Compassion vs. love! This is a semantic question, but since our thoughts are largely based on words, it may be of significance in our everyday relative, subject–object perceptions, experiences and thinking. The word love by itself has certain conventional definitions and connotations; and these are relative and conceptually opposite to hate. The two can co-exist and interchange, and they are never felt uniformly for all creatures. I feel a better term for describing the most important "emotion" for Ahimsa is compassion (or else the more abstruse concept of "agape love"). Misanthropy seems to usually develop from disappointments and rejected "love" of some kind. Obviously, the bulk of human suffering, broadly defined, is in relation to others, as our mind and "heart" cling to human-related expectations and interactions. Really, the only other sources of suffering are physical pain and the existential angst related to the fear of death. While a bit misanthropic, I do feel a great deal of compassion for everyone, because we are all trapped in the human condition. Words matter in the conditional state, and the unqualified word love is less apt for the Ahimsa "impulse" than the word compassion. Feed compassion; starve hate.
— Gabriel Fenteany, February 24, 2016
