O Soul, Thou Art at Rest

What Makes the Taj Mahal a Wonder of the World?

“If I speak in the tongues of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal.

If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing.

If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing.”

1 Corinthians 13

“Where there is love, there is life.” (Mahatma Gandhi)

If there’s one monument every traveler should aspire to visit, it’s the Taj Mahal in the city of Agra in northern India. Because, of all the wonders of the world, ancient or modern, man-made or natural, this is the only memorial to the simple, but authentic, everlasting, and universal emotion we call Love.

No word in any language gets more use. Of all the human connections, love represents everything that is best about us. But because it gets so much use—and because more than a few of those uses are so trivial—we sometimes edge by it, faintly embarrassed by the show.

‘Tis better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all.” (Alfred Lord Tennyson)

In this far from trivial show, the Mughal Emperor Shah Jahan poured ₹35 billion (in today’s money), 12 years of labor, and an ocean of grief into providing his wife Mumtaz Mahal with a place to rest her head into eternity. It’s hard to imagine any of today’s super-rich investing that kind of money to honor their late wives (more likely, late ex-wives) but then, they don’t hold sway over one quarter of humanity’s earthly wealth like Shah Jahan did.

“Time is too slow for those who wait, too swift for those who fear, too long for those who grieve, too short for those who rejoice, but for those who love, time is eternity.“ (Henry van Dyke)

Originally, Shah Jahan planned to build a tomb for himself across the Yamuna River, all in black marble to mirror Mumtaz’s white. But even in those days, that proved a bit much. Their son and heir Aurangzeb griped about the expenses (and his siblings), until he deposed Papa, executed all of his brothers, and took over. But he still settled his father in an apartment in the nearby Agra Fort, with a window where the old man could stare out all day at the love of his life.

“We've got this gift of love, but love is like a precious plant. You can't just accept it and leave it in the cupboard or just think it's going to get on by itself. You've got to keep watering it.” (John Lennon)

Shah Jahan was the fifth Emperor of the Mughal Dynasty, a Muslim clan that had poured out of central Asia in the 16th Century and dominated Hindu India until the ascendancy of the Marathas and the British 200 years later. Like the rest of the Mughals, he spent most of his life and reign on military campaigns, fighting to control and expand his reach.

Mumtaz Mahal accompanied and advised her husband on his conquests until, in 1631 at age 38, she died while delivering their 14th child. We have no idea what she looked like, but by all accounts, she was an intelligent and cultured woman and the perfect Empress for her husband. He certainly thought so—after she died, he collapsed into a grief that incapacitated him for more than a year.

Love is a battlefield. (Pat Benatar)

We arrived at the Taj Mahal in the most challenging possible conditions (for a photographer anyway)—a cold and foggy winter morning. We never use guides or take tours, but this time, hadn’t done enough research, so we spent the day with a credentialed local Agran (no Slumdog Millionaire on this trip!) named Arun.

For better or worse, four things immediately surprised us:

• Physically, the building isn’t nearly as large or imposing as we expected. No massive foyer, no Hall of Mirrors, no grandiose, far-flung wings with royal apartments. After all, this was built as a single-purpose structure, the idea being to house just one or two bodies. The interior tour, even with off-season lines, requires less than 15 minutes.

• The visitors are nearly all Indian—Hindu, Muslim, whatever division or religion. In spite of the monument’s worldwide fame, fewer than 10% of its 8 million visitors are foreigners. You’re conscious of witnessing a living proof of the value of Indian civilization, and the pride in those around you is evident. It’s a nice crowd.

“Love and compassion are necessities, not luxuries. Without them humanity cannot survive.” (The Dalai Lama)

• The guides can spend all day pointing out the technical wonders of the monument, because they are astonishing. The construction took 20,000 artisans 12 years, with another 10 years to finish off the details. Every stone and gem is carved and inlaid by hand. Every tiny architectural detail has an explicit meaning and function and fits seamlessly into the whole. You can get so wrapped up in the technical brilliance of the structure (and the bustling of tourists through its hallways), that you lose sight of its spiritual dimension.

• The building is as alive today as the day in 1643 when it was completed. The marble changes colors with the seasons, the time of day, or a passing cloud. The grounds and structures are maintained by an exclusive clan of workmen all directly descended from the original artisans (with their own private mosque next door). Many of the present-day artisans operate workshops in town, where the production cycle of an individual tourist temptation can run into years.

“How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.” (Elizabeth Barrett Browning)

But all in all, the experience didn’t quite roll our spiritual motors that afternoon. For that kind of dimension, you need time to absorb, to contemplate, to fit a deep dive like this into your everyday experience of the world—to wonder what you in your minuscule existence would do for love.

But that’s the wonderful thing about love, isn’t it? It knows no dimensions and no limits, tiny or grand. It cannot be weighed, measured, or quantified. When you touch the love of your life, that connection launches both of you into a heaven every bit as safe, authentic, and powerful as the paradise inhabited by these two ancient lovers. And maybe that’s just where you want to be.

“Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away.

For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when completeness comes, what is in part disappears.

When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put the ways of childhood behind me.

For now we see only a reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.

And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.”

1 Corinthians 13

---

And just because we always do something like this, here is one of the great love stories of the silver screen, with a tongue-in-cheek homage along the way to the Taj Mahal: