Agape Love vs. Phileo Love

Webers.Home · Jun 6, 2021

.
Agape love isn't unique to God.

Just about anybody with a decent bone in their body practices agape in one
way or another by means of courtesy, respect, kindness, lenience, tolerance,
sympathy, charity, generosity, and civility. Agape is an easy kind of love to
exemplify because it doesn't involve one's affections. In other words: it isn't
necessary to especially like people before being nice to them. For example
John 3:16 which says:

"For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten son, that
whoever believes in him should not perish, but have eternal life."

That's telling me God sympathizes with the world but isn't especially fond of
the world. In other words; God was doing just fine without the world, and He
will not miss it when the world is gone.

Another kind of love in the New Testament is phileo. This one's not so easy
because it involves fondness and attachment. In other words, the main
ingredient of phileo love is affection. This kind of love is emotional. We feel it
for our best friends, the people we admire, our kinfolk, and our favorite pets.
For example John 16:27 which says:

"The Father Himself loves you, because you have loved me, and have
believed that I came forth from the Father."

Phileo is a personal love; it's tender and sentimental. God doesn't feel phileo
for just anybody; only for people close to his heart.
_

Seeker47 · Jun 6, 2021

God's love for his children is the most precious and expensive form of love, regardless of what it may be called.

Webers.Home · Jun 7, 2021

.
• John 21:15 . . So when they had finished breakfast, Jesus said to Simon
Peter: Simon; do you love me more than these?

Some say that "these" refers to the other apostles, but I'm inclined to
suspect that Jesus was referring to the sea, and the fish they had just eaten,
and to the boat, and to the tackle, and to the fishing business. Certainly all
of that was important to Peter seeing as how fishing was his life.

The Greek verb for "love" in that passage is agapao (ag-ap-ah'-o) which isn't
necessarily an emotional kind of love, rather, it's related to things like
preferences, loyalties, and priorities. For example:

• Matt 6:24 . . No one can serve two masters. Either he will hate the one
and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other.

• Luke 14:26 . . If anyone comes to me and does not hate his father and
mother, his wife and children, his brothers and sisters-- yes, even his own
life --he cannot be my disciple.

The verb agapao is employed several times in the 13th, 14th, and 15th
chapters of John's gospel relative to Jesus and his apostles, and relative to
the apostles among themselves.

But then Jesus asked Peter:

• John 21:17 . .The third time Jesus said to him: Simon, do you love me?

That time "love" is translated from the Greek verb phileo (fil-eh'-o) which is
a very different kind of love than agapao.

Well, the thing is: agapao is more or less impersonal; whereas phileo is just
the opposite. It's an emotional, bonding kind of love felt among best friends,
lovers, and kinfolk.

In other words: Peter wasn't asked what he thought of Jesus, rather, how he
felt about him, viz: Jesus question was: Peter, do you like me?

Of course Jesus already knew how Peter felt about him, but Jesus wasn't
satisfied with knowing; he wanted Peter to come out with it, and he did.

• John 21:17 . . He said: Lord, you know all things; you know that I love
you.

NOTE: I'd imagine that expressing his feelings for Jesus was difficult for a
rugged blue collar guy like Peter. I worked as a professional welder for 40
years in shipyards and shops. Very few of the men I worked alongside were
comfortable talking about their feelings for each other.
_

JaumeJ · Jun 7, 2021

Seeker47 said:

Love is Love, and God is Love. There is nothing on earth like His love nor no word thaqt can contain it better than we already know. To say other is simply mumbo jumbo intellectualism and confusing.

Webers.Home · Jun 7, 2021

.

JaumeJ said:

According to Eph 4:11-14, numbers of Christ's followers have been endowed
with the gift of teaching. Well; teachers explain the Bible; they don't just
parrot its verses like a school child reciting the lines of a poem.

Now if you prefer to go on knowing nothing about love, that's your business;
but not everyone is content with ignorance. Quite a few of the folk I
encounter online are critical thinkers, i.e. they're intelligent, and they have
questions.
_

throughfaith · Jun 7, 2021

Webers.Home said:

.
Agape love isn't unique to God.

Just about anybody with a decent bone in their body practices agape in one
way or another by means of courtesy, respect, kindness, lenience, tolerance,
sympathy, charity, generosity, and civility. Agape is an easy kind of love to
exemplify because it doesn't involve one's affections. In other words: it isn't
necessary to especially like people before being nice to them. For example
John 3:16 which says:

"For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten son, that
whoever believes in him should not perish, but have eternal life."

That's telling me God sympathizes with the world but isn't especially fond of
the world. In other words; God was doing just fine without the world, and He
will not miss it when the world is gone.

