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What is L♥ve ?

Love is an illusive quality that many attempts to describe. The imagery contained in poems, songs and stories of love stir us to seek it. Below is a selection of writings from various saints and poets whose words prompt us to want to remove the veil of illusion from our eyes, to see the presence of the Lord within everything, and go to turn inward to the abode of everlasting love. Great Master tells us,

“Love is a force greater than any other. Love is energy, which gives power to the life.”

It is easy to understand why love escapes us when we ponder the vastness of our concepts about love. Love ultimately is beyond the mind to understand and cannot be explained by any language. It is impossible to reduce the greatness of love to words that actually describe its depths, its tender beauty, and its power. Ultimately, we are, as Great Master said, trying to describe God.

Great Master in Philosophy of the Masters, Vol. 2, speaks directly to the heart of the seeker of love:

Four Things Are Necessary In Love

1. No other idea should creep into
   the mind except that of the beloved.
2. The question of bargaining or give
   and take should not arise.
3. All types of fear should be
   removed.
4. The lover should not be in the
   state of enmity or hate with anyone.

Such persons are never disappointed or lose hope. Their Beloved (Satguru) is always by their side. Actually, anyone who possesses love in any form and has even a particle of love in them is worthy to be called a human. This is the touchstone by which we may be judged. We are worthy to be called a human being to the degree in which we have the quality of love in us. If we do not possess the spark of love, we are very far from being called a human being. Great Master continues:

Qualities Awakened Through Love

1. Destruction of Ego.  Another name for love is a continuous remembrance. By remembering the beloved continuously, attachment and love for him are awakened within and the ego or self is destroyed.
2. Love only gives and takes nothing. Love is selfless. Generally, people worship God with some ulterior motive, and they ask for worldly blessings. Only a rare few worship God for the sake of God alone. Those who demand things of the world from Him will get their worldly desires fulfilled, but God will not meet them. To ask for worldly benefits from Him is like asking for farthings from an Emperor.
3. Love brings fearlessness and courage to a high order. The first sign of true love is that a lover becomes free from fear. Even a delicate woman will be prepared to attack a tiger if she sees her children in danger.
4. Love has a force which imparts the increased power of endurance to the lover and makes him capable of enduring pain. Love is a force greater than any other. Love is energy, which gives power to ‘life’.
5. Love comprises service, sacrifice, and true subjugation of the mind. People try to control passion, anger, greed, attachment, and pride. That is not an easy job, but through the true love they are all completely toned down.
6. All things become easy in the presence of love. A person under the influence of love performs the most difficult tasks with comparative ease. He never complains about his inability to do any work because he considers himself to be capable of doing every type of work in the atmosphere of his love. “He does much who loves much”.
7. A lover pays no heed to public opinion or his own high position. In true love, all such feelings vanish. The idea of high or low birth also disappears. Hafiz says, “We do not care for public opinion, nor praise”.
8. Love brings the lover the quality of concealing the bad qualities of others. Love hides all evils and bad things. His attention never turns to the faults or defects of anyone in this world. Why then should he criticize or talk ill of anyone? Criticism is the outcome of the absence of love.
9. Lovers are always awakened by the love, and love’s power remains constant. In love, there is unique oneness, happiness, comfort, and fulfillment. Through love, one is able to benefit his own self and also his family. When the mind is filled with love, the ego is destroyed; fear, worry, and transmigration of the soul are ended.

St. Paul wrote,

Though I speak with the tongues of men and angels and have not Love, I am become as sounding brass or tinkling cymbal. And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries, all knowledge; and though I have all faith so that I could remove mountains, and have not love, I am nothing. – Corinthians 13: 1, 2

Sarmad, a Jewish Mystic said:

I gave my body, I gave my life, and I also gave my beliefs. The whole world is entangled in these things, but all these entanglements have been removed from me. What greater blessing could anyone wish for?

Kabir said:

Love does not grow on trees. Love is not sold in the market. On this path, the poor and the rich are on the same level. Whosoever surrenders himself, gains thereby.

Guru Arjun said:

One cannot achieve Love without a Master. You should bear it in mind that God is Love, and He is manifested in the Master who enables one to meet the Lord. – Maharaj Sawan Singh, Philosophy of the Masters, Vol. 2.

Each of these saints has attempted to describe a quality of love. They do so to give us some inkling of its true nature, to point us in the direction of the only love that will ultimately sustain us on our journey home.

Love is not love,
That alters when it alterations finds
Or bends with the remover to remove,
It is an ever fixed mark,
That looks on tempest and is never shaken,
It is the star to every wandering bark,
Whose worth’s unknown, although his height be taken.
— Shakespeare.

Ultimately, a devotee who experiences love in these ways
crosses the ocean of life and attains salvation. He is honored in the presence
of the Lord. Because of the love within himself, God is always his guide. He
meets God, and God resides in his heart. The mind becomes satisfied. He goes to
his real home, freed from the cycle of births and deaths.

O Uda, do not talk of love
The fish is in love with water;
Separated, she gives up her life.
The deer loves the music of tabor,
Readily he faces the hunter’s blade
The moth, ever in love with the flame,
With joy offers himself to it
Mira is in love with her Master;
She has laid her heart at his feet.
—Mira, the Divine Lover, p. 134.