Does unconditional love even exist?

Can someone really, truly and honestly love another person unconditionally—with no ifs and buts, no fundamental assumptions, no essential ingredient that binds one’s affections? An anonymous mishnah in Avot says “yes”. At Avot 5: 19 we learn:

כָּל אַהֲבָה שֶׁהִיא תְלוּיָה בְדָבָר, בָּטֵל דָּבָר בְּטֵלָה אַהֲבָה, וְשֶׁאֵינָהּ תְּלוּיָה בְדָבָר, אֵינָהּ בְּטֵלָה לְעוֹלָם. אֵיזוֹ הִיא אַהֲבָה שֶׁהִיא תְלוּיָה בְדָבָר, זוֹ אַהֲבַת אַמְנוֹן וְתָמָר, וְשֶׁאֵינָהּ תְּלוּיָה בְדָבָר, זוֹ אַהֲבַת דָּוִד וִיהוֹנָתָן

Any love that depends on something—when that thing ceases, the love also ceases. But a love that does not depend on anything never ceases. What is [an example of] a love that depends on something? The love of Amnon for Tamar. And one that does not depend on anything? The love of David and Jonathan.

Most commentators explain this mishnah simply enough. The Me’iri simply adds that a condition is a sibah, a cause, while R’ Chaim Volozhiner’s Ru’ach Chaim offers no comment at all. In general terms, though, Amnon’s love for Tamar is understood to be conditional upon his urge to possess her. Once he had done so, that condition had been fulfilled and, there being no further basis for it, this love turned to hatred. David and Jonathan however shared a love that did not depend on the fulfilment of any condition.

Maharam Shik challenges the very basis of this mishnah and asks: “Does not every love depend on something?” Even the love of David and Jonathan, he hypothesizes, is firmly pinned on their mutual recognition of the qualities found in the other: they were men of action and their behaviour was in keeping with principles of good conduct. Would their love have persisted, he asks, if it later transpired that either one of them turned out to be evil? Would that not automatically eliminate the basis of their love? It’s a good question.

Maharam Shik does not appear to answer this question. He does however question the validity of the concept of conditional love. He cites the Akedat Yitzchak (R’ Yitzchak Arama) as proposing that everything depends on the factor that motivates the way one acts. If a person’s actions can be attributed a cause or motivation other than love for another person, there is no love. Amnon’s apparent love for Tamar may have felt to him like love for her at the time he desired her, but what he really felt was love for his own desires. This he categorises as desire itself, and not real love. And if it is not love, then it cannot be conditional love either.  In other words, if a feeling is conditional on some external factor, it is disqualified from even being love.

Incidentally, the concept of unconditional love is not only discussed in the context of this mishnah. It is also relevant to one of the very first mishnayot in Avot where (at 1:3) Antigonus Ish Socho teaches that one should serve God like a servant who does so with no expectation of receiving anything in return. On this teaching Rabbenu Yonah observes:

“What is perfect love among people? The desire to serve a loved one only because he has always loved him, even if he knows he will receive nothing in return. It is with this sort of love that man should serve God” [translation by R’ David Sedley].

This might better be termed altruistic love and it is certainly of a high order. Members of Klal Yisrael, the Jewish people, are commanded to love one another just as they love themselves (Vayikra 19:18, וְאָהַבְתָּ לְרֵעֲךָ כָּמוֹךָ, “You shall love your fellow human as you love yourself”) and there is no express stipulation that this love can be made subject to conditions.

Bearing in mind Maharam Shik’s concern about whether unconditional love can exist at all, we can ask why we cite the example of David and Jonathan and not God’s love for His people. We are told that this love is eternal, as we remind ourselves every time we recite the berachah that immediately precedes recitation of the Shema. This love persists even when we disobey God’s instructions and even when He is angry with us and punishes us. But maybe the point our mishnah makes is this: God’s love is divine and we are incapable of comprehending it, never mind emulating it. Our mishnah was however given for mortals. It is in our nature to place conditions on all our relationships—some explicit and some being merely understood. We have to learn that, while we are fully capable of placing conditions on the love we have for others, and of declaring that love to be at an end if those conditions are broken, we should not do so. We should be magnanimous in our relationships and love others the way we would like them to love us.

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