Love is the way

Love is God and also the way to God. Our essential nature is love and love is the way to awaken it. The Hindu Mundaka Upanishad teaches that the self can not be known through thoughts, but only through love. To awaken this love is the goal of life. Love reveals to us a permanent truth beyond the transient nature of this world.
The Greek philosopher Plato conceived of love as a great spirit who connects humanity to God. It is the power wich "prevents the universe falling into separate halves." Love unites. Without fellow feeling, the Taoist Master Chuang Tzu declares, other people will always remain strangers to us. Love makes us want to be of service, which according to Jain scripture, is a basic human function. Tenrikyo tells us that by saving others we save ourselves, because if we do not love we will be forever cut off from our self.

Bright but hidden,
the Self dwells in the heart.
Everything that moves,
breathes, opens, and closes,
lives in the Self.
He is the source of love
and may be known through love
but not through thought.
He is the goal of life.
Attain this goal!

The shining Self
dwells hidden in the heart.
Everything in the cosmos,
great and small,
lives in the Self.
He is the source of life,
Truth beyond the transience
of this world.
He is the goal of life.
Attain this goal!

*Hinduism: Mundaka Upanishad 2.2.1-2

"Look how he abused me
and beat me,
How he threw me down
and robbed me."
Live with such thoughts,
and you live in hate.

"Look how he abused me
and beat me,
How he threw me down
and robbed me."
Abandon such thoughts,
and live in love.

In this world
hate never yet dispelled hate.
Only love dispels hate.
This is the law,
Ancient and inexhaustible.

You too shall pass away.
Knowing this, how can you quarrel?

*Buddhism: Dhammapada 1

Become, perfect as the spirit of your
Heavenly Father and the body of
your Earthly Mother are perfect.
And so love your Heavenly Father,
as he loves your spirit. And so love
your Earthly Mother, as she loves
your body. And so love your true
brothers, as your Heavenly Father
and your Earthly Mother love them.
And then your Heavenly Father shall
give you his holy spirit, and your
Earthly Mother shall give you her
holy body. And then the Sons of Men
like true brothers give love to one
another; and they shall all become
comforters one of another. And then
shall disappear from the earth all evil
and all sorrow, and there shall be
love and joy upon earth. And then
shall the earth be like the heavens,
and the Kingdom of God shall come.
For love is eternal. Love is stronger
than death.

*Christianity: The Gospel of Peace of Jesus Christ