All historical experience demonstrates the following: Our earth cannot be changed unless in the not too distant future an alteration in the consciousness of individuals is achieved.
Hans KungRead
However, if the religions in essence merely repeat statements from the United Nations Human Rights Declaration, such a Declaration becomes superfluous; an ethic is more than rights.
Interpretation
What this quote means
True ethics go beyond mere rights and laws as stated by human rights documents.
Hans Kung emphasizes that ethics should encompass deeper moral values that transcend the basic rights outlined in legal documents like the United Nations Human Rights Declaration. He argues that religions and ethical teachings must provide a richer moral framework rather than just repeating the rights and entitlements that have been codified in human rights declarations, suggesting that ethics involve a richer and more comprehensive understanding of human dignity and morality.
Themes
EthicsHuman RightsMoralityReligionValues
In practice
Example use cases
In a lecture on moral philosophy, you might use this quote to illustrate the depth of ethical discussions beyond legal frameworks.
More from Hans Kung
All quotes βTime and again we see leaders and members of religions incite aggression, fanaticism, hate, and xenophobia - even inspire and legitimate violent and bloody conflicts.
Hans KungRead
But I have to add - and this answers your other question - this catholicity in time and in space is only meaningful for me if there is, at the same time, a concentration on the Gospel.
Hans KungRead
We are conscious that religions cannot solve the economic, political and social problems of this earth.
Hans KungRead
At the same time we are aware that our various religions and ethical traditions often offer very different bases for what is helpful and what is unhelpful for men and women, what is right and what is wrong, what is good and what is evil.
Hans KungRead
In the last resort, a love of God without love of humanity is no love at all.
Hans KungRead
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Church and State, Soul and Body, God and Man, are all one at Mont Saint Michel, and the business of all is to fight, each in his own way, or to stand guard for each other.
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We are on the side of religion as opposed to religions, and we are among those who believe in the wretched inadequacy of sermons and the sublimity of prayer.
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The principle of nonviolent resistance seeks to reconcile the truths of two opposites-Acquiescence and violence -while avoiding the extremes and immoralities of both.
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For a Westerner to trash Western culture is like criticizing our nitrogen/oxygen atmosphere on the grounds that it sometimes gets windy, and besides, Jupiter's is much prettier. You may not realize its advantages until you're trying to breathe liquid methane.
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The voice of the special rebels and prophets, recommending discontent, should, as I have said, sound now and then suddenly, like a trumpet. But the voices of the saints and sages, recommending contentment, should sound unceasingly, like the sea.
Gilbert K. ChestertonRead
Just as we tend to assume that the world is as we see it, we naively suppose that people are as we imagine them to be.
Carl JungRead