What Did The Buddha Teach About Love And Relationships

What does early Buddhism have to say about love and relationships? Can we love without attachment? Can romantic affection be a part of the path? Today we're going to explore what early Buddhism has to say about love, both in the personal and in the universal sense. What we'll see is the answer, as we might expect, is somewhat complicated and also inspiring. First, let's turn to love in the universal sense. This kind of practice, the practice known as metta, or loving kindness, or sometimes I just say kindness, is a practice that is central to early Buddhism. It is typified by a practice of meditation, where we sit in formal meditation, perhaps, and radiate out this emotion of boundless love to all beings in all directions. Now, as I have said, this love is boundless. It is non-discriminatory. It is to all beings in all directions. What it is not, however, is romantic or possessive. It's not about loving certain beings to the exclusion of others. It's not about being mine or me being yours. As such, it is perhaps the key antidote in early Buddhism to ill will, to jealousy, to hatred, and even to fear. It helps to foster an attitude of non-harming towards others, emotional resilience, and a kind of relaxed openness to the world. Second, I want to turn to love in the personal sense. That is, what about romantic love, or love in the context of marriage and family? The Buddha had plenty to say about this, although it was a very different sort of attitude than that of metta. He did not, the Buddha did not dismiss this kind of love, but, as I said, treated it in many different suttas. In particular, one sutta we can look at is the Sigalovada Sutta, which is sort of known as the Buddha's sutta that gives ethical guidelines to lay life, or to, so we might say, the regular household life. Among many other things, it includes a list of what we might term reverential duties or responsibilities between spouses, and these include such things as mutual respect, care, fidelity, and a sharing of domestic responsibilities. In the words of one footnote that is put in by translator Bhikkhu Sujato, he says, the relationship is based on mutual care and respect, not on dominance and obedience. And the Buddha outlines a similar list of responsibilities between children and their parents. Parents guide the children when the children are young and show them the right way, and then children act to support their parents when their parents are older. So it's, again, an example of mutual aid and respect, depending on the age of each of the participants. In a different sutta, the Buddha remarks on four different kinds of spousal relationship, depending on whether neither of the spouses care for one another, only one of the spouses cares for the other, or whether both spouses care for each other. In the latter case, where both spouses care for each other, he says this is the sort of relationship that is like when a god is married to a goddess. He goes on to say, when both are confident and bountiful, disciplined, living righteously, then wife and husband say nice things to each other. Having practiced the teaching here, both equal in precepts and observances, they delight in the heavenly realm, enjoying all the pleasures they desire. Similarly, in a pair of suttas in the Pali tradition, an elderly couple asks the Buddha how they can remain together in the next life. That is to say, how can they preserve their romantic relationship into the far future? Now, the Buddha does not dismiss this question, nor does he belittle it, as we might expect him to do. Instead, he responds with true caring, trying to answer their specific question. He says, householders, if wife and husband want to see each other in both this life and the next, they should be equals in confidence, ethics, generosity, and wisdom. As we see, the Buddha, far from condemning romantic love, saw it as essential to the householder life, the ethical householder life, consistent with the five precepts of basically non-harming of one another. Nevertheless, these aims of rebirth, even into, let's say, heavenly realms or good future destinations, are not the final goal, obviously, of early Buddhist practice. The final goal, of course, is nirvana, is the reaching of enlightenment. And the difference, of course, is that enlightenment is a surer goal. It's a goal that is guaranteed to you to bring good results, whereas, insofar as we're looking for a heavenly rebirth or a good future in that sense, we're still on that wheel of samsara and so still liable in the longer term to end up in a bad destination in one way or another. That's at least how the Buddha would frame it. On that note, we should turn third to this idea of personal love and the problems of attachment. Because while personal love, as we've seen, can have its benefits and its wonderful results, nevertheless, I mean, it always includes an element of subtle attachment, of craving, of clinging. It is a subtly restrictive kind of love and, as such, it sets us up for potential worry or jealousy, fear, disappointment, and suffering. For example, if our partner is under threat in some way or dies, is ill, if they disappoint us in some way, if they leave us, or if, in some way, they