Love Edifieth

But is that word “edifying,” when spiritually understood, such a characteristic adjective for love, that it exclusively belongs to it? It is always quite possible, as regards an adjective, that there are many objects which equally, or even if in varying degrees, still have a claim to this same adjective. If this were the case with “edifying,” it would be particularly wrong to emphasize its use, as this reflection does, in its relation to love; it would be an attempt of misunderstanding to impute to love a presumption, as if it wished exclusively to usurp to its own use that which it shared with others—and which love is precisely willing to share with others, since “it never seeks its own.” Nevertheless, it is truly so that “edifying” is exclusively characteristic of love; but, on the other hand, this quality of edifying has also the characteristic, that it is able to sacrifice itself in everything, be present in everything—exactly like love. Thus one sees that love in this, its own characteristic quality, does not isolate itself, or boast of independence and caution in comparison with others, but absolutely surrenders itself; its characteristic is exactly that it has the exclusive quality of absolutely sacrificing itself. There is nothing, simply nothing, which can [not] be said or done so that it becomes edifying; but whatever it is, if it is edifying, then is love present. Therefore we hear the admonition just at the point where a man himself admits the difficulty of formulating definite rules, “Do everything for edification.” It might equally well say, “Do everything in love,” and have expressed exactly the same meaning. One man may do exactly the opposite of what another man does, but if they each do the opposite—in love, the opposite is edifying. There is no word in the language which is edifying in itself, and there is no word in the language which can [not] be spoken edifyingly and become edifying when love is present. It is therefore, then, very far (alas, it is simply an unkind and divisive error) from being the case that edifying is a privilege of the individually gifted, like art and poetry and beauty and other such things; on the contrary, every man by his life and his behavior, by the conduct of his daily life, by his association with his equals, by his words and tterances, ought to and might be equally edifying, and would be so, if he really had love.

We ourselves are also aware of this, for we use the word “edifying” with the widest possible latitude; but what we do not ourselves perhaps realize is that we nevertheless only use it in connection with the idea of love. Still this constitutes the right usage: to be meticulous not to use this word except in connection with love, and within this limitation to make its range illimitable; then everything can be edifying in the same sense that love can be present everywhere.

Thus when we see a single man with praiseworthy frugality carefully making a little suffice, then we honor and commend him; we rejoice; it confirms our sense of the good. But we do not really call it an edifying sight. On the contrary, when we see how a mother, who has many to care for, by frugality and wise economy affectionately knows how to bless the little so that there is enough for all: then we say it is an edifying sight. The edification lies in the fact that at the same time that we see the frugality and economy which we honor, we also see the mother’s loving care. On the contrary, we say that it is but little edifying, that it is a distressing sight, to see one who in a way starves in the midst of plenty, and who yet has nothing at all left for others. We say it is a shocking thing to see, we are disgusted with his luxury, we tremble at the idea of the horrible revenge of self-indulgence—the starving in the midst of plenty; but the fact that we look in vain for the least expression of love, confirms our belief that it is little edifying.

When we see a large family crowded into a small apartment, and we nevertheless see it living in a comfortable, friendly—roomy apartment, then we say that it is an edifying sight, because we see the love which must be in the individuals and in each one of them, since one unfriendly one would be enough to make the whole place seem crowded; we say it because we see that there is always house-room where there is heartroom. And, on the other hand, it is very little edifying to find an uneasy spirit dwelling in a palace, unable to find rest in a single one of the many rooms, and yet not able to spare or dispense with the smallest closet.

Moreover, what is there which may not be thus edifying! We do not think of the sight of a man asleep as edifying. And yet, if you see a child sleeping on its mother’s breast—and you see the mother-love, see that she seems to have waited for and now is using the moment while the child is sleeping, truly to rejoice over it, because she hardly dares let the child see how unspeakably she loves it: then this becomes an edifying sight. If the mother’s love is not in evidence, if you look in vain in her face and expression to discover the least expression of the joy of mother-love or solicitude for the child; if you see only stolid indifference, as if she would be glad to be rid of the child: then the sight is not edifying. To see the child sleeping by itself is a friendly, a pleasant, a gratifying sight, but it is not edifying. If you wish to call everything edifying, then it is because you see love present everywhere; it is because you see the love of God hovering over the child. —To see a great artist perfecting his work is a glorious, an elevating experince, but it is not edifying. Suppose this masterpiece was marvelous—if now the artist, out of his love for a man, smashed it to pieces: then the sight would be edifying.

