Karen Armstrong: Quotes about life

Karen Armstrong is author and comparative religion scholar from Great Britain. Explore interesting quotes on life.
Karen Armstrong: 112   quotes 1   like

“Theologians in all the great faiths have devised all kinds of myths to show that this type of kenosis, or self-emptying, is found in the life of God itself.”

Karen Armstrong

The Spiral Staircase: My Climb Out of Darkness (2004)
Context: We are, the great spiritual writers insist, most fully ourselves when we give ourselves away, and it is egotism that holds us back from that transcendent experience that has been called God, Nirvana, Brahman, or the Tao.
What I now realize, from my study of the different religious traditions, is that a disciplined attempt to go beyond the ego brings about a state of ecstasy. Indeed, it is in itself ekstasis. Theologians in all the great faiths have devised all kinds of myths to show that this type of kenosis, or self-emptying, is found in the life of God itself. They do not do this because it sounds edifying, but because this is the way that human nature seems to work. We are most creative and sense other possibilities that transcend our ordinary experience when we leave ourselves behind.

Life , God , Faith

“Religion is really an art form and a struggle to find value and meaning amid the ghastly tragedy of human life.”

Karen Armstrong

Ode interview (2009)
Context: A lot of the arguments about religion going on at the moment spring from a rather inept understanding of religious truth … Our notion changed during the early modern period when we became convinced that the only path to any kind of truth was reason. That works beautifully for science but doesn't work so well for the humanities. Religion is really an art form and a struggle to find value and meaning amid the ghastly tragedy of human life.

Life , Religion , Art

“Far from being the father of jihad, Mohammad was a peacemaker, who risked his life and nearly lost the loyalty of his closest companions because he was determined to effect a reconciliation with Mecca.”

Karen Armstrong

Source: Muhammad: A Biography of The Prophet (2001)

Life , Loyalty

“there is no ascent to the heights without prior descent into darkness, no new life without some form of death.”

Karen Armstrong

Source: A Short History of Myth

Life , Death

“Deeds that seemed unimportant at the time would prove to have been momentous; a tiny act of selfishness and unkindness or, conversely, an unconsidered act of generosity would become the measure of a human life.”

Karen Armstrong

Muhammad: A Prophet of Our Times
Muhammad: A Biography of The Prophet (2001)

Life , Time , Selfishness

“Eventually, with regret, I left the religious life, and, once freed of the burden of failure and inadequacy, I felt my belief in God slip quietly away. He had never really impinged upon my life, though I had done my best to enable him to do so. Now that I no longer felt so guilty and anxious about him, he became too remote to be a reality.”

Karen Armstrong book A History of God

A History of God (1993)

Life , God , Failure , Reality

“The cosmology of the ancient world was telling you about the nature of life here and now. Genesis is not about the origins of life. There were many other creation stories current in Israel at that time and no one was required to believe in that one.”

Karen Armstrong

Ode interview (2009)

Life , World , Nature , Time