Love and Trial

I was reflecting on love—what love truly is. I realized that love is not merely an experience confined between two different genders, as many people believe. I came to understand that love is a form of attachment that a person feels toward any material or spiritual object, and that this attachment constitutes a trial.

These trials take various forms: Some become enamored with the Divine, striving to forget the world and all its possessions, seeking to attain the “true reality,” where their primary concern is no longer themselves but the recognition of the Beloved. Such a person is tested through existence itself.

Others become devoted worshippers, filling their tongues with remembrance and prayer. They endeavor to detach entirely from the world and their ego, seeking to kill the living self (nafs) and awaken the dead heart. Such a person is tested through their actions and their nafs.

Some become enamored with status. Their only desire is to rise higher, always thinking of what lies above them, much like Pharaoh. Their trial is ambition and dominion.

Others fall in love with a man or a woman. Sleep eludes them at night; they cannot recall how they rose in the morning, and sometimes they even forget reality itself. Their trial is the very person they love.

Some become enamored with money and property. They are consumed by greed, constantly striving to acquire more. As the saying goes, they worship material things. Is there any real difference between such people and those of old who worshipped idols carved from stone? I believe there is none. Their trial is wealth and possessions.

Others become scholars. There is scarcely a word they have not absorbed or a science they do not claim to know. Their concern is either to explain the Divine or to prove their own ego. Their trial is knowledge itself.

Some are drawn to display. They forget themselves and turn outward, constantly seeking to show off. Their trial is hypocrisy, for within they are one thing, yet outwardly they appear as something else.

There are those who are enamored with fame. They work tirelessly, day and night, their sole aim being to gain and be known. Their trial is their own ego.

Some become enamored with madness. They strive to detach their ego entirely from all that exists. Their trial is humanity itself, for neither others nor even they themselves fully comprehend the meaning they seek.

Others are enamored with their own ego. They care for nothing but themselves, blind to all around them. Their trial is the world. In my view, this is the most difficult of all trials, and overcoming it is truly arduous.

These are the lessons love has taught me. In truth, they all converge on a single point: existence and ego. In every case, I have seen that humanity is tested through existence and ego. Yet I have not yet penetrated the mystery of existence and ego. I do not know what more I will see or experience, but I feel I have drawn somewhat closer to the mystery of love.

With peace...