“with all your mind”
In today’s Gospel, Jesus says that the greatest and first commandment is “You shall love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, with all your soul and with all your mind.” These words: love, heart, soul and mind are all terms that are commonly used to signify many different meanings. Before we can live out this command of Our Lord we must first know what He means by these words.
What is love? As Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI points out in his encyclical God is Love (Deus Caritas Est), there is a problem with our language when we look at the word love. “Today, the term “love” has become one of the most frequently used and misused of words, a word to which we attach quite different meanings.” [1] In the Greek language there are three separate words for love each expressing a distinct type of love. First, is the term eros that refers to the passionate love between a man and a woman neither planned nor willed. Second, is the idea of philia, which means the love of friendship. Lastly, is agape signifying a love of choice and self-giving.
This lesson is the third of three lessons on heart, soul and mind with a focus on the mind and a summary of how heart, soul and mind are integrated.
What is the mind? The mind is “any state or activity of rational consciousness" [2] Our mind is our intellect and many times is seen as the recipient of knowledge. The mind is one of the greatest gifts God gives us, and it can also be our greatest adversary. St. Augustine said, “The mind commands the body and it obeys. The mind orders itself and meets resistance.”
Is the mind the same thing as the soul since the soul has intellect? The mind is the physical part of the soul’s intellect. For example when we think of God or an idea, which are non-material things, there is something material that happens within our brain, our mind. We can start with the soul and then look at the heart and mind. The soul is both the intellect (thought) and the will (choice). The soul manifests itself through the body. The intellect is manifested through the mind, and the will being manifested through the heart.
What does the mind have to do with loving God? One of the three types of love is philia, this is a brotherly love, like that of friendship. In a friendship we gather facts based on perception. We try to “get to know” someone. In the same way, we get to know God. In the prayer of Saint Thomas Aquinas, we pray, “grant me a mind to know you.” The goal is to not just “know about” God but to move to “knowing” God. We move from a fact and the mind to feelings and the heart. This is true of any relationship and shows how the heart, mind and soul work together. As St. Thomas Aquinas also said, “to love God is something greater than to know Him.”
When we are getting to know another person, we understand the mind or thoughts of a person because they communicate verbally and non-verbally with us. We then encounter the heart of another as we being to share in and understand their affections and desires. The beatitude, “Blessed are those that mourn” is a challenge to not just know the mind of another but to know the heart of another, to share in their joys, to share in their suffering. Sometimes we say to someone, “What is on your mind?” or “What is in your heart?” We get to know about and know people through their mind and heart, which are both physical things. But we are also not just getting to know them physically. The mind and the heart manifest the soul, so we are getting to know another person’s soul. It is the invisible soul that is seen and known, from the thoughts of the mind and actions of the heart. In this Gospel verse soul is in the middle of heart and mind. We can think of the soul as the hinge or bridge in which the affections, passions and desires of the heart and the thoughts of the mind are centered.
The scripture verse, referenced in today’s Gospel is from Deuteronomy 6:4-7. In this verse the word strength is used instead of mind. It takes strength, a strength that comes from the Lord to give all and hold nothing back. “Hear, O Israel! The Lord is our God, the Lord alone! Therefore, you shall love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength. Take to heart these words, which I enjoin on you today. Drill them into your children. Speak of them at home and abroad, whether you are busy or at rest.” The Church is the new Israel. We can see the words now as, “Hear, O Church!” This verse was key to the Israelite people, so much so that they “drilled it” into their children and took seriously these words whether “at home and abroad, whether you are busy or at rest.” It is only when we witness the Life of Christ and imitate it that we can give our self away because Jesus gave Himself away.
How as Christians do we sometimes turn our affections toward God “on and off”? Maybe we live for God at home or at church but then turn our affections away from him at school or work. Maybe we live for God when we are at rest and everything is peaceful, but forget about Him when we are “busy.” If we recognize this duplicity in our own lives, we must quickly strive to change it lest we fail to love God with all of our heart, all of our mind and all of our soul.
St. Augustine lived a life of great sin and realized after many years that his life, his dreams, and pretty much everything was pointless. He had a big conversion and became a bishop, saint, and doctor of the Church. This song by Switchfoot is about the mindset of St. Augustine when he realized he was not happy, and calls out to God coming to the realization there has got to be something more than to just loving yourself.
When Jesus says, “The whole law and the prophets depend on these two commandments.” He is saying that there is order and peace within these commandments. That heart, mind and soul can be integrated in the virtue of charity. It is only charity that can bring the heart, mind and soul together and ordered correctly. This charity is given to both God and neighbor. We are integrating our heart, mind and soul in order to give the gift of our self to God and neighbor. The virtue of Chastity, which is also a gift of the Holy Spirit, is the integration of heart, mind and soul. “The chaste person maintains the integrity of the powers of life and love placed in him. This integrity ensures the unity of the person; it is opposed to any behavior that would impair it. It tolerates neither a double life nor duplicity in speech." [3]
Search: Chastity: Filter & Funnel
It is the order and peace and hope of now and finally embracing Jesus that we desire. We want to perfectly give our self to Him so that the person that He is embracing is the whole person, we want to give all, not just more or some. It is only in giving our heart, mind and soul that we can truly love God. Love is the only virtue of the three theological virtues that will remain in heaven. For we will no longer need faith, because we will see what we believe and we will no longer need hope because we will have attained and embraced what we hoped for. Love then will remain, a love that we practiced in life with our heart, mind and soul and will perfect in heaven.
[1] Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI, God is Love (Deus Caritas Est), page 5
[2] Fr. John A Hardon, S.J.; Modern Catholic Dictionary; page 351
[3] Cathechism of the Catholic Church; 2338