Celebration is a confrontation, giving attention to the transcendent meaning of one's actions.
Abraham Joshua HeschelRead
Solitude is a necessary protest to the incursions and the false alarms of society's hysteria, a period of cure and recovery.
Interpretation
Solitude allows for introspection and healing away from societal pressures.
In this quote, Abraham Joshua Heschel emphasizes the importance of solitude as a means of resisting the chaos and distractions created by society. He suggests that taking time away from the noise of everyday life is essential for personal recovery and reflection, allowing individuals to regain their sense of self in a world often filled with confusion and false concerns.
In practice
During a retreat, one might say, 'Remember, solitude is a necessary protest to the incursions of society's hysteria.'
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.
Freedom means you are unobstructed in living your life as you choose. Anything less is a form of slavery.
And to the degree that the individual maintains a show before others that he himself does not believe, he can come to experience a special kind of alienation from self and a special kind of wariness of others.
I must dissent emphatically from any proposal to spend any money on preparing a statue of me, more especially at a time when people do not have enough food and clothing.
We come from a dark abyss, we end in a dark abyss, and we call the luminous interval life.
One mustn't ask apple trees for oranges, France for sun, women for love, life for happiness.
Listen to the Exhortation of the Dawn! Look to this Day! For it is Life, the very Life of Life. In its brief course lie all the Verities and Realities of your Existence. The Bliss of Growth, The Glory of Action, The Splendor of Beauty; For Yesterday is but a Dream, And To-morrow is only a Vision; But To-day well lived makes Every Yesterday a Dream of Happiness, And every Tomorrow a Vision of Hope. Look well therefore to this Day! Such is the Salutation of the Dawn!
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