The Art of Loving Spiritualizing Love or Subjective Explanation - Book Report/Review Example

The Art of Loving –Spiritualizing love or ive explanation of The Art of Loving –Spiritualizing love or Subjective explanation The present essay reviews the book ‘The Art of Loving’ that shares the life experience of the individual in a unique perspective. The book shares experience of an individual who experiences enjoyment and suffering of individual in love. It highlights the nature of a newborn person, who is exposed to the worldly subject. His experience of transformation through different phases of life and how the essence of love would influence their individuality and life experience. The present paper aims to critically analyze the idea presented in the book ‘the art of the loving’ by exploring logic, ideas and concepts. The book, ‘The Art of Loving’ is written by Erich Fromm, who is a famous author in the discipline of social sciences. He has written several books and provided various dimension to explain crucial aspects of the society. The book ‘The Art of Loving’ is one of his tremendous work of art that looks in-depth social, economical, political and religious aspect of the life. The book series examine life experiences of the individual through exploring their thoughts and beliefs that are interconnected with the social changes, such as religious, scientific, artistic, political, economical and social experiences of a man. After reading the book, the reader’s mind interprets various aspect of the life that is related to the past and present events taking place in a person’s life. The book explains issues of the life in a distinct manner. The author of the book mainly stresses the on the human development with a correlation of the intimate and the world. He explains in the book that the element of love in individual’s life would enable the person to become aware and closer to the reality of the universe, his individuality, dynamic, freedom, and identity. The main idea of the book revolves around the world community, rather than focuses on a particular religion, ethnicity or region of the world. The book stresses o the consideration of spirituality, moral, political crisis of the world that have significantly contributed to the development of people. Fremonn stresses on the idea that the "increasing realization that spirit nature are not spare and apart that intuition and reason must regain their importance as the meaning of perceiving and fusing inner being with outer reality". The book ‘The Art of Loving’ by Erich Fromm focuses on the theory of love that explains how the love is art. It shares the experience of individuals who have been infatuated by the inner will without the consent of the outer world. The love with their inner instinct and individuality makes them passionate about their ambitions and endeavors. The main idea presented by the author of the book revolves around the theory and practice of love that develops a human towards betterment and development. Thus, the book is divided into two main subsections that are theory and practice. The author of the book elaborates life experience of different people who are intimated with their inner instinct. They are merely inclined towards the different types of love, such as, motherly love, brotherly love, self-love, and love of God, love of ambitions and love of themselves. It explains that how the different types of love functions and have different characteristic. The second concept that is the practice of love provides overview about the various factors that affect and influence individual to practice love. The author of the book illustrated about the conception of the world, individual and entire universe as a matter and energy. He interprets life of an individual with the various concepts of the work and energy those in terms of biological conception, broadening perspectives of living from a biological and scientific perspective. The relation of the principle of life and spirituality remains to be a dominant concept presented in the book. However, the relationship that the author tries to explain in the book has been supported by coherent evidence. It is because the logic, the author aims to induce to explain his perspective, remains to be abstract in the mind of the individual. A distinction is observed between different types of love, such as, motherly love and fatherly love. The author of the book claims that the difference between the both loves exists because of the importance of the existence of the two different genders in the world that is make and female. He explains that the motherly love is different because of the existence of the mother instinct that exists because of the different genders created the world. The claims provided by the author to explain different types of love is conjecture, as they are not well supported by the evidence and ideas that would be accepted by an individual that seeks for logical and empirical evidence, mainly scientist would face difficult to understand foundation author provides to explain the idea. In addition, cultural biases are often reflected by the author in explaining his ideas and perceptions in the book (Fromm, 1956). In the book, the author has extensively stresses in the Eurocentric cultures in which the concept of the love refers to different material and immaterial things that eventually contract the idea of different type of love that focuses on the feeling and instincts of a human being. In certain parts of the book, the author explains that the love of an individual is associated with material things. For