Hatred stirs up strife, but love covers all crimes.
(Proverbs, 10: 12)
If I give all I possess to the poor and surrender my body to the flames, but have not love, I gain nothing. Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. (The Apostleship of Paul, Corinthians, 13, 3-7)
I started to ask myself: What should I accuse myself for? Am I guilty for going and loving her? That I loved the girl? What did I do, after all? I loved her. She broke me. (A man who murdered his wife)
Love is typically evaluated in very positive terms. However, as there are various kinds of love, some of them -especially the romantic or erotic one-have been frequently criticized. The different views of love can be extreme; thus, while some people consider love to be a supreme source of moral value and strength, others regard it as a kind of disease or destructive intoxication that can makes lovers abandon their moral values. Can love be quite as pure as we would like it to be?
Aristotle takes love to be a wish for good things to happen to another person, with no benefit for the subject. The lover wishes the other's benefit for its own sake, without calculating whether there is any personal benefit to be drawn. Thus, love is not measured in terms of its practical value as a means to achieve certain ends. For instance, loving someone as a means to satisfy one's sexual desire or to become rich is partial and transient; the moment the end is achieved, or a better means is found, love disappears. Disinterested care is not the same as indifference. Disinterested care implies that the beloved is evaluated as having intrinsic worth and not as something that may give us some future benefits.
Although Aristotle considers the essence of love to be caring for the other, love is not an entirely selfless emotion. Aristotle argues that the good things an individual wishes for other people are the same things he wishes for himself. So in a sense, our activities for promoting the good things for the beloved will in fact brings good things for us as well. Aristotle also emphasizes the importance of reciprocity in love, as a lover is someone who loves and is loved in return.
The virtuous aspect of love is emphasized in many cultures that consider true love to be modeled on God's bestowal of love on humans: an unconditional act that lacks any association with deservedness. It is a kind of gift the beloved receives. Erich Fromm defines love as "the active concern for the life and the growth of that which we love." True love has less to do with the lover's own needs and more with concern for the other. Accordingly, love has often been considered to be pure in the moral sense: love involves merely good deeds and "love can do no evil." Hence, it has been claimed that those who fail to love should be considered sinners.
Romantic Ideology even upgrades the moral status of love and considers it to be a moral seal of approval, a synonym for purity of intention. Therefore, everything that is done for the sake of love, because of love, and in the name of love is justified precisely for that reason. As Esther, a widow in her late fifties, who had many affairs with married men, says: "I really, truly believe that all love is good wherever you find it-independently of what status your lover is." In such a view, love is considered an ultimate justification for either self-sacrifice or for evil; thus, it can even be considered worth dying or killing for.
Although romantic love encompasses genuine care for the beloved, it is not a general concern for the beloved's happiness in all circumstances. Typically, the lover desires the beloved's happiness only insofar as the lover is either a part or the cause of this happiness. The spouse can be an extension of our self only in a conditional manner: the condition is being connected to us. In particular, we do not want our beloved to be sexually happy with another person. Pablo Picasso expressed this concern in a rather extreme manner when saying "I would prefer to see a woman dead than see her happy with another man." The egoistic nature of romantic love generates an inherent contradiction: whereas romantic love expresses great concern for the beloved, it cancels the beloved's autonomy. Moreover, the lover's care for the beloved may focus on those aspects that the beloved does not consider to be significant.
Despite, or more precisely because of, the profound moral value of love, love has been used as an excuse for justifying immoral deeds, such as a husband who murders his wife because she plans to leave him. Ronald de Sousa argues that "It is a commonplace that love motivates some of our worst behavior, ranging from dishonesty to murder. ... But what is most astonishing is that we regard love as a justification for treating people far worse than we would ever condone treating a stranger." Despite the high moral value of love (like that of religion), people can allow themselves to act in quite immoral, and sometimes evil, manner. In extreme cases of unrequited love, rejected lovers have committed suicide; in fact, certain genres of literature even regard such suicides as perfect expressions of true love.
The aura of love, as a moral, noble emotion that can do no evil, can be taken to imply limitless justification, which may be used to legitimize whatever is done "in the name of love." This notion encourages people to reject any compromise. Accordingly, men who murder their partners sometimes use it as a moral defense and to avoid recognizing themselves as murderers. They can often use it as a defense against feelings of guilt or even to see themselves as victims of the women who violated their love.
Love may be indeed be "a many splendid thing," but love also hurts a lot, can be dangerous, and may lead us to behave foolishly. It is indeed advisable to make love, not war, but sometimes war and its associated atrocities are enacted, on a private scale, within romantic love itself.
Adapted from In the Name of Love
