The question of whether God is love has been pondered by mystics, philosophers, and seekers throughout the ages. In this article, we will explore four compelling reasons that illuminate why the essence of God is synonymous with the essence of love.
“Love itself is the actual form of God.”
– Ramana Maharshi
1. God Is Love Because God Is Pure Intellect
God is pure intellect; there is no difference between wisdom and love. The highest form of wisdom is love. As Meister Eckhart, one of the greatest Christian mystics, says, God is compelled to love, as any choice other than love would be inconceivable for that which is pure intellect.
2. God Is Love Because It Has Created the Universe for You
God created the universe for you, to allow you to experience the infinite from a limited perspective. The universe is a playground that God has designed to entertain you. If God had not imagined the universe and contemplated reality, it would have been selfish, because God would have kept the entirety of its love and being only for itself. It is clear that for an omniscient, omnipotent, and eternal intellect, the only plausible and sensible choice is to share love.
3. God Is Love Because the Structure of Reality Is Perfect
There is no difference between you and the divine. You yourself imagined reality to allow yourself to rediscover your true nature as love. Very often, people I discuss these topics with tend to criticize the structure of reality without understanding that God had to answer the same questions you ask yourself.
God had to understand and realize its nature and determine what the best structure for reality would be, given its own existence. The structure of reality is not at all random; it is thought out, conceived, and designed by an infinitely intelligent mind. It is designed by pure intellect and love.
4. God Is Love Because Death Is Unreal
Death is unreal, and eternity exists. At the moment of the body’s death, you will discover that there has never been anyone else, that others were your own Self.
It is paramount to realize that death is unreal. Otherwise, you will always be angry with God. How can you be happy if you believe that eternity does not exist? How can you find peace if you believe in a God who allows the existence of death and suffering? You will never be able to reconcile love with the existence of death.
The key to understanding that God is love is to understand the non-existence of death and the existence of eternity. If death is unreal and eternity exists, it is clear that all that is real is love. Only truth exists; only what is real exists. The unreal cannot be; the unreal is pure presupposition.
“The unreal has no existence. The Real never ceases to be.”
– Bhagavad Gita
Dying Before You Die
The main reason we are confused about the existence of God is that we see other people die. We cannot explain what death is. However, understanding what death is makes it possible to understand the existence of the divine and the experience of love.
Death is a non-event. All that can exist is being and eternity. When you experience the death of the physical body, you will discover that after death there is only love. This is precisely the goal of any spiritual practice: to die before the death of the physical body.
Obviously, you can discover that death is unreal without harming the body, there is nothing spiritual about harming the body. Through spiritual practices, you can die before you die. You can abandon the idea that you are your body, that you are your conceptual mind, and you can experience states of union.
The Experiential Nature of Love
At the moment of death, you will understand that other people were nothing but your own Self. The biggest regret you will feel on your deathbed is your inability to love others more deeply. When you die, you will realize that there has never been anyone else, that it has always been only you, that everyone else was a part, an aspect of your own mind. You incarnated as a human being to give an experiential nature to love.
When you are one with the Mind of the divine, it is very easy to love what you know to be yourself. In the divine Mind, love is easy; it is easy to love something you know to be yourself. God has no difficulty loving because it is aware that whatever exists is God and therefore worthy of love. The difficulties, however, arise when we incarnate as human beings, when we take on particular forms, and it is precisely in taking on a particular form and living through the experiences of a human being that love can have an experiential character.
What would you do if you were the only sentient being in reality, if you were omnipotent and omniscient, able to fulfill your every desire and will instantly? It is clear that after a while, this state would become boring, and you would try to share your love with others. However, in this state of omniscience and omnipresence, there are no others. It is necessary to imagine others with whom to share your love and with whom to share the fact of your own existence.
This is precisely the reason why existence exists. You exist because God imagined you to allow you to discover what it feels like to understand that you are God, to understand that you are pure love. Through your eyes, God can experience what it feels like to be a person, and you can rediscover what it feels like to experience being pure love, as if it were always the first time.
Practicing Spirituality for Direct Experience
There are spiritual practices that can guide you to grasp these realizations in a direct, firsthand way. You’ve got a shot at comprehending, deep down in your bones, that death is nothing but an illusion, to know the truth without any filters or intermediaries. It’s only through that direct experience that you can genuinely transform your way of living and perceiving reality. Intellectual understanding is just the first step, but it’s nowhere near enough to bring about real change. If you want to truly embody these truths, you have to dive in and taste them for yourself.