Plato’s theory of love

How did the brilliant Greek philosopher conceive the idea of love?

Plato's theory of love is one of the philosophical proposals that have generated most interest in this ancient Greek thinker. of this Ancient Greek thinker.

The world of love and personal relationships is already, in itself, something to which we pay much importance, and when this area joins the approaches of one of the great figures of philosophy, the result is a theoretical legacy that attracts all eyes. However, this philosopher conceived of love in a very characteristic way, since he linked it to his theory of love. linked it to his theory of knowledge and ideas..

In the following we will see what are the main characteristics of Plato's theory of love and how it was related to his theory of knowledge and ideas. and how it related to his philosophy.

Plato's dualism

Before we can understand how Plato conceived love, it is necessary to be clear about one concept: dualism. This is a philosophical current to which Plato subscribed, and which after his death was adopted by many other renowned thinkers, including, for example, René Descartes.

What does dualism consist of? Well, basically, and simplifying a lot, in the belief that reality is made up of at least two independent substances that can never mix at all: matter and spirit, also sometimes understood as the world of the idas and consciousness. These two substances are independent of each other, in the sense that although they can "come together," they do not mix, nor does one derive from the other.

Plato believed that the human being is in essence a soul trapped in a body, which in turn moves in a body.which in turn moves in an environment that is also uniquely material. That is, while the mind belongs to the realm of ideas, everything else, the matter to which the mind is anchored, is a kind of material prison.

But the mind has a natural tendency a natural tendency to want to be close to the rest of ideas.And so it perfects itself every time it is able to see beyond the appearances of the material world of ideas to access the truth that lies behind it, that which is universal and cannot be localized in time and space.

Plato's myth of the cave, for example, is a mythical tale that expresses just this: the liberation of the human being through access to the truth, not allowing oneself to be deceived by the appearances of the physical world.

Plato's theory of love

And what does the above have to do with Plato's theory of love? Well, it is closely related, because for this philosopher, love can be understood as a state of ecstasy and at the same time of moderate frustration. that is experienced in knowing that there is something beyond the physical that calls us but that, at the same time, will not be given to us completely, because as much as we do not want it we remain chained to the world of the material, the place in which to enjoy things depends largely on our proximity in time and space and in which it is almost impossible to stay away from the influence it exerts on aesthetics, appearances.

The platonic conception of love is, therefore, that of an impulse that leads us to want to go beyond the material in our experience of something, in the access to its beauty, which for the thinker has to go beyond the material in our experience of it.which, for the thinker, has to do with its closeness to truth and not with its aesthetics.

In the case of people, this beauty belongs to a spiritual plane that we intuit but that we cannot make our own, since it is not something material. What characterizes love is, therefore, the search for the true and the pure, which has to do with the very essence of beauty and which belongs to a plane of existence totally separate from the physical.

Thus, in mortal life Platonic love is full of frustration, for although beauty is sensed, it is impossible to experience it directly, it is impossible to experience it directly because of the limitations of the material.

Love as something unattainable

It is sometimes said that the essence of Plato's theory of love is the impossibility of accessing that which is loved. However, the impossibility of direct access to this idea of beauty is only a consequence of Plato's distinction between the ideal and the material.

This philosopher made his theory revolve entirely around the world of ideas.He did not establish very strict rules about concrete actions to be followed in order to experience love in the right way, as if our way of moving and acting in a physical space were in itself something very important.

That is why, among other things, he did not say that love had to be expressed through celibacy, because that would contradict his principles by basing it on the assumption that the experience of beauty has to be connected to the way we experience the material world. This was rather a deformation of the dualistic philosophy used since the from the popularization of the Abrahamic religions, especially Christianity.especially Christianity.

Thus, brass left the door open to different ways of partially accessing the spiritual world, of transcending the boundaries between matter and what, according to him, existed beyond it.