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pia†desideria
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Date Joined Jun 2001
Total Posts : 301

Posted 7/10/2001 6:32 AM (GMT -6)

Benjamin says, “God loves himself more than anything…” This statement is very consistent with God classically defined as unchanging, unfeeling, and absorbed in eternal self-contemplation, following Aristotle's nous noein. Grace is actually God’s means of loving himself in (some) humans.

Sinners are classically defined as people who are curved back in on themselves, homo incurvatus in seipsum. For example, Luther says scripture “describes man as curved in upon himself to such an extent that he bends not only physical but spiritual goods toward himself, seeking himself in all things.”

Given the classical definition of God and the classical definition of sin, how is the classical God not the supreme instance of classical sin? Who is more “curved in upon himself” than God?

pia

Modes of Thought
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Date Joined Jun 2001
Total Posts : 817

Posted 7/10/2001 7:00 AM (GMT -6)

quote:

Benjamin says, “God loves himself more than anything…” This statement is very consistent with God classically defined as unchanging, unfeeling, and absorbed in eternal self-contemplation, following Aristotle's nous noein. Grace is actually God’s means of loving himself in (some) humans.

Sinners are classically defined as people who are curved back in on themselves, homo incurvatus in seipsum. For example, Luther says scripture “describes man as curved in upon himself to such an extent that he bends not only physical but spiritual goods toward himself, seeking himself in all things.”

Given the classical definition of God and the classical definition of sin, how is the classical God not the supreme instance of classical sin? Who is more “curved in upon himself” than God?

pia

I say, give up on both classical definitions and start over.

Seriously though, what is missing is the fundmantal affirmation of relation.

God is triune so this changes things dramatically. Sin is also relational, it is against God, self and creation. That's how I would start.

Tom
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Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 10353

Posted 7/10/2001 9:06 AM (GMT -6)

quote:
...following Aristotle's nous noein...homo incurvatus in seipsum. pia

Pia (or anyone who has an answer)-

Where could I get a volume of theological Latin? I mean, something small enough to keep with me while I read books that use Latin phrases a lot. I don't wanna learn Latin grammar, just memorize the most commonly used phrases. Is there anything like that around?

Tom

"The will to prepare to win is greater than the will to win." Bobby Knight

Modes of Thought
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Date Joined Jun 2001
Total Posts : 817

Posted 7/10/2001 11:33 AM (GMT -6)

GregBoyd
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Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 1818

Posted 7/10/2001 5:38 PM (GMT -6)

The classical answer to Pia would be

God is, by an infinite degree, the greatest value. So of course God loves himself. He loves all others only as a means of loving himself. For humans to love themselves this way would be sin, however, for they are not the greatest value.

There is, I think, an element of truth in this, but only (as Modes pointed out) if its construed in trinitarian terms. God DOES love himself unsurpassably. But this self-love is in fact love of another, for God is internally relational. The central problem with the classical view of self-love was that it was not sufficiently trinitarian. This is why they have to pit God's self-love against his love for humanity. If we consistently conceive of God as triune, then we don't have to have God's love in competition with his love for others, for God's love for himself now includes his love for others.

The Bible emphasizes that all believers are "in Christ." We are thus loved by the Father in the very same act by which he eternally loves the Son. This, I take it, is the central point of Jesus prayer in John 17. We are loved and glorified in the one who is eternally loved and glorified. In this sense too we are "partakers of his divine nature" (1 Pet 1:4 -- or is it 2 Pet 1:4?).

We are partakers of God's eternal, unsurpassable, triune love!!!!!

So, if God is curved in on himself, he includes us in on the curve.

PRAISE GOD

Doc

Modes of Thought
Registered Member

Date Joined Jun 2001
Total Posts : 817

Posted 7/12/2001 1:46 PM (GMT -6)

quote:

Pia (or anyone who has an answer)-

Where could I get a volume of theological Latin? I mean, something small enough to keep with me while I read books that use Latin phrases a lot. I don't wanna learn Latin grammar, just memorize the most commonly used phrases. Is there anything like that around?

Tom

"The will to prepare to win is greater than the will to win." Bobby Knight

Hey Tom, since sid hasn't gotten back to you yet, I checked it out myself. "Consecrated Phrases: A Latin Theological Dictionary" is published by the Liturgical Press at Collegeville MN. It was published in 1998. There are others, I'm sure, but this one is a nice little hardcover. Ask "p" what she thinks of it.

BTW: keep an eye out for a response in the Christ crucified from the foundations of the world thread. Or what ever it was called...

Edited by - ModesofThought on 07/12/2001 6:51:41 PM

Tom
Registered Member

Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 10353

Posted 7/12/2001 7:45 PM (GMT -6)

quote:
BTW: keep an eye out for a response in the Christ crucified from the foundations of the world thread. Or what ever it was called...

Oftho-

Looking forward to your response. Have mercy on me, a poor Neophyte!

Tom

"The will to prepare to win is greater than the will to win." Bobby Knight

Edited by - TGB on 07/13/2001 12:46:28 AM

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