Another kind of love in the New Testament is phileo. This one's not so easy
because it involves fondness and attachment. In other words, the main
ingredient of phileo love is affection. This kind of love is emotional. We feel it
for our best friends, the people we admire, our kinfolk, and our favorite pets.
For example John 16:27 which says:

"The Father Himself loves you, because you have loved me, and have
believed that I came forth from the Father."

Phileo is a personal love; it's tender and sentimental. God doesn't feel phileo
for just anybody; only for people close to his heart.
_

I see the terms phileo and Agape mean the same thing . The term is interchangeably used in the bible .

Webers.Home · Jun 7, 2021

.

throughfaith said:

Phileo is a verb, whereas agape is a noun.

In addition, phileo is a specific kind of love, whereas agape is somewhat
general.

Phileo is always affectionate, whereas agape may or may not be
affectionate.

BTW: Another love verb is agapao; for example:

John 3:16-18 starts off with God's love for the world and ends with
condemning some of the world.

The Greek verb translated "loved" in that verse is agapao. Now had the verb
in John 3:16 been phileo instead of agapao, then not one soul would be
condemned because phileo love is affectionate whereas agapao love is
merely sympathetic. So then, in my opinion, phileo love is rather to be had
from God than agapao love.
_

JaumeJ · Jun 8, 2021

I have never experienced love but from God. Love is love, not some Greek, Latin nor Hebrew nuance from it. God Is love.

throughfaith · Jun 8, 2021

Webers.Home said:

Why are the wives only expected to phileo their husbands, but husbands are expected to Agape their wives?

Webers.Home · Jun 9, 2021

.

throughfaith said:

Agape is a noun. The husband's love about which you speak isn't a noun, it's
the verb agapao, which is love in actions rather than feelings.

For example Eph 5:25-33. In that passage, a husband's love for his wife is
expressed by taking her under his wing, so to speak, viz: by protecting her
and providing for her.

Phileo is typically emotional. A good example is Titus 2:4 which is a bounce
from Gen 3:16 which says:

"Your desire shall be for your husband"

That passage appears to me the very first prohibition against adultery and
pre-marital intimacy. If so; then phileo's use in Titus 2:4 is telling wives to
be faithful and chaste; which has the benefit of ensuring that all her children
will be the offspring of the man she's married to.
_

Webers.Home · Jun 10, 2021

.
Webster's defines conflate (in so many words) to fuse, i.e. fail to make a
distinction.

For example: God is love. (1John 4:8 and 1John 4:16)

The Greek word translated "love" in that passage is agape. So then, may we
conflate agape with God and construe agape is divine? Well; I don't think so
because agape is required in the legal agreement that Moses' people signed
with God in the Old Testament.

• Rom 13:9-10 . . Love your neighbor as yourself. Love does no harm to its
neighbor. Therefore love is the fulfillment of the law.

That passage is a bounce from Lev 19:9-18 which lists a number of
antisocial behaviors, and concludes with the commandment to love your
neighbor as yourself.

The first of the loves in Rom 13:9-10 is the Greek verb agapao which is love
per one's actions rather than love per one's feelings.

The second and third loves in that passage is the Greek noun agape, which
is an abstract encompassing the whole spectrum of love; both in actions and
feelings.

So then, when people back then complied with Lev 19:9-18, they walked in
agape; and that was by law rather than grace.

My point is: Although agape is a Christian virtue, the Christians don't own it.
Agape is universal. People were feeling and practicing agape in one form or
another long before Christians came along, e.g. Gen 27:4
_

throughfaith · Jun 10, 2021

Webers.Home said:

.
Agape love isn't unique to God.

Just about anybody with a decent bone in their body practices agape in one
way or another by means of courtesy, respect, kindness, lenience, tolerance,
sympathy, charity, generosity, and civility. Agape is an easy kind of love to
exemplify because it doesn't involve one's affections. In other words: it isn't
necessary to especially like people before being nice to them. For example
John 3:16 which says:

"For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten son, that
whoever believes in him should not perish, but have eternal life."

That's telling me God sympathizes with the world but isn't especially fond of
the world. In other words; God was doing just fine without the world, and He
will not miss it when the world is gone.

Another kind of love in the New Testament is phileo. This one's not so easy
because it involves fondness and attachment. In other words, the main
ingredient of phileo love is affection. This kind of love is emotional. We feel it
for our best friends, the people we admire, our kinfolk, and our favorite pets.
For example John 16:27 which says:

"The Father Himself loves you, because you have loved me, and have
believed that I came forth from the Father."