example, ambitions, scientific, technological and other aspects of the life are associated with a type of love. The idea presented in the book to associate love with material things creates the illusion of the concepts and composition of the human mind and emotions give a complete another meaning to the love that goes beyond feeling or expression of love. The idea puts the reader in a phase of paradox, where explaining the love as a feeling or as material creates confusion. Different types of love explained by the author are evident in the western culture (Fromm, 1956). In the Greek culture, love is explained in terms of four different words that are similarly evident in the English language and even in Christianity. The typology of ‘love’ discussed in the book is can be associated with the four different types of love that are preached in Christianity. Hence, the concept of ‘types’ of love are more likely to inspire of the western culture. The similar elements are evident in the various assumptions that are provided by the author to explain different types of love (Fromm, 1956). The exploration of the different types of love is associated, such as brotherly love, motherly love, fatherly, erotic love, self-love and love of God dominantly prevails in the western society (Fromm, 1956). The meaning and interpretation of the different types of love are, however, not evident in the other cultures (Fromm, 1956). The distinction between different loves is based on the social and cultural values that are different in the various cultures (Fromm, 1956). For example, the author explains self-love and erotic love with an optimistic approach that enables individual to fight for his desires and ambitions to attain a position in the society. It can be in terms of scientific, technological development. The self-love explained that different cultures and religions have very different perspectives (Fromm, 1956). It seems that the author is inspired more with the Greek-western culture in which their beliefs are based on the false premises of types of love. Hence, Fromm’s point of view to explain types of love of undergoes ontological fault that is often rejected or denied for the readers that belong to different religions and cultures. In the eastern culture, the element of self-love is considered spiritual and pure. It is beyond the materialist approach, based on selflessness and sacrifices to serve humanity. However, Fromm in the book takes a selfish and negative approach to explain love that is material and objective that is resisted by eastern society. In other words, the author claims element of self-love is the way to succeed in the world, as he considers love to be self-centered and self-approach (Shanafelt, 2012). The idea is often rejected among individuals who perceive love as a spiritual element. Hence, it can be determined that the author’s approach to explain different types of love remains is influenced by the western culture due to which the acceptance of the idea in the other regions of the worlds or people belonging to different culture would portray a negative impact on them (Fromm, 1956). Fromm (1056) explains love as, "love is an art. We must proceed in the same way we have to proceed if we want to learn any other art, say music, painting, carpentry or the art of medicine or engineering" (Fromm, 1956). The statement creates confusion in the minds of the reader; it is because the author claims that the loving is in control of human nature. The feeling can be developed according to their personal will. In addition, author associated love with the material aspects of the life that can be controlled by the human. It eventually directs the readers to express the feeling of love with the material aspect that is subjective, material or a skill (Fromm, 1956). Hence, it essence of spirituality to explain the feeling of love becomes abstract and confuses the reader (Fromm, 1956). In addition, the assumptions claimed by the author to describe the characteristics of ‘love’ are often perplexed and confused that often contradicts his statement. Fromm (1956) explains that the motherly love is developed when she gives birth to the child. Her instincts are developed to her offspring that make her love her child more. In other words, he claims that the development of the motherly love is beyond the control of the human, perhaps it is inherited by the natural process. He explains that the giving birth to the child is the reason that she develops unconditional love for the child and tackles issues that are related to her child. In addition, the individual like his personal willingness voluntarily develops the phenomena of the simple loving, which he explains. Whereas, at the same time the author claims that the love itself is selfishness and constraint satisfaction. The idea eventually contradicts the idea of motherly love that is explained by the author in which he states that the love is developed for a reason, such as giving birth to a child. In the similar manner, he proceeds says in the text that the motherly love is helpless, in case if the mother adopts a child and lover her, at the same time, she gives birth to her own child she would eventually abandon the love for her infant one. Hence, motherly love is instinctive and would not change any circumstances. Moreover, the author explains the erotic love, in terms of gender that differs from a male to female. He explains that the transformation of love in the western society is based on an object that is merely a person. In the book, he explains "being lovable in essentially a mixture of being popular