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| "Venus healing Aeneas" by Blondel (19th century) |
Love in her most high and divine state is
freehearted and generous – this is why the ancient myths so often depict Venus
as licentious. Love only becomes impure when it is stained by our fragile egos and selfish, grasping desires which give rise to shameful (and selfish) concepts
of love. Regardless, love distilled is a supreme virtue.
In Greco-Roman mythology only Venus has the
power to disarm Mars, whom we associate with violence, or to sooth Vulcan’s
destructive and potentially life extinguishing fires. Even today, the white
doves of Venus are the foremost symbol of peace. Venus also shared her love
with the quick-witted Mercury and thereby bore he whom we think of as the masculine aspect of love – Cupid. Another of their children is one who transcends gender, Hermaphroditus.
Interestingly in Germanic mythology we see a related pairing – Woden, God of
wisdom (equated in ancient times with Mercury), is paired with Frija, Goddess
of love – surely Venus in another guise. It seems to me that when the two Gods merge
we find the highest state of being arises – the Buddha himself said that wisdom (prajna) and love (maitri) are conjoined paths to enlightenment.
This ability of love to lead to a higher
spiritual state was expressed in the ancient world most famously through Plato’s
writings on a higher and ennobled form of love, from which the concept of “platonic
love” derives. This was a species of Eros
(ie, Cupid). Likewise,
Apuleius wrote of love’s ability to transform in his Metamorphoses, whereby, through love, Psyche achieves spiritual ascent. In
Hinduism we find a similar vehicle of divine love, known as bhakti (devotional love for a God, guru, etc, which leads to
spiritual ascent).
Of course, as Plato’s musings suggest, love
need not be sexual, but that does not mean we should despise sexuality, for sex
is a legitimate and natural expression of love. Except of course when it is not
legitimate, because it has become poisoned by selfish desire, by a lust for
power and control, by exploitation, by violence. And of course sexuality
demands that its participants be ripe. Children are unripe and far too green for
sexual expression. They are not naturally sexual beings, only the degenerate
thinks them so, and when their sexuality emerges it is fragile and rightly
shared only with others as young as themselves. Thus the pedophile is the enemy
of love, for he mistakes selfish exploitation for love. Love is compassionate,
generous and kind – always, otherwise it is not love, but a sick and deranged imposter
wearing the mask of love but lacking her substance.
How much sweeter is the world when we feel
loved, and when we give it generously. Though we crave it and we need it, so
often we give it all too little. Small-minded, frail egos imprison us in this
profane human realm, but if we are receptive and our egos are not too bruised
we see that Venus lights the path to the divine through her healing love,
kindness and compassion.
“Love looks not with the eyes, but with the mind, and therefore is winged Cupid painted blind [Shakespeare].”
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| "Venus preventing Aeneas from killing Helen" by Ferrari (c. 1650) |
An excellent post about one of the most relevant Divine force of the Universe not accidentally, in her wider, esoteric and deeper meaning, at the base of the Roman Spirituality (known as the "Green Path")
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Carmelo
Many thanks - I woke up around 2 weeks ago after a moment that felt like an epiphany and suddenly wrote this. Then I hesitated and shortened it (to make it more relevant to the world and less self-indulgent) before posting. I'm very glad you like it:)
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