The problem to be faced is: how to combine loyalty to one’s own tradition with reverence for different traditions.
ABRAHAM JOSHUA HESCHELThe riches of the soul are stored up in its memory. this is the test of character, not whether a man follows the daily fashion, but whether the past is alive in his present.
More Abraham Joshua Heschel Quotes
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We use words as tools. We forget that words are a repository of the spirit. The tragedy of our times is that the vessels of the spirit are broken.
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The opposite of good is not evil, the opposite of good is indifference.
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Trust is the core of human relationships, of gregariousness among men.
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Spiritual life begins to decay when we fail to sense the grandeur of what is eternal in time.
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The awe of God is wisdom.
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It is not enough for me to ask question; I want to know how to answer the one question that seems to encompass everything I face: What am I here for?
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It is dangerous to take human freedom for granted, to regard it as a prerogative rather than as an obligation, as an ultimate fact rather than as an ultimate goal.
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This may be the vocation of man: to say “Amen” to being and to the Author of being; to live in defiance of absurdity, notwithstanding futility and defeat; to attain faith in God even in spite of God.
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We do not step out of the world when we pray; we merely see the world in a different setting.
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There is a war to wage against the vulgar, the glorification of the absurd, a war that is incessant, universal.
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Self-sufficiency, independence, the capacity to stand apart, to differ, to resist, and to defy-all are modes of being human.
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Celebration is a confrontation, giving attention to the transcendent meaning of one’s actions.
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The degree to which one is sensitive to other people’s suffering, to other (people’s) humanity, is the index of one’s own humanity
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The utilization of its resources is taken to be the chief purpose of man in God’s creation.
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What is meant, however, is a higher category than being: the power of maintaining being.
ABRAHAM JOSHUA HESCHEL