Sunday, September 12, 2010

Love Shall be the Whole of the Law

My friend Hecate, poetry lover, practicing witch and world class energy regulation lawyer, posted this on Eschaton this morning:

Charge of the Goddess:

Whenever you have need of anything, once a month, and better it be when the moon is full, you shall assemble in some secret place and adore the spirit of Me Who is Queen of all the Wise.
You shall be free from slavery, and as a sign that you be free you shall be naked in your rites.
Sing, feast, dance, make music and love, all in My Presence, for Mine is the ecstasy of the spirit and Mine also is joy on earth.
For My law is love is unto all beings. Mine is the secret that opens the door of youth, and Mine is the cup of wine of life that is the cauldron of Cerridwen, that is the holy grail of immortality.
I give the knowledge of the spirit eternal, and beyond death I give peace and freedom and reunion with those that have gone before.
Nor do I demand aught of sacrifice, for behold, I am the Mother of all things and My love is poured out upon the earth.

--I wonder about love as a law. Makes sense, in the context gods, goddesses and the like are heard all too often by us poor limited souls, I guess: we can't hear everything a larger entity worth a serious person's consideration would say. But law, down here, anyway, is oft compulsion imposed from without, perhaps, sadly, more commonly than an agreed to part of a just society. The rest of the lovely piece suggests something more than what we flawed, limited folk mean by law, redeeming the concept, and, I think, offers us a chance to be part of something larger than we are. I've heard 1 Corinthians 13 discussed that way, too, as well as restricted to dogmatism, limiting love, which, if it's worth anything at all, should never be restricted to even humanity as a whole, much less any given subset of humanity, certainly not to oneself.

Looking up at the stars, I know quite well
That, for all they care, I can go to hell,
But such indifference is the least
We have to dread from man or beast.

What if the stars were to burn
With a love for me that I could not return?
If equal affection cannot be,
Then let the more loving one be me.

WH Auden

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Do what keepeth thou from wilting shall be the loophole in the law.

ProfWombat said...

All laws have loopholes. Without exception. Part of the trouble with 'em.

Take Newton's, for instance...