Still these seventeen first steps don’t yet take

[Mary Naeem]

Still these seventeen first steps don’t yet take us into what is love proper, although they are its indispensable conditions and preparatory stages that one must pass. Love is not simply the absence of enmity and it is very superior to it [22]. In this respect St. Maximus the Confessor writes: “To feel no envy, nor wrath, nor bitterness towards the offender does not yet mean to have love for him. One can, without any love, avoid rendering evil for evil because of the commandment. Not to hate someone, does not yet mean to love him. One can feel for him something between the two: not love and not hate. It is the following steps that will bring us to real love.