Written in exile when he was in his twenties, Ibn Hazm's treatise on love moves chapter by chapter through its signs, causes, and catastrophes — the glance, the go-between, the betrayal, the parting — each illustrated with verses and with stories of real people in Umayyad Córdoba. Beneath the elegance is the same demand for evidence and honesty that later made him Islam's great literalist jurist.
Love — may God exalt you! — begins in jest and ends in earnest. Its depths are too vast to be described; the truth of it can only be grasped by experience. It is not disapproved by religion nor prohibited by the Law, for hearts are in the hand of God.
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