essay
Love is only so called
Will we not be better off, if we bypass the priest and the therapist, and pray at the altar of the body and stop confusing it?
By Saeed Ur Rehman
All that gazes, seeks rapture in the other, dances, decorates itself to flaunt its untapped vitality, pulsates, throbs, runs in our veins, and yearns for eternity by multiplying itself is confused with one word: love. Love is an effect of biological vitality not its cause. We do not desire another human being because we feel love but rather we humans have assigned taming metaphors to what our flesh induces in us. By assigning abstract concepts to all that is life-giving, we, the metaphysical animals, have created an elaborate prison of metaphors for our healthy bodies.

All things to all men
A metaphor for solace and fulfilment
By Sarwat Ali
Love is the most abused word. It is used with great laxity and little exactness because it has the all-pervasive power of the healing touch. It may mean many things to many people and probably this "many splendoured thing", a protean sentiment moves in to fill the emptiness that surrounds life. It is bound up in so much - the most intense experience available to human kind, the desire of immortality and that tender touch desperately needed in a life to trudge on the long forlorn road.

Love in the times of sms
Modern ways of expressing you care
Love has shown its many faces to us without changing its 'original' shape. Most of the post-modern manifestations of love are 'technological.' Electronic mail, to start with, has become as normal as a cup of morning tea. We use it every day, check it regularly, and some people check it obsessively. On a computer, Blackberry or iPhone, it's one of the main ways we communicate with our loved ones.

In clinical terms
Scientists assert that the 'state' of being in love is just the brain trying to comprehend the physiological changes that the body undergoes in some sensual encounters
Love or romance has become deeply integrated in the human race through social evolution. Songs such as All You Need Is Love and Love Is All Around Us have echoed the passionate desires of millions. Their massive popularity has established love as a highly powerful force to be reckoned with for the unsuspecting victim.

Logic categorises feelings into pleasant and unpleasant ones. Science has chemical and material explanations for everything. Metaphysics recognises it as a force strong enough to make or break an individual being, while religions and cultures have their own customised, acceptable versions. Love is, perhaps, the most intensively studied and written about human feeling/emotion that has inspired creative analyses and philosophical theories, lyrical ballads and tales of revolution through the ages.

However, at the end of the day, all human attempts to fathom it still seem insufficient. This Special Report is not a Valentine's Day supplement, as you may like to think. Though Feb 14 indeed gave us the peg, a subject of debate. And we readily took it up to analyse, theorise and philosophise Love.

We have opened up this space for all kinds of arguments, even those demolishing the concept. In his well-argued piece, Saeed Ur Rehman declares, "Love is an effect of biological vitality not its cause" and goes on to say, "It is high time we acknowledged the futility and the harm caused by confusing metaphors and the priestly suppression of desire and said amen to the body and took care of it."

In the context of Feb 14, and the social space that has been created for love, Naeem Safi's piece is insightful, especially when he says: "We, who are dependent on the West to express our love, and follow the Middle Eastern traditions to show our resistance and hatred, need to ask ourselves what our culture is contributing to this global village."

There are myriad of ways to look at love and other human emotions, and we have tried to include as diverse perspectives as possible. This Special Report does not argue a singular position because, as an institution, we are no authority on what essentially falls within the sphere of the personal and the private. It is for our readers to decide what they make of love and how they interpret it in their everyday, lived experiences.

It is not really about claims; it's about performance. Talking about now, not our grand past, where do we stand in the contemporary societies and cultures when it comes to expressing our love.

The notion that this culture does not have the capacity to enjoy and celebrate sensual experiences altogether is the anomaly bought by the urban youth who are overexposed to the West. The welcoming of spring as Basant or romanticizing the monsoon rains in songs are examples of celebrating, without philosophy or creed, our presence on this planet and cherishing just whatever good is around -- the simple joy of being human. The expression can be different and less liberal, but the capacity was always there.

We are not a species that can claim to have a monopoly over love. A male fish trying to win the heart of his beloved in the deep waters, pairs of birds cuddling on the trees or in some lake, butterflies fluttering over the flowers are the images that tell the story of their survival. One major attribute that distinguishes us Homo sapiens from the rest, apart from intimacy, is that we can express our feelings through words.

