The Pagan Path

Those who wonder are not lost; they are trying to awaken! 'The Sleeper must awaken!'

Wednesday, June 22, 2022

A Reexamination of 'Love Without Judgement?'

 Just a little more than five years ago, I published the above-mentioned article. The gist of my argument was that in order to love, humanly speaking, we have to make a judgement first. While I still believe that, as far as that goes, a little clarification is in order here, a 'reexamination', if you will. In the original piece, the question was posed; "what IS Love?" A better question might be, "Who is Love?!" Of course, being the good little Christian I was at the time, I answered my own question by reminding my readers that the Bible says "God is Love". This is true enough, though, as I'm wont to do anymore, I pose a further question; "Who is God?" Is 'God' something outside of us? Most Christians would undoubtedly answer in the affirmative & even when faced with the biblical truth that the Holy Spirit indwells the 'believer' ( Christian ), they still hold to the belief that the Father has not yet made His home with us ( as promised ). Thus, they perpetuate the notion that their so-called 'Trinity' is made up of three separate gods, rather than three persons in one god! But, I digress; this is NOT a diatribe against Christianity!

So, "Love without Judgement": is it possible to love without judgement? My earlier position, which I still hold to in some sense & which I hope to make clear, was that a judgement must be made in order to show love. However, after 5 years, I've come to the conclusion that 'choice' might have been a better word to use here. Humanly speaking, this is true, we must make the choice to love or not to love. Even so far as actions ( "hate the sin, love the sinner" was mentioned ), we must judge for ourselves whether an action is right or wrong, good or evil. We cannot judge another's actions as such, unless we know the whole story, which we rarely, if ever do! We may dislike, even hate those actions, but just because we feel, or even believe that they are wrong or evil doesn't mean they are. Conscientious objectors might here bring up words like 'theft', rape', or even 'murder'.  Yes, these are all crimes, all wrong & yes, even evil. However, one thing to consider here is that what looks to us like theft, might simply be one person retrieving what was theirs in the first place. Rape is a little harder to judge, for again, without knowing the whole story, it is impossible to judge accurately. This is why juries exist. One or both parties are more than capable of lying, so there are many complications to such a case. Even if the perpetrator is caught in the act, it's rarely, if ever, an 'open & close' case!

One thing that I failed to bring forward in the previous article was the glorious fact that We ARE Love! Not having reached that stage in my Journey, I AM willing, however, to give myself a bit of lee-way. Without going back to the whole 'God' thing; let's suffice to say that, like the Christian God, our True Nature is Divine! We are made up of the same Energy as the Source of All. This has been proven by greater men than I & to be quite honest, I rest my case on their work; that & of course, the fact that it resonates with my Spirit. As such, I no longer simply believe, I KNOW!

Judgement, as alluded to earlier, implies a choice & vice versa. With the knowledge that We ARE Divine, that We ARE Love, do We really HAVE a choice?! We ARE Who We are; We cannot BE anything other than what We are. We can, however, as long as we inhabit this human form, exercise the power of choice, be it as simple as whether to wear shorts or pants, or as complex as whether any given action is right for us. In the case of the latter, we must judge for ourselves whether or not we feel right doing a certain thing, or whether it just feels wrong to us. A good rule of thumb is, "an ye harm none, do as ye will". That in itself is hard enough to decipher, without complicating things further by adding others to the mix. I say 'others' purely from a human standpoint, though some might point out that therein lies the problem!

The subject of 'Unconditional Love' was also brought to bear in the original piece. Humanly speaking, it is well-nigh impossible to show love without condition. Take the love of a mother for her child. Does she love the child simply because the child IS, or because that child is hers; her own flesh & blood? Vice versa, does the child love his or her mother because the mother has given her or him life, because she continues to care for the child, providing them with the necessary constituents to sustain life? These could all be perceived as conditions. What IS Unconditional, however, is US! Our True Nature cannot be changed! Only our form changes. Our True Nature, which is Divine, which IS Love, cannot choose whether or not to BE Love; It just IS. Only humanly speaking can we choose whether to manifest our True Nature, or that which is against Nature Herself!

So, back to "Love without Judgement"; is it possible, humanly speaking, for us to show others that Unconditional Love that We are? Can we love the other without first deciding if she or he is worthy of our love? Is it possible to simply BE, without taking the time to figure out whether we like this person or that, whether to show kindness to one but not the other? I say "YES" & More than possible! Not to sound like a broken record, but we ARE More than our relatively weak humanity! If only we would remember Who & What We are, then we would see, as Jesus taught His disciples, that indeed, in judging the other, we judge ourselves. 

In the greatest sense then, Unconditional Love IS Love Without Judgement! Does that mean, in this mortal realm, that no judgement is involved? Humanly speaking, even the choice to love freely from our True Nature can be construed as a judgement, though this is a right judgement. A wrong judgement & the one we are warned against, is judging for others what is right or wrong. Some would say, to the contrary, that we can & should judge for others what is right & what is wrong; I myself used to be of this persuasion, but again, unless we know the whole story, how can we judge, much less righteously? 

Namaste' & Blessed Be,

Sage Charles