Williams, Daniel Day. The Spirit and the Forms of Love. New York: Harper & Row, 1968.

Abstract

A dynamic new understanding of love, particularly in the relation of love to intellectuality, is a matter of great urgency for man in this age of nuclear weapons, of the computer, of vast emotional disorder and suffering, notes Daniel Day Williams author of The Spirit and the Forms of Love. This is probably the first full-scale interpretation of love from the standpoint of the new "process" theologies, which stress the concepts of evolution, growth, and becoming. Dr. Williams believes that the revolution in the world-view affecting theology must be incorporated into the traditional Christian notion of love. The reformulation of the concept of love requires a critique of the doctrine of God as unchanging and complete in his being so that the world adds nothing to him. Dr. Williams shows that the understanding of God's love has been confused by the glorification of his immutabilty. He puts forth instead of process theology that if God is love he must be in interaction with the world, responsive to the world's needs, and enriched through the creative adventure of individuals in their freedom. The author reviews the biblical way of thinking about love, and describes the major interpretations of love in the Christian tradition. The forms of love in Western Christian thought are analyzed into the Augustinian, the Franciscan, and the Evangelical. Each of these is seen to undergo transformation in the modern period as disclosed in the theology of Martin D-Arcy, Albert Schweitzer, and Reinhold Niebuhr.How the new interpretation of love illuminates daily living is demonstrated in such concrete areas as: self-sacrifice, sexuality, the struggle for social justice, and the intellectual life. Here Dr. Williams applies his theology of love specifically to the crisis of the contemporary world.