We, the people from the East, are very romantic, but it seems that either we have some ideal image of the beloved -- are shocked and disappointed once successful -- or we just love the idea of being in love.

This question needs further exploration as the Eastern poetry and music are great when it comes to suffering and yearning for love, the period known as firaaq -- absence or separation. But where do all the songs and poetry disappear when love is consummated, known as visaal (union). Our poetry is mostly object- or, shall we say, beloved-centered, which is the core theme of love poetry almost everywhere. But then comes enjoying the post-visaal life which pertains to things other than the beloved herself.

Another interesting fact in our poetic or lyrical culture is that the gender of beloved is usually feminine, with the exception of a few contemporary poetesses. Even if the adjectives are not feminine, the point of view is mostly masculine -- something that is in contrast with the contemporary Western tradition of song and poetry. The clichéd image of the female trapped in a tower or by an evil person, and the male fighting the world to rescue her are somehow still followed. The heroes' struggles have created great epics, but what is the story inside the tower?

Freedom of expression and different sets of values have encouraged diversity and liberty in the Western cultures and have brought the point of view of the female singers into the mainstream. It is important to understand this difference as it does affect the overall mood of the lyrical tradition.

The majority of the movies produced in the Indian subcontinent follow a pattern in which the protagonist is a hero only when he is single and has to overcome many obstacles to get to his beloved, and once that is achieved, it serves to be the ne plus ultra of heroism for our hero, end of story, no more dancing or singing -- an interminable kitsch syndrome of epic proportions.

Since the only legitimate relationship between a male and a female, in this society, is that of man and wife, and the majority are arranged, there is not much left to be merry about -- as the whole relationship is conceived by external factors and not from a spark within. An arranged marriage is like choosing a closed box from a number of designs on a shelf, with nothing much but date of manufacture on each, all of which have something edible, and then either praying to be lucky or trying to develop a taste later, commonly known as compromise.

The metaphor of food should not be considered sexist, as it is even worse in the case of females: their boxes choose them. The absurdity of the analogy is nothing compared to the practice itself. No wonder all the singing and dancing ends there. Or is it because of the fact that sharing the post-visaal experience is too indecent for our culture, where even 'legitimate' spouses are not allowed to suggest their intimacy let alone show much affection in the presence of others. It seems that the culmination of love is also a culmination of the songs, or we yet have to develop a taste for cherishing daily experiences like having a cup of coffee, a walk, some quality time, a touch--and write songs about them. So far we see this in the cooking oil and tea ads.

Ballet, salsa, tango, waltz etc -- dance forms that are the poetry of human body, originated in cultures that allow the male and female bodies to be intimate in public. How many dance forms do we have in our culture that allow us to express our feelings for our loved ones? The fact that such a dance would fall in the post-visaal experience: once in touch with our love, silently we stand. In our culture the idea of post-visaal pleasures seems to be absent altogether from any form of social expression, but children.

Kuch ishq kiya kuch kaam kiya by a celebrated poet is a testimony to how this culture considers love to be something useless. In the Sufi tradition Ishq with a human is reduced to just a majazi (simulated) one. This is a major shift from the rest of the species, as all the worldly pleasures are considered futile, even if legitimate. The result is painted on the walls all over our beloved country, sending the poor love moths on guilt trips for the 'wrong-doings' of the teenage (usually the result of un-consummated love). This is an amazing mastery of a culture over the hypocrisy that allows the claims of cures to be painted on the walls, but is not ready to acknowledge the restrictions as a cause, or the very disease itself.

Though it is not a question of integrity to borrow the visual icons like the heart-shape from the West, as they had borrowed it from the ancient Egyptians who might have gotten it from somewhere else, it is still important for us to know how our ancestors expressed their love. We, who are dependent on the West to express our love, and follow the Middle Eastern traditions to show our resistance and hatred, need to ask ourselves what our culture is contributing to this global village. In all these battles of the East and the West, orthodoxy and liberalism, where do we stand? What is our own expression, if not silence?