and having sex appeal" (Fromm, 1956). It explains that the individual fall in love with a similar exchange of ideas that is dependent on mutually favorable exchange. He explains that the favorability as an exchange of attractiveness, tastes, intensity, feeling, etc. that develops mutual ground for the individual to love or develop relation with each other (Fromm, 1956). The existence of the opposite genders (male and Female) is the major reason that drives erotic love among genders. In terms of homosexual and the same gender, erotic love does not exist. He completed denies the fact that the same genders are incapable to love each other. However, in the real life love among the same gender is evident (Fromm, 1956). Thus, the gender variation cannot be claimed to be the only reason to explain virtue of erotic love. It is because the gender is dependent on the constraint setting, and the erotic love has no particular association or neglects the erotic love among same gender (Fromm, 1956). Besides, the fact the book was published in 1956 due to which at that time homosexuality was viewed as psychological or mental problem by the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders that was not removed until 1974. Due to which the claim presented by the author about the erotic love remains to be one of the major phenomena. One of the books published by the Alfred Kinsey that explained sexual behavior of male and female highlights that the publications before 1975’s have a negative view about homosexuality, as it was considered to be an unethical and mental illness. However, the present researchers show that the homosexuality is not a mental illness, as the individuals are competitive in every aspect of the society like a normal human. Thus, the discussion regarding homosexual individuals depicts negative impact on the minds of readers. In the similar manner, Evelyn Hooker provided several experiments and evidences explaining that the love in the homosexual exists as nature (Fromm, 1956). In the similar manner, the other researches that are conducted explain that there is no difference between homosexuals and heterosexuals when it comes to social performance (Fromm, 1956). It proves that the erotic love exists among the people of the same gender. The author while explaining the idea of love of God comes across several elements that are related to selfishness and self-centeredness of individual. However, in the real world and various religions love of God is perceived pure and selfless that is a therapeutic delusion. It is because individuals often become helpless and lose control in their lives due to which they seek a higher entity that would take care of their problems and put them away of the values of their lives in case if any tragic event happens. The notion of God is beyond the control of the human being; his existence remains to be a prominent element in the different cultures and religions that cannot be ignored. In addition, discussing the concerns regarding the selfishness to explain the God portrays a negative impact on the mind of the individual. Thus, the love of God remains to be one of the major aspects that are dependent on the survival mechanism of the several aspects. Formm (1956) explains, "Having belief in God also has a second function, and that is to give hope, hoping that the afterlife is better than the present, which again is a survival mechanism, because otherwise, people may not be able to survive the present" (Fromm, 1956). Hence, it can be determined that the love of God is pure that is selfless and the logic that the author provides rejects the idea to explain the love of God in an effective manner that would be subjected to coherent and scientific reasoning. Thus, the use of selfishness as an element of love remains to be abstract. It is rather dependent on the selflessness and sacrifices that are developed among individuals with the passage of time. However, in the modern society materializing love is becoming very common that is similarly depicted in the book (Fromm, 1956). Thus, the main element that differs the love and its meaning is dependent on the consciousness and variation of human behavior that provides meaning for love (Fromm, 1956). The idea presented in the book by the author focuses love as a different aspect that is neither a noun nor an object; instead it is a verb that is more like a practice (Fromm, 1956). It is dependent on the virtue and idea that the practicing of love is dependent on the understanding or sharing similar grounds that is the sharing of the similar problems, determination and interest (Fromm, 1956). He claims that the art of loving is dependent on the inner will of the individual and devotion to understanding the core issues of the life. He highlights that the loving anything in the life can make an individual to attain higher virtues and ambitions of individual. However, the concepts that are provided in the book are dependent on the several concerns that are often contradictory. Hence, the element of spirituality and love lack the evidence that would support the idea of love in the book (Fromm, 1956). Moreover, the explanation of love and different type of love are contradictory as presented in the book. However, the idea to spiritualize the love for the subjects and person is the prominent theme of the book that encourages individual to induce love for every effort they make to attain their ambitions. References Fromm, E. (1956). The Art of Loving. London. Shanafelt, C. (2012). Literary Analysis and Essay Writing Guide. New York: Gatsbys Light Publications. Read More