True Love and Lost Spiritual Pleasure

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True love is one of the noblest and loftiest feelings that a person can experience. In addition, it is one of the blessings that Almighty Allah has graced human beings with.However, many people misunderstand the notion of true love and confine it mainly to man-woman affection. This type of love, though natural and significant, is not the only kind that we are blessed with. There are other important kinds of love that humans should be distinguished with so as to find joy, satisfaction and happiness.

Lost Spiritual Pleasure By  Harun Yahya Love is one of the deepest, most intense emotions that a person can experience. It is also one of the most wonderful blessings that Almighty Allah has created for human beings in this world. People take great pleasure in the material and spiritual gifts that Allah has bestowed upon them; they take pleasure in beautiful views, comfortable houses, and fine cooking. But none of these satisfactions can compare with the happiness that love gives. In order to experience love to the fullest, certain conditions are necessary. First of all, an individual must be able to see the good qualities in others and appreciate their fine points. The more open an individual’s mind and conscience, the stronger his or her ability to love. However, such ability can only be attained through faith in and fear from Allah. Therefore, a person is able to experience love according to the measure of his or her faith and piety; to that extent, the individual will take pleasure in it. Similarly, for a person to love another, he or she needs to find lovable qualities in that person and again, these qualities arise from faith and fear of Allah. The deeper an individual believes in Allah, and the more he or she fears Him, the more lovable qualities this person possesses. This is because the one who fears Almighty Allah has a good moral character; and along with the fear of Allah develops mercy, tolerance, reliability, courage, self-sacrifice, intelligence, and good conscience. All these qualities naturally create a deep and strong sense of love in the heart of anyone who sees with the eyes of faith. But if these conditions — faith and fear of Allah, which are the basis of love — are absent, then no one can experience true love. The basic source of the love that believers feel for others is their love of Allah. The knowledge that Almighty Allah creates the joy that comes from their heart-felt love for others, as a manifestation of Himself, gives that love its depth. However, since the love of disbelievers is founded on their expectation of gain, they can never truly experience love. They love only those who are useful to them, make them comfortable, and grant them favors. But such love rests on crumbling foundations and can never become sincere and heart-felt. In reality, they love themselves more than others and, thinking that they are more valuable than others, want others to do them favors, protect them, and take an interest in them. As long as they get this attention, they feel a certain sense of love. But most often, this type of love does not make others happy or feel loved, for it is false and directed toward gain. Being no more than a polite pretense for the sake of other people’s feelings, it ends when the goal is achieved. Naturally, they cannot show any sincere affection, no matter how often they express their love. All they can do is mouth the stereotyped words and phrases generally available for this purpose and used on special days set apart for expressions of love. However, believers can express true love toward others with sincere, moving, and meaningful words, because the joy of love is alive in their hearts. Indeed, believers who sincerely honor and love their beloved ones will never do or say anything to harm them. Above all, this type of love does not depend upon circumstances or any expected reward. It is Almighty Allah alone Who will reward true love, for its sole purpose is to win His favor. Disbelievers think that love grows weak over time because of mutual boredom and loss of enthusiasm. Of course, many relationships end this way among the disbelievers, for their love was based upon falsity and was never true. In true love, on the other hand, time always plays a positive role, for it enables each person to appreciate the other’s compassion, mercy, generosity, consideration, self-sacrifice, and other good qualities. Their love grows stronger over time as their personalities, moral understanding, and attitudes develop toward perfection. There is never any boredom or frustration in this kind of love with which good looks, material means, and prestige become irrelevant. The only important thing is the beloved’s moral character. In contrast, judging everything by material standards, disbelievers suffer great material loss when that foundation collapses. In fact, disbelievers have broken faith in their hearts, therefore they live in a loveless world and cannot derive pleasure from the aspects thatnaturally bestow joy to the human spirit. More importantly, since they cannot know true love and how to love and be loved, they will not experience this blessing in Paradise either, which is a place filled with the never-ending love of Allah. There, people will know how to love and taste the eternal joy of being loved. In the Qur’an, Almighty Allah tells us of the blessings that await believers in Paradise as a reward for their good moral character. One of these will be a passionate love shared by two partners. [On lined couches, reclining on them face to face. There will wait on them immortal youthwith bowls and ewers and a cup from a pure spring,wherefrom they get no aching of the head nor any madness. And fruits such as they choose, and flesh of fowls that they desire. And [there are] fair ones with wide, lovely eyes, like unto hidden pearls as areward for what they used to do. They will hear no vain speaking nor recrimination. All that is said is “Peace! Peace!” And the Companions of the Right Hand: What of the Companions of the Right Hand? Amid thornless lote trees, fruit-laden acacias, wide-spreading shade, gashing water, and fruits in abundance never failing, neither out of reach nor yet forbidden, and on elevated couches; lo! We [Allah] have created them a [new] creation and made them virgins, lovers, friends, for the Companions of the Right Hand .] (Al-Waqi`ah 56:15-38 )

Harun Yahya was born in Ankara in 1956. He studied fine arts at Istanbul’s Mimar Sinan University and philosophy at Istanbul University. Since the 1980s, he has published many books on political, faith-related, and scientific issues