The Love

[Ani]

LOVE

 

“Though I speak with the tongues of men

and of angels, and have not charity,

I am become a sounding brass, or a clashing cymbal.”

 

I Corinthians 13,1

 

The word ‘Love’ has become prosaic to such an extent that it has lost all meaning. When a word loses its meaning, it becomes saltless, and all things which become saltless lose their power and decay. In the organic world, when certain foods enter the stomach and do not react correctly with it, a state which doctors call indigestion comes into being, which causes an unpleasant feeling in the whole body. This law is true not only in the physical world, but also in regard to the mental life. When a thought arises which does not react with our brain, and the mind cannot perceive it, a similar condition follows. The same thing holds good for the human heart. When a desire enters a man’s heart and cannot react with it-as a result of which the heart cannot accept it, a similar condition is the result.

 

Human nature has a threefold conception of things. Take an apple, which is red, colourful and pretty. First, its form will attract your eyes and you will take it, turn it this way and that, and form a certain idea of its colour and external form. After your eyes have finished their process, you will put the apple near your nose to see if it has any smell; your sense of smell will define the quality of its smell. When your sense of smell has done its work, your tongue and teeth will taste the apple; they will spoil its beautiful dress, and nothing will remain of this colourful outfit. And the tongue will say: “This apple tastes good.” In the same way love has a threefold expression in life in regard to people, but because of a misunderstanding of its relations, people have a wrong conception of it. Some say it is a feeling, others that it is a force, still others that it is an illusion, and so man’s mind determines his state; therefore his conception of love will be such as his mind is.

 

Everything must be tested in its own place. Therefore when we come to talking about the meaning of love in a broad sense of the word, you will not all be ready to understand what I can tell you, and in order to make my idea comprehensible, I shall put it in a simple form. When a child is born, his mother first gives him milk, and after he has grown a little, she prepares liquid foods for him, and the child enjoys the milk and the soft foods. However, in order to give him hard food he must have teeth to chew, otherwise his stomach will be spoiled. But before the child’s teeth start growing a process takes place: the child falls ill and his temperature rises. The scared mother thinks it is a fever of which the child may die, so she calls the doctor. But as soon as the teeth have grown, that condition passes.

 

In human life there exists such a state when man a is given hard food — love. He passes through the process of sufferings. Therefore when we say that sufferings are necessary, we understand that we must pass through sufferings in order that our teeth may grow and so we can eat hard food. What these teeth are needs further explanation, but now I say to you that, as soon as your sufferings begin, it is a sign that your teeth are growing. After you have passed through this process, you are of the same form as Christ: you have thirty-two teeth, and you are at Christ’s age — thirty-two.

 

Now I shall carry out a little analysis of the Apostle Paul’s conception of love. In order to understand love, we must compare this idea with its opposite ideas.

 

In the world today all people want to be eloquent orators, because all know that a man can influence a group by the power of his speech. But the Apostle Paul says: “If I had all the eloquence a man may attain in his own language, even if I had the eloquence of the angels and did not understand love, it is of no profit.” It would be like looking at the outside of an apple. Further on, the Apostle says: “And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, and have not love, it profits me nothing.”

 

Even though we may have all the gifts mentioned by the Apostle Paul, but have not love, we are deprived of the most precious thing. It does not mean that these gifts are of no value, but they concern the external man, not his soul.

 

Let us look at the positive qualities of love. Its first quality is long-suffering. Do you know the meaning of patience? It is the basic pillar of life. If you have patience, you can attain everything, but if you do not have it, you will not attain anything in life. A man of patience is like a ship with an anchor: a man without patience is like a ship without a rudder. This is in reality the distinct property of love. This is why it is said: “God is love,” since He is long-suffering. Long-suffering is the sign of the great love which God has for us. If He did not have such love, He would not have tolerated us for so long; He would not have tolerated our ignorance and our baseness and would have cleared the world of men a long time ago. So no matter what work we take up or what benefits we want to acquire in life, patience is absolutely necessary to us.

