Four Hundred Texts on Love 9

31.  Just as the thought of fire does not warm the body, so faith without love does not actualize the light of spiritual knowledge in the soul.

Although this text is really just an expanded thought from the Epistle of James, I’m struck by the physicality of the text. Faith alone, which James calls the faith of demons, is like the thought of fire. It has no tangible, physical reality. The physical reality of our faith is love, which James calls ‘works’. It seems clear to me that James was not referring to the works of Torah, but rather the works of love, which is to say the works of Christ.

Our God, who is love, is also described as a consuming fire. It is fitting, then, that the metaphor of fire is used when we think of love. And the love of God, the love by which we are commanded to live, is tangible not ethereal. The thought of love is not love and will not fire our faith.