Book Description

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1907 edition. Excerpt: ...and again it warns against love as a temptation; therefore, it is not to be supposed that love, either in its good sense or its bad, is merely a matter of feeling. The truth is, there is "love," and there is "love." Both in the Hebrew and in the Greek, there are several words, of different shades of meaning, which are alike translated " love; " and this is a prime cause of the ambiguity of the English word which is taken to represent them all. The root idea of the Hebrew word which stands for divine love, and for the holiest love of which man is capable, is that of "giving," of "outgiving;" it applies to an unselfish attitude of being, rather than to an emotion, or feeling, of the soul. The idea of another Hebrew word, also translated "love," is that of lust, or of selfish indulgence. These two words, of diametrically opposite meanings, are translated by a single word in our English tongue; and it is much the same with the Greek as with the Hebrew. What wonder that the average English reader is confused in finding " love " used in one connection in the sense of an unselfish outgiving of devotion, and in another connection in the sense of selfish craving or of sinful desire! Our English word " love " is represented in the Sanskrit, with the original meaning of "covetousness, " or of " selfish longing." Another Sanskrit word for "love" stands for our word "friendship, " with the central thought of a generous outgiving of self. Hence there is " love" that is love, and there is " love " that is not love. There is love that represents an attitude of being which is approved of God and of man; and there is...