Sunday, May 13, 2007

Romantic love

Romantic love
Part of a series on Love
Emblem-favorites.svg
Historically
Courtly love
Religious love
Types of Emotion
Erotic love
Platonic love
Familial love
Puppy love
Romantic love
See Also
Unrequited love
Problem of love
Celibacy
Sexuality
Sex
Valentine's Day

Romantic love is a form of love that is often regarded as different from mere needs driven by sexual desire, or lust. Romantic love generally involves a mix of emotional and sexual desire, as opposed to Platonic love. There is often, initially, more emphasis on the emotions than on physical pleasure.

Varieties and aspects

Romantic love can be returned or unrequited. In the former case, the mutual expressions of love can lead to marriage or to the establishment of a permanent relationship, which in most cases will include passionate sexual love. Where the love is one-sided (unrequited), the result can be damaging to the self-esteem and/or the psychological welfare of the spurned lover.

One aspect of romantic love is the randomness of the encounters which lead to love. It may be for this reason that some in Western society have historically emphasized romantic love far more than other cultures in which arranged marriages are the tradition.[dubious — see talk page] However, the globalization of Western culture has spread Western ideas about love and romance.

Romantic love became a culturally recognized passion during the Middle Ages, when in some cases insurmountable barriers of morality or convention separated lovers. The effect of physical attraction and the impossibility of intimacy often resulted in the lover experiencing an excessive regard of the beloved as extremely precious. Winning the love, or at least the attention, of the beloved motivated great efforts of many kinds, such as poetry, song, or feats of arms.

In more modern times, romantic love has been the theme of art and entertainment in all its forms. Some of the greatest poetry (e.g. Shakespeare's sonnets), opera (e.g. La Boheme), and literary prose (e.g. Pride and Prejudice) has romantic love as its main theme. Similarly much popular culture, from theatre to film to popular music, has romantic love at its heart. However, it has not been without its critics. Virginia Woolf called Middlemarch one of the few English novels for "grown up people" given its pessimistic portrayal of marriage.

Properties of romantic love purported by Western culture include these:

  • It must take you by surprise (be the result of a random encounter).
  • It cannot be easily controlled.
  • It is not overtly (initially at least) predicated on a desire for sex as a physical act.
  • If requited, it may be the basis for a lifelong commitment.

As above mentioned, though it is widely believed that romantic love relationships are unique to Western culture, they may be found in various cultures, although they may appear in forms/styles which Western people would not immediately recognise.

One of the oldest romantic serenades was written in Arabic in Iran, and there are diaries written in 12th century Japan in which people expressed their emotional and passionate feelings towards loved ones. One famous Hyakunin-ishu - the collection of the poems - reads: "even I suppress my feelings to her, it appears too obvious to others as asked if there is anything wrong with me..."

Due to globalisation, Western romantic love has become more commonly recognized; many people now identify it as the only form of romantic love.

Fantasy against reality

While romantic love as discussed above is a dream of many, some claim that such love as is depicted in books and movies rarely, if ever, occurs. They point to the modern practice of dating, where often the goal is to have sexual intercourse as soon as possible instead of building a lasting relationship. Often, the rigorous demands of careers in the modern world rob people of the time to find such ideal companions, and mental disorders such as social anxiety disorder prevent people from approaching others. In addition, the high prevalence of divorce in western society may be an additional deterrent for individuals seeking long-term, romantic relationships with the possibility of marriage. Yet while romantic love may remain no more than a dream for many, as a dream it is unquestionably a powerful influence on real-world behavior and judgments.

See also

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Puppy love

Puppy love
Part of a series on Love
Emblem-favorites.svg
Historically
Courtly love
Religious love
Types of Emotion
Erotic love
Platonic love
Familial love
Puppy love
Romantic love
See Also
Unrequited love
Problem of love
Celibacy
Sexuality
Sex
Valentine's Day


Puppy love is an informal term for feelings of love between young people, especially during adolescence, so-called for its resemblance to the affection that may be felt towards a puppy dog. Puppy love is also commonly known as a "crush." The crush is the small form of love which can grow into romantic love.

See also limerence and infatuation.

During Elizabethan times, it was known as 'calf-love'; a traditional example is in the famous William Shakespeare play Romeo and Juliet.


