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Indifference to evil is more insidious than evil itself. It is a silent justification affording evil acceptability in society.

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
Evil
Affording
Insidious
Justification
Indifference
Silent
Society

More quotes 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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New insight begins when satisfaction comes to an end, when all that has been seen, said, or done looks like a distortion. ... Man's true fulfillment depends on communion with that which transcends him.
Abraham Joshua Heschel
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A religious man is a person... whose greatest passion is compassion.
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There are no two hours alike. Every hour is unique and the only one given at the moment, exclusive and endlessly precious. Judaism teaches us to be attached to holiness in time to learn how to consecrate sanctuaries that emerge from the magnificent stream of a year.
Abraham Joshua Heschel
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The test of love is in how one relates not to saints and scholars but to rascals.
Abraham Joshua Heschel
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God is not a hypothesis derived from logical assumptions, but an immediate insight, self-evident as light. He is not something to be sought in the darkness with the light of reason. He is the light.
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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Self-respect is the fruit of discipline the sense of dignity grows with the ability to say no to oneself.
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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We are closer to God when we are asking questions than when we think we have the answers.
Abraham Joshua Heschel
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Forfeit your sense of awe, let your conceit diminish your ability to revere, and the universe becomes a market place for you.
Abraham Joshua Heschel
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Life is not meaningful...unle ss it is serving an end beyond itself unless it is of value to someone else.
Abraham Joshua Heschel
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Awe enables us to see in the world intimations of the divine, to sense in small things the beginning of infinite significance, to sense the ultimate in the common and the simple, to feel in the rush of the passing the stillness of the eternal.
Abraham Joshua Heschel
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Our age is one in which usefulness is thought to be the chief merit of nature in which the attainment of power, the utilization of its resources is taken to be the chief purpose of man in God's creation. 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 Heschel
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To pray is to take notice of the wonder, to regain a sense of the mystery that animates all beings, the divine margin in all attainments.
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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When I was young, I admired clever people. Now that I am old, I admire kind people.
Abraham Joshua Heschel
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(People) can never attain fulfillment, or sense of meaning, unless it is shared, unless it pertains to other human beings.
Abraham Joshua Heschel
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Ultimately there is no power to narcissistic, self-indulgent thinking. Authentic thinking originates with an encounter with the world.
Abraham Joshua Heschel
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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