Faith is the highest passion in a human being. Many in every generation may not come that far, but none comes further.
Soren KierkegaardRead
Job endured everything - until his friends came to comfort him, then he grew impatient.
Interpretation
The quote reflects on how Job's suffering was exacerbated by his friends' attempts to comfort him, highlighting the complexity of human relationships during hardship.
In this quote, Soren Kierkegaard illustrates the paradox of friendship in times of suffering through the biblical figure Job. While Job endured immense personal suffering, it was the well-meaning but ultimately frustrating attempts of his friends to provide comfort that pushed him to impatience, suggesting that sometimes, the support from others can feel more burdensome than the struggles we face alone.
In practice
In a discussion about the nature of support during tough times.
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 managerβI 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.
Man is a simple being, and however rich, varied, and unfathomable he may be, the cycle of his situations is soon run through.
She mixes religion with desertion to make it sound noble.
In high school, I had to hide my comic book side, my nerd side from the civilian world so they wouldn't categorize me. They would try to marginalize me for what I like. I tried to give it up, believe me. I tried to kick the habit. But there's too much I liked about it to give it up completely.
When people learn no tools of judgment and merely follow their hopes, the seeds of political manipulation are sown.
If every tool, when ordered, or even of its own accord, could do the work that befits it... then there would be no need either of apprentices for the master workers or of slaves for the lords.
As I look back over the truly crucial events in my life I realize that they were not planned long in advance. Albert Einstein said, 'There are only two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is.'
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