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Familial love

Familial love

In sociology, familial love is a type affinity or natural affection felt between members of a group bound by common ancestry or blood ties. The cultural ideal of familial love is one that is committed, unconditional, selfless, emotionally full, and reciprocally returned by the other.

See also


This entry is from Wikipedia, the leading user-contributed encyclopedia. It may not have been reviewed by professional editors (see full disclaimer)

In sociology, familial love is a type affinity or natural affection felt between members of a group bound by common ancestry or blood ties. The cultural ideal of familial love is one that is committed, unconditional, selfless, emotionally full, and reciprocally returned by the other.

See also


This entry is from Wikipedia, the leading user-contributed encyclopedia. It may not have been reviewed by professional editors (see full disclaimer)

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Platonic love

Platonic love

Platonic love in its modern popular sense is an affectionate relationship into which the sexual element does not enter, especially in cases where one might easily assume otherwise. A simple example of platonic relationships is a deep, non-sexual friendship between two heterosexual people of the opposite sexes.[1]

At the same time, this interpretation is a misunderstanding of the nature of the Platonic ideal of love, which from its origin was that of a chaste but passionate love, based not on disinterest but virtuous restraint of sexual desire. In its original Platonic form, this love was meant to bring the lovers closer to wisdom and the Platonic Form of Beauty. It is described in depth in Plato's Phaedrus and Symposium. In the Phaedrus, it is said to be a form of divine madness that is a gift from the gods, and that its proper expression is rewarded by the gods in the afterlife; in the Symposium, the method by which love takes one to the form of beauty and wisdom is detailed.

History

The term amor platonicus was coined as early as the 15th Century by the Florentine scholar Marsilio Ficino as a synonym for amor socraticus. Both expressions signify a love focused on the beauty of a person's character and intelligence rather than on their physical charms. They refer to the special bond of affection between two men Plato had highlighted in a dialogue, and exemplified by the affection between Socrates and his young male pupils, in particular to the one between Socrates and Alcibiades.

The English term dates back as far as Sir William Davenant's Platonic Lovers (1636). It is derived from the concept in Plato's Symposium of the love of the idea of good which lies at the root of all virtue and truth.

Paradox

Ironically, the very eponym of this love, Plato, as well as the forementioned Socrates and Ficino, all belonged to the community of men who desire boys, and they all engaged in erotic pedagogic friendships with youths. The concept of platonic love thus arose within the context of the debate pitting mundane sexually expressed pederasty against the philosophic – or chaste – pederasty elaborated in Plato's writings (Symposium, Phaedro, Laws, and others).

Plato and his companions.
Enlarge
Plato and his companions.

Regarding Socrates, John Addington Symonds in his A Problem in Greek Ethics states that he "...avows a fervent admiration for beauty in the persons of young men. At the same time he declares himself upon the side of temperate and generous affection, and strives to utilize the erotic enthusiasm as a motive power in the direction of philosophy." According to Linda Rapp, Ficino, by platonic love, meant "...a relationship that included both the physical and the spiritual. Thus, Ficino's view is that love is the desire for beauty, which is the image of the divine."[2]

Because of the common modern definition, platonic love can be seen as paradoxical in light of these philosophers' life experiences and teachings. Plato and his peers did not teach that a man's relationship with a youth should lack an erotic dimension, but rather that the longing for the beauty of the boy is a foundation of the friendship and love between those two. However, having acknowledged that the man's erotic desire for the youth magnetizes and energizes the relationship, they countered that it is wiser for this eros to not be sexually expressed, but instead be redirected into the intellectual and emotional spheres.

To resolve this confusion, French scholars found it helpful to distinguish between amour platonique (the concept of non-sexual love) and amour platonicien (love according to Plato). When the term "Platonic love" is used today, it generally does not describe this aspect of Plato's views of love.

The understanding that Platonic love could be interpreted as masculine eros is alleged by some socio-historical critics to be linked with the social construction of a homosexual identity [citation needed], and the cultural model of platonic friendship / pederasty was supposedly used by educated gay men since the early Renaissance[citation needed].

