So far as I can remember, there is not one word in the Gospels in praise of intelligence.
Interpretation
The quote suggests that the Gospels do not commend intelligence or intellectual pursuits.
Bertrand Russell's quote reflects the idea that religious texts, particularly the Gospels, focus more on faith, morality, and spiritual values than on the importance of intelligence or rational thinking. This highlights a tension between religious beliefs and intellectualism, suggesting that faith may require a different approach than rational understanding.
In practice
During a debate about the role of reason in faith, this quote can provide a thought-provoking perspective.
St. Paul introduced an entirely novel view of marriage, that it existed primarily to prevent the sin of fornication. It is just as if one were to maintain that the sole reason for baking bread is to prevent people from stealing cake.
Freedom comes only to those who no longer ask of life that it shall yield them any of those personal goods that are subject to the mutations of time.
Of these austerer virtues the love of truth is the chief, and in mathematics, more than elsewhere, the love of truth may find encouragement for waning faith. Every great study is not only an end in itself, but also a means of creating and sustaining a lofty habit of mind; and this purpose should be kept always in view throughout the teaching and learning of mathematics.
At all times, except when a monarch could enforce his will, war has been facilitated by the fact that vigorous males, confident of victory, enjoyed it, while their females admired them for their prowess.
Moreover, the attitude that one ought to believe such and such a proposition, independently of the question whether there is evidence in its favor, is an attitude which produces hostility to evidence and causes us to close our minds to every fact that does not suit our prejudices.
Extreme hopes are born from extreme misery.
If truth were everywhere to be shown, a scarlet letter would blaze forth on many a bosom.
Death laid its eggs in the wound
To see a world in a grain of sand_x000D_ And a heaven in a wild flower,_x000D_ Hold infinity in the palm of your hand,_x000D_ And eternity in an hour.
Science without conscience is the soul's perdition.
Our strength lies in spiritual concepts. It lies in public sensitivities to evil. Our greatest danger is not from invading armies. Our dangers are that we may commit suicide from within by complaisance with evil, or by public tolerance of scandalous behavior.
In proportion as a church is holy, in that proportion will its testimony for Christ be powerful.
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