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Never once in my life did I ask God for success or wisdom or power or fame. I asked for wonder, and he gave it to me.

Abraham Joshua Heschel

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Abraham Joshua Heschel
Age: 65 †
Born: 1907
Born: January 11
Died: 1972
Died: December 23
Judaic Scholar
Philosopher
Rabbi
University Teacher
Warszawa
Abraham Heschel
Never
Fame
Life
Gave
Asked
Wonder
Wisdom
Asks
Success
Power

More quotes by Abraham Joshua Heschel

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How embarrassing for man to be the greatest miracle on earth and not to understand it!
Abraham Joshua Heschel
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He who is satisfied has never truly craved, and he who craves for the light of God neglects his ease for ardor.
Abraham Joshua Heschel
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The worship of reason is arrogance and betrays a lack of intelligence. The rejection of reason is cowardice and betrays a lack of faith.
Abraham Joshua Heschel
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The idea of dependence is an explanation, whereas self-sufficiency is an unprecedented, nonanalogous concept in terms of what we know about life within nature. Is not self-sufficiency itself insufficient to explain self-sufficiency?
Abraham Joshua Heschel
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All events are secretly interrelated the sweep of all we are doing reaches beyond the horizon of our comprehension.
Abraham Joshua Heschel
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Faith is not the clinging to a shrine but an endless pilgrimage of the heart. Audacious longing, burning songs, daring thoughts, an impulse overwhelming the heart, usurping the mind--these are all a drive towards serving Him who rings our hearts like a bell. It is as if He were waiting to enter our empty, perishing lives.
Abraham Joshua Heschel
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There is a realm of time where the goal is not to have but to be, not to own but to give, not to control but to share, not to subdue but to be in accord. Life goes wrong when the control of space, the acquisition of things of space, becomes our sole concern.
Abraham Joshua Heschel
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There is a built-in sense of indebtedness in the consciousness of man, an awareness of owing gratitude, or being caled upon at certain moments to reciprocate, to answer, to live in a way which is compatible with the grandeur and mystery of living.
Abraham Joshua Heschel
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The true meaning of existence is disclosed in moments of living in the presence of God
Abraham Joshua Heschel
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Wonder, or radical amazement, is a way of going beyond what is given in thing and thought, refusing to take anything for granted, to regard anything as final. It is our honest response to the grandeur and mystery of reality our confrontation with that which transcends the given.
Abraham Joshua Heschel
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To become aware of the ineffable is to part company with words.
Abraham Joshua Heschel
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The man who has not suffered - what does he know anyway?
Abraham Joshua Heschel
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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
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When religion speaks only in the name of authority rather than with the voice of compassion, its message becomes meaningless.
Abraham Joshua Heschel
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There are few ideas in the world of thought which contain so much spiritual power as the idea of the Sabbath. Aeons hence, when of many of our cherished theories only shreds will remain, that cosmic tapestry will continue to shine.
Abraham Joshua Heschel
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Sometimes we wish the world could cry and tell us about that which made it pregnant with fear-filling grandeur. Sometimes we wish our own heart would speak of that which made it heavy with wonder.
Abraham Joshua Heschel
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We forfeit the right to worship God as long as we continue to humiliate negroes. ... The hour calls for moral grandeur and spiritual audacity.
Abraham Joshua Heschel
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When I was young, I admired clever people. Now that I am old, I admire kind people.
Abraham Joshua Heschel
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Wonder or radical amazement is the chief characteristic of the religious man's attitude toward history and nature.
Abraham Joshua Heschel
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In the midst of our applauding the feats of civilization, the Bible flings itself like a knife slashing our complacency remind us that God, too, has a voice in history.
Abraham Joshua Heschel