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complete. Right vision has been considered essential for spiritual liberation. Therefore, this automatically proves the necessity of the feeling of affection for attaining spiritual emancipation and liberation.
In a true feeling of affection there is no place for attachment. The attachment comes in only where there is a desire for acquiring and enjoying means for own sensory pleasures. In a mother's affection there is no desire for getting any comfort or solace from the child. The cow can even sacrifice her own life in trying to protect its calf even when on growing up it does not serve or help the cow in any way. The cow has no desire for getting anything in return from the calf and, therefore, her affection for the calf is said to be natural and selfless affection. The reason being that where there is a desire to get anything in return, there is attachment, there is delusion and not affection. Affection denotes natural and selfless love.
When a child is born it requires to be fed with mother's milk. It cannot survive if the mother would not feed it. For its survival it is essential that the mother feed it. Not only feeding but to help the child in all possible ways is the sacred duty of the mother. The mother that does not perform this duty does not discharge her mother-dharma and does not even know the meaning of affection. Therefore, besides natural love practically affection also represents concrete help and cooperation.
There is a significant difference between humans and other living beings. The mothers in other species of living beings give birth to their offspring but cannot give them as much affection as a human mother can. The main reason behind this is that the mothers in subhuman species have to arrange for their own food for which they have to go about here and there leaving their offspring behind and unattended. They also have to struggle for their own survival and safety and invest their time and effort towards this vital need also. Another reason is that the linguistic ability and intellect in the mothers of other species are not as well developed as they are in human mothers. Because of these reasons the quality of the feeling of affection in the human mothers is that of a superior quality than that in the mothers of the other species.
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