Eternal over mortal

The debate about real love versus metaphorical love (ishq-e-haqiqi versus ishq-e-majazi) is centuries' old and has always had supporters and opponents both. The followers of the creed in pursuit of Ishq-e-haqiqi believe that the worldly love is conditional and based on feelings and emotions that can change any time. It is said to be generated by beloved person's external beauty which also is temporary. On the contrary they think that a human's love for God is eternal as God's love for His creatures is unconditional and not based on mere feelings or emotions.

In Sufism, ishq-e majazi and ishq-e-haqiqi are different but not disassociated from each other. The Sufis think, rather believe, that ishq-e-majazi or a one's love for God's creation can eventually lead to ishq-e haqiqi where one annihilates one's self and gets lost in love for God. That's why it's always the death anniversaries of the Sufis that are celebrated and not the birthdays. It is believed that the death takes a saint to the God where he belongs and it's the life thereafter that means everything.

To a put it simply the Sufis believe that a human filled with ishq-e-haqiqi is like a fish that is taken out of the water. All the time just like a fish struggling to go back in the water, he longs to be united with God.

A clarification badly needed here is that Sufism is not a philosophy confined to Muslim saints. It is very much akin to mysticism that existed even before the advent of Islam -- in Buddhist philosophy, Vedantic thought, among yogis and later Bhakti movement. Followers of these thoughts preached love for human beings regardless of religion caste and creed as they all were creatures of God and loving them tantamounts to loving the God. Historians and researchers have discovered that Greek philosophy has left an indelible mark on many aspects of Sufism. "This came about as a result of the translation of Greek philosophical works into Arabic during the third Islamic century. Greek pantheism became an integral part of Sufi doctrine," reads the work of a western scholar on "Islamic Philosophy and Theology."

Sufi poets have created love stories like Heer Ranjha, Sassi Punnoo and Saiful Malook and tried to spread the words of God and the Prophet and pearls of wisdom through them. Though they appear to be talking of worldly love the message that lies beneath is spiritual and eternal.

An incident involving Rabia Basri, a female saint of Basra, is often quoted to explain this concept and is being repeated here to put the matter in the nutshell. Once a man sought her hand in marriage to which she replied: "The tie of marriage applies to those who have being. …Here being has disappeared, for I have become naughted to self and exist only through Him (the God). I belong wholly to Him."

-- Shahzada Irfan Ahmed

All that gazes, seeks rapture in the other, dances, decorates itself to flaunt its untapped vitality, pulsates, throbs, runs in our veins, and yearns for eternity by multiplying itself is confused with one word: love. Love is an effect of biological vitality not its cause. We do not desire another human being because we feel love but rather we humans have assigned taming metaphors to what our flesh induces in us. By assigning abstract concepts to all that is life-giving, we, the metaphysical animals, have created an elaborate prison of metaphors for our healthy bodies.

It was not always like this. Before the arrival of the guilt-producing preacher on the horizon of human societies, the function of religion, as Nietzsche has argued, was to absolve humanity of guilt (see The Genealogy of Morals). It was possible for a human being to yield to his or her bodily urges and lay the blame on Eros. It was monotheism that introduced shame at such a large scale in human societies and produced, by using tricky concepts, the concept of "the original sin." What were the preachers trying to achieve by labelling the process that keeps the species going and also brought them into existence? It was not their desire for some otherworldly bliss. It was a process of material control.

Many historians and political theorists, for example Friedrich Engels' arguments in The Origin of the Family, Private Property, and the State, have posited that our desires are minutely configured by the political and economic system we inhabit. The institutions that promote celibacy seek to inherit the property undivided, those who promote monogamy want to keep the property within a predicable family system and those who go and seek "ideal life partners" for their offspring are choosing the best exchange value (price) for their material or biological assets. Those who seek control over surplus regulate desire as they regulate raw material and labour. From priests, merchants, demagogues, and politicians, all participate in the taming of the human body because all are afraid of its capacity for seeking unregulated ecstasy and disrupting political systems. Michel Foucault captured this condition of the human body succinctly in his book Discipline and Punish: "the soul is the prison of the body."

