"King Pasenadi came all alone to visit the Buddha, unaccompanied by even a guard. He left his carriage and driver at the monastery gate. He was greeted by the Buddha in front of the Buddha’s thatched hut. After exchanging formal greetings, the king spoke to the Buddha most frankly, “Teacher Gautama, there are people who say you advise people not to love. They say you have said that the more a person loves, the more he will suffer and despair. I can see some truth in that statement, but I am unable to find peace with it. Without love, life would seem empty of meaning. Please help me resolve this.”

The Buddha looked at the king warmly. “Your majesty, your question is a very good one, and many people can benefit from it. There are many kinds of love. We should examine closely the nature of each kind of love. Life has a great need of the presence of love, but not the sort of love that is based on lust, passion, attachment, discrimination, and prejudice. Majesty, there is another kind of love, sorely needed, which consists of loving kindness and compassion, or Maitri and Karuna.

“Usually when people speak of love they are referring only to the love that exists between parents and children, husbands and wives, family members, or the members of one’s caste or country. Because the nature of such love depends on the concepts of ‘me’ and ‘mine’, it remains entangled in attachment and discrimination. People want only to love their parents, spouse, children, grandchildren, their own relatives and countrymen. Because they are caught in attachment, they worry about accidents that could befall their loved ones even before such things actually take place. When such accidents do occur, they suffer terribly. Love that is based on discrimination breeds prejudice. People become indifferent or even hostile to those outside their own circle of love. Attachment and discrimination are sources of suffering for ourselves and others. Majesty, the love for which all beings truly hunger is loving kindness and compassion. Maitri is the love that has the capacity to bring happiness to another. Karuna is the love which has the capacity to remove another’s suffering. Maitri and Karuna do not demand anything in return. Loving kindness and compassion are not limited to one’s parents, spouse, children, relatives, caste members, and countrymen. They extend to all people and all beings. In Maitri and Karuna there is no discrimination, no ‘mine’ or ‘not mine’. And because there is no discrimination, there is no attachment. Maitri and Karuna bring happiness and ease suffering. They do not cause suffering and despair. Without them, life would be empty of meaning, as you said. With loving kindness and compassion, life is filled with peace, joy, and contentment. Majesty, you are the ruler of an entire country. All your people would benefit by your practice of loving kindness and compassion.”

The king bent his head in thought. He looked up and asked the Buddha, “I have a family to care for and a country to rule. If I don’t love my own family and people, how can I care for them? Please help clarify this for me.”

“Naturally, you should love your own family and people. But your love can also extend beyond your own family and people. You love and care for the prince and princess, but that doesn’t prevent you from loving and caring for the other young people in the kingdom. If you can love all the young people, your now limited love will become an all embracing love, and all the young people of the kingdom will be as your children. That is what is meant by having a heart of compassion. It is not just some ideal. It is something which can actually be realized, especially by someone like you who has so many means at his disposal.”

“But what about the young people of other kingdoms?”

“Nothing prevents you from loving the young people of other kingdoms as your sons and daughters, even though they do not dwell under your rule. Just because one loves one’s own people is no reason not to love the peoples of other kingdoms.”

“But how can I show my love for them when they are not under my jurisdiction?”

The Buddha looked at the king. “The prosperity and security of one nation should not depend on the poverty and insecurity of other nations. Majesty, lasting peace and prosperity are only possible when nations join together in a common commitment to seek the welfare of all. If you truly want Kosala to enjoy peace and to prevent the young men of your kingdom from losing their lives on the battle field, you must help other kingdoms find peace. Foreign and economic policies must follow the way of compassion for true peace to be possible. At the same time as you love and care for your own kingdom, you can love and care for other kingdoms such as Magadha, Kasi, Videha, Sakya, and Koliya.

“Majesty, last year I visited my family in the kingdom of Sakya. I rested several days in Arannakutila at the foot of the Himalayas. There I spent much time reflecting on a politics based on nonviolence. I saw that nations can indeed enjoy peace and security without having to resort to violent measures such as imprisonment and execution. I spoke of these things with my father, King Suddhodana. Now I take this opportunity to share these same ideas with you. A ruler who nourishes his compassion does not need to depend on violent means.”

The king exclaimed, “Wondrous! Truly wondrous! Your words are most inspiring! You truly are the enlightened one! I promise to reflect on all you have said today. I will penetrate your words, which contain so much wisdom. But for now, please allow me to ask one more simple question. Ordinarily, love does contain elements of discrimination, desire, and attachment. According to you, that kind of love creates worry, suffering, and despair. How can one love without desire and attachment? How can I avoid creating worry and suffering in the love I hold for my own children?”

The Buddha replied, “We need to look at the nature of our love. If our love is based on selfish desire or to possess others, we will not be able to bring them peace and happiness. On the contrary, our love will make them feel trapped. Such a love is no more than a prison. If the persons we love are unable to be happy because of our love, they will find a way to free themselves. They will not accept the prison of our love. Gradually the love between us will turn to anger and hatred.

