Love

I should thank Pendragon for his comment on definition of Love :nod:.

Speaking of Bible, there are several types of love mentioned there, which are closely related to Greek's definitions:
Agape - is charitable, selfless, altruistic, and unconditional. It is parental love seen as creating goodness in the world, it is the way God is seen to love humanity, and it is seen as the kind of love that Christians aspire to have for one another.
Phileo - a human response to something that is found to be delightful. Also known as "brotherly love".
There are two other types of love, Eros (sexual love) and storge (needy child-to parent love), which are said never mentioned in the Bible.

However, I'm not really sure whether they're never mentioned. For example, I think the story of David and Bathsyeba is a good example of Eros.

As we already have good exposure of love from Christianity, I suppose it's also a good idea to disscuss about love from other religions' point of views:

Buddhism/Hinduism:
Kāma is sensuous, sexual love. It is an obstacle on the path to enlightenment, since it is selfish.

Karuā is compassion and mercy, which reduces the suffering of others. It is complementary to wisdom, and is necessary for enlightenment.

Advea and maitrī are benevolent love. This love is unconditional and requires considerable self-acceptance. This is quite different from the ordinary love, which is usually about attachment and sex, which rarely occur without self-interest. Instead, in Buddhism it refers to detachment and unselfish interest in others' welfare.

In Hinduism, there's also Bhakti, which is a Sanskrit term from Hinduism meaning 'loving devotion to the supreme God'. A person who practices bhakti is called bhakta.

Islam:
In a sense, love does encompass the Islamic view of life as universal brotherhood which applies to all who hold the faith. There are no direct references stating that God is love, but amongst the 99 names of God
(Allah), there is the name Al-Wadud or 'the Loving One', which is found in Surah 11:90 as well as Surah 85:14. Also, there's also this term, Ishq, or divine love, which is the emphasis of Sufism. Sufis believe that love is a projection of the essence of God to the universe.

Judaism:
In Hebrew Ahava is the most commonly-used term for both interpersonal love and love of God. Other related but dissimilar terms are Chen (grace) and Hesed, which basically combines the meaning of "affection" and "compassion" and is sometimes rendered in English as "loving-kindness".

(source: wikipedia)

From those definitions, I suppose all these main religions of the world share more or less same definition on Love. Except Buddhaism, other religions share the thoughts that certain love is closely related to God and human relationship towards divine being. On the other hand, there are types of love which are self centric or closely related to personal and interpersonal relationship relationship.

What do you think?

Wow, I "love" this thread.
I just want to mention that on the last page I made a quote from Aristotle's poetics. wel its not, i was cumfufled. It is from his . . . well i guess the best way to put it, it was from his lecture notes. I only hav an excript of the whole thing though because I got the quote from a text book. So i just thought I should clarify.
God Bless

"If I don't hate, whom do I love?"

Love can also be defined by hate. It's the opposite of it. Love and hatred, two sides of a coin.

What do you think?

If I don't hate, it doesn't instantly mean that I love...I suppose there's something in between...You may not feel love or hate towards something/someone. Love and hate stands on each opposite end.

There's this definition of peace as the absence of war. But surely, peace is far beyond the absence of war.

I would like to thank subterranean for the very studious and very correct breakdown of the various words used to mean love in the Bible. I would also add the comment that The Song of Solomon, a love poem, could be interperted as showing the type of love defined by the word "eros".http://www.websmileys.com/sm/love/656.gif

I think that the opposite of love is indifference, not hate.

My thanks goes to you as well :nod:.

Yes, when I read The Song of Solomon for the first time (I was 12 or so), I felt shocked as I thought the contents were inappropriate to be included in a book which is regarded as book of God. Then I learnt further that God is not against sexual relationship, yet He created it so that husband and wife who are legally married can enjoy the intimacy not only physically but mentally as well. I'm not an expert on this, so please excuse me if my understanding is wrong :)

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Pendragon

I would like to thank subterranean for the very studious and very correct breakdown of the various words used to mean love in the Bible. I would also add the comment that The Song of Solomon, a love poem, could be interperted as showing the type of love defined by the word "eros".http://www.websmileys.com/sm/love/656.gif

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Well I think indifference is the opposite of both (love and hate)

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Psycheinaboat

I think that the opposite of love is indifference, not hate.

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I was onced asked by a very prestigous theologian who was the opposit of God. My first initial response was, of course, satan. But then, he broke down the meaning of opposite.... It is the exact equal on the other side. But sense satan is a lesser power, he cannot be the opposite to God. In the same way, if God is Love, then there can be no opposite to Love... that is taking it down to human understanding; it cannot be done. Not even hate or indifference could be opposite of Love.

:nod: :nod: :nod:

Thanks for initiating the discussion.

It occurs to me that Love and Hate require an object, but indifference denies any object.

In this sense, indifference removes the existence of the object, subtracting its essence from some reality.

Love and Hate create something positive or negative, indifference destroys something by removing its existence.

namaste

Quote:

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Originally Posted by PerAnnum

I have been reading a few of the discussion topics on this forum and find them rather interesting. I found the post intitled "Christians" especially interesting. I don't know about Islam or Bhuddism, or any other religion, because I was raised in a Christian home, but I do know what Christianity is all about.
It seems as though the word 'Christian' is producing a distaste among many people, and I wonder why that is. No, I don't. I know exactly why that is. We as Christians are to be Christ-like, and we have lost that, most of us. (I speak to myself). The Christian faith comes down to 2 basic principals.
1. Love God.
2. Love others.
Everything else falls underneathe these two categories. Life would be such a better place if we could understand these to principals. We try to put rules on ourselves and others, to MAKE the world see who Jesus is when all we have to do is love.
1 Corinthians 13:1-3
"If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor and surrender my body to the flames, but have not love, I gain nothing."

For what it's worth, PerAnnum.

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Your understanding of the Bible is really interesting and great. But today it is taken differently in point of fact it is taken fanatically. It stirs violence.