Alcibiades – beloved of Socrates, a love given as an example of what was later named Platonic love
Enlarge
Alcibiades – beloved of Socrates, a love given as an example of what was later named Platonic love

References

  1. ^ "Platonic love definition", Reference.com
  2. ^ "Linda Rapp in glbtq"

External link

See also


This entry is from Wikipedia, the leading user-contributed encyclopedia. It may not have been reviewed by professional editors (see full disclaimer)

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Platonic love

Platonic love

Platonic love in its modern popular sense is an affectionate relationship into which the sexual element does not enter, especially in cases where one might easily assume otherwise. A simple example of platonic relationships is a deep, non-sexual friendship between two heterosexual people of the opposite sexes.[1]

At the same time, this interpretation is a misunderstanding of the nature of the Platonic ideal of love, which from its origin was that of a chaste but passionate love, based not on disinterest but virtuous restraint of sexual desire. In its original Platonic form, this love was meant to bring the lovers closer to wisdom and the Platonic Form of Beauty. It is described in depth in Plato's Phaedrus and Symposium. In the Phaedrus, it is said to be a form of divine madness that is a gift from the gods, and that its proper expression is rewarded by the gods in the afterlife; in the Symposium, the method by which love takes one to the form of beauty and wisdom is detailed.

History

The term amor platonicus was coined as early as the 15th Century by the Florentine scholar Marsilio Ficino as a synonym for amor socraticus. Both expressions signify a love focused on the beauty of a person's character and intelligence rather than on their physical charms. They refer to the special bond of affection between two men Plato had highlighted in a dialogue, and exemplified by the affection between Socrates and his young male pupils, in particular to the one between Socrates and Alcibiades.

The English term dates back as far as Sir William Davenant's Platonic Lovers (1636). It is derived from the concept in Plato's Symposium of the love of the idea of good which lies at the root of all virtue and truth.

Paradox

Ironically, the very eponym of this love, Plato, as well as the forementioned Socrates and Ficino, all belonged to the community of men who desire boys, and they all engaged in erotic pedagogic friendships with youths. The concept of platonic love thus arose within the context of the debate pitting mundane sexually expressed pederasty against the philosophic – or chaste – pederasty elaborated in Plato's writings (Symposium, Phaedro, Laws, and others).

Plato and his companions.
Enlarge
Plato and his companions.

Regarding Socrates, John Addington Symonds in his A Problem in Greek Ethics states that he "...avows a fervent admiration for beauty in the persons of young men. At the same time he declares himself upon the side of temperate and generous affection, and strives to utilize the erotic enthusiasm as a motive power in the direction of philosophy." According to Linda Rapp, Ficino, by platonic love, meant "...a relationship that included both the physical and the spiritual. Thus, Ficino's view is that love is the desire for beauty, which is the image of the divine."[2]

Because of the common modern definition, platonic love can be seen as paradoxical in light of these philosophers' life experiences and teachings. Plato and his peers did not teach that a man's relationship with a youth should lack an erotic dimension, but rather that the longing for the beauty of the boy is a foundation of the friendship and love between those two. However, having acknowledged that the man's erotic desire for the youth magnetizes and energizes the relationship, they countered that it is wiser for this eros to not be sexually expressed, but instead be redirected into the intellectual and emotional spheres.

To resolve this confusion, French scholars found it helpful to distinguish between amour platonique (the concept of non-sexual love) and amour platonicien (love according to Plato). When the term "Platonic love" is used today, it generally does not describe this aspect of Plato's views of love.

The understanding that Platonic love could be interpreted as masculine eros is alleged by some socio-historical critics to be linked with the social construction of a homosexual identity [citation needed], and the cultural model of platonic friendship / pederasty was supposedly used by educated gay men since the early Renaissance[citation needed].

Alcibiades – beloved of Socrates, a love given as an example of what was later named Platonic love
Enlarge
Alcibiades – beloved of Socrates, a love given as an example of what was later named Platonic love

References

  1. ^ "Platonic love definition", Reference.com
  2. ^ "Linda Rapp in glbtq"

External link

See also


This entry is from Wikipedia, the leading user-contributed encyclopedia. It may not have been reviewed by professional editors (see full disclaimer)

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EROTIC LOVE

Eroticism is an aesthetic focus on sexual desire, especially the feelings of anticipation of sexual activity. It is not only the state of arousal and anticipation, but also the attempt through whatever means of representation to incite those feelings.

The word "eroticism" is derived from the name of the Greek god of love, Eros. It is conceived as sensual love or the human sex drive (libido). Philosophers and theologians discern three kinds of love: eros, philia, and agape. Of the three, eros is considered the most egocentric, focusing on care for the self.

