Plato was one of the pioneers of Greek philosophy, a student of Socrates, and the teacher of Aristotle (Alós, 2018). His unique thinking made a difference in the world as he founded The Academy, an organization aimed at enhancing intelligence and promoting clear thinking among individuals (Villarroel, 2018). His goal was to achieve what he called "eudaimonia," or the full realization of the individual. In this process of personal growth, one of the most prominent aspects is love (Villarroel, 2018), which, according to Ortiz (2013), is one of the most important characteristics in people's lives.
The Universality of Love
Various artists, philosophers, poets, and even neuroscientists and psychologists have attempted to understand what love is (Vargas, 2020). However, defining this concept becomes complicated due to the diversity of uses, meanings, and feelings associated with it (Alós, 2018). Therefore, in correspondence with Alós (2018), one of the fundamental elements of love is that it is a universal concept related to affinity between people.
In Spanish, the word "amor" encompasses a wide range of emotions and feelings (Alós, 2018). It ranges from the passionate and intimate desire characteristic of romantic love to the asexual emotional closeness that defines family love. It also includes the deep devotion or unity associated with religious love (Alós, 2018). According to Ortiz (2013), love drives one to do and experience what the biological body cannot comprehend, which is the heroic; for example, for love, one abandons peace and comfort to dedicate life to serving others, whether it is healing the sick or teaching children.
From a Buddhist perspective, love is the desire for all beings to be happy and have causes for happiness (Alós, 2018). This desire includes all beings without exception, both close individuals and neutral people, and even enemies. The concept of compassion is also considered, meaning the desire for all beings to be free from suffering and its causes. In correspondence with Alós (2018), both Buddhist love and compassion establish a different viewpoint than what is commonly heard.
However, regardless of the type of love being discussed, the emotions present are extremely intense and, in some cases, can be considered irresistible, making it impossible to escape them (Alós, 2018). In accordance with Alós (2018), love itself is a significant facilitator of human relationships; thus, it is a source of inspiration for the arts and an object of study for psychology.
The Arrogant Act and the Shadow of Incompleteness
According to Plato, beauty was equated with justice, goodness, and truth (Alós, 2018). In this context, love pursued these elements, as it needed them to be complete, launching itself in their pursuit (Alós, 2018). In his Socratic discourse, Plato described a previous race of beings that had characteristics of both sexes (Fischer, 2019). In correspondence with Fischer (2019), they were beings with four legs, four arms, and two faces joined in one head: they were perfect bodies, categorized as androgynous.
According to the myth, these beings were so powerful that, in a fit of pride, they contemplated challenging the Olympian gods (Fischer, 2019). When Zeus noticed their intentions, he divided them into two, giving rise to the separation between men and women. In correspondence with Fischer (2019), since then, humans are born with a sense of incompleteness, and throughout their lives, they seek to recover what was lost by a simple act of arrogance.
Once found, the individual regains their original strength, and the sense of lack can eventually fade away (Fischer, 2019). In short, according to Villarroel (2018), Plato's philosophy explains that humans seek love to feel complete because, for him, each human is nothing more than half of a person separated from their totality. Therefore, the search for the other half is entirely reasonable. However, in correspondence with Fischer (2019), it is interesting to note that Plato did not exclusively refer to heterosexual love but also suggested the possibility of beings composed of two masculine or feminine attributes, thus recognizing homosexuality as one of the possible variables in this conception.
Beyond the Body
For Plato, eros was an excuse to seek a higher level of knowledge (Fischer, 2019). To understand this, it is crucial to grasp that Plato's doctrine was based on the World of Ideas, as described in the Allegory of the Cave (Fischer, 2019). This explains that, paradoxically, beauty was unattainable but also omnipresent (Torres, n.d.). According to Torres (n.d.), Plato maintained that the world perceived through the senses expressed two realities: a material one, encompassing everything perceived through the senses, and an ideal one, where the essence of beauty resided.
This duality explains why the essence of beauty can be found everywhere and in every imaginable individual, depending on the level at which virtue allows glimpsing the ideal world in the material surroundings (Torres, n.d.). It is then, according to Fischer (2019), that love acts solely as a stimulus for human beings to discover a subtle experience of beauty, from which, otherwise, they would be blinded. From this philosopher's perspective, people didn't fall in love with others but with the requirements of beauty they found in them (Torres, n.d.). According to Plato, when people encountered beauty, love arose, defined as an impulse or determination that pushed individuals to explore and contemplate that beauty (Alós, 2018). In this way, Platonic love is not about an unattainable or impossible love but a love that transcends the limits of physical beauty, perhaps making it challenging to achieve. Therefore, according to Alós (2018), it is a series of phases that occur gradually.
