God's Love and Hate


Romans 9: Yet, before the twins were born or had done anything good or bad—in order that God’s purpose in election might stand: not by works but by him who calls—she [Rebekah] was told, “The older will serve the younger.”[d] Just as it is written: “Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.”[e]What then shall we say? Is God unjust? Not at all! For he says to Moses,
“I will have mercy on whom I have mercy,
              and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.”[f]
It does not, therefore, depend on human desire or effort, but on God’s mercy.

The above passage is, obviously, a part of a much longer passage, and that context is relevant to its meaning. But, I am going to ignore all that for now. I think that everything I say here is compatible with the rest of the passage, but if it is not, I expect you to attempt to show me that it is not. So, without further ado…
I think that love implies hate and hate implies love. Here are two principles that seem roughly correct to me: 

Love Then Hate: If S loves x to degree n, then S will be disposed to hate to degree n all that destroys x. 

Hate Then Love: If S hates y to degree n, then S is disposed to love to degree n all that destroys y. 

I think the above principles help illuminate various portions of Scripture. For example, consider the following difficult passage:

Luke 14: 26 "If anyone comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters--yes, even their own life--such a person cannot be my disciple.

My love for Jesus is to be so great that I hate everything that could possibly destroy His rule, His kingdom, my relationship to Him. Since, my father, mother, wife, children, brothers, sisters, even my own life (desires, goals, thoughts, behavior, etc) could possibly get in the way of His rule, etc., then I must be disposed to hate those persons and those things. But notice that in hating them for the sake of loving Jesus with all of my being, I am actually loving them for the sake of their loving Jesus with all of their being. In other words, Jesus is telling us to love our neighbor (in this case our family members) just as we love ourselves. We are to recognize that there is no person and no thing that is worth loving more than Jesus and that Jesus is worth loving more than anything. This means, given the above principles, that I am to hate anything that could obstruct that. And in loving you as my neighbor, I want you to love Jesus more than anything else, which implies being disposed to hate anything that could obstruct that love. So, I should want you to hate me in that way as well. 

So far, I have analyzed the Luke passage in such a way that it involves hating anything that could obstruct our relationship to Jesus and His kingdom. In loving Jesus to the highest degree, I am thereby disposed to hate everything that could destroy Him, His kingdom, my love for Him, etc. I think that is a legitimate way to understand the passage, but I also think that something else may be going on as well. 

To see what else may be going on, let’s consider the following question:

Is my loving x incompatible with my hating x? 

I do not think so, at least not as stated. I think that there is something is called comparative love and comparative hate. Suppose S loves x to degree n, and S loves y to degree n10 (n x 10). Then it may be accurate to say that in comparison to y S hates x, but nevertheless S loves x. Something like this is probably what is going when Jesus tells us to hate our loved ones. I am to love God and God alone with all of my heart, soul, strength, and mind. Nothing else is to come close to that kind of love.

Now, it also be accurate to say that I am equivocating a bit here. Perhaps the love we are to have for God and the love we are to have for everyone else is simply a different kind of love. But, I am inclined to deny that. I am inclined to say that they are both called love for good reason, namely, because they are both love. 

I think the above distinctions can help us understand what Paul is up to in Romans 9. Perhaps what he is saying is that both Jacob and Esau are loved by God but they are not both the objects of his mercy-love or grace-love. And in comparison with that Esau really is hated, because he is not mercy-loved by God. In other words, Esau is loved by God, but he is not loved either to the same degree as Jacob or in the same way as Jacob. Just as it is possible for me to love x to degree n and love y to degree n10, it is possible for God to love Esau to degree n and Jacob to degree n10. So, both are loved by God, but in comparison to Jacod, Esau is hated.  

Or, applying the Love-Hate relationships above, we can analyze the passage as follows: 

Loving x to degree n implies hating to degree n anything that destroys x. The same is true of God. Since Esau represents something that can destroy something that God loves, God is disposed to hate Esau. And once again, this is perfectly compatible with God loving Esau as well. He loves Esau in virtue of Esau’s being human, being an image bearer, etc, but God hates Esau in virtue of being something that stands in the way of God’s plans, other loves, etc. 

If that is close to correct, then I think what SK says about Christ’s love for all can be reconciled with Romans 9.

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