 Soble’s intent in understanding eros to be a reason-dependent sort of love is to articulate a sharp contrast with agape, a sort of love that does not respond to the value of its object. ‘Agape’ has come, primarily through the Christian tradition, to mean the sort of love God has for us persons, as well as our love for God and, by extension, of our love for each other—a kind of brotherly love. In the paradigm case of God’s love for us, agape is “spontaneous and unmotivated,” revealing not that we merit that love but that God’s nature is love (Nygren 1953b, p. 85). Rather than responding to antecedent value in its object, agape instead is supposed to create value in its object and therefore to initiate our fellowship with God (pp. 87–88). Consequently, Badhwar (2003, p. 58) characterizes agape as “independent of the loved individual’s fundamental characteristics as the particular person she is”; and Soble (1990, p. 5) infers that agape, in contrast to eros, is therefore not reason dependent but is rationally “incomprehensible,” admitting at best of causal or historical  explanations.[1]