betray our trust in them, then we are liable to fall into, let's say, a bad destination. As the Buddha says, This attitude of sorrowlessness is perhaps exemplified by Velukantaki, a woman in the Pali tradition who's known as Nanda's mother. This sutta is interesting because it mirrors a famous later sutta where Ananda talks about the incredible and amazing features of the Buddha. However, in this sutta, Velukantaki remarks on her own incredible and amazing qualities when she's talking with Sariputta. It's incredible, Nanda's mother. It's amazing that you purify even the arising of a thought. And then she goes on to say that she doesn't recall being upset similarly when her husband, her beloved husband who had passed away, reappeared to her after his death. Then, what her final incredible and amazing quality is that she realizes she's given up the five lower fetters. Now, I did a video on that. I'll leave a link to it down below if you don't know what that is, but basically what that means is that she is what's known in the early tradition as a non-returner, which is one step from being fully enlightened. And this story, I think, highlights a key tension in the early texts between, on the one hand, the wholesomeness of love, and on the other hand, its subtle tension with dukkha, its tendency to make us suffer in the light of impermanence. The question is whether we really can love one another without clinging in the way that Velukantaki exemplifies. On that note, I want to turn to how we might go about cultivating healthier relationships with one another. While I think for most of us, perhaps for all of us, this imperturbability that Nanda's mother exemplified is not going to be the sort of thing we're actually going to be able to attain, nevertheless there are practices we can do that might aid us in our slow steps along the road towards her kind of destination. First of all, we can practice metta, as we've mentioned before. Metta is a good way to practice a kind of love, a kind of kindness, that is without this clinging. And so, insofar as we can practice this kind of loving kindness, we can perhaps see a way to release some of that attachment that surrounds the love that we normally have for one another. Second, we can practice seeing our loved ones as impermanent. That is to say that our loved ones can pass away at any time, and indeed will certainly pass away at some time or other. Now, this is not a practice in order to become morbid. It's simply a way of releasing our clinging, of becoming aware of impermanence, and so being truly present with them with gratitude while they're here. Third, we can practice to let go of control. We cannot control or change another person unless they're actively engaged with that change. Insofar as we try to fix, quote-unquote, fix somebody else in the face of this kind of repeated disappointment, we're only going to be creating harm for ourselves and disappointment for other people. So, if we can learn to let go of that, of our tendency to try to control things that are out of our control, we'll be making our lives easier. Fourth, we can use conflict as a practice. Disagreements, in the longer term, reveal our attachments, our clinging in various ways. So, can we come to our disagreements with our significant others with more of a sense of mindfulness and openness to change? Can we respond with patience and spend less time on grudges and anger towards one another? Fifth, we can focus on giving, not getting. In the final analysis, love is an example of generosity, not in a financial and material sense, but in an emotional sense. Insofar as we think of love as a kind of a bargain we strike with somebody else, insofar as we see it in this kind of material bargaining sorts of terms, we're liable to be setting ourselves up for disappointment in the longer term. Fifth, in conclusion, love is indeed a part of the path. As we've seen, the Buddha did not reject romantic love or minimize it or pretend that it didn't exist. Instead, he pointed out ways that we should be mindful of it and investigate it. In particular, this kind of love that we have towards one another can be beneficial to the extent that we can try to minimize the clinging and the jealous attachment that we have with it. In love's purest form, which we might term metta or loving kindness, it is a universal attitude of goodwill towards all beings, no matter where they may reside. However, where there is clinging and attachment, even the deepest sort of love can result in fear, jealousy, and disappointment in suffering. But if we can hold our love for those dear to us with mutual respect and care, it can nevertheless be of benefit to us all in the medium and longer term. So my question to you is how do you deal with these kinds of subtle or strong attachments in your own personal life? I think they're difficult for all of us. Now, I did a prior video on how or if metta or this attitude of universal love can actually lead directly to enlightenment. That is the controversial opinion of one recent scholar about early Buddhism and I did a video on that. I'll leave a link to it up here on the screen if you would like to hear what he has to say. Thanks so much and we'll catch you on the next video. And meanwhile, all of you be well.