Quote

We have had to learn that history is neither a God nor a redeemer.

Reinhold Niebuhr

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Reinhold Niebuhr
Age: 78 †
Born: 1892
Born: June 21
Died: 1971
Died: June 1
Ethicist
Philosopher
Political Scientist
Theologian
University Teacher
Wright City
Missouri
Karl Paul Reinhold Niebuhr
Neither
Learn
History
Redeemer

More quotes by Reinhold Niebuhr

Image
Ultimately evil is done not so much by evil people, but by good people who do not know themselves and who do not probe deeply.
Reinhold Niebuhr
Image
The prophet himself stands under the judgment which he preaches. If he does not know that, he is a false prophet.
Reinhold Niebuhr
Image
Ultimately freedom is necessary for a society, because every despotic society - for instance, the Russian society - lives on the basis of a rather implausible dogma - the Marxist dogma of world redemption through Communism.
Reinhold Niebuhr
Image
For democracy is a method of finding proximate solutions for insoluble problems.
Reinhold Niebuhr
Image
Nothing we do, however virtuous, can be accomplished alone therefore, we are saved by love. No virtuous act is quite as virtuous from the standpoint of our friend or foe as it is from our own standpoint. Therefore we must be saved by the final form of love, which is forgiveness.
Reinhold Niebuhr
Image
I think I have one answer, that is partly religious and partly secular and that is to say, we ought to at least recognize that we and the Russians are in a common predicament. That would be religious in the sense, Judge not lest you be judged.
Reinhold Niebuhr
Image
Nothing which is true or beautiful or good makes complete sense in any immediate context of history therefore we must be saved by faith.
Reinhold Niebuhr
Image
Rationalism belongs to the cool observer. But because of the stupidity of the average person, they follow not reason, but faith. This naïve faith, requires necessary illusions and emotionally potent oversimplifications, which are provided by the myth maker to keep the ordinary person on course.
Reinhold Niebuhr
Image
The essence of man is his freedom. Sin is committed in that freedom. Sin can therefore not be attributed to a defect in his essence. It can only be understood as a self-contradiction, made possible by the fact of his freedom but not following necessarily from it.
Reinhold Niebuhr
Image
Religion, declares the modern man, is consciousness of our highest social values. Nothing could be further from the truth. True religion is a profound uneasiness about our highest social values.
Reinhold Niebuhr
Image
It's always wise to seek the truth in our opponents' error, and the error in our own truth.
Reinhold Niebuhr
Image
Life is a battle between faith and reason in which each feeds upon the other, drawing sustenance from it and destroying it.
Reinhold Niebuhr
Image
I'm not afraid of too many things, and I got that invincible kind of attitude from my father.
Reinhold Niebuhr
Image
The final wisdom of life requires not the annulment of incongruity but the achievement of serenity within and above it.
Reinhold Niebuhr
Image
Love is the motive, but justice is the instrument.
Reinhold Niebuhr
Image
Faith is the final triumph over incongruity, the final assertion of the meaningfulness of existence.
Reinhold Niebuhr
Image
Whether the man is an atheist or a Christian, I would judge him by his fruits, and I have therefore many agnostic friends.
Reinhold Niebuhr
Image
The more complex the world situation becomes, the more scientific and rational analysis you have to have, the less you can do with simple good will and sentiment.
Reinhold Niebuhr
Image
You can't say that religion or irreligion will give us a particular answer to the nuclear dilemma.
Reinhold Niebuhr
Image
The history of mankind is a perennial tragedy for the highest ideals which the individual may project are ideals which he can never realize in social and collective terms.
Reinhold Niebuhr