Humanities & Cultures

While I was attending university I was able to start the long process of recovering from the childhood abuse that I had suffered. There was a particular author that helped me tremendously in those early years.

Namely, Abraham Joshua Heschel, who wrote a book entitled God in Search of Man - A Philosophy of Judaism

Here are some quotes:

Theology starts with dogmas. Philosophy sees the problem first; theology has the answer in advance. Philosophy is a kind of thinking that has a beginning but no end; the problems outlive all solutions.

We teach children how to measure and weigh, but fail to teach them how to revere, how to sense wonder and awe. Modern man fell into the trap of believing all enigmas can be solved and wonder is a form of ignorance. Mankind will not perish for want of information, but for want of appreciation.

What is, is more than what you see; we are unable to attain insight into the ultimate meaning and purpose of things. We live on the fringe of reality and hardly know how to reach the core. Inaccessible to us are the insights into the nature of ultimate reality. Even what is revealed is incomplete and in disguise.

Awe is an act of insight into a meaning greater than ourselves. Knowledge is fostered by curiosity; wisdom is fostered by awe. Awe is the awareness of transcendent meaning; loss of awe is a great blockage to insight.

“The ineffable” is a synonym for hidden meaning rather than for absence of meaning, a dimension so real and sublime that it stuns our ability to adore it. All creative thinking comes out of an encounter with the unknown. It is a fact of profound significance that we can sense more than we can say.

The world as scrutinized and depicted by science is but a thin surface of the profoundly unknown.