Man has indeed become primarily a tool-making animal, and the world is now a gigantic tool box for the satisfaction of his needs.
ABRAHAM JOSHUA HESCHELMan’s true fulfillment depends on communion with that which transcends him.
More Abraham Joshua Heschel Quotes
-
-
We worry a great deal about the problem of church and state. Now what about the church and God?
ABRAHAM JOSHUA HESCHEL -
In the darkest night to be certain of the dawn…to go through Hell and to continue to trust in the goodness of God-this is the challenge and the way.
ABRAHAM JOSHUA HESCHEL -
All action is vicarious faith.
ABRAHAM JOSHUA HESCHEL -
Aeons hence, when of many of our cherished theories only shreds will remain, that cosmic tapestry will continue to shine.
ABRAHAM JOSHUA HESCHEL -
The man who has not suffered – what does he know anyway?
ABRAHAM JOSHUA HESCHEL -
I have one talent, and that is the capacity to be tremendously surprised, surprised at life, at ideas. This is to me the supreme Hasidic imperative: Don’t be old. Don’t be stale.
ABRAHAM JOSHUA HESCHEL -
It’s silence remains unbroken; no words can carry it away. Sometimes we wish the world could cry and tell us about that which made it pregnant with fear–filling grandeur.
ABRAHAM JOSHUA HESCHEL -
Self-respect is the fruit of discipline; the sense of dignity grows with the ability to say no to oneself.
ABRAHAM JOSHUA HESCHEL -
Awareness of the divine begins with wonder.
ABRAHAM JOSHUA HESCHEL -
Awe enables us to see in the world intimations of the divine, to sense in small things the beginning of infinite significance
ABRAHAM JOSHUA HESCHEL -
Each day enrapture me with your marvelous things without number. …I do not ask to see the reason for it all: I ask only to share the wonder of it all.
ABRAHAM JOSHUA HESCHEL -
You must build your life as if it were a work of art.
ABRAHAM JOSHUA HESCHEL -
Sometimes there seems to be a greater separation between the church and God than between the church and state.
ABRAHAM JOSHUA HESCHEL -
Human being is both being in the world and living in the world. Living involves responsible understanding of one’s role in relation to all other beings.
ABRAHAM JOSHUA HESCHEL -
Celebration is an active state, an act of expressing reverence or appreciation. To be entertained is a passive state–it is to receive pleasure afforded by an amusing act or a spectacle.
ABRAHAM JOSHUA HESCHEL






