“What is too absurd to believe is believed because it is too absurd to be a lie.”

Sebban Balwer
(15 October 1994)
Source: Lord of Chaos

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

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Robert Jordan 305
American writer 1948–2007

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“It is to be believed because it is absurd.”
Prorsus credibile est, quia ineptum est. / Certum est, quia impossibile.

Tertullian (155–220) Christian theologian

Variant translations
It is by all means to be believed, because it is absurd.
It is is entirely credible, because it is inept.
It is certain because it is impossible.
De Carne Christi 5.4
Often paraphrased or misquoted as "Credo quia absurdum."
Also paraphrased as "It is so extraordinary that it must be true."
Two lines from De Carne Christi have often become conflated into the statement: "Credo quia impossibile" (I believe it because it is impossible), which can be perceived as a distortion of the actual arguments that Tertullian was making.

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“Do not believe in an absurdity
no matter who says it.”

Rumi (1207–1273) Iranian poet

"The Three Fish" Ch. 18 : The Three Fish, p. 196
Disputed, The Essential Rumi (1995)

“Even if it's absurd to think you can change things, it's even more absurd to believe that it is foolish and unimportant to try.”

Peter C. Newman (1929) Canadian journalist

Source: Here Be Dragons: Telling Tales Of People, Passion and Power

George Orwell photo

“There are some ideas so absurd that only an intellectual could believe them.”

George Orwell (1903–1950) English author and journalist

Possibly a paraphrase of Bertrand Russell in My Philosophical Development (1959): "This is one of those views which are so absurd that only very learned men could possibly adopt them." It is similar in meaning to Orwell's line from Notes on Nationalism (1945): "One has to belong to the intelligentsia to believe things like that: no ordinary man could be such a fool." However, Russell was commenting not on politics, as Orwell was, but on some philosophers and their ideas about language.
Misattributed
Variant: Some ideas are so stupid that only intellectuals believe them.

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“It is absurd to believe in the possibility of perpetual peace…Fascist education must be education for battle. Fascism believes in sanctity and heroism.”

Achille Starace (1889–1945) Italian Fascist general

Quoted in "Believe, Obey, Fight" - Page 98 - by Tracy H. Koon - Political Science – 1985.

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“Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities.”

John Allen Paulos (1945) American mathematician

Preface (p. xiii; quoting Voltaire)
Irreligion: A Mathematician Explains Why the Arguments for God Just Don’t Add Up (2008)

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