Cor ad cor loquitur

One tends to distinguish between dis-interested or neutral "knowledge," and human emotion, human love, human desire. One is objective, the other subjective, and the aim is to move from subjective to objective in order to gain true knowledge.

This, of course, is a caricature of how we know and feel. In reality, we live at once on various levels of cognition and feeling, so our knowledge involves and is motivated by both.

This lesson applies to all we do, from science to the humanities, from philosophy to biblical criticism and theology. The idea is to find the personal dimension in what we study, so that heart speaks to heart.

A good example from science is Nobel prize winning biologist Barbara McClintock, who observed that she learned the secrets of corn genetics while loving her corn plants. In love they became almost personal, communicating their uniqueness to her. See her A Feeling For the Organism.

From the humanities, one can't find a higher authority than Goethe:

One cannot come to know anything unless one loves it; and the deeper and deeper and more complete the knowledge is to become, the stronger, more powerful, and livelier must that love, indeed passion, be.

Man lernt nichts kennen, als was man liebt, und je tiefer und vollstandiger die Kenntnis werden soll, desto starker, kraftiger und lebendiger muss Liebe, ja Leidenshaft sein.

Quoted in The Nature of Biblical Criticism, by Robert Barton, at p. 59, n. 66. Barton also quotes Manfred Oemin, "Man kann nur verstehen, was man liebt" (One can only understand what one loves.) Barton says he agrees with Oemin's position that "love is necessary, insofar as it means a commitment to studying this or that text, but that rational detachment is also necessary . . . the two attitudes can coexist; not all love is blind!" Ibid.

And so, as is so often the case, life is not either or, but both . . . and more and more. Distinctions unite in a whole, brought together by love. Heart to Heart.

Listen to "Love Knows No Borders" (James Loynes)

Listen to "How Can I Keep From Singing?" (James Loynes)

Listen to Enya, "How Can I keep From Singing?"