Quite some time ago I mentioned, to muse, having once heard that ancient Greek had four words distinct words for "love," each expressing a different concept.

Today I came across a list of them: eros, philos, storge, and agape.

What are the distinctions?

Aput's Postulate: for any statement 'X has n words for Y' made in a language L, the statement 'L has n words for Y' is also true. English's words for this include: love, liking, adoration, friendship, fondness, affection, desire, dearness, kindness, pleasure, passion, enjoyment, charity.

Now for the answer. philía is the most general term, applying to friends; to the love/liking of wisdom or words (philosophía, philología), or of father or mother or country; and to having a characteristic (e.g. philópsogos 'fond of boasting'). Many hundreds of compounds. The verb philéO had meanings ranging from like, love, be fond of; to befriend, welcome; to kiss; to like to do, practise, enjoy, be in the habit of.

érOs is erotic love, whose compounds mean things like darling, sweetheart, beloved, to write on love, love affair, to be madly in love.

storgÉ is the natural affection such as between parents and children, or others in that relationship such as king and people. The verb stérgO covers like, love; be pleased with, be content with, acquiesce in, bear up under; pray, entreat. Only these two words: not used for compounding.

agápE is charity, kindness, affection, brotherly love. Originally (as in Homer) the verb agapáO meant welcome, entertain; then take leave of, treat well, treat kindly, be fond of, be well pleased with, love; and like philéO could also mean enjoy, be in the habit of. A few compounds.

Wow, those are great. I like how the Greeks think. I don't see that we have that same concept at all in English, though I wish we did. For example, where is our "philos," meaning a love of wisdom or words? Surely philosophy doesn't do that. What a wonderful concept! Or brotherly love? While we have fondness, do we have a word that incorporates the charity of brotherly love in English?

Argh! But it's not how the Greeks think! It's just a bunch of words. They haven't got some concept PHILIA that means exactly all and only those things that the English translations cover. They're just words: we have a limited number of them and use whatever seems close enough for the job at hand.

What does 'affection' mean? Or 'kindness'? Or 'desire'? Or 'lust' (add another to my earlier list)? We don't have all these concepts AFFECTION and DESIRE and FOND and so on in English, parcelled off and separate from each other. They overlap hugely and often any one of half a dozen could be used.

I like how the Greeks think. I don't see that we have that same concept at all in English

If we don't have the same concept how can you understand the distinctions posited for those Greeks? And what about aput's long list of English words for different kinds of "love"? There's an old joke about the French being a very strange people: why they almost always have a different word for everything. How can you trust anybody who doesn't call a dog a dog or a book a book?

I believe that "philos" is in fact another Greek love, as in "philo-sophia" love of wisdom or "Phil-adelphia" love of cheese-steaks.

Gk adelphos 'son of the same mother; brother; kinsman' < delphus 'womb'. A synonym in Greek is agastor < gaster 'paunch, belly'. Philadelphia == 'city of brotherly love'

jheem, what does your < symbol mean in this context? "derived from"?

jheem -- I apologize for the dreadful humor. Of course adelphos is brother. Any relation to "Delphi," as the "oomphalos" of the world?

Not a problem, Robert. I just thought folks'd be interested in the etymology. I wondered about Delphi, too. And the belly button is close to the womb. It could've been a Greek folk etymology of some pre-Hellenic placename.

Shu:

Yes, < means 'derived from'. The (h)a- suffix is supposed to be related to homos (Latin similis, English same) 'same', meaning 'together'.

To continue the joke, wouldn't love of cheese-steak sandwichers be: tyrokreasiphilia?