This confusion between the body and its yearnings has produced an endless array of cultural artefacts but no peace. Lovers are in pain because their own imagined soul, or socially produced self, is not in absolute harmony with the constructed self of the other. Even when they are happy physically, they fight over concepts like two animals confused by the availability of language and its never-available yield called the truth. "What is truth but a mobile army of metaphors?" chided Nietzsche but still the body remains trapped in a pursuit of the bliss authorised as the ideal state by the preacher, or in modern times, the psychoanalyst. The result is obvious: human beings are the only species that has ever needed marriage counselling.

This leads us to the crucial question: will we not be better off, if we bypass the priest and the therapist, and pray at the altar of the body and stop confusing it? The moment someone says "yes" to this proposition, a counter argument always constructed like a slipper slope is put forward. What about the risks of uninhibited desire and the maladies of the flesh? Bertrand Russell answered the question in an essay by arguing wherever the preacher inhibits desire there the maladies of flesh because the discussions are not open.

But in essence, this argument is also not against desire per se but certain effects of desire. Even in this domain, philosophers before the rise of monotheisms, provide better guidance. The Epicureans, perhaps the least understood group of ancient philosophers, had figured it right. They argued in favour of enjoyment in such a way that one enjoys for the longest duration. Enjoying one kilogram of sugar in one day will make one sick but eating it in a month can yield decades of sweetness. In other words, outside the confusion caused by metaphors and systems of guilt, a healthy avowal of bodily pleasures is possible and there is no need for our desires to have a label. A house can be lived in whether it has a nameplate on its façade or not.

Some societies have already moved to a guilt-free and label-free acceptance of physical desires. For example, in Scandinavian countries, the confusion-free rituals have also evolved. Two independent adults often rely on the physical attraction and use the minimum number of metaphors. "Your place or mine?" is the usual first question, totally free from the confusion caused by convoluted expressions and misleading expectations. Life can be simple if we return to our original instincts before language confused and enfeebled us, imprisoning us within our own creations.

It is high time we acknowledged the futility and the harm caused by confusing metaphors and the priestly suppression of desire and said amen to the body and took care of it. And if this seems to too much to ask, let individuals decide what is good for them instead of letting the parental authority, the police, the moralisers, and the union councils decide what is good for a human being. Our biological nature, when freed of the linguistic trappings, will look after its own needs and perpetuation in a more effective way. The effect of attraction will be recognised as a healthy sign. According to biologists, natural long-term bonding exists between human beings because of the biological necessity of the long time a newborn human takes in becoming independent. It is the longest period of nurturing required in nature. But that is a biological instinct to nurture one's own gene pool. It has nothing to do with the culture of shame and denial we have around us but rather with the celebration of what we are.

While choosing between the metaphysical and the carnal, human beings have favoured metaphysics for last two millennia. The era of the carnal has never really been with us in its most life-affirming way. In the second half of the twentieth century, there was a greater affirmation of bodily urges but successive conservative American governments managed to curtail the revolution. After experiencing sensuality in one form, when repression came along, the culture of gourmet food became dominant. The body, after partial retreat in one area of sensuality, asserted itself in another domain. The body is here with us to stay -- other things will come and go.

Love is the most abused word. It is used with great laxity and little exactness because it has the all-pervasive power of the healing touch. It may mean many things to many people and probably this "many splendoured thing", a protean sentiment moves in to fill the emptiness that surrounds life. It is bound up in so much - the most intense experience available to human kind, the desire of immortality and that tender touch desperately needed in a life to trudge on the long forlorn road.

So it had to become the metaphor for solace as well as fulfilment. The dominant and all pervasive power and role of love in the life of a human can be best measured from the instance that it has become the central metaphor in literature.

