Love
Fri, 01/25/2008 - 18:10 — admin
Love is also an attribute of a person. To say “God is love” and to deny His personality is a gross contradiction. Love is actually an intimate feeling which one person feels for another. Love is not just a vague impersonal force which floats around bestowing itself on people.
Sometimes a girl may have a secret admirer who sends her bunches of roses, poems filled with sweet words, boxes of chocolate candies, etc. When she receives these gifts, she does not think, “Oh, love is sending me these things. Love loves me.” No, she intelligently takes it that some person is feeling love for her. She sees the flowers, poems, and chocolates as symptoms of love, and she knows that this love is coming from a person. She may not know who that person is yet, but because she perceives symptoms of his love for her, she is able to understand that he exists. This is a correct understanding.
If the girl were very dull, she might not even perceive that there was love behind the gifts, and if she were a little less dull, she might perceive the love, but not understand it to be connected with a person. This can be compared to those who are able to perceive the existence of a loving creator, or cause of all causes, but who think that the creator is the love, not understanding it to be an attribute or characteristic symptom of His existence as a person.
The attributes which less perceptive persons think to be the ultimate cause of all causes are actually attributes which point to His personal nature.
MICHAEL: What you have said seems to make a great deal of sense, TEACHER, and I am very appreciative that you've taken the time to talk to me. I can't say that I'm perfectly convinced, however. Even though we have no experience of intelligence, creativity, will, and the other attributes you've mentioned except in relation to persons, how can I know that these can't be experienced or found in an impersonal force? Just because I've never seen or experienced a thing doesn't mean it doesn't exist, does it? Isn't there the possibility, in fact, that we may be projecting our own limited experience onto God and coloring our impressions of Him with our own misgivings?
TEACHER: To answer that question, I think we have to take a slight detour from the mainstream of our conversation. It seems that we have practically exhausted the empirical process.
CULTIVATING KNOWLEDGELove
The wise have explained that one result is derived from the culture of knowledge, and that a different result is obtained from the culture of nescience.
~Sri Ishopanishad, Mantra Ten
For one who lives a hedonistic life, a life in which nescience is cultivated, the results are envy, anger, greed, impatience, disrespect for others, anxiety, depression, hatred, ever-increasing lust, forgetfulness, frustration, dissatisfaction, duplicity, fear of death, and so on.
Science of Identity Foundation – Siddhaswarupananda
Love is also an attribute of a person. To say “God is love” and to deny His personality is a gross contradiction. Love is actually an intimate feeling which one person feels for another. Love is not just a vague impersonal force which floats around bestowing itself on people.
Sometimes a girl may have a secret admirer who sends her bunches of roses, poems filled with sweet words, boxes of chocolate candies, etc. When she receives these gifts, she does not think, “Oh, love is sending me these things. Love loves me.” No, she intelligently takes it that some person is feeling love for her. She sees the flowers, poems, and chocolates as symptoms of love, and she knows that this love is coming from a person. She may not know who that person is yet, but because she perceives symptoms of his love for her, she is able to understand that he exists. This is a correct understanding.
If the girl were very dull, she might not even perceive that there was love behind the gifts, and if she were a little less dull, she might perceive the love, but not understand it to be connected with a person. This can be compared to those who are able to perceive the existence of a loving creator, or cause of all causes, but who think that the creator is the love, not understanding it to be an attribute or characteristic symptom of His existence as a person.
The attributes which less perceptive persons think to be the ultimate cause of all causes are actually attributes which point to His personal nature.
MICHAEL: What you have said seems to make a great deal of sense, TEACHER, and I am very appreciative that you've taken the time to talk to me. I can't say that I'm perfectly convinced, however. Even though we have no experience of intelligence, creativity, will, and the other attributes you've mentioned except in relation to persons, how can I know that these can't be experienced or found in an impersonal force? Just because I've never seen or experienced a thing doesn't mean it doesn't exist, does it? Isn't there the possibility, in fact, that we may be projecting our own limited experience onto God and coloring our impressions of Him with our own misgivings?
TEACHER: To answer that question, I think we have to take a slight detour from the mainstream of our conversation. It seems that we have practically exhausted the empirical process.