Loving-kindness — benevolent, friendly goodwill and active interest in the welfare and happiness of all beings..
Loving-kindness — benevolent, friendly goodwill and active interest in the welfare and happiness of all beings. The first of the four Buddhist brahmavihāras.
A deliberately trainable, universal goodwill directed equally at self, loved ones, strangers, and enemies — unlike romantic or possessive love (its near enemy is precisely attachment). It differs from karuna: metta is the wish to give others happiness, where karuna is the wish to remove their suffering (the Visuddhimagga's image: a mother wishing her healthy child to thrive vs. her sick child to recover). The foundational first member of the brahmavihāra set with karuna, mudita, and upekkha.
“friendliness, amity,” from mitra “friend.”
Sanskrit maitrī, from mitra “friend”; Pali mettā derives from it. Attested in this sense as far back as Vedic literature.
The brahmavihāra framework predates the Buddha; in canonical Buddhism metta is expounded chiefly in the Metta Sutta and is one of the ten Theravada perfections. The concept has remained stable, and has entered modern secular mindfulness as “loving-kindness meditation.”
Translation varies (loving-kindness, benevolence, goodwill); one oversimplification to avoid is equating metta with sentimental affection or English “love” — scholars stress it is an aspiration for others' happiness, not an emotional attachment.