The folk tales are all about separation and the yearning, to be together, of the lover and the beloved. Be it 'Heer Ranjha', 'Mirza Sahibaan' or 'Saasi Punno' the tale hovers around the passion of two individuals which does not get realized. This great tragedy of human existence - the potential that imagination ignites through love does not get realized or actualized in reality. The passion does not guarantee the meeting of the lovers. They die in the end without the satiation of requited love. They do not live happily hereafter. This central metaphor of fulfilment is expressed in terms pf physical passion. In Punjabi poetry the metaphor is usually couched in terms of marriage.

In the characters of Heer and Ranjha, Shah Hussain for the first time used them as symbols in poetry. This then became the two central figures that represented passion over compromise that overrode common sense and mundane rationality. The authenticity of experience could only be judged from the unrelenting commitment that drew its strength from the union of these two characters. The entire human existence is nothing but going in search of this fulfilment, this yearning which is expressed in terms of a physical union.

And then in Bulleh Shah also the same characters are employed for the quest, best embodied in a journey that has for its destination the union of the lovers.

And echoing Shakespeare all journeys end in lovers' meeting, the fulfilment and destination as they coincide at that crucial point.

'Ishq' is the condition that is the nadir of life and it is that one wants to aspire for. This condition is the envy of those mortals who trudge the way of life at normal human pace as compared to those who put on trial their entire life to catch and experience that state symbolized as love.

Whatever the 'ishq' is about because some may argue that 'ishq' can be about anything - work, commitment to a cause, or even a relationship with an abstract ideal ensconced in the sophistry of the metaphysical - the fact is that it is only explained or expressed in terms of sexual passion bordering on the ecstatic.

The imagery most commonly employed in Urdu and Persian poetry is that of visaal. It has only sexual and physical connotations; it cannot be mistaken for anything else, and it is stretched to include another experience with a vivid implication that the same level of intensity and passion is needed for any worthwhile act. The absence of visaal is the lack of fulfilment, an absence of total involvement, totally missing the focal point of ecstasy where all else is forgotten or placed on the backburner, where there is no duality of thought and idea, where the mind and the body achieve a point of absolute convergence.

And it is questionable whether it can be achieved, this intensity can be experienced in other acts, in other activities no matter how committed a person may be. Probably there is a slight divide between the two, the absolute involvement in one and a partial involvement which fails to reach that level. The lack of fulfilment cannot be forgotten and, therefore, can be mocked and taunted but has a haunting absence.

Even when the Progressive Writers chose to draft a manifesto of bequeathing their writings to the cause of a better economic and social existence for society on the whole, the prime metaphor for their revolutionary act could not escape this central metaphor and merged with it. It remained at the centre of their poetical expression and the revolutionary activity which symbolized emancipation was best achieved in the metaphor of love. It seemed funny and still does if one was to find in love the fulfilment of a cause or revolution. It is always the other way round - any act or cause has to achieve or attain the condition of sexually driven ecstasy.

Love has shown its many faces to us without changing its 'original' shape. Most of the post-modern manifestations of love are 'technological.' Electronic mail, to start with, has become as normal as a cup of morning tea. We use it every day, check it regularly, and some people check it obsessively. On a computer, Blackberry or iPhone, it's one of the main ways we communicate with our loved ones.

"For me email is like a blessing. I remember the times when it used to take hours to write a letter to my husband who was living in London. Sitting down with a blank sheet of paper and pouring out your news – usually several weeks' worth since the last letter," says 44-year-old Javeria. "More importantly, it is your own personal thing (she pauses). I mean, no one can go through it, especially when you are living in a joint family."

However, many believe that email can never replace letters. "In letters you can see their handwriting, you can hear their voice, smell their scent and it's just part of them. I surely would have loved to be a part of that time and age of letter romancing," says 24-year-old Hina.

From the electronic email we jump onto the electronic cards. There are thousands of websites offering e-cards with personalised messages such as "Show your love to your partner everyday. Say the most mesmerizing of words, 'I Love You', in a unique way to your sweetheart".

"Now you don't need to go to a shop and buy cards. The message is already written. What else do you want? And one can always print the e-card and use it as well," says Irfan.

