Faith is the highest passion in a human being. Many in every generation may not come that far, but none comes further.
Soren KierkegaardRead
Concepts, like individuals, have their histories and are just as incapable of withstanding the ravages of time as are individuals. But in and through all this they retain a kind of homesickness for the scenes of their childhood.
Interpretation
Concepts and individuals both evolve over time, yet they yearn for their origins.
Soren Kierkegaard's quote suggests that both concepts and people are subject to the passage of time and change, losing their original state and innocence. However, despite this transformation, there remains an intrinsic longing for the simplicity and familiarity of their beginnings, reflecting a deeper philosophical reflection on the nature of existence and growth.
In practice
In a speech about the importance of preserving cultural heritage, one might quote Kierkegaard to emphasize our connection to our roots.
Faith is the highest passion in a human being. Many in every generation may not come that far, but none comes further.
Men think that it is impossible for a human being to love his enemies, for enemies are hardly able to endure the sight of one another. Well, then, shut your eyes--and your enemy looks just like your neighbor.
How did I get into the world? Why was I not asked about it and why was I not informed of the rules and regulations but just thrust into the ranks as if I had been bought by a peddling shanghaier of human beings? How did I get involved in this big enterprise called actuality? Why should I be involved? Isn't it a matter of choice? And if I am compelled to be involved, where is the manager—I have something to say about this. Is there no manager? To whom shall I make my complaint?
A possibility is a hint from God. One must follow it.
And when the hourglass has run out, the hourglass of temporality, when the noise of secular life has grown silent and its restless or ineffectual activism has come to an end, when everything around you is still, as it is in eternity, then eternity asks you and every individual in these millions and millions about only one thing: whether you have lived in despair or not.
I am so stupid that I cannot understand philosophy; the antithesis of this is that philosophy is so clever that it cannot comprehend my stupidity. These antitheses are mediated in a higher unity; in our common stupidity.
The vast numbers of people who suffer some kind of mental illness under capitalism can either think, 'there is some failing with me, if only I could fit into this system better, if only I were working harder, if only I could enjoy these empty pleasures more, then things would be OK' or 'the problem is with the system that is making me ill.'
If you can let go of (the Tao) with your mind and surround it with your heart, it will live inside you forever.
There are things than cannot ever occur with any precision. They are too big and too magnificent to be contained in mere facts. They are merely trying to occur, they are checking whether the ground of reality can carry them. And they quickly withdraw, fearing to loose their integrity in the frailty of realization.
Every individual of the community at large has an equal right to the protection of government.
I think the greatest weakness in the church today is that almost no one believes that God invests His power in the Bible. Everyone is looking for power in a program, in a methodology, in a technique, in anything and everything but that in which God has placed it—His Word. He alone has the power to change lives for eternity, and that power is focused on the Scriptures.
It is one of the sternest judgments confronting a human being after death that insofar as he is himself evil, he can see only what resembles himself because he can reproduce in his own being only the physiognomy of other evil people.
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