Post 64. An interpretation of Khalil Gibran's Poem

Interpretation of " On Marriage" by Khalil Gibran.
( Dedicatd as homage to Miss Lyss.)
On Marriage.

You were born together, and together you shall be forevermore.

You shall be together when the white wings of death scatter your days.

Ay, you shall be together even in the silent memory of God.

But let there be spaces in your togetherness,

And let the winds of the heavens dance between you.

Love one another, but make not a bond of love:

Let it rather be a moving sea between the shores of your souls.

Fill each other’s cup but drink not from one cup.

Give one another of your bread but eat not from the same loaf.

Sing and dance together and be joyous, but let each one of you be alone,

Even as the strings of a lute are alone though they quiver with the same music.

Give your hearts, but not into each other’s keeping.

For only the hand of Life can contain your hearts.

And stand together yet not too near together:

For the pillars of the temple stand apart,

And the oak tree and the cypress grow not in each other’s shadow.

An interpretation.

Since I have observed people to give different interpretations to this poem by Khalil Gibran, and upon this having been shown to me by a dear lady-blogger on Bigblog, in the occasion of my submision to her attention of my little rambling work “Of Bodies and Souls” (uploaded in the following Post)which reflects christian/Catholic theological and ethical sensibilities, moreover believing it concurs with some of the criteria in my work, I have decided, without claiming to be an expert of Gibran’s poetry, to attempt an Interpretation. Although not being an expert at poetry, I have done more than my share of readings in Italian Literature.First of all I do not think that the title-: “On Marriage” is applicable, as I believe the Poem to be about a great love experience between two human beings. Carnal union is not appearing at all in this Poem, and what is stressed is a correspondence between the two souls, what ancient italian poetry called “una corrispondenza di amorosi sensi”.

The only indication that the love may be between a man and a woman may be the use of the oak and cypress analogy in the metaphor at the last verse. Had the Souls of the two lovers been of persons of the same gender, Gibran should have used either "cypress" or "oak" for both according as to whether the two were respectively and both female or male. The latter case of two, non-carnally engaged male lovers could apply to a poem that sang the love David had for Saul's son, the tragic Jonatan.

"You" were born together.................

"You " refers to the love between the two souls which arises simultaneously in both lovers, like a love at first sight. "Soul", "love" and "heart" are one and the same thing in this Poem. The true love between two souls which endures eternally, is like a Friendship founded on character rather than on commonly described love which Aristotle distinguishes and defines in his chapters on Friendship in one of his works about Ethics, “Nichomachean Ethics”. He says of the one founded on love that it can be transitory as amply proved by our modern separations and divorces, while the one founded on character may endure forever.
Aristotle considered three types of Friendship-: Political ( any mercenary friendship based on utility and material/service exchange), from love (pleasure, mutual liking/physical attraction/mannerism), from character.
Gibran, although a Persian of indo-european origins, was a Moslem and since he obviously belonged to the learned circles of islamic scholars, one in which theology and philosophy were prerequisites for all types of higher learning, Gibran must have studied Aristotle who had been rediscovered by the Arabs in the course of their conquests since 650 A.D.
It is also obvious that Platonic influences were also strong in islamic learned circles, very much more so than Aristotle, who became, in a modified understanding contrasting the islamic/jewish one, the philosopher of the Catholic Scholastics, led by the Dominican, St. Thomas Aquina ( an italian/calabrian of noble german origins), called by his fellow parisian colleagues " the Sorbonne-ox ", owing to his humble, patient, unflippable, kind, slow, methodical, thorough, devastating reasoning and logic.
One had to wait for William of Oackam, Francis Bacon, and the dutch theologians/philosophers to have Aristotle's exhaggerated veneration to abate.
In Ethics though he still remains unsurpassed, as Situation Ethics ( although appropriate and true, if honestly applied, like when I say that there may sometime be a justification for a poke or even two) is a failure since human beings are naturally devoted to lying and false rationalisations,
to suit situations.

spaces in your togetherness.........................
the winds of the heavens dance between you........
a moving sea between the shores of your souls..............
stand together yet not too near together..............
the pillars of the temple stand apart.....................
the oak tree and the cypress grow not in each other’s shadow...........................

Since I have stressed the point that Gibran is talking about a love between Souls without necessarily implying----as we modern readers who are grossly biased in favour of carnal expressions of what we may call love, not always even of a straight type---- carnal unity that was then the prerogative of those who wished to procreate, or of those indulging in gross love-making, the above expressions from the Poem predicate a sharing rather than a mutual possession of one another ’s Souls.
Why so?
The answer is-:

Give your hearts, but not into each other’s keeping.

For only the hand of Life can contain your hearts.................

This is what the Angel says in my Poem about God owning the Souls and that we are only allowed to borrow. these from God.
The hand of Life is simply The Creator (i.e., a maker uses one's own hands to make) of Life that can only be God the Father or God the Creator.
Heart is another word for Soul, its seat of affections and feelings.

For only the hand of Life can contain your hearts...........................

This is what the Angel said in my poem " Of Bodies and Souls"..

Give your hearts, but not into each other’s keeping............................................

Let there be a communication, a mutual borrowing, an amorous exchange, but do not attempt to absolutely own, posses one another, as we as Souls belong to God.

Love one another, but make not a bond of love:
Let it rather be a moving sea between the shores of your souls............................

Here above again the motive of free, open, unbounded communication between independent Souls.

Fill each other’s cup but drink not from one cup.
Give one another of your bread but eat not from the same loaf,
Sing and dance together and be joyous, but let each one of you be alone,
Even as the strings of a lute are alone though they quiver with the same music........................

Here above again the motive of “ A mutual exchange of love while remaining individual Souls, love being like a music made by strings that remain separate while playing together in time ".