From: Tagi@cup.portal.com (Tagi Mordred Nagashiva)
Newsgroups: alt.magick
Subject: Love/Compassion in Eastern Traditions
Date: Sun, 13 Sep 92 13:53:00 PDT
Organization: The Portal System (TM)

9209.13 e.v.

Amanda quotes Peggy and writes, I respond to both:

Peggy:

> I've heard this commonly said and I don't agree.  Love is a 
> strong emotion, so its opposite would have to be an equally 
> strong emotion, thus hate.  Indifference is neutral, between the 
> two extremes, and can be used to *transcend* personal experience.


Response:

I don't understand why any of the people who've posted about this
so far would think that there is only one perspective on love and
it's 'opposite' (as if it is some sort of mathematical variable).

There are countless FORMS of love, as has been pointed out.  Also,
it really depends upon of what we are to take the 'opposite'.  If we
are to take the opposite of a strong emotion, one could posit, as has
been done, that it is the LACK of emotion, which could be considered
indifference or detachment.

If we are to take the opposite KIND of emotion, then I see two possibilities.
The first is, as Peggy mentions, anger or hatred.  Love involves feeling
kindly, nurturing, helpful.  Hatred is quite the opposite.  The other
possibility is that love is an attractive, closer-drawing emotion.  The
opposite of this would be fear, which is a repulsive, dividing-up 
feeling.  

I note that fear and anger are typical responses to the perceived source
of emotional pain.  Most people have emotional wounds, I've found.  Perhaps
love is the natural healthy development after healing.  One could say, then,
that the opposite of love is being wounded.  We could see that love is like
water, which, if our emotional Plant receives enough of it, inspires our
Heart to reproduce it for others.


Amanda:

This is a very eastern view.  Another way to look at it is that hate is 
simply a variation on love, and that what characterizes them both is the 
degree of attention.  

...Love and hate most definitely do not "cancel each other out..."


Response:

I'd like to know where you get your ideas about the East.  More on this below.

There are pitfalls to compassion.  The major one I know about is attachment.
COMpassion can lead to passion (suffering) if one is not able to keep from
identifying oneself with another or their feelings/actions.  Anger or hatred
expressed toward someone one feels strongly about usually arises out of
an attachment to one's concept of who we think that person is,  and an
expectation that they will behave in certain ways.  As soon as the person
does not meet our expectations, we may become angry or hateful.  Given this,
I agree with Amanda that in this way hate is a variation on love.  In fact,
I contend that it is the result of love in immaturity.  Both are attentive,
as Amanda makes clear.
  

Peggy:

> When I made the comment about being disinterested, I did not rule 
> out Agape, or compassion.  This is an impersonal love.  (A few, 
> like Mother Theresa, make it personal, but that is an exception.) 


Response:

I really think that there ought to be an entire thread on this one
concept alone.  'Agape' is probably the most neglected term/idea in the
whole of western culture, occult and religious worlds combined.  I
don't claim to understand it very well myself, but I've seen enough
to think that it cannot be categorized this easily.


Amanda:

To me, that makes it very worthy of attention.  To me, the personalization of 
Agape is a very central process in spiritual development.  This is one major 
aspect of middle eastern religions (Judaism, Christianity, and at least some 
branches of Islam) that differentiates them from most of the other religions 
of Eurasia, and one of the reasons that, for example, I do not think of 
myself as a follower of any eastern religion, despite the great insights I 
may gather from many of them.


Response:

I'd like to hear more about this.  Have you compared your ideas to what
is called 'bhakti' in Hinduism, 'jen' in Chinese religions, or those
traditions which focus on Kwan Yin or Tara?  I'm very surprised that 
you don't associate these with agape and personalization.


Peggy:

> What about perfect hate?


Response:

I think that this is the most insightful question I derived from this
entire thread.  Yes, what about Perfect Hate and Perfect Mistrust?
What about Perfect Fear?  Why do we eschew these 'negative'
emotions in favor of the 'good' ones?  I can think of interesting
descriptions of each of these, but would rather hear what comes of
restating the question.


Amanda:

I haven't had much experience of it.  Can you define or describe it?  Insofar 
as I can imagine hate becoming perfect, I find it indistinguishable from 
perfect love.


Response:

And I enjoyed this response, though I think it a tad ambiguous.  What do
you mean that it becomes 'indistinguishable from perfect love'?  That
it dissolves into nicety?  That in some fashion love and hate (or fear)
somehow unify?  What would this look like?  'Tough love'?  :>




Thyagi
---------------------------------------------------------------------
These Warrior-goddesses!   I just can't get enough of them!  :*
Newsgroups: alt.magick