Vague love.
Aug. 23rd, 2007 11:48 pmI think we are limited anymore in our understanding of love. Especially since I just reread C.S. Lewis book The Four Loves. I find it so very enlightening that the Greeks had four different words for love, which were all pretty well-defined and understandable, whereas we pretty much have the one anymore, and it's been used for so many purposes that it, in some ways, has lost much of its meaning. It's nice to be able to use a word in a such a versatile way, such as loving pizza, or loving a family member, or loving a spouse, but in so broadening its scope, we have completely obliterated the important differences between the kinds. It is only when we truly know something that we are able to act on it, able to learn and change. Would it not make more sense to be able to properly label things for what they are? Telling two people dating that they are experiencing eros rather than agape (spiritual, godly type love), for instance, seems rather more understandable than saying that they are in love but don't yet truly love one another. Eros more implies being in love, something you feel (as does the love between family members which translates as affection), whereas some of the others, such as agape, also include acts of will, a choosing to love.