Love

The Buddhist concept of love is depicted in a story about a grandmother whose grandchild had died. The woman sought Buddha's advise as to how she should handle grief. He first asked the distressed woman how many people lived in her city, Savatthi. When answered, he inquired, "Would you like to have as many children and grandchildren as there are in Savatthi?" The old woman replied that she would. "But," the Buddha adminished, "if you had as many children and grandchildren as there are people in Savatthi, you would have to weep every day, for people die dailt there." The woman left comforted because she took with her the Buddha's saying: "Those who have a hundred dear ones have a hundred woes; those who have ninety dear ones have ninety woes . . .those who have one dear one have one woe; those who hold nothing dear have no woe."

The moral of the story is that if you love something or someone, you will grieve. A loveless life, however, frees you from attachments and miseries of life and enables you to live in a state of painless peace and joy.

In contrst, god has a world full of dear ones and world full of woes. Instead of living in a state of painless peace and joy by holding nothing dear, John tells us that "God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish, but have eternal life." (John 3:16, NIV) The biblical concept of love means becoming attached to the lives of other people. Fortunately for us, God took his own advice and rejected Buddha's "wisdom." We should do likewise.