The Wonderfully Whirling Legacy of Love
Have you ever wondered what makes the world go ’round? No, I mean really: what makes the earth spin on it axis, and rotate around the sun? It’s a good thing to wonder about, for the answer gives us a clue to the leaning of Love.
Psalm 136
Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good,
for his steadfast love endures forever.
5 to him who by understanding made the heavens,
for his steadfast love endures forever;
6 to him who spread out the earth above the waters,
for his steadfast love endures forever;
7 to him who made the great lights,
for his steadfast love endures forever;
8 the sun to rule over the day,
for his steadfast love endures forever;
9 the moon and stars to rule over the night,
for his steadfast love endures forever . . .
Stars and solar systems, and therefore planets, begin life as great clouds of gas and minute dust particles. The tiny, submicroscopic partcles in these clouds interact minutely with each other, and over cosmic periods of time these interactions create motion – known as angular momentum – or spin. You know how when a spinning ice skater draws her arms into her sides and she begins spinning faster and faster? That’s a good demonstration of increasing angular momentum. So, too, with those pre-planatery gas/dust clouds. The tiny bit of gravity possessed by each tiny particle begins to pull those particles in toward each other. They begin to clump into bigger particles, and those bigger particles have more gravity, so they attract one another more strongly. The cloud begins to collapse in on itself, much like that ice skater drawing his arms in toward his body, and the angular momentum, or spin, increases. By the time the planet compacts into a more or less solid mass, it has devloped quite a spin – it is “going ’round.” (The same principle applies on a larger level for planets revolving around a star.)
It is this growing relationship, this coming together, this uniting, that creates the world, and makes it go ’round. And the Psalmist (above) sees this as a demonstration of God’s Steadfast Love (in Hebrew: Chesed.) The sun by day, the moon and stars by night, a dramatic experience of the spinning of the earth.
So it is with all Love, for all Love is a part of God’s Steadfast Love for creation. A coming together, a uniting, a relationship that is more than social, but rather ontological – a “one-ing”, if you will, with the other. And this is a physical manifestation of the Golden Commandment: “you shall love your neighbor as yourself: I am Adonai.” (Leviticus 19:18) Not, “love your neighbor as if he were like yourself.” Not, “love your neighbor like you love yourself.” Rather, “love your neighbor with the same self-love that you lavish upon yourself, because you and your neighbor are so united with each other that you are the same thing – you are each other.” This, my Sisters and Brothers, is the essence of Steadfast, Biblical Love, andit is the essence of God.
The antithesis of this – the antithesis of Love – is self-centeredness: a drawing away from the other, and concentrating on your own ego driven wants and desires, with no thought for your neighbor. This is a good thing to remember when you are struggling for Biblical answers tquestions of social consciousness. Will your response draw you in toward your neighbor, thus increasing “The Wonderfully Spinning Legacy of Love?”
Love is what draws us together, what makes us one, what makes the world go ’round. To realize the full potential of our created nature we must love, because God loves this creation, and we are immersed in God’s Steadfast Love.
~ Will
All Good Gifts 