Wherever the edifying is, there is love; and everywhere love is, there is the edifying. Therefore Paul says that a man without love, though he speak with the tongues of men and of angels, is like sounding brass or a tinkling cymbal. What, too, can be less edifying than a tinkling cymbal! The worldly, however glorious and however vociferous it is, is nevertheless without love, and therefore it is not edifying; the most insignificant word, the slightest act with love or in love, is edifying. Therefore knowledge puffeth up. And yet knowledge and the communication of knowledge may also be edifying; but if it is, it is because there is love. To commend one’s self seems little edifying, and yet even this too may be edifying. Does not Paul sometimes do it? But he does it in love, and, as he himself says, “for edification.” It would therefore be the emptiest of all speeches to talk about what can be edifying, since everything can be so; it would be the emptiest of all, just as it is the most distressing accusation which can be brought against the world, that one sees and hears so little that is edifying. Whether it is rare to see wealth is neither here nor there; we should rather see a general well-being. If it is rare to see a masterpiece, oh, well, in a certain sense that makes no difference, and, as far as that goes, men for the most part care little about it. It is otherwise with edifying. At any given moment there are countless numbers of men living; it is possible that everything which any man says, everything which any man undertakes, may be edifying: alas, and yet it is so rare to see or hear anything edifying! Love edifies. Let us now consider that which we developed in the introduction to this discourse, whereby we at once assured ourselves against the danger of the discourse falling into error through choosing an insuperable task, since everything can be edifying. To edify is to build on some foundation. In the simple story about a house, a building, everyone knows what is understood by the ground and the foundation. But what is, spiritually understood, the ground and the foundation of the spiritual life which shall support the building? It is simply love; love is the origin of everything, and, spiritually understood, love is the deepest foundation of the spiritual life. Spiritually understood, the foundation is laid in every man in whom there is love. And the building which, spiritually understood, will be erected is again love; and it is love who does the building. Love edifies, and this means that love builds it up. In this way the task is limited; the discourse does not spread out on the individual and the manifold; it does not in confusion begin on something which it must quite arbitrarily break off somewhere in order to finish; no, it centers itself and its attention on the essential, on one and the same thing in all the manifold. The talk is first and last about love, just because the fact of edifying is love’s most characteristic purpose. Love is the foundation, love is the building, love edifies. The act of edifying is the building up of love, and it is love which edifies. It is true we sometimes speak in a general sense about edifying; we use the word in contrast to the corruption which would only tear down, or in contrast to the confusion which can merely tear down and divide; about the fact that it is the clever man who edifies, the one who knows how to direct and lead, the one who knows so well how to instruct in his line, the one who is master of his art. Every such person builds up in contrast to tearing down. But all of this building up of knowledge, of insight, of ingenuity, of righteousness and so on, is still, insofar as it does not build up love, not edification in the deepest sense. For, spiritually, love is the foundation, and to edify is to build on this foundation. Consequently when the speech is about the work of love in edifying, this must then either indicate that the lover implants love in another man’s heart; or it must indicate that the lover presupposes that love already exists in the other man’s heart, and just through this presupposition, he builds up the love in him—radically, insofar as he affectionately presupposes love at bottom. One or the other of these conditions is necessary for edifying. But I wonder if one man can implant love in another man’s heart? No, this is a superhuman relation, an unthinkable relation between man and man; in this sense human love cannot edify. It is God, the Creator, who must implant love in every man, He who is Himself love. It is therefore unkind and by no means edifying, for someone presumptuously to imagine himself as wishing and being able to create love in the other man; all busy and self-important zeal in this respect neither builds up love, nor is itself edifying. The first relationship would be unthinkable for edifying; hence, we must consider the second relationship—between man and God. Thus we have gained the explanation of what it means, that love edifies, on which explanation we shall now reflect: the lover presupposes that there is love in the other man’s heart, and just through this presupposition he builds up the love in him—on that foundation, insofar as he affectionately presupposes that it exists at bottom.

