Celebration is a confrontation, giving attention to the transcendent meaning of one's actions.
Abraham Joshua HeschelRead
Awareness of the divine begins with wonder.
Interpretation
True awareness of the divine starts with a sense of awe and curiosity about the world.
Abraham Joshua Heschel's quote emphasizes that recognizing the divine presence requires a sense of wonder. This sense of wonder is essential to develop an understanding of the profound mysteries of life and existence, suggesting that an open mind and heart are crucial for spiritual awakening and deeper connection to the divine.
In practice
This quote can inspire a discussion in a spiritual gathering about the importance of wonder in faith.
Celebration is a confrontation, giving attention to the transcendent meaning of one's actions.
Normal consciousness is a state of stupor, in which the sensibility to the wholly real and responsiveness to the stimuli of the spirit are reduced. The mystics, knowing that man is involved in a hidden history of the cosmos, endeavor to awake from the drowsiness and apathy and to regain the state of wakefulness for their enchanted souls.
Prayer cannot bring water to parched fields, or mend a broken bridge, or rebuild a ruined city; but prayer can water an arid soul, mend a broken heart, and rebuild a weakened will.
The worship of reason is arrogance and betrays a lack of intelligence. The rejection of reason is cowardice and betrays a lack of faith.
We worship God through our questions.
When religion speaks only in the name of authority rather than with the voice of compassion, its message becomes meaningless.
Any time something is written against me, I not only share the sentiment but feel I could do the job far better myself. Perhaps I should advise would-be enemies to send me their grievances beforehand, with full assurance that they will receive my every aid and support. I have even secretly longed to write, under a pen name, a merciless tirade against myself.
Solomon, who was one of the Deity's favorites, had a copulation cabinet composed of seven hundred wives and three hundred concubines. To save his life he could not have kept two of these young creatures satisfactorily refreshed, even if he had fifteen experts to help him. Necessarily almost the entire thousand had to go hungry for years and years on a stretch. Conceive of a man hardhearted enough to look daily upon all that suffering and not be moved to mitigate it.
The law has no claim to human respect. It has no civilizing mission; its only purpose is to protect exploitation.
Eroticism is assenting to life even in death.
The entire life of a good Christian is in fact an exercise of holy desire. You do not yet see what you long for, but the very act of desiring prepares you, so that when he comes you may see and be utterly satisfied.
The Great Spirit is everywhere; He hears whatever is in our minds and our hearts, and it is not necessary to speak to Him in a loud voice.
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