Jordan has a strange, haunting beauty and a sense of timelessness. Dotted with the ruins of empires once great, it is the last resort of yesterday in the world of tomorrow. I love every inch of it.
King Hussein IRead
Nothing is more useless in developing a nation's economy than a gun, and nothing blocks the road to social development more than the financial burden of war. War is the arch enemy of national progress and the modern scourge of civilized man.
Interpretation
What this quote means
War hinders a nation's progress and development.
This quote emphasizes the detrimental effects of war on a nation's economy and social advancement. It suggests that the resources spent on warfare could be better utilized for developing society, indicating that conflict is not just a physical struggle but a barrier to overall human and societal growth.
Themes
WarEconomyDevelopmentProgressPeace
In practice
Example use cases
In a speech advocating for peace, one might quote this to highlight the costs of violence.
More from King Hussein I
All quotes βI want to say a simple thing, that the dividing line exists not between Jordan and Israel, but between the proponents of peace and the opponents of peace.
King Hussein IRead
God help us from those who believe that they are the sole possessors of truth. How we manage at times to agree willingly to become prisoners within our own minds and souls of beliefs and ideas on which we can never be flexible.
King Hussein IRead
The link between peace and stability on the one hand, and social and economic growth on the other, is dialectic. Peace, poverty, and backwardness cannot mix in one region.
King Hussein IRead
Without peace and without the overwhelming majority of people that believe in peace defending it, working for it, believing in it, security can never really be a reality.
King Hussein IRead
In this life struggle, here I am among you fully cognizant that a true believer has no fear of what God has ordained for him. Those who are visited by fear live only for their present, under the illusion that the world began with them and will end with their departure.
King Hussein IRead
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