Quote of the Week 57 - Micah

“He has told you, O man, what is good, and what God requires of you: Only to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God.”
Micah

Quotes of the Week 56 - Winkler, Evil Inclination

“Judaism is a living path, a dynamic theology. Show me any legal ruling in the traditional Jewish codes and I will show you on the same page one or two or half a dozen sources who contest, qualify, reinterpret, or outright disagree with that ruling. I am a Jew. Give me a boundary, and I shall cross it.”

--Rabbi Gershon Winkler, from his book, Travels with the Evil Inclination

“I will not be to my predecessors as a donkey, eternally hauling their books. I will explain their teachings and study their ways, but when my perception does not correspond to theirs…I will then decide according to what my own eyes are seeing, and will do so with legal confidence. For the Creator grants wisdom in every generation and in every period, and will not deny goodness to those who are sincere.”

--Rabbi Gershon Winkler, quoting 13th century Rabbi Nachmanides, in Winkler’s book, Travels with the Evil Inclination

Quote of the Week 55 - The World is a Refinery

“The world is the world. But the majority of the people will be more conscious. The majority, not the whole world. The world will always have raw materials, half-finished, unpainted. It’s a fact! People get cleaned, refined and then go. So it is a refinery. You can’t expect all pure gasoline in a refinery; crude oil comes in, gasoline goes out. That is the purpose of life.”

Swami Satchitananda

Quotes of the Week 54 - God is Love

Self-importance is our greatest enemy. Think about it – what weakens us is feeling offended by the deeds and misdeeds of our fellow men. Our self-importance requires that we spend most of our lives offended by someone.

Far beyond all thought and death, no matter how smart, lies the magnificent conquering energy that one sees in even the smallest of babes and feels in the body’s very cells and heart: LOVE.

I believe that true love is that which overflows at home to spill out to others in the world.

God is the center of love, and a cruel fire, too. We are not prepared to accept that other aspect of God.

What do you do? I pick up the blossoms dropped by night. I listen to the whispers of silence. I contemplate on the vast void within. I babble Her name in each breath of my life. I revere the beauty of Her radiant face. When sun comes out of bed, I retire. I enter the depths of void and bathe in the eternal fire. Through the clouds of joy, the wingless bird of my spirit soars higher and higher. I am in love and fused beyond desire. That is what I do.

The mere existence of anything is an astonishment without a cause.

Once you identify yourself with universal consciousness, you will experience oneness with all and find great delight in witnessing changes taking place in the external world as well as in yourself. Your fear of death, decay, and destruction vanishes. You become fearless. Because of this fearlessness, you love all and reject none, for you know that everyone and everything in the universe is simply an elaboration of yourself. In this state of realization, love alone is your spontaneous expression because that has become your nature.

-- All sources unknown