The Love of God: Divine Gift, Human Gratitude, and Mutual Faithfulness in Judaism. Jon D. Levenson. Princeton
University Press, 2016. p. 235. Cloth.
Love is a two-way street, but in the economy
of love between humanity and God, the flow of that love and the level of
mutuality is complexly contested. In biblical perspective, love is articulated
early in Scripture in primarily covenantal terms, embedded in particular social
relations. As understandings of love shift and change through the middle ages
and into the modern period, so our reading of God's love and its implications
for love of neighbor also shift.
So, for example, Levenson argues early in
this book against the misperception that the love of God is primarily
sentiment, and so a private matter. Love in Near Eastern treaties is quite
unsentimental--it is, in fact, "the proper stance of the lesser party
toward the greater" (xiii.). Levenson takes great pains to establish this
definition of love as founding semantic context for the term, and the argument
is helpful, because it explains, for example, why even as late as the formation
of the Lutheran Small Catechism, Luther can coin the felicitous turn of phrase,
"We are to fear and love God so that..."
Jon
Levenson's work focuses on the interpretation of the Hebrew Bible, including
its reinterpretations in Second Temple Judaism and rabbinic midrash. He is a
frequent interlocutor with Christian theologians, and has written extensively
on resurrection in particular. In addition, one of his current courses at
Harvard Divinity School deals with the use of medieval Jewish commentaries for
purposes of modern biblical exegesis, and another focuses on central works of
Jewish theology in the twentieth century. All of this type of hermeneutical and
historical work is on full display in The
Love of God.
Levenson,
however, does not leave love languishing in the historical relationship between
suzerain and vassal. He also states, "Although the God-Israel relationship
in the classical Jewish sources is asymmetrical, as any relationship with God
cannot but be, it is thoroughly mutual, as any relationship among personal
beings inevitably is" (xiv). Levenson establishes the validity of this
second point through an extensive reading of the love of God in classical
Talmudic literature (chapter two), the Song of Songs (chapter three), the
Jewish-Muslim cultural symbiosis of medieval Spain, Moses Maimonides in
particular(chapter four), and twentieth
century religious thinkers, Martin Buber and Franz Rosenzweig (chapter five).
Levenson's
book opts against an exhaustive treatment of the love of God, and instead
attempts to evoke the power of the classical Jewish idea of the love of God.
This makes the book highly readable and engaging. Levenson's lifelong
scholarship, like the best of popular theological writers, has refined his
ability to write theologically rigorous books accessible to the lay reader.
As
a reader, I found the early chapters of the book especially compelling. I had
never really considered love as a cover term for acts of obedient service, but
upon hearing that definition, was able to think of the widely varied places
where that kind of love is still both expected and practiced.
This
kind of love can be commanded. It is a love that is expressed in loyalty, in
service, and in obedience. Understanding love in this fashion makes much sense
of the love commands, as well as such places in Scripture where Jesus asks
Peter, "Do you love me?" and then commands, "Feed my
sheep." This is not sentiment. This is obligation. Yet it is love.
Intriguingly,
although this is not a Christian or Christological account of love, there are
aspects of it that parallel Christian doctrine, such as the concept of imputedness.
Levenson notes that in Hosea, in its description of the marital intimacy of God
and Israel in chapter two, "righteousness," "justice,"
"goodness," "mercy," and "faithfulness" are gifts with
which the Lord endows Israel in exchange for her exclusive fidelity to him
(105). "They constitute at once what the groom contributes to and expects
from the relationship."
Furthermore,
Levenson points us to a synthesis of love and law sorely lacking in much of
Christian theology. Christian theology in particular after the Reformation
turn, has understood law primarily according to two uses: to condemn sin and order
life together. Law in this account is either a threat, or a burden. But law in
Jewish tradition is much more than this, and more beautiful. Understanding the
fulfillment of law as love is the way
forward.
First,
there is an invitation to recognize together with Franz Rosenzweig, that God
"has sold Himself to us with the Torah" (192). This is to say, the
Torah, among other things, is God's form of falling in love with God's people.
If the Torah is such a divine gift, then those who receive such a gift have
more options. "The choice does lie between rote observance of the law as
an impersonal, unfeeling reality, on the one hand, and the rejection of law as
incompatible with the being of the loving God, on the other. There is a third
position--a principled stance of openness to the Torah as the medium for
encountering the loving and commanding God of Israel" (192).
In
this sense, law becomes a commandment, commandment as event, and that event is
election, the divine and mutual gifting of God with the community that
maintains such an open posture that makes the gift of the law and human
gratitude for it one and the same thing--the love of God.
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