They don't ask much of you. They only want you to hate the things you love and to love the things you despise.
Boris PasternakRead
What you don't understand is that it is possible to be an atheist, it is possible not to know if God exists or why He should, and yet to believe that man does not live in a state of nature but in history, and that history as we know it now began with Christ, it was founded by Him on the Gospels.
Interpretation
What this quote means
This quote explores the relationship between faith, history, and the role of Christ in shaping modern life.
Boris Pasternak's quote conveys the idea that one can hold a secular view or uncertainty about the divine while still acknowledging the profound impact of history shaped by religious narratives, particularly those surrounding Christ. It suggests that even without belief in God, the influence of Christian teachings and the development of history through the Gospels have fundamentally shaped human existence and moral frameworks.
Themes
FaithHistoryChristPhilosophyBelief
In practice
Example use cases
During a philosophical debate on the origins of morality.
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He is her glory. Any woman could say it. For every one of them, God is in her child. Mothers of great men must have been familiar with this feeling, but then, all women are mothers of great men -- it isn't their fault if life disappoints them later.
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Our evenings are farewells. Our parties are testaments. So that the secret stream of suffering. May warm the cold of life.
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The most extraordinary discoveries are made when the artist is overwhelmed by what he has to say.
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Oh, how one wishes sometimes to escape from the meaningless dullness of human eloquence, from all those sublime phrases, to take refuge in nature, apparently so inarticulate, or in the wordlessness of long, grinding labor, of sound sleep, of true music, or of a human understanding rendered speechless by emotion!
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