 

In order to be patient we must be leavened by three basic qualities: wisdom, truth and virtue. Why does a mother tolerate certain faults in her child and try to bring him up? She foresees that, although her child has shortcomings, he will one day become a great man, useful to his home and country. Foreseeing all that, she says: “I shall bear all hardships and all his shortcomings.” And she acts wisely. The patient man is wise and foresees the future. Take a young maiden, for instance: before she marries, she keeps her hands very clean, does not want to dip them much in water, and uses creams, perfumes etc.; but once she is married, she does not mind soiling them even with the mess of the child: she even finds pleasure in it.

 

I am speaking to you about love in its broad sense. Some people think of love as a pleasant sensation, or a pleasant disposition of the heart. This is not love, because one may drink some wine and have a pleasant feeling in the heart. You have a massage to alleviate certain pains and again you have a pleasant feeling, but this is not the pleasantness which love gives. When a man loves you, he may cause you pain sometimes, for love always causes both suffering and joy: that is its property. It is a two-edged power: it caresses all, but it also punishes all. And how does it punish you? When it leaves you, you become sorrowful and say: “I am unhappy.” Why are you unhappy? Because of the absence of love. “I am happy.” Why? — “Because love is present in me.” But love says something else: patience is the way by which it can come into a man’s heart. Long-suffering creates conditions for the manifestation of love. Love cannot enter us without patience. It is the first basic quality, the avant-garde of its coming. When you acquire this patience in its broad sense, you will see that it is a great power in the hands of a brave and resolute man: such a man has a great future before him.

 

Now I shall consider the word ‘benevolence’. This is the positive, active aspect of love, while patience is the passive, preserving aspect, where you have to sustain a certain burden. Benevolence is love in order to build up and do good to someone, regardless of who he may be. If you meet a beggar who wants you to do him a kindness, do it.

 

We want people to love us and be polite to us, but we ourselves often break this rule, and besides our lack of patience, we do not show the benevolence we owe them either. Someone says he loves a person, but speaks evil of him before another. One day the echo of these words will be heard, because a man reaps what he sows: if he plants apples, he will gather apples; if he sows thorns, he will reap thorns. I am not saying what my relations to you must be, but I always have in view what my relations to God must be — to love — i.e. to do what is required of me for my brothers. How I understand my actions is a secondary problem: the important thing for me is to be ready to fulfil the basic law which love requires of me. Can I be as patient as love wants me to be? Can I be benevolent according to it? This is the important thing for everyone, for the whole world, for all those who have a heart.

 

Some people say: “I have no chance in the world, and I am an unhappy man.” I answer him: “Because love has not visited, you are unhappy.” “But why does it not visit me?” “Because you are impatient. You are not benevolent.”

 

Now you say: “These are easy things to do, and I shall do them,” but you do not do them. I say to you as a physician: “You are all ill,” for I have not met a healthy man in the full sense of the word. Only the saints and the angels who live in Heaven are completely healthy.

 

People are ill, but, of course, not to the same degree. When a doctor visits your home, he will say; “Your house is not healthy because it faces the north, you must leave this room and move to a southern one; you should keep your window open much of the time so that pure air and light can enter in; you must change your bedding, your food also, and many other things.” Love says the same thing: “You have a room which faces north, it is not healthy and you should occupy a southern room where the sun can shine on you,” i.e. it wishes to say: “You must be patient and benevolent.”

 

Therefore, those of you who can understand must realize what patience implies in the complete sense of the word. It is not just the patience of tolerating offences. The secret of patience is, when a man offends, to discover the good side of his offence and to make use of it. The offence is a very hard nut which someone has given you, but you must break it, find the kernel inside it and eat it. If you can nourish yourself in this way, you will be a completely healthy man. When people speak evil of you and insult you, they give you food, and if you can use this food, you will be more than satisfied. When people throw hard stones at you, you must break them, because inside them there are treasures which you can use to enrich yourself When you go home, begin to meditate and pray to God to help you understand what patience is. Up till now many people have been engaged in useless things; many Christians want to be great and famous, or have much knowledge. Well, knowledge can be a power which can favour both yourself and your neighbour, if you know how to use it correctly, but it can also be a heavy rucksack upon your back.

