WRITING in response to this post about a woman’s disappointment with her husband, Jeff W. writes:

There are two kinds of love: human love and God’s love. Sometimes these two kinds of love are called by the ancient Greek terms eros and agape.

Eros and agape are very different. One main difference is that eros recognizes value in its object and loves it, while agape loves and then creates value in its object. In other words, eros recognizes an alpha male and loves him because he makes her feel safe, protected, and feminine. Agape, however, can love any person, even the most loathsome and disgusting. This is the kind of love a Christian may have for a diseased and dying beggar from the streets of Calcutta, or even (though it may seem unbelievable) a beta male husband. Through agape love, a loathed and rejected person becomes the beloved.

There is a good summary of the qualities of these two kinds of love on page 159 of this book (scroll to the bottom).

                                                — Comments  —

Vishal Mehra writes:

This is a fine topic for discussion. However, the linked book gives out the view that “One main difference is that eros recognizes value in its object and loves it, while agape loves and then creates value in its object,” –only to criticize it.

However, I think that the view espoused in the book itself, that eros is love for the sake of lover while agape is love for the sake of Beloved (And philia is love for the sake of relationship) is also simplistic and rationalistic. Personally I found the discussion in the Four Loves by C.S. Lewis to be far more realistic, truer and elegant.

C.S. Lewis makes no lists or one-point criteria. Love is not reducible to formulae. It is not easy, if at all possible to summarize him. One distinctive characteristic of eros is that the Beloved is one person. Eros picks out one person as an Object. And is related to a fundamental Masculine-Feminine binary that exists in the Creation. It has nothing to do with alpha-beta. All kinds of men may be objects of eros–there is no calculation in love.

Perhaps there are erotic elements in Divine love too. Recall the Bridegroom, Song of Solomon , the Church as Bride, Israel as adulteress.

Mr. Mehra writes:

A wonderful illustration of the rationalistic approach to love is found in the book ” Love, Human and Divine” by EC Vacek. I just could not bear not sharing it.

This is from the chapter titled Eros:

The father who lovingly encourages his children’s education genuinely wants their advancement; but his love is eros if he would cut off support when “parenting” no longer brings him satisfaction.

Bear in mind that for Vacek, eros is defined as the love for the sake of Lover and not eros as commonly understood.

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