"Love- May Allah exalt you!-Is in truth a baffling ailment, and its remedy is in strict accord with the degree to which it is treated; it is a delightful malady, a most desirable sickness. Whoever is free of it likes not to be immune, and ...whoever is struck down by it yearns not to recover."
Ibn Hazm (rahim Allah) appears to be categorising romantic love (between human beings, not between the servant and Creator) as a spiritual sickness. I believe this is an appropriate categorisation as such "love" can become so all consuming that it takes one away from the remembrance of Allah and can make people act unwisely.
Hassan al-Basri (may Allah have maercy on him) mentioned that love of the dunya (this wordly life) and love for Allah can not co-exist in the same heart. That is not to say that Islam opposes love of that which exists in this temporal world; quite the contary, in fact. What Hassan al-Basri is speaking of is love which exceeds the limits set by Allah.
An affinity for the natural world, if it's a means by which we contemplate and praise the Creator, sanctifies what might otherwise be a mere hobby. Another person might,for example, take pleasure in their work, knowing that Allah has provided them with such work as a means of fulfilling their financial obligations and spending in charity. Alternatively, they could turn their work into an all consuming pursuit of money for its own sake.
Gai Eaton spoke of how the signs of Allah,especially those occuring in the natural world, if not recognised as such and instead loved for their own sake, can in fact take us away from Allah, The Exalted. In his book, "King of the Castle" he said:
"Paganism in the proper sense of the term is an idolatry applied to the natural world, but it is also, in most cases, the debris of a religion in the final stages of decay, when its adherents, like dogs sniff at the pointed finger rather than going where the finger points; idolatry, animism, fetishism and other such aberrations bear all bear witness to the fact that phenomena which were once adored as symbols of transcendent realities have come to be worshipped for their own sakes."
On the subject of Valentines Day, secular festivals have a lot in common with the religious practises of the pre-Islamic Arabs in Mecca. For example,as custodians of the idols,they charged people to access the kabbah (where the idols were held). Valentine's day, for its part, has its own idols (ie., cards, roses,heart shaped rubbish that cost about 10p to make in China). Custodians are in the form of gift shop owners, chocolatiers and restauranters in the current era.
Ibn Hazm was an Andalusian philosopher, litterateur, psychologist, historian, jurist and theologian born in Córdoba, present-day Spain.
Hassan al-Basri (Abu Sa'id al-Hasan ibn Abi-l-Hasan Yasar al-Basri), (642 -728 or 737), also known as Imam Hasan al Basri, was a well-known Sunni Muslim theologian and scholar of Islam who was born in Medina from Persian parents.
Charles Le Gai Eaton (Hasan le Gai Eaton or Hassan Abdul Hakeem) (1921 – 26 February 2010) was born in Switzerland and raised as an agnostic by his parents.He received his education at Charterhouse and at King's College, Cambridge. He worked for many years as a teacher and journalist in Jamaica and Egypt. He then joined the British Diplomatic Service. Eaton converted to Islam in 1951.
-biographical information from Wikipedia
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