Ancient Greek philosophy’s overturning of mythology defines in many ways our understanding of the heightened aesthetic sense in eroticism and the question of sexuality. Eros was after all the primordial god of unhinged sexual desire in addition to homoeroticism. In the Platonic ordered system of ideal forms, eros corresponds to the subject's yearning for ideal beauty and finality. It is the harmonious unification not only between bodies, but between knowledge and pleasure. Eros takes an almost transcendent manifestation when the subject seeks to go beyond itself and form a communion with the objectival other. This corresponds to attaining orgasm in erotic love-making. The French philosopher Georges Bataille believed eroticism was a movement towards the limits of our own subjectivity and humanitiy - a transgression that dissolves the rational world but is always transitory.

Yet an objection to eros and erotic representation (pornography) is that it fosters a subject/object relationship in which the object of desire is mere projection of the needs of desiring subject. Love as eros is considered more base than philia (friendship) or agape (self-sacrificing love). But erotic engagement paradoxically individuates and de-individuates the desirer.

Some believe defining eroticism may be difficult since perceptions of what is erotic fluctuate. For example, a voluptuous nude painting by Peter Paul Rubens could have been considered erotic or pornographic when it was created for a private patron in the 17th century. Similarly in the United Kingdom and United States, D. H. Lawrence's sexually explicit novel Lady Chatterley's Lover was considered obscene and unfit for publication and circulation in many nations thirty years after it was completed in 1928, but may now be part of standard literary school texts in some areas. In a different context, a sculpture of a phallus in Africa may be considered a traditional symbol of potency though not overtly erotic.

The holiday of Eros Day celebrates the spirit of Eros and eroticism on or around January 22 every year.

See also

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Religious love

Religious views

Whether religious love can be expressed in similar terms to interpersonal love is a matter for philosophical debate. Religious 'love' might be considered a euphemistic term, more closely describing feelings of deference or acquiescence. Most religions use the term love to express the devotion the follower has to their deity, who may be a living guru or religious teacher. This love can be expressed by prayer, service, good deeds, and personal sacrifice. Reciprocally, the followers may believe that the deity loves the followers and all of creation. Some traditions encourage the development of passionate love in the believer for the deity. Refer to Religious Views below. The tension between religious love of the other and self-affirmation is resolved in part by contrasting both love and self-affirmation with their impostors. Further analysis and references about such contrasts are summarized by Roderick Hindery in comparative religious contexts and in the framework of love as confirming the other.

Specific Religious views

In alphabetical order:

Bahai

Bahai says, "This is the truth and there is naught beyond the truth save error. Know thou assuredly that-

Love is the mystery of divine revelations! Love is the effulgent manifestation! Love is the spiritual fulfillment! Love is the light of the Kingdom! Love is the breath of the Holy Spirit inspired into the human spirit! Love is the cause of the manifestation of the Truth (God) in the phenomenal world! Love is the necessary tie proceeding from the realities of things through divine creation! Love is the means of the most great happiness in both the material and spiritual worlds! Love is a light of guidance in the dark night! Love is a bond between the Creator and the creature in the inner world! Love is the cause of development to every enlightened man! Love is the greatest law in this vast universe of God! Love is the one law which causeth and controlleth order among the existing atoms! Love is the universal magnetic power between the planets and stars shining in the lofty firmament! Love is the cause of unfoldment to a searching mind, of the secrets deposited in the universe by the Infinite! Love is the spirit of life in the bountiful body of the world! Love is the cause of the civilization of nations in this mortal world! Love is the highest honor to every righteous nation!

(Abdu'l-Baha, Tablets of Abdu'l-Baha v3, p. 525)

Buddhist

In Buddhism, Kāma is sensuous, sexual love. It is an obstacle on the path to enlightenment, since it is selfish.

Karunā is compassion and mercy, which reduces the suffering of others. It is complementary to wisdom, and is necessary for enlightenment.

Advesa and maitrī are benevolent love. This love is unconditional and requires considerable self-acceptance. This is quite different from the ordinary love, which is usually about attachment and sex, which rarely occur without self-interest. Instead, in Buddhism it refers to detachment and unselfish interest in others' welfare.

The Bodhisattva ideal in Tibetan Buddhism involves the complete renunciation of oneself in order to take on the burden of a suffering world. The strongest motivation one has in order to take the path of the Bodhisattva is the idea of salvation within unselfish love for others.

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