 

Loves does not envy. Therefore, in order to understand if real love has visited you, test yourself whether you envy or not. If you envy, you have no love. Love must always be present in our actions, for it is needful not only for this life, but for all our future lives, and the higher we ascend, the more significant it will become. We must start on this way now: there is no other way to Heaven.

 

You will ask: “What is love, and of what elements does it consist?” Love is the food of life, without it you cannot live, or attain anything in the world. Many people have an obscure idea of love, be it in regard to trade, education, or war. We should have love everywhere, for it is a great power. The force with which I raise this glass is also love. This same force can be put into a cannon and kill many people, or it may be expressed in an earthquake, or destroy the whole earth, but it can also create a new world. The important thing is the use to which we put this force.

 

Love is a force which can be used by being regulated. People are selfish, and when love comes, they want to shut it in themselves. But if we shut it in, it will tear down our walls and get out. It cannot stay in such a place, as we wish to have it stay, for then death is born. Death is a process of destroying every egoistic thought and desire, but God destroys all enclosures wherein the bad spirits have enclosed themselves.

 

Our heart and our mind must have all the necessary conditions to accept love. It is calm and quiet, but at the same time in its actions it is a terrible power. When we are in harmony with it, life is blessedness, but if we are not in harmony with it, there is no more dangerous force in nature than love. That is why experience has taught people to say: “He who loves much, hates much as well.” It is as strong in its positive aspect as it is in its negative one. That is why we must be very careful with it.

 

Many say that God is love, and as such He should not punish. God, being so kind, is at the same exigent. When He sees us dissatisfied, he says: “Put a kilogram on his back.” We ask: “Why do they put this weight on me?” But He without answering says: “Put one more kilogram on his back.” “But I cannot bear this.” “Put one more kilogram on his back.” And when we are so loaded that we cannot move, then we begin to say: “God, forgive me.” “Take a kilogram off his back,” God answers. We repeat the petition. “Take one more kilogram off his back.” The more we pray, the more kilograms come off our backs. And after taking off all our load, God asks us: “Have you learnt the lesson yet?” “We have learnt it well.” “If you do not wish to be loaded any more, you must be benevolent and patient to all those around you, as they also must be patient and benevolent towards you; these little brothers of yours may make mistakes, but you must have patience, as I am patient. The day you break this law, I shall burden you again.”

 

I told you how we can become free from our load. Everyone must say from his heart to God: “I am thankful with all my heart and soul for everything you have given me.” God has given thousands of benefits to every man, but man does not know how to use them. There is a saying: “He wades in water and is thirsty.” Many merchants are dissatisfied. Why? Because they had ten thousand leva and it is insufficient to them. If you give them twenty thousand, still the sum would be insufficient; give them fifty or hundred thousand, and still they will be dissatisfied. As we often like to put salt and pepper in our food, so in the same way God will put some salt and pepper in us when we are not satisfied in order to make us satisfied. For life does not consist in the great quantity which we have, but in what we can use at any given moment, and in being thankful for what God has given us. Then God will give us greater benefits.

 

This chapter of the Apostle is to be applied in practical life; we should start working in order to be useful to our brothers around us. We are here as in a school, not as in a hot-house. In a hot-house you can grow anything, whereas in a school you grow only those things which can be useful.

 

You say: “Why has God not given me greater abilities, more power and more money?” I see many reasons for that. Because as many times as He has sent you and your ancestors to the field to work, instead of cultivating your minds and hearts, you engaged yourselves in tasting the forbidden tree, in making more and more experiments which cost you all your capital. As many times as you came together to this field, instead of working, you ran away and returned to Him, begging Him to give you something without effort. You are like students, whose father and mother want to make them learned men, but who do not study and run away from school. Many of you have run away from this divine school. You say: “I can make nothing out of this, so I shall run riot.” But he who wants to learn the divine law and receive a higher degree, reaching the state of the saints from where he can observe life clearly and receive the benevolence of God, must finish the divine school on earth and graduate with matriculation exams. The good of every man depends on this graduation. If you remain unprepared in this world, you will drive horses, plough, break stones, and make roads until you learn what the horses, the plough, the stones and the roads have to teach you. God makes the disobedient children break stones, but He gives nobler tasks to His obedient ones. He will say: “This teaching is difficult for the indolent, but it contains wealth for the diligent.” Yes, it is true that the teaching is difficult for the indolent, but it contains wealth for the diligent, the industrious and the humble. Do you know why the worm is in the ground, the frog in the water, the bird in the air and man among them all? These are the four great states of life. But you will say: “These are abstract things.” They are not abstract things, but four great truths which show you the narrow way, the way of God’s thought. It is narrow indeed, but there are deep reasons for this which I cannot explain now. They are beyond the boundaries of this world.

