God has graced every tradition with insight into the divine mystery, from the most primitive to the most sophisticated-each has a gift to bring to the world.
BEDE GRIFFITHSThere is a beautiful expression of this in the Chandogya Upanishad: ‘There is this City of Brahman, (that is the body), and in this city there is a shrine, and in that shrine there is a small lotus, and in that lotus there is a small space, (akasa).
More Bede Griffiths Quotes
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In his (Christ’s) surrender on the cross all the pain and agony of mankind was concentrated at a single point, and passed through from death to immortality.
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This process of change since my stroke has been very gradual. It is going on all the time… It is partly a physical transformation.
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I was being called to surrender the very citadel of my self. I was completely in the dark. I did not really know what repentance was or what I was required to repent of. It was indeed the turning point of my life.
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God had brought me to my knees and made me acknowledge my own nothingness, and out of that knowledge I had been reborn. I was no longer the centre of my life and therefore I could see God in everything.
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The main theme of the Bible is the restoration of humanity and, through humanity, of the whole of creation to its original harmony.
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Stillness within one individual can affect society beyond measure.
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It was God’s purpose which he set forth in Christ as a plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things in him, things on heaven and things on earth’.
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…the need to overawe people and demand obedience from them is powerful and seductive. It is a part of that world that the kingdom of heaven is not of.
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I am rediscovering the whole sexual dimension of life at the age of 86, really. And that also means discovering the feminine. So the whole of this dimension, which I had been seeking for a very long time, is now sort of opening itself up to me.
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It is no longer a question of a Christian going about to convert others to the faith, but of each one being ready to listen to the other and so to grow together in mutual understanding.
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Above all we have to go beyond words and images and concepts. No imaginative vision or conceptual framework is adequate to the great reality.
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Now what exists within that small space, that is to be sought, that is to be understood.’ This is the great discovery of the Upanishads, this inner shrine, this guha, or cave of the heart, where the inner meaning of life, of all human existence, is to be found.
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Atheism and agnosticism signify the rejection of certain images and concepts of God or of truth, which are historically conditioned and therefore inadequate. Atheism is a challenge to religion to purifiy its images and concepts and come nearer to the truth of divine mystery.
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There is no pain of any creature from the beginning to the end of time which was not ‘known’ at this point and thus transmuted.
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The body itself is undergoing great changes. My problem before was that I was living largely from the head; and then after the stroke I got down into the heart.
BEDE GRIFFITHS