Agape and Eros Love

This has been something that has been eating at me ever since I heard it in a sermon at a church that I had been attending for about 3 years. The sermon series was on sex from a Christian perspective. To be honest I cannot remember much from the original sermon and will ask from some latitude in the post. The one thing that remains extremely clear in my mind is that the pastor stated that God gave us the word Eros and that it was meant for the marital bed.

Now, I need to give you some background. I have struggled with sexual sin for many years and this was something that was hard for me to wrap around my brain. First, I knew when this was said that Eros does not appear in the New Testament at all. The form of love that is spoken of in the Bible when referring to marraige is that of Agape.

(Ephesians 5:25-33 ESV)

[25 ] Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, [26 ] that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, [27 ] so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish. [28 ] In the same way husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. [29 ] For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ does the church, [30 ] because we are members of his body. [31 ] “Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.” [32 ] This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church. [33 ] However, let each one of you love his wife as himself, and let the wife see that she respects her husband.


The word for love that is used above is that of Agapao. Now, why does that make a difference? It is now time to give a little background on the difference between the two versions of Love. We use the word love to mean different things in different situations. When one says they Love ice cream, it is different from Loving your Mother, and Loving your spouse.

Eros in greek, at the time that the epistles and gospels were written, meant something very different from what it has morphed into today. Eros was a desiring love, a desire unto possession and control for the object of their desire. It was used for sexual desire that was unclean and impure.

Now, Agapao on the other hand is an unconditional love. This is the kind of Love that God feels for us and commands us to express within our families. This is the pure form that we are to have between husband and wife.

This bugged me quite a bit and so I decided to speak with the pastor regarding the use of the word Eros in the sermon. Now, I did not look into the word forms as deeply back two years ago as I did recently.  When I spoke with the pastor he said that he was just trying to refer to that form of Love being saved for the bedroom of a husband and wife. I accepted the answer. I felt "ok so eroticism is ok when expressed between a husband and wife."

It actually confirmed in my mind the corrupted view of marital relations that I had for many years. It was ok to have these images of my spouse mixed with the disturbing images that I had been corrupted by.  I am sure this was not the intention of the pastor, however it was what I walked out of his office thinking.

Now I want to make it crystal clear that I am not trying to say that my corrupt was legitimized in any way by what the pastor said. I had sinned by bringing the worlds view of something that was meant to express deep love for and caring towards your spouse.

The main point that I want to make is that words mean things and they were used in the Bible for a specific meaning. If they were not in the bible then there was a reason that they were not used. Provided you have a view that scripture is inspired, which I do, then God had a reason for words that were not in the inspired greek text, just as there was a reason for including specific words. Although extensive knowledge of greek is not needed to properly exegete scripture, it sure is helpful to have a layman's knowledge so as not to misrepresent the word. 

Grace and Peace