No Love, Small Love and Great Love

Xuefeng

As a child, I used to herd sheep. I observed that when the lambs knelt to suckle, the mother sheep always turned her head to lick the lamb's bottom, which seemed an unfortunate unclean habit for a mother sheep. While teaching in high school, my son had seven or eight cats at home. Watching the mother cat after giving birth, it hastily licked the sticky dirt off the kittens. I could not agree with the mother cat's unclean habit.

While conducting business abroad, my wife kept several dogs. I noticed that within a dozen days after the mother dog gave birth to puppies, she licked the urine and excrement of the puppies inside the doghouse daily, which I found extremely disgusting.

Sitting under a tree contemplating quietly, I realized my astonishing stupidity. Isn't all of this the Greatest Creator telling me what love is? If the mother sheep does not promptly lick the thin stool from the lamb's bottom, it will quickly form a scab, preventing the lamb from defecating, leaving the lamb with only one option: to die. For the lamb to grow healthily, the mother sheep must lick its feces. This is not an issue of hygiene but a matter of whether LIFE can survive and continue. After the kittens are born, the mother cat must quickly eat the afterbirth; otherwise, the kittens will suffocate inside the afterbirth. If the mother dog does not lick the excrement and urine of the puppies in the den daily, the den will inevitably emit a foul odor, the puppies will stink, and bacteria will breed massively. Flies and other insects will swarm the den, causing not only the puppies to be unable to grow healthily but also leading to their rapid illness and death.

This is love. For the sake of love, we should not just consider hygiene; we should not hesitate to endure even hardships.

So, how to define love? I believe love is an inner liking and selfless dedication without any conditions.

Based on this definition, let's compare it to the love in human society.

If a person does not properly care for the elderly or raise their children, then that person lacks love. Being unable to show love for both the elderly and children makes such an individual extremely selfish and cruel, nothing short of human waste. Given the opportunity, such a person, apart from neglecting wildlife, deforestation, and polluting rivers, lakes, and oceans, can even betray friends, their own ethnicity, and their country, all for personal gain. Any heinous act is within their capacity as long as it satisfies their self-interest.

If a person loves their own elderly, children, and family, yet neglects siblings, neighbors, and nature, then this person possesses only small love. There's not much difference between this person and animals. For the sake of their children and family, if conditions permit, they may not hesitate to engage in actions that violate their conscience, involving deceit or theft.

If a person not only loves their own elderly and children but also cares for the community, nature, and the future and fate of humanity, this person possesses great love. Those with great love do not care about personal gains and losses. For the sake of others and humanity, they are willing to endure all hardships and injustices.

In the human world, the one with the greatest love is Jesus, it's the heart of Christ. To save humanity, he sacrificed his blood and his own LIFE. Despite the Roman soldiers cruelly nailing nails into his hands and feet and humiliating him, he not only didn't hate but also prayed for the Greatest Creator to forgive them. This is a tremendous amount of love!

Humanity! Should we doubt Jesus' identity as Christ? Is there any hatred we cannot let go of? Is there any psychological knot that we cannot untie?

People should possess great love. This is not just moral preaching, it's not teaching you to be a good person, but because the magnitude of love directly involves the future direction of your own LIFE. In general terms, those without love will definitely end up in inflamed layers, frozen layers, netherworld, or animal world. Those with small love will at best return to this world. Only those with great love qualify to ascend to the higher realms of LIFE.

Death is not the end of LIFE; this is not superstition, nonsense, deception, or lies; it's a fact. It's not because other realms of LIFE do not exist but because our spiritual perception is too dull. It's not because this world lacks light, but it's because the blind cannot see the light. It's not because there's no sound in this universe, but the deaf cannot hear the sound. It's not because the Pure Land does not exist, but our vision lacks that function.

The Greatest Creator is fair and selfless; gods and Buddhas love humanity. What can I say that you will believe?