“Majesty, did you hear of the tragedy that took place ten days ago in Savatthi because of selfish love? A mother felt she had been abandoned by her son when he fell in love and married. Rather than feeling as if she had gained a daughter, she only felt that she had lost her son, and she felt betrayed by him. Because of that, her love turned to hatred, and she put poison in the young couple’s food, killing them both.

“Majesty! According to the way of enlightenment, love cannot exist without understanding. Love is Understanding. If you cannot understand, you cannot love. Husbands and wives who do not understand each other cannot love each other. Brothers and sisters who do not understand each other cannot love each other. Parents and children who do not understand each other cannot love each other. If you want your loved ones to be happy, you must learn to understand their sufferings and their aspirations. When you understand, you will know how to relieve their sufferings and how to help them fulfill their aspirations. That is true love. If you only want your loved ones to follow your own ideas and you remain ignorant of their needs, it is not truly love. It is only a desire to possess another and attempt to fulfill your own needs, which cannot be fulfilled in that way.

“Majesty! The people of Kosala have sufferings and aspirations. If you can understand their sufferings and aspirations, you will be able to truly love them. All the officials in your court have sufferings and aspirations. Understand those sufferings and aspirations, and you will know how to bring them happiness. Thanks to that, they will remain loyal to you all their lives. The queen, prince, and princess have their own sufferings and aspirations. If you can understand those sufferings and aspirations, you will be able to bring them happiness. When every person enjoys happiness, peace, and joy, you yourself will know happiness, peace, and joy. That is the meaning of love according to the Way of Awakening.”

King Pasenadi was deeply moved. No other spiritual teacher or brahmana priest had ever opened the door to his heart and allowed him to understand things so deeply. The presence of this teacher, he thought to himself, was of great value to his country. He wanted to be the Buddha’s student. After a moment of silence, he looked up at the Buddha and said, “I thank you for shedding so much light on these matters for me. But there remains one thing that still bothers me. You said that love based on desire and attachment creates suffering and despair, while love based on compassion brings only peace and happiness. But while I see that love based on the way of compassion is not selfish of self-serving, it still can bring pain and suffering. I love my people. When they suffer from some natural disaster like a typhoon or flood, I suffer, too. I am sure it is the same for you. Surely you suffer when you see someone who is sick or dying.”

“Your question is very good. Thanks to this question, you will be able to understand more deeply the nature of compassion. First of all, you should know that the suffering caused by a love based on desire and attachment is a thousand times greater than the suffering that results from compassion. It is necessary to distinguish between the two kinds of suffering – one which cultivates delusion, anger and craving which disturb our minds and bodies and the other which nourishes caring, responsibility and enlightenment. Love based on compassion can provide the energy needed to respond to the suffering of others. Love based on attachment and desire only creates anxiety and more suffering. Compassion provides fuel for the most helpful actions and service. Great King! Compassion is most necessary. Pain that results from compassion can be a helpful pain. If you cannot feel another person’s pain, you are not truly human.

“Compassion is the fruit of understanding. Practicing the Way of Awareness is to realize the true face of life. That true face is impermanence. Everything is impermanent and without a separate self. Everything must one day pass away. One day your own body will pass away. When a person sees into the impermanent nature of all things, his way of looking becomes calm and serene. The presence of impermanence does not disturb his heart and mind. And thus the feelings of pain that result from compassion do not carry the bitter and heavy nature that other kinds of suffering do. On the contrary, compassion gives a person greater strength."

"Eros love might best be defined as promoting well-being by affirming that which is valuable or beautiful (Thomas Jay Oord).

Eros can also be defined as the longing for wholeness or completeness, and is used to describe fulfillment between man/woman and man/Gods.

According to Allan Bloom in Love and Friendship: The Fall of Eros, true Eros has been eroded by the scientific way society has gone about analyzing love. This is seen especially in the work of Sigmund Freud and Alfred Kinsey. Such scientific observations of Eros, sex, and love have led us away from giving in to true overwhelming attraction for another and from finding true love."

""Philia" (Greek: φιλíα) in Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics is usually translated "friendship", though in fact his use of the term is rather broader than that.

As Gerard Hughes points out, in Books VIII and IX Aristotle gives examples of philia including:

'young lovers (1156b2), lifelong friends (1156b12), cities with one another (1157a26), political or business contacts (1158a28), parents and children (1158b20), fellow-voyagers and fellow-soldiers (1159b28), members of the same religious society, or of the same dining club (1160a19), or of the same tribe (1161b14), a cobbler and the person who buys from him (1163b35).' "

"#2. Love Conquers All: ...

The moral of all these movies is that all of the adult, rational decision-making that keeps us from doing really retarded things, should go out of the window if we get that one huge crush on the girl or guy of our dreams. Because, you know, love conquers all of that other stuff.

The problem is, they don't really come back and show those relationships as they exist a couple of years down the road, after the rush of emotion has worn off and we're left with two people who actually aren't compatible at all, with at least one of them no longer able to remember why they gave up their job or city or previous marriage."