 

I shall revert to the word love’ which people have rendered saltless and have perverted. We say: “Love is one of the illusions of life, empty dreams of green young girls and men who chase the illusive shadows of life.” Yes, it is a shadow, but behind this shadow there is the reality from which flows the sap of life, incessantly satisfying the soul’s thirst, as a tired traveller satiates his thirst at a clear, cold, mountain spring. What invaluable wealth, what knowledge lies hidden in this single word! And if people knew how to pronounce it correctly, as it was originally pronounced by God’s mouth, everything around them would smile and tenderly listen to this heavenly call. They would be in possession of the magic wand of the ancient sages, before the power of which everything bowed down reverently That is why we must be thankful for what God in His .great Wisdom has deigned to give us.

 

I do not advise you ever to listen to peoples’ advice. You may draw a lesson from their advice, but every man must listen to the advice which God has deposited in his own conscience. Hear what people say, and if it is in accord with what God tells you inwardly in your conscience, listen to them; if not, do not ever follow others’ advice. If you want to be free from faults, you must listen to and obey God. He who does not listen to God is not a wise man, but a slave to his superficial inclinations and a slave to men in all things.

 

You are searching for God, but where? He is in you, in your mind, in your heart. He is manifested in these two talents. Listen well to your mind and heart, for God speaks to you through them. Some will preach to you that the mind and the heart have been spoiled. That is not right. If your mind and heart had been spoiled, how would we come to know God? Some things in us are spoiled, but not everything. And I ask you, if you do not believe in your mind and heart, whom do you believe in? If your mind and your heart were spoiled like mine, why should I believe in you? Whom must we believe in? — In God, who lives in us. And when we believe in ourselves, we shall believe in our brother also. He who does not believe in God who lives in him cannot believe in other people either. And he who is not benevolent toward his neighbour is not pleasing to God. That is why God tells us to love our neighbour.

 

Your neighbour is wounded and crucified, nailed to the cross. Your God is not in Heaven: you have nailed Him to the cross. Read the New Testament to confirm that this is true. Your salvation will be effected in no other way, but by this nailing, by patience and benevolence. Then your liberation will come. You will say: “This is a difficult task.” But it is not difficult, be not afraid. If Christ had not worn the crown of thorns and had not been crucified, how would He have expressed His love? Would you love Him to-day, if He had wanted to live like a king and had done so? You love Him, because He was nailed to the cross from your salvation.

 

That is why from now on you must be heroes and not be afraid of sufferings, you must tell the world that you are men ready to bear not one, but ten crosses. Sufferings are the sign of God’s love, and let us all bear this cross.

 

That is why God gave these sufferings to the whole Bulgarian nation, that they might acquire these two great qualities — long-suffering and benevolence. You say that the Greeks and Serbs are doing such and such things. Never mind what they are doing; do not pay attention to them. You learn the lesson for your salvation and leave them alone: they have not gained anything, and the time will come when they will study the lesson which has been given you earlier, for which you must be thankful and not complain.

 

“They crucified us.” “Never mind, you are nearer Me,” God answers. When they crucify you is the time for your entering into the Kingdom of God. That is why we should rejoice.

 

Let us all be followers of Christ and worthy on earth of the name of Christians! Let us ignore what others may say! Let us be long-suffering and benevolent and fulfil our duty to God as we understand it in our pure thoughts and desires! And let us never stumble on this great path, but rather fight resolutely and bravely, and encourage everyone who is fighting alongside us. This is the power by which we shall overcome the present hardships,

 

Talk given on July 6th, 1914, Sofia