Love, love, accursed torment… Why is love so important to man? Why is he willing to perish of love, or to destroy his beloved rather than be torn away? Does balance exist in love?
People are like the three butterflies before the candle flame. The first, as it drew near, said only this: I know love. The second touched the flame with its wings and said: I know the burning of love. The third threw itself into the heart of the flame and burned up. It alone knows true love.
It is said that love is the most intelligent way of appropriating others. If we suppose that this is so, then the desire to possess is understandable, the avoidance of parting is understandable, impatience is understandable. Others say that love is the finest quality, a resonant energy that cannot be artificially induced, and for that very reason it is an irresistible force. Force can be resisted, love cannot.
Man's life is conceived in the fire of love and grows in the amniotic waters of the womb, his first breath is often a cry, and his bones are as solid as the earth. Bodily existence mirrors the elements, and man is the embodiment of passion in the world. He is marked by will, curiosity, desire, craving, rage and vehemence, and yes, by love. One of the most ardent expressions of passion is love. Euphoria? Biochemistry? A play of feelings? All of them and none. According to the philosophy of yoga, the human soul is wrapped in several layers, the outermost of them food, then the workings of the senses and the mind, the intelligence, and last of all the sheath of joy, which is thus the closest to our true self. Perhaps that is also why feelings are so important to man? As if we were at the mercy of our feelings…
According to Aurobindo, love is first an animal instinct, then a sweet daze in the adoring heart, later a fervent friendship in happy thought, and at last it is ennobled into the expanse of the widest spiritual longing. In this sense it is all love, and not romantic love, that is supreme. Montesquieu declares outright: ‘I am in love with friendship’…
Whether it be love of humanity, friendship or love – these are social bonds that tie people to one another emotionally. If we now examine love in the strict sense, according to Plato love is the desire to will the good for ever, yet he also traces man's failings back to this feeling, saying that sin is disordered love. And yet, to examine happiness, love and ecstasy from the viewpoint of philosophy is an exceedingly dry experiment, whereas to examine philosophy from the standpoint of joy, that at last is satisfying.
We know that in love there is no rule – that is the supreme rule. If it is such a playful thing, then we ought to decide whether man is playing with love or love is playing with man? It is a commonplace, but perhaps we may say that the most important thing in life is love. Life is the milk, love is the butter… Though it cannot be seen, the butter lies hidden in the milk, just as love lies hidden in life, or at least the possibility of it.
But love is not merely a human relationship. As a relationship with God, love is a gravitational force that draws the believer to God, and God to his believers. It is said, too, that love is God, which is also true in reverse: God is love. But how strange is Michelangelo's view: ‘God dwells not in love but in the lover; the beloved is merely the instrument of divine inspiration.’ That is why love is – intoxicated. What degree of adoration it takes for this to become reality:
If I eat – You are nourished,
if I drink – Your thirst is quenched.
If I utter a word – You speak,
if I reach heaven – You attain salvation.
For the question is not – and love is not – knowing whom you would gladly spend your life with, but recognising in whose absence you would perish. For that is precisely the sweet and poison-bitter truth of this self-abandoning rapture, love.