The speech can then not be about what the lover, who wishes to edify, will now do to transform the other man, or to force the love forth in him, but it is about how the lover edifyingly constrains himself. Certainly this is already edifying, to see how the lover edifies by constraining himself! Only the non-lover imagines that he is able to edify by constraining the other; the lover constantly presupposes that love is present, and just by this he is edifying. A builder thinks little about the stone and gravel he will use in building; a teacher presupposes that the pupil is ignorant; a disciplinarian presupposes that the other man is perverted: but the lover who edifies has but one course—to presuppose love; what further he constantly has to do is only constantly to constrain himself to presuppose love. Thus he lures the good forth, he encourages love, he edifies. For love can be and will only be treated in one way, by being loved forth; to love it forth is to edify. But to love it forth consists exactly in presupposing that it is basically present. Men can therefore be tempted to become master-builders, to become teachers, to become disciplinarians, because those things seem to imply having control over others; but to edify, as love does, cannot tempt one, for that means exactly to be the servant; therefore only love has the desire to edify because it is willing to serve—The master-builder can point to his work and say, “That is my work”; the teacher can point to his pupil; but the love which edifies has nothing to point at, for its work consists only in presupposing it.

Again, this is very edifying to consider. Suppose the lover succeeded in building up love in another man; when the building stands there, the lover stands aside by himself, abashed he says, “I have always presupposed this.” Alas, the lover has no merit at all. The building up of love is not like a monument to the master-builder’s art, or, like the pupil who is a reminder of the teacher’s instruction; the lover has done nothing, he has only presupposed that there was love at bottom. The lover works so quietly and so soberly, and yet the forces of eternity are in motion. Love humbly makes itself inconspicuous just when it is working hardest; aye, its labor is as if it did nothing at all. Alas, to busyness and worldliness this is the greatest folly conceivable, the idea that, in a way, doing nothing at all should be the hardest work. And yet it is true. For it is more difficult to rule one’s own spirit than to take a city, and more difficult to edify as love edifies, than to carry out the most marvelous undertaking. If it is difficult for one to rule one’s own spirit, then how difficult to annihilate one’s self completely in one’s relation to another man, and still do everything and suffer everything! If it would ordinarily be difficult to begin without the presupposition, truly the most difficult of all is to begin to edify with the presupposition that love is present, and to end with the same presupposition, so that one’s entire labor is discounted in advance, since the presupposition from first to last involves self-denial, or that the master-builder be hidden and as nothing. The only thing with which we are able to compare this edification of love is the secret working of nature. Man sleeps, but the forces of nature rest not either night or-day: no one considers how they go on—while all take delight in the beauty of the fields and the fruit of the pastures. So is love manifest in the same way; it presupposes that love is present like the germ in the corn, and if it succeeds in bringing that to growth, then has the love concealed itself, as if it were hidden, whereas it was working early and late. Nevertheless, this is the edifying wonder in nature: you see all this glory and then it impresses you edifyingly if you happen to consider how strange it was that you did not see at all the one who produced it. If you could see God with the sensual eye, if He, if I dare say this, stood by your side and said: “I produced all this!” then would the edification have disappeared. Love edifies by presupposing that love is present. Thus one lover edifies the other, and here it is easy enough to presuppose it, since love is generally known to be present. Alas, but love is never perfectly present in any man, insofar as it is possible for him to do something else than presuppose it; possible to discover one or another fault or frailty in it. And then when he has unkindly discovered this, he wishes perhaps, as they say, to take it away, to take the mote away in order really to build love up. But love edifies. The one who loves much, to him is much forgiven; but the more perfect the lover presupposes the love to be, the more perfect a love he loves forth. In no worldly relations is there found any relation where there is thus like for like, where that which results corresponds so exactly to what was presupposed. Let no one raise an objection, let no one appeal to experience, for this would be unkindly arbitrarily to fix a day when it must appear how it turned out. Love itself does not understand such things, it is eternally certain about the fulfillment of the presupposition; if this is not true, then the love is already at the point of exhaustion.

Love edifies by presupposing that love is fundamentally present, therefore love also edifies there where, humanly speaking, love seems to be lacking, and where, humanly understood, it seems first and foremost necessary to tear down, not indeed for the sake of pleasure but for the sake of salvation. Tearing down is the opposite of building up. This contrast never shows more clearly than when the discourse is about the fact that love edifies; for in whatever other connection there may be talk about edifying, it still has a resemblance to tearing down, that is, doing something through another. But when the lover edifies, then it is exactly the opposite of tearing down, because the lover does something through himself: he presupposes that love is present in the other man—which is certainly exactly the opposite of doing something through the other man. Tearing down satisfies only too readily the sensual man; edifying in the sense that one does something through the other man, can also satisfy the sensual man; but to edify by qvercoming one’s self satisfies only love. And yet this is absolutely the only way to edify. But in the well-meant zeal for tearing down and building up, one forgets that in the last analysis no man is able to plant the ground of love in another man.

