Art begins when a man, with a purpose of communicating to other people a feeling he once experienced, calls it up again within himself and expresses it by certain external signs.
Leo TolstoyRead
Nowhere nor in anything, except in the assertion of the Church, can we find that God or Christ founded anything like what churchmen understand by the Church.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Tolstoy suggests that the institutional Church does not represent the true essence of God or Christ's teachings.
In this quote, Leo Tolstoy critiques the organized Church, arguing that there is no substantial evidence in scripture or Christ's teachings supporting the institutionalized version of the Church as understood by its leaders. He points to the idea that true spirituality and faith may exist independently of the established Church's doctrines and practices, emphasizing a more personal relationship with God and a departure from institutional forms of religion.
Themes
ChurchFaithSpiritualityInstitutionReligionCritique
In practice
Example use cases
During a discussion on the role of organized religion in modern society.
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People try to do all sorts of clever and difficult things to improve life instead of doing the simplest, easiest thing-refusing to participate in activities that make life bad.
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It's too easy to criticize a man when he's out of favour, and to make him shoulder the blame for everybody else's mistakes.
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Music is the shorthand of emotion. Emotions, which let themselves be described in words with such difficulty, are directly conveyed to man in music, and in that is its power and significance.
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A quiet secluded life in the country, with the possibility of being useful to people to whom it is easy to do good, and who are not accustomed to have it done to them; then work which one hopes may be of some use; then rest, nature, books, music, love for one's neighbor β such is my idea of happiness.
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