How does attachment contradict love in Hindu teachings?
And what exactly is love without attachment?Battle of Kurukshetra… According to the Mahabharata , this is the biggest massacre in the ancient world… because OF ATTENTION! Not because of a king who was unlucky at dice, but because of affection… The affections of King Tritarashta for his sons, Duryodhan for the throne, Guru Drona for his son… Bhishmas to their promise, Pandavas to their wife, children, etc., etc., etc… So what does it turn out to be? Dharma is love and empathy.Attachment is Adharma. But how can you love someone or something if you are not attached to them? Or how to sympathize with someone if that's what you're looking for… don't care?
Love gives freedom, increases the number of opportunities for a person, and attachment, on the contrary, takes away.
In psychology, attachment is called a “fusion” or “dependent” relationship.
For example, an alcoholic's attachment to alcohol. An alcoholic says that he “likes” to drink, but in fact he cannot help but drink (there is a threat in case of disobedience – he will feel bad).
Addiction is when it is impossible to leave a relationship voluntarily, and there is a danger or threat of punishment for leaving such a relationship. Lovers are together because they want to be together, and addicts are together because they are afraid to separate.
Love without attachment is love without the threat of punishment, without jealousy, without fear of loss, and without any fears at all.
Two completely different questions were actually asked:
I hope everyone understands that “Hinduism” and “actually” are not exactly the same thing (but this does not mean that Hinduism is “worse” than “actually”).
In addition, Hinduism is a whole set of different beliefs and teachings united by some cultural features and traditions, and not something so “unified”. The range of teachings is so wide that it includes the entire set of worldviews from rigid atheism to theism/pantheism and teachings in which the question of God in general “does not stand” in any way. Therefore, when answering the question, I will rely mainly on Buddhism (since it is not even possible to list all the teachings of Hinduism in the Q format), although Buddhism is not homogeneous at all.
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Let's start with “actually” (this is for us, “Western people”, as if “simpler”).
There is no clear “definition of love”. That is, we do not know “what it really is”. Moreover, even if we “gave” such a generally accepted definition, it is not a fact that it would correspond to “how it really is”. Therefore, in my answer, I will rely on known facts and typical “concepts”.
With “attachment” is somewhat easier. There are two clear criteria: liking (I like it) and loyalty (unwillingness to even question something). It is easy to see that both criteria speak of slavish dependence on desires (the inability of a person to critically consider the “object of attachment”).
What we know about love (concepts and facts to name just a few):
Actually, “Western culture” considers love (not passion) as the basis and source of any life (this is often why the words “love” and “truth” are synonymous with the word “god”).
It turns out that if a person is “attached” to something (slavery), then this is definitely not love (most likely we are talking about a “passion” of some kind).
A mother, for example, can punish her beloved child precisely because she loves him! For any passion, this is absurd. Actually, this is the answer to the question ” how really “(for “Western thinking”). Whether you like it or not is up to you (I don't know how to “judge” it that way).
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Now about Hinduism. The central concept of Hinduism is “dharma” (in some ways they resemble our” sources of everything”, i.e., the source of everything).e. like “attributes of God” or “laws of nature” that create the world). There are many dharmas, but the” dharma of love ” as such is not among them. But there are separate “dharmas” that are well correlated with the ” artibutes of love “(described above). That is, love in Hinduism seems to “break up” into several different “dharmas”. When Hindus talk about love, they consider “compassion”, “attachment”, “kindness”, “thinking”, “causality”, etc.separately, and then they don't even try to “put it all together” and give it a separate “concept”.
Actually, Hinduism is typically concerned with “attachments” (dependencies) as a bad (negative) behavior of a person in relation to life. And to compassion (even with a biting mosquito) and NOT violence (the desire for world peace) in Hinduism is very “positive” attitude (although the reasons for this attitude with the “Western” and do not always coincide). Buddhists do this not “out of love”, but because “it is reasonable “(leads to success in life).
That is, in Hinduism too (as in the “west”) clearly, attachments are not related to anything “good” (they are condemned).
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If you want to better understand the difference, I can cite two sources: Hindu (Dharmic) and Christian (ideological) on this issue.