Next in line are our very own cellular-based lovers. Free sms-es, late-night packages with catchy taglines have paved the way for thousands of new expressions of love. Check out 'Lambi raat, free baat!' and other slogans that obviously target the youth. What's more, free sms-es have become a national obsession -- boys and girls are seen tick ticking on their cell phones or calling up seems to be outdated. If you listen to any popular FM show you will learn the "best of forward messages on love." Another rather new phenomenon is making an audio or video CD for that special someone.

The newest of them, and one that takes the lead, is the mother of all social-networking website. You guessed it. Facebook. For those bored with real-time chatting on MSN, MiRc or other chat rooms, Facebook offers many interesting applications that surpass chatting. Gifts, MyGifts, Likeness, Send Flowers, Hug Me, iLike, Poke and many more. The social networking site has redefined privacy online by allowing its users to create profiles with photos, quotes, personal information and relationship statuses. Users list themselves as single, in a relationship, married, engaged, in an open relationship or to say "It's complicated". If you want to find out someone's 'status' go to Facebook.

-- Naila Inayat

Scientists assert that the 'state' of being in love is just the brain trying to comprehend the physiological changes that the body undergoes in some sensual encounters

Love or romance has become deeply integrated in the human race through social evolution. Songs such as All You Need Is Love and Love Is All Around Us have echoed the passionate desires of millions. Their massive popularity has established love as a highly powerful force to be reckoned with for the unsuspecting victim.

Writers and poets have written volumes attempting to make sense of the complex urges and emotions that hijack a person's entire being, driving him or her often to the brink of insanity.

It is after all quite perplexing to figure out why all this psychological hullabaloo occurs only for the sake of a sperm meeting an egg!

Scientists have repeatedly tried to assert through various studies that the feeling of being in love is just the brain trying to comprehend the physiological changes that the body undergoes in some sensual encounters. The medley of hormones and neurotransmitters such as Serotonin, Dopamine, Norepinephrine react upon the brain in instances of sensory stimuli such as eating or sex. Oxytocin and vasopressin result in increased heart rate and blood flow to the skin. Even images that are associated with perceptions of attractions trigger the release of these chemicals that activate the so-called pleasure centres of our brain, namely a bunch of neurons called the nucleus accumbens. These areas of the brain are seen to 'light up' during sessions of FMRI (functional magnetic resonance imaging) performed on subjects that had recently 'fallen madly in love'.

Dr Elaine Hatfield, a Professor of Psychology at the University of Hawaii, has worked extensively in attempting to understand the linkages between intense love and sexual desire by developing a passionate-love scale.

However, apart from the reaction to the physical sensations, the very strong emotive aspects have to be taken into account as well. People tend to seek out long-term partnerships that give them a sense of security and comfort. With a whole barrage chemicals and related experiences such as the orgasm riddling the body, the state of being in love becomes very tricky for the mind to comprehend.

Dr Helen Fisher, who has a PhD in Biological Anthropology and is a professor at Rutgers University, has written several books relating to the chemistry of romantic love and gender differences in the brain. Fisher contends that men and women unconsciously create different ideals regarding romance and attachment and end up addressing these mental perceptions while "hooking up" and then later during relationships. What happens is that when you fall in love, "that someone takes on special meaning and it's as if the world has a new centre". Fisher explains that due to the focus that is on him or her, the resultant obsessive thinking yields mood swings, craving, emotional dependence and separation anxiety amongst other strong feelings. You might be able to identify the negative traits of the one you love but you tend to lock them in a box and throw away the key.

The enigma of love is such a perplexing one that, however, much we may attempt to rationalise and deconstruct it, we may never be able to grasp its very essence. Multibillion industries have sprung up in the wake of various studies and research done upon the subject. Be it perfumes, movies, romance novels, magazines and grooming products - all promise to make you more appealing towards your potential soul mate, whereas dating and matchmaking services claim to actually find one for you!

Yet, what we fail to understand is that if we truly want to be in love rather than derive mere pleasure, we should.........hell, if I knew the answer to that, wouldn't I have capitalised upon it rather than just write about it in an article.

-- Aziz Omar