The Call of Love
Though living in a materialistic world, as souls of divine origin and spiritual essence, we are naturally sensitive to the call of love. Love is a vital ingredient of man’s inner nature. It is both our weakness and our greatest strength and asset, and at a subconscious level shapes our thoughts and daily activities. However, worldly love is expressed and experienced more as a survival tool that lends support and comfort to our mundane and troubled lives. Worldly love has a high concentration of selfishness generated by the working of lust, anger, greed, attachment and ego. The true love spoken of by the mystics is of entirely another nature and degree. It is necessary to distinguish between the worldly and the spiritual or divine love. Saints, being the embodiment of true love, present their spiritual teachings as an ultimate expression of divine love. In Philosophy of the Masters, Vol II, Maharaj Sawan Singh discusses the influence of true love in our lives as follows:
Love itself is the beginning and the end. It is a pure emanation of God’s current, which enters the heart of a pure person and spreads its influence all round, thus purifying the entire area. The heart of a lover is pure, and at the same time those who have the opportunity of meeting him cannot escape his purifying influence. If one comes across such pure souls, his heart is so greatly influenced that he feels as if purity had entered into him from head to foot.
Love is not worldly or material. It is divine. If you see two hearts sacrificing their very existence at the altar of love, you should understand that they are vessels filled with divine influence. By their mere touch, even withered hearts become fresh and are renewed. You cannot conceal it. Even if the tongue does not speak, the eyes reveal it by the tears that fill them.
Kabir Sahib says: “Try hard to conceal love. But it cannot be concealed once it has taken hold of a person. Even if one does not talk about it, the eyes disclose it.”
The refreshing rainfall comes from the sky, but when the eyes of two lovers meet, they are flooded with the tears of love. It takes time for a Swanti drop to turn into a pearl, but the water oozing from loving eyes flows like a string of shining pearls. The dryness within is removed and one’s entire being is refreshed from head to foot.
Just as milk and water become one when mixed, the two loving hearts blend themselves into divine union with the water of love. It is then difficult for them to be separate entities. Love is true. It contains no deceit and no superficiality. Coming under its influence, two hearts unite into one in such a manner that one cannot detect any difference between them. Then one is not able to find out who is the disciple and who the Master, who is the lover and who the Beloved. The curtain of duality is removed. The lover and the Beloved become one.
When love produces this condition in one’s heart, he needs no meditation, prayer or any spiritual effort, because love is the real meditation, is the real prayer, is the real union. A true lover is a real believer in the oneness of God and is a true discerner of the jewel of his non-duality. But this does not convey the correct meaning. Actually, he himself becomes the very embodiment of his attributes. The value of a man’s life is greatly enhanced by love, for, the influence of love is unique. It lifts a man from the state of being a mere nothing to the celestial heights.
Maulana Rum says: “With love, even bitter things become sweet, brass is turned into gold, and everything that is soiled becomes clean. With the pain of love in one’s heart, love itself becomes the remedy for it. Thorns then give the same pleasure and fragrance, as would beautiful flowers. Under the influence of love even the peevish temperament, which is as sour as vinegar, turns into a sweet intoxicant as that of wine. People become as smooth as oil, as soft as wax, even if they were as hard as iron.”
By love, poison becomes nectar, and a tiger is turned into a harmless mouse. Disease turns into a blessing, and tyranny into mercy. The dead are even brought to life, and kings become slaves by means of love.
The Great Master concludes by saying “Love is an intense light which shows us the way of spirituality. A person is blind without love.”