Frank\'s Theology: Love (General)

by dhw, Friday, December 04, 2009, 17:22 (5466 days ago) @ dhw

I've waited a few days in the hope that Frank would reply to my last post, but I fear my constant harping on the contradictions may have finally proved too much to bear. I'm sorry for this, and maybe I'm too fastidious.-There are still a lot of subjects raised by Frank that are far from being exhausted, but one that we've never discussed directly on this forum also combines posts by David and BBella. BBella believes there is "a 3rd quality that is not considered in the "dualistic cosmologies" and without which there would only be light and darkness, and maybe even multifaces of God, but nothing more...and this 3rd quality is love (for lack of a better word)."-Frank believes that God loves every individual, and our consciousness is God's, "running through" our brain, while David reports that in many cases of NDE, the patient experiences an overwhelming feeling of peace and love. We're not talking here just about the love that binds partners together ... this is something much wider, which encompasses sympathy, empathy, pity, compassion, protectiveness, charity and all the qualities that represent the better side of nature. We shouldn't confine these to humans ... they are present in many animals too, though like most aspects of consciousness probably not developed on the scale we find in humans. It seems to me that a good deal of man-made suffering is caused by the absence of these qualities, which can all be subsumed under the term "love".-We've spent a long time discussing consciousness and subconsciousness, and the fact is that despite the proven links with the physical brain, there is still no explanation as to how the cells produce ideas, imagination, memory, emotions etc. If we focus exclusively on love, I think the mystery deepens still further. This is a force of such strength that without it, not only would species die out immediately (no mammal can survive without the self-sacrificing devotion of its mother), but in human society its absence spells chaos and misery ... the absolute triumph of selfishness. Our laws are an attempt to make up for its absence: we punish those who criminally put into practice their disregard for the feelings of others; but our laws are powerless to prevent the effects of, for instance, an upbringing without love. Many criminals have a troubled, loveless childhood, and so do many psychiatric patients. -There's nothing new in all this, but yet again it raises the question: what is the source? A materialist would say (I presume) that it's all chemicals and electrical impulses, but how can they transform themselves into this all-powerful emotion? Religious people may claim that the source is God. But the love I feel is MY love. It comes out of me, and it's directed towards people outside myself. I don't believe, as Frank does, that my identity or that of others is an "illusion of separateness". If you claimed this in court, you'd probably be found not guilty by reason of insanity. ("It wasn't me, guv. I'm an illusion of separateness. It was God wot dunnit.") God is nowhere in the relationship between my individual identity and that of my individual loved ones, and I can also feel a general bond between myself and my fellow creatures without the need for a universal consciousness. But if love does not arise out of our chemicals or out of a force beyond ourselves, where does it come from?