Mother's love is said to be the best example for unconditional love
Unconditional love is known as affection without any
limitations, or love without conditions. This term is sometimes
associated with other terms such as true altruism
or complete love. Each area of expertise has a certain way of
describing unconditional love, but most will agree that it is that type
of love which has no bounds and is unchanging.
In Christianity,
this concept is hypothetical because Hell exists. The worldly meaning,
implies no condition can keep you from heaven, which is simply not the
case. Unconditional love is often misunderstood, as there is a perceived
punishment for iniquities, however God’s love is eternal and
unconditional as absolutely anyone can receive its saving power. Now Charity
or Christian Love is the closest type of love to God's love, that
mankind can display, as mankind is flawed to its very nature. Four Loves; affection, friendship, eros, and charity. In ethology,
or the study of animal behavior, unconditional love would refer to
altruism which in turn refers to the behavior by individuals that
increases the fitness
of another while decreasing the fitness of the individual committing
the act. In psychology, unconditional love refers to a state of mind in
which one has the goal of increasing the welfare of another, despite any
evidence of benefit for oneself. The term is also widely used in family
and couples counseling manuals.
Conditional love
Some authors
make a distinction between unconditional love and conditional love. In
conditional love, love is 'earned' on the basis of conscious or
unconscious conditions being met by the lover, whereas in unconditional
love, love is "given freely" to the loved one "no matter what". Loving
is primary. Conditional love requires some kind of finite exchange,
whereas unconditional love is seen as infinite and measureless.
Unconditional love should not be confused with unconditional
dedication: unconditional dedication or "duty" refers to an act of the
will irrespective of feelings (e.g. a person may consider they have a
duty to stay with someone); unconditional love is an act of the feelings
irrespective of will.
Unconditional love separates the individual from her or his
behaviors. However, the individual may exhibit behaviors that are
unacceptable in a particular situation.
Humanistic psychology
Humanistic psychologist Carl Rogers spoke of an unconditional positive regard
and dedication towards one single support. Rogers stated that the
individual needed an environment that provided them with genuineness,
authenticity, openness, self-disclosure, acceptance, empathy, and approval.
Also Abraham Maslow
supported the unconditional love perspective by saying that in order to
grow, an individual had to have a positive perspective of themselves. In Man's Search For Meaning, Logotherapist and Holocaust Survivor Viktor Frankl
draws parallels between the human capacity to love unconditionally and
living a meaningful life. Frankl writes, "Love is the only way to grasp
another human being in the innermost core of his personality. No one can
become fully aware of the essence of another human being unless he
loves him. [...] Furthermore, by his love, the loving person enables
the beloved person to actualize ... potentialities." For Frankl, unconditional love is a means by which we enable and reach human potential.
Neurological basis
There
has been some evidence to support a neural basis for unconditional
love, showing that it stands apart from other types of love.
In a study conducted by Mario Beauregard and his colleagues, using an fMRI
procedure, they studied the brain imaging of participants who were
shown different sets of images either referring to "maternal love"
(unconditional love) or "romantic love". Seven areas of the brain became
active when these participants called to mind feelings of unconditional
love. Three of these were similar to areas that became active when it
came to romantic love. The other four active parts were different,
showing certain brain regions associated with rewarding aspects,
pleasurable (non sexual) feelings, and human maternal behaviors are
activated during the unconditional love portions of the experiment.
Through the associations made between the different regions, results
show that the feeling of love for someone without the need of being
rewarded is different from the feeling of romantic love.
Along with the idea of "mother love", which is commonly associated with unconditional love, a study found patterns in the neuroendocrine system
and motivation-affective neural system. Using the fMRI procedure,
mothers watched a video of themselves playing with their children in a
familiar environment, like home. The procedure found part of the amygdala and nucleus accumbens were responsive on levels of emotion and empathy. Emotion and empathy (compassion) are descriptives of love, therefore it supports the idea that the neural occurrences are evidence of unconditional love.
Religious perspective
Christianity
In Christianity,
the term "unconditional love" may be used to indicate God's love for a
person irrespective of that person's love for God. The term is not
explicitly used in the Bible, and advocates for God's conditional or
unconditional love, using different passages or interpretations to
support their point of view, are both encountered. The civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. was quoted as saying "I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word in reality".