The first phase is the beauty of the body, starting with a feeling of love for a particular beautiful body and developing to appreciate beauty in general (Alós, 2018). In other words, according to Ortiz (2013), love for the beauty of the body is an aesthetic education; one loves a body, and beyond that, it is seen that beauty is not limited to a single body. Instead, the beauty of one body is the twin sister of another, and not only are people beautiful, but there is beauty in everything: in nature, in animals, in mountains, and in clouds.
The second step is the love for the beauty of souls, for moral beauty, for behavior, where, after overcoming the barrier of appreciating and falling in love with the physical appearance of a person, individuals focus on the inner aspects; related to the moral and cultural plane of the person (Alós, 2018; Ortiz, 2013). In this phase, love transcends the physical and turns towards the soul (Alós, 2018). According to Ortiz (2013), a beautiful soul is preferred over a beautiful body, a good character over green eyes, a wise heart over long legs; there is an inner beauty valued more than the physical.
The third phase is the beauty of wisdom, where the path of appreciating the beauty of the soul leads to a love for knowledge, ideas, and goes beyond the loved person (Alós, 2018). In other words, according to Ortiz (2013), from now on, the person is capable of recognizing the beauty in all activities and laws, developing love for knowledge, spirit's projections, sciences, and arts, reaching the highest: love for the beautiful.
In this final phase, beauty is in itself (Alós, 2018). When the person manages to overcome the three previous phases, a new and definitive door opens, offering the opportunity to experience love for beauty detached from any object or subject. This last step is characterized by knowing beauty passionately, disinterestedly, and purely, a feeling that is not distorted or changed over time. Consequently, in correspondence with Alós (2018), it is not an impossible love in itself but is based on the appreciation of ideas and perfect, intelligible, and eternal forms.
Desmitifying Platonic Love
Plato wasn't as self-centered as to put his name on one of his philosophical contributions (Torres, n.d.). The term "platonic love" was first coined by Marsilio Ficino in the 15th century (Alós, 2018). This kind of love focuses on the beauty of a person's character and intelligence rather than their physical appearance. However, it's a love that only exists in the world of ideas, where it's considered perfect and incorruptible (Alós, 2018). Therefore, according to Torres (n.d.), it's quite challenging to use this concept with the same precision as Plato did, as both the context and the way of thinking have changed significantly since the time of Athens over 2000 years ago.
Plato based his theory entirely on the world of ideas, leaving little room for concrete guidelines on how to properly experience love, as if the way of moving and acting in physical space were fundamental (Torres, n.d.). According to Plato, the purity of the loving feeling was unattainable since love was not based on interests but on virtue (Alós, 2018). In other words, according to Alós (2018), it would be a perfect love, and perfection is just an illusion in the real world, possible only in the world of ideas.
For this reason, Platonic love is a type of love that, for Plato, not only manifested physically but was also linked to an object of desire beyond the material (Torres, n.d.). In this sense, according to Alós (2018), the term is consistent with what this philosopher extols about love. However, it only covers a small part of what the complete notion of Platonic love implies, turning it into a colloquial expression and a common misconception.
References
Alós, D. (2018). ¿Qué es el Amor Platónico?. La Mente es Maravillosa. Recuperado 24 May 2021, a partir de https://lamenteesmaravillosa.com/que-es-el-amor-platonico/
Fischer, A. (2019). Pasos que Debes Seguir Para Encontrar al Amor de tu Vida. Culturacolectiva.com. Recuperado 24 May 2021, a partir de https://culturacolectiva.com/historia/que-es-el-amor-platonico-segun-la-filosofia
Ortiz, S. (2013). ¿Qué nos Enseña Platón del Amor?. Revista Esfinge. Recuperado 24 May 2021, a partir de https://www.revistaesfinge.com/2013/10/que-nos-ensena-platon-del-amor/
Torres, A. (s.f.). Amor platónico: una guía para amar en tiempos modernos. Psicologiaymente.com. Recuperado 24 May 2021, a partir de https://psicologiaymente.com/pareja/amor-platonico-guia-amar-tiempos-modernos
Torres, A. (s.f.). La Teoría del Amor de Platón. Psicologiaymente.com. Recuperado 24 May 2021, a partir de https://psicologiaymente.com/psicologia/teoria-del-amor-platon
Vargas, M. (2020). Qué es el Amor y Cuál es su Verdadero Significado. Marca de Mujer. Recuperado 29 May 2021, a partir de https://marcademujer.com/que-es-el-amor/
Villarroel, M. (2018). El Amor Platónico: la filosofía del romance según Platón. culturizando.com. Recuperado 24 May 2021, a partir de https://culturizando.com/amor-platonico-la-filosofia-del-romance-segun-platon/
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