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I did not ask for success I asked for wonder.

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
Wonder
Asks
Success
Asked

More quotes by Abraham Joshua Heschel

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Philosophy, to be relevant, must offer us a wisdom to live by.
Abraham Joshua Heschel
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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.
Abraham Joshua Heschel
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Understanding God is not attained by calling into session all arguments for and against Him, in order to debate whether He is a reality or a figment of the mind. God cannot be sensed as a second thought, as an explanation of the origin of the universe. He is either the first and the last, or just another concept.
Abraham Joshua Heschel
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Mundus vult decipi'—the world wants to be deceived. To live without deception presupposes standards beyond the reach of most people whose existence is largely shaped by compromise, evasion and mutual accommodation. Could they face their weakness, their vanity and selfishness, without a mask?
Abraham Joshua Heschel
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Proximity to the crowd, to the majority view, spells the death of creativity. For a soul can create only when alone, and some are chosen for the flowering that takes place in the dark avenues of night.
Abraham Joshua Heschel
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All action is vicarious faith.
Abraham Joshua Heschel
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This is one of the goals of the Jewish way of living: to experience commonplace deeds as spiritual adventures, to feel the hidden love and wisdom in all things.
Abraham Joshua Heschel
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Few are guilty, but all are responsible.
Abraham Joshua Heschel
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Normal consciousness is a state of stupor, in which the sensibility to the wholly real and responsiveness to the stimuli of the spirit are reduced. The mystics, knowing that man is involved in a hidden history of the cosmos, endeavor to awake from the drowsiness and apathy and to regain the state of wakefulness for their enchanted souls.
Abraham Joshua Heschel
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Faith like Job's cannot be shaken becasue it is the result of having been shaken.
Abraham Joshua Heschel
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Knowledge-like the sky- is never private property. No teacher has a right to withhold it from anyone who asks for it. Teaching is the art of sharing.
Abraham Joshua Heschel
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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. For living is not being in itself, but living of the world, affecting, exploiting, consuming, comprehending, deriving, depriving.
Abraham Joshua Heschel
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Prayer is our humble answer to the inconceivable surprise of living.
Abraham Joshua Heschel
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The 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.
Abraham Joshua Heschel
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There is happiness in the love of labor, there is misery in the love of gain.
Abraham Joshua Heschel
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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?
Abraham Joshua Heschel
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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. It is the beginning of wisdom to be amazed at the fact of our being free.
Abraham Joshua Heschel
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In a controversy, the instant we feel anger, we have already ceased striving for truth and have begun striving for ourselves.
Abraham Joshua Heschel
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Awareness of the divine begins with wonder.
Abraham Joshua Heschel
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It is of the essence of virtue that the good is not to be done for the sake of a reward.
Abraham Joshua Heschel