Aquinas:

1)

Article 1. Whether love exists in God?

Objection 1. It seems that love does not exist in God. For in God there are no passions. Now love is a passion. Therefore love is not in God.

Objection 2. Further, love, anger, sorrow and the like, are mutually divided against one another. But sorrow and anger are not attributed to God, unless by metaphor. Therefore neither is love attributed to Him.

Objection 3. Further, Dionysius says (Div. Nom. iv): “Love is a uniting and binding force.” But this cannot take place in God, since He is simple. Therefore love does not exist in God.

On the contrary, It is written: “God is love” (John 4:16).

I answer that, We must needs assert that in God there is love: because love is the first movement of the will and of every appetitive faculty. For since the acts of the will and of every appetitive faculty tend towards good and evil, as to their proper objects: and since good is essentially and especially the object of the will and the appetite, whereas evil is only the object secondarily and indirectly, as opposed to good; it follows that the acts of the will and appetite that regard good must naturally be prior to those that regard evil; thus, for instance, joy is prior to sorrow, love to hate: because what exists of itself is always prior to that which exists through another. Again, the more universal is naturally prior to what is less so. Hence the intellect is first directed to universal truth; and in the second place to particular and special truths. Now there are certain acts of the will and appetite that regard good under some special condition, as joy and delight regard good present and possessed; whereas desire and hope regard good not as yet possessed. Love, however, regards good universally, whether possessed or not. Hence love is naturally the first act of the will and appetite; for which reason all the other appetite movements presuppose love, as their root and origin. For nobody desires anything nor rejoices in anything, except as a good that is loved: nor is anything an object of hate except as opposed to the object of love. Similarly, it is clear that sorrow, and other things like to it, must be referred to love as to their first principle. Hence, in whomsoever there is will and appetite, there must also be love: since if the first is wanting, all that follows is also wanting. Now it has been shown that will is in God (19, 1), and hence we must attribute love to Him.

Reply to Objection 1. The cognitive faculty does not move except through the medium of the appetitive: and just as in ourselves the universal reason moves through the medium of the particular reason, as stated in De Anima iii, 58,75, so in ourselves the intellectual appetite, or the will as it is called, moves through the medium of the sensitive appetite. Hence, in us the sensitive appetite is the proximate motive-force of our bodies. Some bodily change therefore always accompanies an act of the sensitive appetite, and this change affects especially the heart, which, as the Philosopher says (De part. animal. iii, 4), is the first principle of movement in animals. Therefore acts of the sensitive appetite, inasmuch as they have annexed to them some bodily change, are called passions; whereas acts of the will are not so called. Love, therefore, and joy and delight are passions; in so far as they denote acts of the intellective appetite, they are not passions. It is in this latter sense that they are in God. Hence the Philosopher says (Ethic. vii): “God rejoices by an operation that is one and simple,” and for the same reason He loves without passion.

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Bullinger:

1) In the first part and first article of the creed, we confess our faith, of God and of the creation: “We believe that GOD is one in essence (for we say, ‘I believe in GOD,’ and not, I believe in gods) and three in persons, namely, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost.”

The singular from or manner of speaking wherein we confess, I believe in God the Father, and not, we believe in God the Father, is to be marked. For faith is required of every one of us, wherewith we must believe in God, not only that he is God, but also that he is our God. And therefore we say not, “I believe GOD, but I believe in God, as in him on whom my mind and soul, my heart and all my hope stays.” For God is not only the Father of Christ from everlasting, but the Father of us all, not only because he created us, but also because he bears every one of us goodwill, is loving and merciful unto all men, and gives us all things necessary, both for the soul and body, and defends us from all evil: all which things he can very well perform. For as much as he is almighty, and therefore his will and power are coupled together. Henry Bullinger, Common Places of Christian Religion, (Imprinted at London by Tho. East, and H. Middleton, for George Byshop, 1572), 123.

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God is Love

John 4:16.

