The Brahmavihara of love as contrasted with Nibanna

The Watercooler
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Just a heads up: I read today the story of Godhika. I know of the story of the mass suicide of monks after asubha contemplation.

It is my view that the only meaningful purpose for action, that is, the ethical dimension, which is the end of our actions, and separate from the means, is to affect the heart, the mind, the soul, citta.

As I see it, we all bow to something in this world. We all love something. We want love. We need love. We do not live on bread alone. As I see it, the only options are to love self, to love nothingness, or to love one another.

Loving self is vanity and folly. Loving nothingness is Nibanna, is suicide. Loving one another is to love as long as you live.

Within love there is harmlessness, there is compassion, there is mutual joy, there is understanding, there is patience, there is knowledge, there is interest, there is care, there is peace.

Everything is impermanent. Who cares? Love things as they are, right now. Everything is not-self. Who cares? Love things as they are, right now.

We are not just the aggregates, a pile of nothing but random sensory weather patterns which have no firm basis. There are traits in beings which remain unchanged throughout their life span. There is a truth in each being which can be known. The truth of each being is in their heart, their personality.

What makes a being a being, what makes a thought, action, or intention ethically relevant, is our heart, our citta. Greed, hate, delusion, jealousy, vanity, etc. are poisons. Love is the antidote.

Love is to love things as they are, right now, and accept them, while also wishing for their benefit. Therefore the joy of love is to bring all other beings into love… peace, mutual joy, compassion, understanding, patience, etc.

I had a fish that died once. I loved and cared for it. I fed it and raised it. I was happy when it was happy. When it became sick, I treated it. I had compassion for it.

When its time came, I was sad. But I didn’t gnash my teeth and sink into misery. I knew it was always meant to die. I was just glad I could care for it and enjoy its presence while it was here.

Sadness is not suffering. Suffering is living a whole life alone, lonely, caring for nothing but self. But our salvation in this world is to let go of self, and to love others.

Back to the mass suicide of monks: “Huh, it seems the ranks of mendicants have grown thin. Oops.”

Do monks love each other? Do they love their Sangha? Did the Buddha love his Sangha? Did he care when they passed away?

The world is fraught with danger and suffering and pain. To bring another being into this world is to continue to cycle of birth; to not is to end the cycle of rebirth. Love is still the answer.

I think a lot of Buddhists have attachment issues and trauma. This is the damage of a lack of love. This shows the importance of love. Love is still the answer.

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Hi @FishGuy890,

I’m not sure I completely understand your post, but I would point out that the gradual training, e.g. in DN2, involves sympathy and compassion:

Ethics:

And how, great king, is a mendicant accomplished in ethics?
It’s when a mendicant gives up killing living creatures, renouncing the rod and the sword. They’re scrupulous and kind, living full of sympathy for all living beings.

Giving Up the Hindrances:

Giving up ill will and malevolence, they meditate with a mind rid of ill will, full of sympathy for all living beings, cleansing the mind of ill will.

Also see:

SN45.2

Good friends, companions, and associates are the whole of the spiritual life.

AN3.63:

I meditate spreading a heart full of compassion to one direction, and to the second, and to the third, and to the fourth. In the same way above, below, across, everywhere, all around, I spread a heart full of compassion to the whole world—abundant, expansive, limitless, free of enmity and ill will.

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We could also find what these (love & Nibanna) have in common:

What do they have in common?

  • both can be said to be a kind of limitless heart release
    sn41.7 states that unshakable release of heart (aka Nibanna, right?) is said to be the best kind of limitless release of heart

It’s when a mendicant meditates spreading a heart full of love to one direction, and to the second, …
This is called the limitless release of the heart.
Greed, hate, and delusion are makers of limits. A mendicant who has ended the defilements has given these up, cut them off at the root, made them like a palm stump, and obliterated them, so they are unable to arise in the future. The unshakable release of the heart is said to be the best kind of limitless release of the heart. That unshakable release of the heart is empty of greed, hate, and delusion.

  • Lack of bad deeds and lack of suffering
    An10.219

What do you think, mendicants? Suppose a child had developed the heart’s release by love from their childhood on. Would they still do any bad deed?”

“No, sir.”

“Not doing any bad deed, would they still experience any suffering?”

“No, sir. For if they don’t do any bad deed, from where would suffering afflict them?”

“This heart’s release by love should be developed by women or men. For neither women nor men take this body with them when they go. The heart is what’s inside mortal beings. They understand: ‘Whatever bad deeds I have done in the past with this deed-born body I will experience here. It will not follow me to my next life.’ The heart’s release by love developed in this way leads to non-return for a wise mendicant here who has not penetrated to a higher freedom.