Spiritual Friendship: Learning to Be Friends with God and One Another

Chapter 2 The Definition and Origin of Spiritual Friendship (Book 1.31–71)

Chapter Summary Do you think Christians can be friends with everyone? In this chapter Aelred and Ivo’s conversation will help you discover why Aelred believes the answer while living here on earth is “no.” He shows how there is a distinction between Christian love and spiritual friendship (1.31−32) and that if one does not love oneself, one cannot love a friend (1.35). Then Aelred explains the nature of three kinds of friendship: fleshly friendship, worldly friendship, and spiritual friendship (1.36−49). After explaining spiritual friendship’s nature in contrast with these two lesser kinds of friendship, Aelred describes how spiritual friendship began at the creation of the world and flows directly from the Creator (1.50−56). He points to the first marriage, between Adam and Eve, as an example of the first human friendship and shows how this friendship indicates that

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