DID we only give credit to the text, did we but view God as love-on this simple translation into another belief, would there be the translation into another character. We should feel differently of God, the moment that we thought of Him differently; and with the establishment of this new faith, there would instantly emerge a new heart and a new nature. For, let us attend, in the first place, to the original conception of Humanity, placed and constituted as it now is, m reference to this great and invisible Being–secondly, let us adduce the likeliest considerations, the likeliest arguments, by which to overcome this conception, and to find lodgement in the human breast or another and an opposite conception in its place–And, thirdly, let us stop to contemplate the effect of such a change in the state of man’s understanding as to God, on the whole system of his feelings and conduct

I. Under the first general head, then, let it be observed–that there are two reasons why we should conceive God to be so actuated as to inspire us with terror, or at least; with distrust; instead of conceiving Him to be actuated by that love which the text ascribes to. Him; and which were no sooner believed than it would set us at ease, and inspire us with delightful confidence.

1. The first of these reasons, which we shall allege, admits of being illustrated by a very genera experience of human nature. It may be shortly stated thus–Whenever placed within the reach of any Being, of imagined power, but withal of unknown purpose–that Being is the object of our dismay. It is not necessary for thin, that we should be positively assured of His hostility. It is enough, that, for aught we. know, He may be hostile; and that, for aught we know, He has strength enough For the execution of His displeasure. Uncertainty alone will beget terror; and the fancies of mere ignorance, are ever found: to be images of fear. It is thus, that a certain recoil of dread and aversion, would be felt in the presence of a strange animal, whatever the gentleness of its nature–if simply it a nature were unknown. And hence, too, the fear of a child for strangers, who must first make demonstration of their love by their gifts, or their caresses they can woo it into confidence. And, so also the consternation. of savages, on the first approach of a mighty vessel to their shores–more especially if in smoke, and thunder, ans feats of marvelous exhibition, it hath given the evidence of its power. It may a voyage of benevolence; but this they as yet know not. They only behold the power; and power beheld singly tremendous. And many often are the vain attempts at approximation, the fruitless demonstrations and signals of good-will, ere they can conquer their distrust ; or recall them to free and fearless intercourse, from the woods or the lurking-places to which they had fled for safety. Such, then, is the universal bias of nature, whenever the power is known and the purpose is unknown. Men give way to the visions of terror, to the dark misgivings of a troubled imagination. The quick and instant suggestion, on all these occasions, is that of fear; and the difficulty, an exceeding difficulty, for it is if working against a constitutional law or tendency of the heart, is to reassure it into confidence.

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Boyce:

Of this there are five kinds, which vary according to the object upon which love is exercised. The attribute in God is the same; but it is in its exit, or in its termination, that it assumes these different forms.

1. There is the love of complacency or approbation. This is exercised towards a worthy object in which excellencies are perceived. It is of the nature of tile love of the beautiful, or the good, or the useful in us. It complacently or approvingly regards, because there is in the object something worthy of such regard.

This is exercised by God, in its highest degree, in the love of himself, of his own nature and character, because the infinitely excellent must be to God the highest object of complacent love.

Were God but one person, in this way only could such love be exercised. But in the Trinity of the Godhead, there is found, in the love of the separate persons towards each other, another mode in which this love of complacency may in this highest sense be exercised.

Such love is also felt by God for his purposes. As he perceives them to be just, wise and gracious, he approves and regards them with complacent love.

But this love extends itself also to the creations, which result from this purpose.

This is true of inanimate creation. It is perfect, as far as conformed to his will, and fitted to accomplish his end, and as such God can regard it and pronounce it good. Thus we find that he did in the creation, Genesis, Chap. 1:10, 12.

The same record is made, in verse 25, as to the animal creation, before that of man; and after the creation, and investiture of man with the dominion over the earth, with its plants and animals, we are told, verse 31, “And God saw everything that he had made, and, behold, it was very good.”

The complacent love of God, therefore, extends not only to himself and his will, but to all his innocent creation and even to inanimate nature.

This love of complacency, however, as it is exercised in its highest degree towards himself, so also is it exhibited, in the nearest approach to that, towards those beings who are most like himself, having been made in his nature and likeness. An innocent angel, or an innocent man is therefore by nature a joy to God, as is the child to the father who sees in it a peculiar likeness to himself.

But the guilty cannot thus be loved. Sinful man cannot receive such love, so long as sinful. Even the penitent believer in Jesus, until the time of his perfect sanctification in the life to come, and doubtless even then, has access to God only through Christ, and, of himself, can in no respect secure the approbation of God.

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