I want to do for today what the Apostle Paul did with the word ‘agape’ for his time. He expanded the meaning to aid in spiritual development. When he started doing that, most of the Greek-speaking, non-Jewish audiences he addressed would not have known what he was talking about. 'Agape' was not a word in common usage.
So just as Paul’s influence helped the word gain new meaning for the 1st Century, the word started gaining new meaning during the 20th Century as it became used, once again, by more and more people. And I’m expanding on that meaning in this blog.
But in the 19th Century, when ‘agape’ was reintroduced as a religious term after centuries of not being used, most people considered it just as arcane and unusual a word as it was considered by the Greek audiences Paul addressed. To show how Paul expanded the word’s meaning, I’ll focus just on 2 sections in Romans.
Especially when we read through chapter 12, we are reminded so much of 1 Cor. 13, that I couldn’t help but think that he was showing conclusions he had come to after reflecting on what he had written in 1 Cor. 13. (Most scholars agree that Romans was written after Corinthians, even though Romans became listed first when the New Testament was finally put together as a whole unit.)
No one knows for sure, of course, about how that unusual Greek word ‘agape’ first became used by Christians to speak to Greek-speaking audiences, but there might have been a connection with the Septuagint (LXX), the Greek translation of the Hebrew scriptures. Those translators of LXX might have started using ‘agape’ because it sounded similar to the Hebrew word for love (ahaba). Because Paul grew up in the Greek-speaking coastal city of Tarsus and was educated by Pharisees, he would have known that the two Great Commandments given by Jesus referred to Deut. 6:4-9 and Lev. 19:18. So he knew that, in the Greek version, both those passages used ‘agapan,’ the verb form of ‘agape.’ That may have been what started the use of ‘agape’ by Christians. (Those 2 Commandments are the only place in Mark where any form of ‘agape’ appears.)
The next step for Paul may have been to expand on the link between the 2 Great Commandments. In other words, asking the profoundly important question, “What is there about agape that links religious devotion with how we treat other people?” I think the first major answer to that question was 1 Cor. 13. Then he expanded on that in Romans chapters 5, 8, and 12.
But our starting place is the first place ‘agape’ appears in Romans -- that’s the passage I’ve mentioned in previous postings (Romans 5:5) as playing such an important part in my morning prayers for the last couple of years. So we need to start where Paul did -- with God’s agape as a power that comes to us when we open up to the working of the Holy Spirit in our lives. This verse shows how Paul linked agape with the Holy Spirit.
Keeping that linkage in mind helps when we read 12:2 -- then we can understand that the Holy Spirit uses agape to transform us through the renewal of our minds. That transformation (sometimes very slow in some people because of their resistance, or rapid in others because they throw themselves open to God’s Presence) brings us the ability to keep from being conformed to the selfish, egotistical, violent pattern of the human world.
That transformation also liberates us from being controlled by the worldly pattern, although, the tremendous pressures from the human world are very difficult to overcome because the forces of the world have been building up for the 6,000 years of the process that has been named ‘civilization.’ (Ralph Waldo Emerson once said, “The end of the human race will be that we will eventually die of civilization.” That slow death is what we have to overcome.)
Then in the next 5 verses Paul listed other gifts that come to us from the Holy Spirit as he did in 1 Cor. 12. Even though he did not say in exact words (as he had done in 1 Cor. 13:13) that the greatest of these is agape, he implied that by starting vs. 9 with agape. Also implied in that verse is his awareness that the word ‘agape’ was being used in so many different ways that he wanted to make sure his reader understood that he was using the word in the highest way (the Greek word that Paul used has been translated as “genuine” or “sincere” or “non-hypocritical” or “not a pretense” or “without dissimulation”).
What he seemed to have been talking about is our need for the genuineness of personal relationship (or as Rollo May put it: “authenticity in relationship.” [Love and Will, p. 306]) Paul recognized that need, and so he made the point that through the Holy Spirit we receive God’s agape to help us find such authenticity.
Then in the next 10 verses he spelled out practical actions that God’s agape helps us do (as he had done in 1 Cor. 13:4-6). He started a little differently with the list of actions in Romans; by implying that, if we use it in the right way, agape helps us discern what is good and what is evil. Then he gave a list -- similar to 1 Cor. 13 -- by beginning with the action of treating others as kind family members would treat each other, with respect, showing honor toward the other.
He showed how he was using the spiritual meaning God’s agape -- he talked about being “aglow with the Spirit” as we “serve the Lord” through living by God’s agape. He concluded with joy -- “Be joyful in hope.” This verse shows the link between agape and joy and hope.
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