Love Begins in the Home

“God loves us, but God's love is mediated and experienced, at least initially, through the love shown to us by human caregivers. We sense the possibility of God's love only because we experience human love – most commonly at home, in families.” This is a theme for an entire chapter in Shai Held’s important new book, Judaism is About Love: Recovering the Heart of Jewish Life.

Because his method is both eclectic and non-chronological, Held is able to bring together Bible, rabbinics, philosophy, ethics, synagogue life, family, and the social sciences. In other words, Held creates a savory brew that keeps us on pace.

God begins with two – Adam and Eve – a family, and a covenant family, and God mediates covenant to use through others.

Yet, Held holds very firmly both to the uniqueness of each individual and to the separateness of each individual. Love is only known when both are maintained. “When we love, we don't just acknowledge the others separateness; we also embrace and celebrate their uniqueness.” Notice this one: “in creating us, God allows us – wants us – to be other than God.” Hang on to that one. He explores tzimtzum, the ability and capacity of God to be different, distant, and present. This idea “yields intensified presence.” It is about how an infinite God can “dwell in a finite space.” Yet, in being present, God makes space for us – God does not overcome, overwhelm, or squeeze us out. Narcissists are present in a way that does not make space for others to be who they are. Martin Buber speaks of “primal setting at a distance.”

Love has mornings and love has evenings. “Covenantal love is above all a commitment and an orientation. It includes passion and emotion but is not limited to them. … I would argue that a commitment to remain steadfast in moments when passion is attenuated or diluted is a significant part of what constitutes the covenant of marriage.”

As a rabbi/pastor, Held knows any emphasis on fidelity and commitment requires sensitivity:

“Some marriages fail because despite the best efforts of one or both partners, the love the partners share(d) simply dissipates over time; some fail because one or both partners betray the trust that makes lasting marriage possible. And some marriages become abusive, degrading, and even violent; religious leaders need to be cautious lest they romanticize fidelity in situations when it is no longer appropriate (or sometimes even safe).”

Speaking of romanticizing, he is aware the Jewish wedding vows that “make the bold and dramatic claim that this wedding matters, and matters ultimately. It has a vital role to play in bringing the world closer to redemption.” He's right, because he knows the nuances.

“Marriage is, at its best, both an intrinsic good and an instrumental one. … [because] Marriage changes who we are and thus enables us to be more fully present, more loving, more compassionate, and more generous in the rest of our lives too.” Love, as he is writing, begins in the home, in the relationships of love, and leads others to discover God’s love.

Children: “having children can be a form of imitation Dei (the imitation of God): bring new lives into the world so that we can love them.” Like God. He makes this bold claim: “The only way for young children to internalize the sense that they matter, and that God loves them, is if parents and teachers mediate that love for them.”  Nuance coming: “we reflect God's love for our children, but because we are human, we do so imperfectly, and sometimes downright badly.”

He enters the discussion of unconditional love. “Ideally at least, parental love would be unconditional. We would love our children in much the same way that God loves us: with expectations, but without conditions.” Nice formulaic way of framing it. He nuances: “I'm not sure that human beings are actually capable of unconditional love – and in any case, we can't ever be sure that our love is truly unconditional.” That is, as is found in the prophet Hosea, “God's love, and only God's love, is truly unconditional.”

In loving children we are to learn to love each child in that child’s uniqueness. That is, “ethics is about responding not to human beings in general but to human beings in particular – and in all their particularity.” Thus, “What is required of parents is not perfection but attention, a willingness to learn and relearn, repeatedly – what each child individually needs, and needs from us.”

The self of each of us is shaped and formed “by the internalization of its relationships.” Some theologians today speak then of the dyadic nature of humans. We are who we are in relationship and because of those relationships. What matters, then, in the formation and nurturance of love is our character. Character stands behind all of it. This is why in the book of Genesis a child is entered into the covenant through a ritual shaped in the context of family. The parents’ “obligation is to see to it that the child does not enter into the future without a past.” Hands-off parenting will lead to hands-off relational flatness. Families teach both promises, responsibilities, and duties in the context of uniqueness and rights. We are to equip children, as he puts it, to swim.

“Parental love is a commitment (or set of commitments), an orientation, a way of holding and conducting ourselves with our children…. In all genuine relationships meant to endure over time, faithfulness constitutes the essential baseline.”

We teach children to love so that they can be loved and can learn to love others.