Love Marquette Studies in Philosophy Andrew Tallon, editor Harry Klocker, S.J. William of Ockham and the Divine Freedom Margaret Monahan Hogan. Marriage as a Relationship Gerald A. McCool, S.J. The Neo-Thomists Max Scheler. Ressentiment Knud Løgstrup. Metaphysics Howard P. Kainz. Democracy and the Kingdom of God Manfred Frings. Max Scheler: A Concise Introduction into the World of a Great Thinker G. Heath King. Existence Thought Style: Perspectives of a Primary Relation, portrayed through the work of Søren Kierkegaard Augustine Shutte. Philosophy for Africa Paul Ricoeur. Key to Husserl’s Ideas I Karl Jaspers. Reason and Existenz Gregory R. Beabout. Freedom and Its Misuses: Kierkegaard on Anxiety and Despair Manfred S. Frings. The Mind of Max Scheler. The First Comprehensive Guide Based on the Complete Works Claude Pavur. Nietzsche Humanist Pierre Rousselot. Intelligence: Sense of Being, Faculty of God Immanuel Kant. Critique of Practical Reason Gabriel Marcel. Gabriel Marcel’s Perspectives on The Broken World Karl-Otto Apel. Towards a Transformation of Philosophy Michael Gelven. This Side of Evil William Sweet, editor. The Bases of Ethics Gene Fendt. Is Hamlet a Religious Drama? As Essay on a Question in Kierkegaard Pierre Rousselot. The Problem of Love in the Middle Ages. A Historical Contribution Jan Herman Brinks. Paradigms of Political Change: Luther, Frederick II, and Bismarck. The GDR on Its Way to German Unity Margaret Monahan Hogan. Marriage As a Relationship Gabriel Marcel. Awakenings Roger Burggraeve. The Wisdom of Love in the Service of Love Jules Toner. Love and Friendship Anton Pannekoek. Lenin As Philosopher. A Critical Examination of the Philosophical Basis of Leninism Gregor Malantschuk. Kierkegaard’s Concept of Existence John Cowburn, S.J. Love Roger Alan Deacon. Fabricating Foucault: Ratonalising the Management of Individuals Love John Cowburn , S.J. Marquette University Press Marquette Studies in Philosophy No. 36 Series Editor, Andrew Tallon Library of Congress Cataloguing-in-Publication Data Cowburn, John. Love / by John Cowburn.— 1st ed. p. cm. — (Marquette studies in philosophy ; no. 36) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 0-87462-659-5 (pbk. : alk. paper) 1. Love. 2. Love—Religious aspects—Christianity. I. Title. II. Marquette studies in philosophy ; #36. BD436.C598 2003 128'.46—dc22 -2003022136 © 2003 Marquette University Press All rights reserved. Marquette University Press Member, American Association of University Presses Association of Jesuit University Presses Cover design by Andrew J. Tallon Between 1959 and 1962 I wrote a philosophy thesis on love, to a degree; also, not for any degree, I wrote a long theological essay in which I discussed some of the theological implications of my theory. I put these together and revised the combination for publication. In 1967 it came out as a book, Love and the Person (London: Geoffrey Chapman), and in 1972 it went out of print. This book has many of the ideas and quotations that were in the earlier one, but it is a different work, not a revised edition of it. John Cowburn, S.J. Jesuit Theological College Melbourne August 2002 Introduction I have sympathy for people who have tried to understand suffer ing, love or life, who have failed and who have then turned de- feat into victory by saying: “We are not meant to understand this. It is holy and it would be a desecration to analyse it, to distil its essence, to classify its forms and put them on a chart. To grasp it intellectually would be to crush it; to pin it down would be to kill it. The highest wisdom is to see where thought cannot go, to respect mystery and live in wonder.” I believe, however, that bright myster- ies like love do not forbid thought but invite it. I also believe that if we attain some understanding of them we will not lose interest in them, as a person loses all interest in a crossword puzzle as soon as he or she has solved it, and that while understanding means the end of bewilderment it does not put an end to wonder. Isn’t there a danger that the intellectual analysis of love might make us self-conscious and rob us of our spontaneity? Well, first, I refuse to believe that love with a warm heart and a clear head is necessarily feebler or less spontaneous than love with an equally warm heart and confusion upstairs. Second, to be reasonably clear about the different kinds of love can be of practical value. If, for instance, a young adult wants to leave home and the parents say, “People who love each other want to be together, so if you love us you won’t go,” they confuse different kinds of love and out of that confusion comes emotional conflict. In this and other cases the making of distinctions can be liberating. Now let me say some things about this book. Though at times I venture into ethics, my chief aim is to say what love is and this book should not be catalogued (as my Love and the Person sometimes was) under the heading “sexual ethics” or “moral theology.” 8 John Cowburn Love It is not a “how to” book or practical guide. For instance, I say in a general way that married couples have children but I do not say how many children different kinds of couple have, when they have them, or in what circumstances they wisely decide to have none; I say that growing children become gradually more and more independent but give no advice to parents about how much independence they should give to their children at this or that age; and I say that conflicts are inevitable in many human relationships without going into detail about how they can be resolved. I quote from a wide range of authors and there is a reason for this. When it can be shown that much the same thing was said by Aristotle or Cicero in ancient Greece or Rome, by medieval writers, by Shakespeare around 1600, by philosophers, psychologists, novelists, poets and dramatists of different countries and times, and by Chris- tians, Jews and others, there is reason to believe that it is not a belief which is peculiar to our few countries at this present moment but belongs at least to a Western “perennial philosophy” or wisdom. Whether it is more universal than that is the subject of chapter 26. In a somewhat artificial way, since many writers on love have been Christians who mixed philosophical and theological reflections, I have kept theological considerations until the last chapter of this book. I use “he” as short for “he or she” when the expression occurs more than once in a sentence and I trust that the reader will accept this. Also, I have not altered quotations so that I say that Kierkegaard said that we love “actual individual men” and expect the reader to know that he (or his translator) meant “men and women.” Introduction 9 Table of Contents Part 1~Self-love and Love in General 1. Acceptance 19 Acceptance can be mature and dignified 21 Resigned acceptance 22 Acceptance of being 24 2. Self-love 25 Self-love is self-acceptance 26 What the self is 27 The fruits of self-love 28 Self-rejection 30 Self-love is free 32 Moral evil 33 3. The altruism debate 35 The denial or rejection of altruism 35 The reality & goodness of altruism 38 What is a gift? 42 Altruism and the mutuality of love 44 The thesis of this book 44 Part 2~Solidarity-Love 4. Having children 49 Goodness distributes itself 49 Instinct 51 The reproductive instinct 52 The influence of society 53 Are children given existence? 54 10 John Cowburn Love 5. Parental love 55 What parents usually do 56 Obligations of parents and rights of children 57 The altruism of parents 59 The benefits of parenthood 60 That parental love is physical 61 Quasi-parents 63 6. Small sons and daughters 65 The benefits of having good parents 66 7. The parent-child relationship when children are older 69 Free (involving free will) and mutual 69 Communication 69 Leaving home & letting go 71 Separation & conflict 72 Parental & filial love sometimes fade 73 Rejection 74 The love that endures 76 Quasi-parental relationships 76 8. Fraternal and similar loves 77 The experience of solidarity 77 Factors which intensify solidarity-love 80 Observations on this love 82 How long this love lasts 85 The reach of this love 86 9. False forms of solidarity-love 91 Parental aberrations 91 False filial love 93 The selfish family 95 Tribalism 96 Wholes and parts 98 What is wrong in these cases 98