Deism and Love

I know that many theists believe that God is the source of all love and that through love humans can know God, however most deists tend to believe in either an impersonal or trans-personal god.

As deists, what do you think the source, meaning, and importance of love is?

For me, love is a human emotion that is required for us to form life-sustaining relationships and ultimately can bring about a better life for those that are able to share in such a concept.

However, as most will agree here, I don't believe that God has human traits and characteristics so the idea that God embodies love or has love makes no sense to me. Whatever God truly is I find no value in placing human characteristics on God as this only places God in a box and basically creates God in our image.

I always liked the quote that stated that if horses had Gods then they would look like horses.

I believe that we do not come to know God as much as we have the ability to experience God. We are limited in our understanding of the world which forces us to try and fashion that which we come to believe in to that world.

Unfortunately, how do we come to understand something such as God that is beyond our limited understanding? The answer is simple, we don't. Instead, we must learn as a species that we are limited and come to accept that our views on God are limited and fall far short of what God truly is.

Ultimately, love can be that which allows us to respect these differences of opinion among ourselves and to overcome all the man-made versions of God that we create and then use to control others.

Wishful thinking on my part but it would make a better world if we all practiced love and respect.

Joe

Love is to the moral universe what the physical laws such as gravity are to the physical universe.

That's my theory in short.

The source of love is the mind and not the heart like most people believe. I believe God has a mind so he has love and is the source of it.

I believe that love is placing such a high value on someone that it feels like they are a part of you. The the meaning or purpose of love is to unite all as one. All things are united in God because God loves all things. In other words, God places a very high value on all things. So, all things are a part of him.

Helium wrote:

Love is to the moral universe what the physical laws such as gravity are to the physical universe.

That's my theory in short.

Can you share your long version?

Quote :

Can you share your long version?

Yes, good point. I'll get back to ya when I have a chance to scribble it down.