Phileo is a personal love; it's tender and sentimental. God doesn't feel phileo
for just anybody; only for people close to his heart.
_

I believe the English ' Charity ' is good

Webers.Home · Jun 13, 2021

.
• John 3:16 . . For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten
son, that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have eternal life.

The Greek word translated "loved" in John 3:16 is conjugated from the verb
agapao, which tells me that God's love in that passage isn't especially divine
because the very same Greek verb is used in Luke 6:32, which says:

"If you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? Even sinners
love those who love them."

Every "love" in that verse is derived from agapao. Well; the very fact that
sinners are capable of agapao tells me that it would be a mistake to restrict
its use solely to God and/or to assume that agapao always, and in every
instance, speaks of divine attributes.
_

Webers.Home · Jun 15, 2021

.
There are times when Heaven's love is conditional; for example:

"If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love; just as I have
kept my Father's commandments, and abide in His love." (John 15:10)

The Greek noun translated "love" in that passage is agape, which is a
nondescript noun. In other words; agape alone doesn't tell me whether the
love in view is affectionate or non affectionate, i.e. phileo or agapao. For
example John 3:16 which says:

"For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that
whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life."

The love in that passage is conjugated from the Greek verb agapao, which
informs me that God experiences pity for the world without necessarily liking
the world. This is somewhat similar to the sympathy that many of us
experience for a desperate stranger with a cardboard sign that says "Lost
job due to Covid 19"

And then there's this:

"Then Jesus, beholding him, loved him" (Mark 10:21)

The Greek word translated "love" in that passage is conjugated from phileo,
which basically speaks of affection, fondness, acceptance, and bonding. (cf.
1Sam 18:1)

Here's an hypothetical situation that breaks John 3:16 down to something
practical.

Evangelist: Did you know that the Bible says God loves you?

Audience: God likes me?

Evangelist: Sorry, my bad. I should've been specific. I was asking if you
were aware that God pities you.

Audience: Pities me?! What's to pity?

Evangelist: You are on the road to a future that's so disagreeable Jesus said
you'd be better off dismembering a hand or gouging out an eye than to end
up there.

» God pities the world's deplorable spiritual condition and has a remedy for it (Luke 2:8-14)
but that shouldn't be construed to mean that He likes the world. In point of fact, God regrets
its creation. (Gen 6:6)
_

posthuman · Jun 15, 2021

Webers.Home said:

.
• John 21:15 . . So when they had finished breakfast, Jesus said to Simon
Peter: Simon; do you love me more than these?

Some say that "these" refers to the other apostles, but I'm inclined to
suspect that Jesus was referring to the sea, and the fish they had just eaten,
and to the boat, and to the tackle, and to the fishing business. Certainly all
of that was important to Peter seeing as how fishing was his life.

The Greek verb for "love" in that passage is agapao (ag-ap-ah'-o) which isn't
necessarily an emotional kind of love, rather, it's related to things like
preferences, loyalties, and priorities. For example:

• Matt 6:24 . . No one can serve two masters. Either he will hate the one
and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other.

• Luke 14:26 . . If anyone comes to me and does not hate his father and
mother, his wife and children, his brothers and sisters-- yes, even his own
life --he cannot be my disciple.

The verb agapao is employed several times in the 13th, 14th, and 15th
chapters of John's gospel relative to Jesus and his apostles, and relative to
the apostles among themselves.

But then Jesus asked Peter:

• John 21:17 . .The third time Jesus said to him: Simon, do you love me?

That time "love" is translated from the Greek verb phileo (fil-eh'-o) which is
a very different kind of love than agapao.

Well, the thing is: agapao is more or less impersonal; whereas phileo is just
the opposite. It's an emotional, bonding kind of love felt among best friends,
lovers, and kinfolk.

In other words: Peter wasn't asked what he thought of Jesus, rather, how he
felt about him, viz: Jesus question was: Peter, do you like me?

Of course Jesus already knew how Peter felt about him, but Jesus wasn't
satisfied with knowing; he wanted Peter to come out with it, and he did.

• John 21:17 . . He said: Lord, you know all things; you know that I love
you.

NOTE: I'd imagine that expressing his feelings for Jesus was difficult for a
rugged blue collar guy like Peter. I worked as a professional welder for 40
years in shipyards and shops. Very few of the men I worked alongside were
comfortable talking about their feelings for each other.
_

I agree with the substance of what you are saying here, and in no way deny the significance of the words being said in John 21..
but I think the real reason Jesus stopped asking Peter is that Peter finally got the answer right the 3rd time: he confessed that Christ knows all things. He is omnipotent; He is God

posthuman · Jun 15, 2021

JaumeJ said:

Amen I have not known love, except that He loves me

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Agape Love vs. Phileo Love

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