Abraham Joshua Heschel Quotes - Page 2

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• People of our time are losing the power of celebration. Instead of celebrating we seek to be amused or entertained. Celebration is an active state, an act of expressing reverence or appreciation. To be entertained is a passive state--it is to receive pleasure afforded by an amusing act or a spectacle.... Celebration is a confrontation, giving attention to the transcendent meaning of one's actions. Source: The Wisdom of Heschel

  Abraham Joshua Heschel

  Appreciation, People, Giving

  182 Copy quote

• Awe enables us to see in the world intimations of the divine, to sense in small things the beginning of infinite significance, to sense the ultimate in the common and the simple, to feel in the rush of the passing the stillness of the eternal.

  Abraham Joshua Heschel

  Simple, World, Common

  Abraham Joshua Heschel (1965). “Who is Man?”, p.89, Stanford University Press

  89 Copy quote

• A test of a people is how it behaves toward the old. It is easy to love children. Even tyrants and dictators make a point of being fond of children. But the affection and care for the old, the incurable, the helpless are the true gold mines of a culture.

  Abraham Joshua Heschel

  Children, Tyrants, People

  Abraham Joshua Heschel (1955). “Insecurity of Freedom”, p.72, Macmillan

  209 Copy quote

• The test of love is in how one relates not to saints and scholars but to rascals.

  Abraham Joshua Heschel

  Love Is, Saint, Tests

  Abraham Joshua Heschel (1973). “A Passion for Truth”, p.85, Macmillan

  55 Copy quote

• It is gratefulness which makes the soul great.

  Abraham Joshua Heschel

  Soul, Gratefulness

  Abraham Joshua Heschel (1997). “Moral Grandeur and Spiritual Audacity: Essays”, p.342, Macmillan

  66 Copy quote

• We worry a great deal about the problem of church and state. Now what about the church and God? Sometimes there seems to be a greater separation between the church and God than between the church and state.

  Abraham Joshua Heschel

  Thought Provoking, Worry, Church

  118 Copy quote

• When I marched with Martin Luther King in Selma, I felt my legs were praying.

  Abraham Joshua Heschel

  Kings, Prayer, Legs

  Abraham Joshua Heschel, Harold Kasimow (1991). “No Religion Is an Island: Abraham Joshua Heschel and Interreligious Dialogue”, Orbis Books

  104 Copy quote

• In a controversy, the instant we feel anger, we have already ceased striving for truth and have begun striving for ourselves.

  Abraham Joshua Heschel

  Buddhist, Truth, Life Changing

  65 Copy quote

• A religious man is a person who holds God and man in one thought at one time, at all times, who suffers harm done to others, whose greatest passion is compassion, whose greatest strength is love and defiance of despair.

  Abraham Joshua Heschel

  Love, Encouragement, Religious

  Abraham Joshua Heschel (1997). “Moral Grandeur and Spiritual Audacity: Essays”, p.289, Macmillan

  100 Copy quote

• God is not nice. God is not an uncle. God is an earthquake.

  Abraham Joshua Heschel

  God, Uncles, Nice

  46 Copy quote

• Speech has power. Words do not fade. What starts out as a sound, ends in a deed.

  Abraham Joshua Heschel

  Sound, Deeds, Speech

  56 Copy quote

• To serve does not mean to surrender but to share.

  Abraham Joshua Heschel

  Mean, Doe, Surrender

  Abraham Joshua Heschel (1976). “Man Is Not Alone: A Philosophy of Religion”, p.141, Macmillan

  23 Copy quote

• The primary purpose of prayer is not to make requests. The primary purpose is to praise, to sing, to chant. Because the essence of prayer is a song, and man cannot live without a song. Prayer may not save us. But prayer may make us worthy of being saved.

  Abraham Joshua Heschel

  Song, Prayer, Men

  36 Copy quote

• The road to the sacred leads through the secular.

  Abraham Joshua Heschel

  Sacred, Secular

  Abraham Joshua Heschel (1997). “Moral Grandeur and Spiritual Audacity: Essays”, p.76, Macmillan

  25 Copy quote

• A religious man is a person... whose greatest passion is compassion.

  Abraham Joshua Heschel

  Religious, Passion, Men

  New York Journal-American, April 5, 1963.

  60 Copy quote

• Everything is phenomenal; everything is incredible; never treat life casually. To be spiritual is to be amazed.

  Abraham Joshua Heschel

  Spiritual, Incredibles, Treats

  "Why is spirituality correlated with life satisfaction?" by Daniel José Camacho, www.theguardian.com. November 12, 2017.

  84 Copy quote

• People are anxious to save up financial means for old age; they should also be anxious to prepare a spiritual means for old age.... Wisdom, maturity, tranquility do not come all of a sudden when we retire.

  Abraham Joshua Heschel

  Spiritual, Mean, Maturity

  Abraham Joshua Heschel (1986). “The Wisdom of Heschel”, p.114, Farrar, Straus and Giroux

  9 Copy quote

• The beginning of our happiness lies in the understanding that life without wonder is not worth living.

  Abraham Joshua Heschel

  Lying, Understanding, Wonder

  Abraham Joshua Heschel (1976). “God in Search of Man: A Philosophy of Judaism”, p.46, Macmillan

  24 Copy quote

• You must build your life as if it were a work of art.

  Abraham Joshua Heschel

  Art, Works Of Art, Ifs

  Abraham Joshua Heschel (1983). “I Asked for Wonder: A Spiritual Anthology”, Crossroad Publishing Company

  8 Copy quote

• We can all do our share to redeem the world in spite of all absurdities and all frustrations and all disappointments.

  Abraham Joshua Heschel

  Disappointment, Frustration, World

  Abraham Joshua Heschel (1983). “I Asked for Wonder: A Spiritual Anthology”, Crossroad Publishing Company

  35 Copy quote

• There are two primary ways in which mans relates himself to the world that surround him: manipulation and appreciation . In the first way he sees in what surrounds him things to be handled, forces to be managed, objects to be put to use. In the second way he sees in what surrounds him things to be acknowledged, understood, valued or admired.

  Abraham Joshua Heschel

  Appreciation, Two, Use

  Abraham Joshua Heschel (1965). “Who is Man?”, p.82, Stanford University Press

  64 Copy quote

• The hour calls for moral grandeur and spiritual audacity.

  Abraham Joshua Heschel

  Spiritual, Audacity, Moral

  Telegram to President John F. Kennedy, June 16, 1963.

  14 Copy quote

• Every little deed counts.

  Abraham Joshua Heschel

  Deeds, Littles

  Abraham Joshua Heschel (1997). “Moral Grandeur and Spiritual Audacity: Essays”, p.412, Macmillan

  30 Copy quote

• When religion speaks only in the name of authority rather than with the voice of compassion, its message becomes meaningless.

  Abraham Joshua Heschel

  Compassion, Names, Voice

  Abraham Joshua Heschel (1955). “Insecurity of Freedom”, p.4, Macmillan

  28 Copy quote

• Mundus vult decipi'—the world wants to be deceived. To live without deception presupposes standards beyond the reach of most people whose existence is largely shaped by compromise, evasion and mutual accommodation. Could they face their weakness, their vanity and selfishness, without a mask?

  Abraham Joshua Heschel

  Vanity, People, Deception

  Abraham Joshua Heschel (1973). “A Passion for Truth”, p.190, Macmillan

  30 Copy quote

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