Just here it appears how difficult the art of building is, as practiced by love, and as it is described in that celebrated passage by the apostle Paul; for what he says about love is just a closer definition of how love manages to edify. “Love is long-suffering,” and thereby it edifies; for long-suffering is just continuing to presuppose that there is love at bottom. He who judges, even if this came about slowly, that the other man is wanting in love, takes away the foundation—he cannot edify. But love edifies through long-suffering. Therefore it harbors neither envy nor spite, for envy and spite negate the love in the other man, and consume, if that were possible, the foundation of love. The love which edifies endures the other man’s misunderstanding, his ingratitude, his anger—that is certainly enough to bear; how then should love also be able to bear envy and spite! That is the way things are divided in this world: he who bears envy and malice does not bear the other man’s burdens, but the lover who loves does not bear malice and envy, he bears the burdens. Each one bears his own burden, the envious and the lover, both in a certain sense are martyrs, for as a devout man has said: the envious man is also a martyr—but the devils.

“Love seeketh not its own,” therefore it edifies. For he who seeks his own must push the other aside; he must tear down in order to get a place for his own house which he wishes to build. But love presupposes that love is basically present, therefore it edifies. “Jt rejoiceth not in wmiquity”; but he who wishes to tear down, or at least wishes to seem important by pretending that it is necessary to tear down, he may be said to rejoice in iniquity—otherwise there would be nothing to tear down. Love, on the contrary, rejoices in presupposing that love is fundamentally present, therefore it edifies. “Love beareth all things”; for what does it mean to bear all things? In the final analysis it means being able to find love in everything, as it is fundamentally presupposed. When we say of a man who has a very strong constitution, that as regards food and drink he can stand anything, we mean by that, that his system is healthy enough to get nourishment from even unhealthful food (just as the sick may be injured by even healthful food); we mean that his system derives nourishment even from that which would seem least nourishing. In this way love bears all things, always presupposing that it is fundamentally present—and thereby it edifies. “Love believeth all things”; for to believe all things is exactly, although it does not seem so, although it seems just the opposite, to presuppose that love is fundamentally present, even in thé misguided, even in the perverted, even in the most malicious. Mistrust precisely takes the foundation away by presupposing that love is not present; therefore mistrust cannot edify.

“Love hopeth all things”; but to hope all things is truly, although it does not seem so, and even seems to be the opposite, to presuppose that love is, nevertheless, fundamentally present, and that it will manifest itself in the erring, in the misguided, even in the lost. Was not the father of the prodigal son perhaps the only one who did not know that he had a prodigal son, for the father’s love hoped all things? The brother knew at once that he was hopelessly lost. But love edifies; and the father regained the prodigal son just because he who hoped for everything, presupposed that love was fundamentally present in his son. On the father’s side, in spite of the son’s dissipation, there was no rupture (and a rupture is exactly the opposite of edifying), he hoped all things; therefore by his fatherly forgiveness he edified in truth, because the son vividly felt that his father’s love had borne with him, so that there had been no breach. “Love endureth all things”; for to endure all things is exactly to presuppose that love is fundamentally present. When we say that a mother endures all her child’s naughtiness, do we mean thereby that as woman she patiently suffers evil? No, we mean something else; we mean that as mother she always continues to remember that it is a child, and consequently to presuppose that the child still really loves her, and that this will soon be evident. Ordinarily we talk about how patience endures all things, not about how love does. For patience endures all things and is silent; and if the mother thus endured the child’s naughtiness, then we should really mean by that that the mother and the child were estranged from each other. On the other hand, love endureth all things, patiently silent—but presupposes in all stillness that love is still present in the other man.

Thus love edifies. “It is not puffed up, does not behave itself unseemly, is not easily provoked”: it is not puffed up at the thought that it might create love in the other man; it is not provoked and precipitate, impatiently, almost hopelessly concerned with what it must first tear down in order to build up again; no, it always presupposes that love is fundamentally present. Therefore it is unconditionally the most edifying sight to see love edifying, a sight by which even the angels are edified. And therefore that is unconditionally the most edifying talk, if a man really succeeds in telling how love edifies. There is many a friendly, many a salutary, many an enchanting, many an impressive, many an elevating, many a captivating, many a persuasive sight, and so on; but there is but one edifying sight, that of seeing love edifying. Whatever you may have seen of horror or abominations in the world, which you could wish to forget, because they tend to break down your courage and your confidence, to make life distasteful to you, and the idea of living abhorrent: consider only how love edifies, and you are edified in living! There are very many different things to speak about, but there is only one which is edifying: how love edifies. Therefore, whatever may befall you, so embittering that you might almost wish that you had never been born, and wish that you were dead, the sooner the better: only consider how love edifies, and you are again edified in speaking. There is but one edifying sight and one edifying subject: yet everything can be said and done edifyingly, for everywhere where there is edifying there is love, and wherever there is love, there is edifying, and as soon as love is present, it edifies.

Love edifies by presupposing that love is present. Have you not experienced this, my hearer? If any man has ever spoken in this way to you or acted in this way toward you, so that you really felt edified by him, then it was because you were vividly conscious of his presupposition that there was love in you. Or what kind of a man do you think the other man ought to be who might truly edify you? Is it not true that you would wish him to have insight and knowledge and ability and experience? But still you would not believe that it decisively depended on these; on the contrary, it would depend on his being a reliable, kindly man, that is, a truly loving man. Hence you believe that to be able to edify decisively and essentially depends on being loving, or in having love to such a degree that one can depend upon it.

But what, then, is love? Love is presupposing love; to have love is to presuppose love in others; to be loving is to presuppose that others are loving. Let us understand each other. The characteristics a man may have may either be characteristics he has for himself, even if he makes use of them for others; or attributes for others. Wisdom is one quality inherent in himself; power and talent and knowledge and so on may also be attributes peculiar to himself. To be wise is not to say, not to assume, that others are wise; on the contrary, it may very certainly be true, if the truly wise man assumes that all men are far from wise. Moreover, because “wise” is an exclusively personal attribute, there is nothing in the thought to prevent one from assuming that there might live, or has lived, a wise man who dared say that he assumed that all other men were unwise. In the thought (of being wise—and assuming that all others are unwise), there is no contradiction. In the realities of life, such an expression would be arrogant, but merely in the thought as such, there is no contradiction. On the other hand, if one were to believe that he himself was loving, but also that all other men were not loving, then we should have to say: “No, stop; there is a contradiction here in the thought itself; for to be loving is just to assume, to presuppose, that other men are loving.” Love is not an exclusively personal attribute, but an attribute by virtue of which or in which you exist for others. In ordinary conversation we of course say, when we sum up a man’s qualities, that he is wise, understanding, lovingand we do not notice what a difference there is between the last attribute and the first. His wisdom, his experience, his understanding are his own, even if others benefit by them; but if he is truly loving, then he does not have love in the same sense as he has wisdom, but it is exactly his love which presupposes that the rest of us have love. You praise him as the lover; you believe love is an attribute he has, as it really is; you feel edified by him just because he is loving, but you do not notice that this is because his love indicates that he presupposes love in you, and that just for this reason you are edified, just for this reason the love in yourself is built up. If it were actually true that a man could be loving without this indicating a presupposed love in others, then you would not in the deepest sense feel yourself edified; however certain it was that he was loving, you would not in the deepest sense feel yourself edified, any more than you would in the deepest sense be edified, no matter how certain it was that he was wise, understanding, learned and experienced. If it were possible that he might in truth be loving without this signifying that it presupposed love in others, then you could not fully rely upon him, for the test of reliability in the lover is exactly that, even when you are distrustful of yourself, of your own love, he is loving enough to presuppose, or rather he is the lover who presupposes it.—But you demanded that a man in order truly to be able to edify should be truly loving. And to be loving has shown itself as signifying: presupposing love in others. So you say absolutely the same thing that has been developed in the discourse.

So the reflection returns to its beginning. To edify is to presuppose love; to be loving is to presuppose love; only love edifies. For to edify is to build up something on a foundation, but spiritually love is the foundation of everything. No man can lay the foundation of love in another man’s heart; nevertheless, love is the foundation, and one can only build on that foundation; hence one can only edify by presupposing love. Take love away, then there is nothing which edifies, and no one who is edified.

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