There is something precious in our being mysteries to ourselves, in our being unable ever to see through even the person who is closest to our heart and to reckon with him as though he were a logical proposition or a problem in accounting.
Interpretation
This quote highlights the inherent mystery of human relationships and the complexities of understanding ourselves and others.
Rudolf Bultmann emphasizes that a significant aspect of human existence lies in the mysteries that we embody. No matter how close we are to someone or how much we think we understand ourselves, there are always layers of depth and complexity that elude our comprehension. This invites a sense of humility and wonder in our relationships, as we encounter the unpredictable nature of human connection and the limitations of our rationality.
In practice
In a discussion on the nature of love, this quote can illustrate how relationships are deeper than mere logic.
It may be said that myths give to the transcendent reality an immanent, this-worldly objectivity. Myths speak about gods and demons as powers on which man knows himself to be dependent, powers whose favors he needs, powers whose wrath he fears. Myths express the knowledge that man is not master of the world and his life, that the world within which he lives is full of riddles and mysteries and that human life also is full of riddles and mysteries.
There is no such thing as a good tax.
Jesus Christ out-socialists the socialists. He says that in His Kingdom he that is greatest shall be the servant of all. The real test of the saint is not preaching the gospel, but washing disciples' feet, that is, doing the things that do not count in the actual estimate of men but count everything in the estimate of God.
Gosh, what a gripping story. You must have been simply terrified. Meanwhile we went to Godric's Hollow and, let's think, what happened there, Harry? Oh yes, You-Know-Who's snake turned up, it nearly killed both of us, and then You-Know-Who himself arrived and missed us by about a second. Imagine losing fingernails, Harry! That really puts our sufferings into perspective, doesn't it?
Every man to whom salvation is offered has an inalienable natural right to say 'No, thank you: I prefer to retain my full moral responsibility: it is not good for me to be able to load a scapegoat with my sins: I should be less careful how I committed them if I knew they would cost me nothing.
Here we meet, on the page, naked and unadorned: shorn of class, race, gender, sexual identity, age and nationality.
Most of black America is in housing projects, without jobs, living on welfare. And this is not the case in 'The Cosby Show,' because all the values in that household are strictly what I would call white American values.
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