The main use of "unconditional" in Christianity is the assertion
"That God so loved the world..." In other words, God loves the world
enough to suffer for us without preconditions. There is then the
postcondition of actually accepting that Grace.
The two together are not fundamentally different from
psychology's unconditional positive regard with the added proviso that
some actions are inherently flawed and that only God knows the true
nature and consequence of our actions. However, psychology's
unconditional positive regard allows one to fail utterly since the
psychologist can not demand that we take care of the whole world since
the psychologist has no fundamentally better idea of how to do that than
the patient does.
The consequence is that we need to be in a relationship with God
who does know how. However, this view is not particularly supported by
scriptures found in the Bible. Jesus himself said that receiving his
love is based on conditions, specifically the condition of following his
commandments (example at John chapter 15 verses 10 and 14). Other
conditions are found throughout the Bible.
Buddhism
In Buddhism one of the most important concepts is called Bodhicitta. There are two kinds of Bodhicitta. They are Relative and Absolute Bodhicitta.
In Relative Bodhicitta one learns about the desire to gain the
understanding of unconditional love, which in Buddhism is expressed as
Loving-Kindness and Compassion. The point is to develop Bodhicitta for
all living (sentient) beings.
Absolute Bodhicitta is a more esoteric Tantric Teaching.
Understanding the principle of Loving-Kindness and Compassion is
expressed when one treats all living beings as if one was or had been
(in former lives) their own mother. One's mother will do anything for
the benefit of her child. The most loving of all relationships may be
that between a mother and her child. Of course if all beings treated all
other living beings as they would their own child then there would be
much less enmity in this world.
The importance of this cannot be overstated. At every moment one
has the opportunity to make a choice how to act, and to be completely
mindful of one's actions means that in every interaction with another
being one will consciously act with Loving-Kindness and Compassion
toward every other being no matter what the nature of that interaction.
Hinduism
Hinduism and Buddhism, the Sanskrit word Bhakti
is apparently used by some to refer to the concept of unconditional
love, even though its root meaning seems to be "participate". Bhakti or
Bhakthi is unconditional religious devotion of a devotee in worship of a
divine.
Islam
In Islamic belief, unconditional love can only be directed to Allah.
The highest spiritual attainment in Islam is related to the love of
God. "Yet there are men who take (for worship) others besides God, as
equal (with God): They love them as they should love God. But those of
Faith are overflowing in their love for God."
O lovers! The religion of the love of God is not found in Islam alone.
In the realm of love, there is neither belief, nor unbelief.
In Islamic Sufism, unconditional love is the basis for the divine love Ishq-e-Haqeeqi,
elaborated by many great Muslim saints to date. Prominent mystics
explain the concept in its entirety and describe its hardcore reality.
Rabia of Basra was the one who first set forth the doctrine of Divine Love known as Ishq-e-Haqeeqi
and is widely considered to be the most important of the early
renunciants, one mode of piety that would eventually become labeled as
Sufism.
She prayed:
"O Lord, if I worship You because of Fear of Hell,
then burn me in Hell;
If I worship You because I desire Paradise,
then exclude me from Paradise;
But if I worship You for Yourself alone,
then deny me not your Eternal Beauty.
Ishq itself means to love God selflessly and unconditionally. For Rumi, 'Sufism' itself is Ishq and not the path of asceticism (zuhd). According to Sultan Bahoo, Ishq means to serve God unconditionally by devoting one's entire life to Him and asking no reward in return.
Other religions
Neopaganism in general, and Wicca in particular, commonly use a traditional inspirational text, Charge of the Goddess, which affirms that the Goddess's "law is love unto all beings".
Mohism,
China c. 500BCE, bases its entire premise on the supremacy of such an
element, comparing one's duty to the indiscriminate generosity of "The
Sky", or "Heaven", in contrast to Confucianism
which based its model of society on family love and duty. Later schools
engaged in much debate on exactly how unconditional one could be in
actual society. (cf "...who is my neighbour?" in "The Good Samaritan" story of Jesus of Nazareth )
Unitarian Universalism,
though not having a set religious creed or doctrine, generally accepts
the belief that all human begins are worthy and in need of unconditional
love though charity in the community and spiritual understanding. The Unitarian Universalist Association
explicitly argues this in the Seven Principles, where the "inherent
worth and dignity" of all humans is a regularly-cited source arguing for
unconditional love.
