an analytic way, my experience is that people are quite syncretic about this topic, not having clear distinction between the use of the word as you say you are using it, and in the other ways that I outlined; which is a large part of the reason why Christianity is infested by Eastern thought and postmodernism.

Tom: I concede all the legitimate analytic/academic differences in uses of the term “selfless.” Already said that. My point is this—once you SETTLE on one of those uses, THEN we can talk. There is only disagreement between you and me on this when we equivocate on WHICH use of “selfless” you want to employ. And you equivocated right above. I was talking about “selfless” NOT as 'being les or other than a self” but as loving personal treatment of others. You responded with, “So, a mode of being a self is being without a self?” See?

If you want to fix the meaning of “selfless” as “being without a self,” THEN let’s do that. If we do that, then I agree with you. God is NOT selfless. Not was Christ. Nor should any of us strive to be selfless.

BUT…if we ask the same question (Should we be selfless?) and fix the meaning of “selfless” as “not objectifying others,” THEN would you agree with me that God IS selfless?

None of the legitimate uses of “selfless” matter once we SETTLE on ‘ONE’ of them as the meaning around which we want to frame the discussion.

Asher: And an additional unrelated reason is the way I have seen many Christian leaders (Baptists, Methodists, various Pentecostals, etc) promote the idea of selflessness as a manipulative tool to get an army of obedient "servants" "for the cause of Christ."

Tom: All good language can be so abused. I can’t think of any word or concept that human beings can’t put to manipulative use. You’re right. But…I’ve also been motivated to act in genuinely loving ways by the same language. So I wouldn’t want to flush our God-talk of all references to “selfless” or “selflessness” just because such talk can be manipulated.

Asher: But, I get it. The idea of "selflessness" is one that cannot be reformed. Evidently its roots run too deep. When you guys hear the word, it touches some of your deepest convictions. But, that is not so for many, many Christians...it touches only confusion. And for me specifically, I have nearly an opposite reaction to you guys when I hear the word.

Tom: Bro, it can ALL be reformed. Language can be reformed at super deep levels too. We all know that. It’s totally OK with me that different people have different default meanings they attribute to the same word. No problem. What I’m saying is that ONCE we clarify WHICH meaning we’re attributing to the word “selfless,” I don’t think you and I (or D) have any fundamental disagreements. You don’t think God objectifies people or treats them as less than personal because God is overcome by emotional dysfunction and needs people to shore up his less-than-fully-realized divine ‘self’. If we agree on THAT, then where’s the disagreement?

Asher: But when you're saying things like ""freely, lovingly gracious." my deepest convictions are touched upon, which does keep us all related. But I do feel a double bind when you lay "dispassionately selfless" alongside "freely, lovingly gracious."

Tom: I too disliked talk of “dispassionate” divine action. The default meaning I grew up with for “dispassionate” was not a good one. It meant something like being a “cosmic stuffed shirt” or “emotionally dead.” But I’m coming to appreciate what seems to be the general patristic insight on “apetheia,” and it’s NOT that God is emotionally dead. It’s that the fullness of his emotional life is triunely constituted. God doesn’t NEED us to be as emotionally satiated as he can be. THAT is something I’ve always believed in even though I don’t like the WORD “dispassionate.” I would use the term with those I knew already were cool with the Orthodox view of things, but not with any average Joe. So I totally understand and agree with what you’re saying.

Does any of this help?

Peace,

Tom

Post Edited (Tom) : 10/12/2010 7:37:35 PM (GMT-5)

What would the golden rule look like if there were no post-mortem consequences? How could one be loving one's self by loving their neighbor by dying for that neighbor in that case? Post-mortem consequences is what makes it to where an action that SEEMS purely unselfish is really an act of loving both one's self and another. Jesus loved us by dying for us. But he also had a joy set "before" him, post-mortem, that motivated him to endure the suffering involved in that. This is one reason why the language is so variable in its use. It changes nuance with contextual perspective.