“In fact,” the Dalai Lama's entire lecture is devoted to ” love “(in the” Western ” sense), and when a Buddhist uses the word “love”, he does not mean exactly the same thing as in the” West “(it is not by chance that the lecture begins with the Hawaiian concept of”aloha”). And please do not say that I recommended this Christian text as a “criticism of Buddhism” (the author of the text himself clearly almost does not understand the essence of Buddhism, so I see most of the “criticism” as incorrect). I have given the sources only so that you can “feel the difference” between Hindu and Christian values and concepts (and for nothing else).
Attachment and love are not the same thing. Love is, first of all, self-sacrifice. If we consider something very valuable, we are ready to give a part of ourselves for it. But, we value most of all what has cost us dearly. And then it turns out a vicious circle, the wheel of Samsara, which forces a person to reincarnate again and again on Earth. Having sacrificed something, a person demands a return return, which binds himself to the object of his love. Willingly or unwittingly, we provoke the one we love to return our love. Endless signs of attention, the desire to protect, to save from adversity, all this must be mutual, otherwise the person will suffer. This suffering will lead to a new incarnation. Only when a person has severed all emotional ties can they end their karma. And how to do it? Only by ceasing to wait for love in return, and this is self-sacrifice. When a person understands this, he will also get rid of attachment, since he does not need to look at the reaction of the object of his love, it is enough for him to love himself.
Moving along the path of development involves the practice of internal disidentification. When you live the experience of being aware of yourself not with your body, not with your emotions, not with your energy, not with your thoughts, and so on.
For example, you see how emotions come into the space of the inner Self, like actors on stage, you watch them from the audience, but you are not involved in their action.
Your attention stays with you and is not “stolen” or “captured” by your emotions.
In this way, you live emotions, do not fight them, do not prevent them, and at the same time you are not involved in them at all.
It begins to dawn on you that everything outside of you can't affect you in any way.
At this point, you discover your true nature, which is comparable to the constant radiance of the sun (pure intelligence if you will 😉 and this radiance radiates in all directions, you are its source.
Just as the sun illuminates plants and gives them growth, it can be said that it shows its love for them, so a person shows love for his relatives, or anyone, illuminates them with his nature, but is not involved or attached to them in any way.
The sun is not tied to plants in any way. It simply manifests, realizes its nature, that's all.
Attachment is the inability (or pain) to live without. If you go deeper, this is the volume of hopes, expectations, projections, social and historical schemes, role performance, duty, guilt, expectations of family and kind. These are personal problems. Plus karmic phenomena.
Empathy is the ability to experience and feel the same as a person. You don't need to be linked to it.
Love.. In my understanding, this is a property of the human soul, a kind of higher force of attraction. Soul-to-soul attitude, unconditional acceptance. In the human plan, there is a good definition: a keen desire for the good of a person. Higher love (love without attachment) does not require anything in return, does not require the presence of an object nearby, it is just, as I see it, the quiet joy of having it at all. It is comparable to the admiration of some beautiful person. (There is another good definition: Love is an unmotivated act of beauty.)
We are stuck with a lot of personal problems: expectations, fears, systems of duty, so we (in most cases) can not imagine a relationship without these ties, without longing, suffering, boredom, expectations of reciprocity. Hinduism means that these are properties of personality, matter. This is something that must be overcome as a captivity of the flesh, as a cause of suffering (here Buddhism is already overlooked). And then there is the true attitude, pure love (what Christianity calls Christ's love, unconditional).
To love without attachment is to be happy when you are together and not to suffer when you are not around. It is simply to be happy that a person is happy-regardless of whether he is happy with you or with someone else (you wish him well, not looking for yourself). In true love, there are no requirements – since their direct interaction is important for souls, it does not matter what happens on a personal level. In true love, there is no separation – because souls are always in contact with each other, and death is not the end, it is just a change of incarnations. The highest kind of love – unconditional-is love for everyone, for every person (every soul), no matter what he is, what he manifests on the material plane, what he looks like, what he does – there is still a beautiful pure soul behind him.
That's how I see it. Not exactly in Hinduism, but this topic is very relevant to me, I live with it.
if you are reciting the Mahabharata, it is also the answer to your question .. The most famous (quoted) book of the Mahabharata is the Bhagavad Gita .. In it, Krsna also explains everything to Arjuna in a popular way. . in particular, the fact that attachment (derived from love for relatives) prevents him from fulfilling his duty – that is, to kill these relatives .. and if there were no attachment, then relatives could be killed while being filled with love and duty .. and it would be a good practice (yoga).
as for dharma and adharma .. I'm not sure that love and affection are just the main pillars.