Divisions of Saintliness | Part Five

In Divisions of Saintliness part five we shall now speak of the love of God and its three branches – joy, cleaving and honor. Love of God consists in a person’s desiring and actually lusting for the nearness of the Blessed One and pursuing His holiness as one pursues anything which he strongly desires. This love extends so far as to cause the mere mentioning of the Blessed One’s Name, the reciting of His praises and the occupation with the words of His Torah and with the nature of the Blessed One’s Divinity to be a delight and a pleasure to one, in the same manner that one who very strongly loves the wife of his youth or his only son finds joy and pleasure in merely speaking of them. As Scripture states (Jeremiah 31:19), “For when I speak of him i will strongly remember him.”