Wishful Thinking: A Theological ABC (1973)
“Is man one of God’s blunders, or is God one of man’s blunders?”
“One must be fond of people and trust them if one is not to make a mess of life”
What I Believe (1938)
Context: One must be fond of people and trust them if one is not to make a mess of life, and it is therefore essential that they should not let one down. They often do. The moral of which is that I must, myself, be as reliable as possible, and this I try to be. But reliability is not a matter of contract — that is the main difference between the world of personal relationships and the world of business relationships. It is a matter for the heart, which signs no documents. In other words, reliability is impossible unless there is a natural warmth. Most men possess this warmth, though they often have bad luck and get chilled. Most of them, even when they are politicians, want to keep faith. And one can, at all events, show one's own little light here, one's own poor little trembling flame, with the knowledge that it is not the only light that is shining in the darkness, and not the only one which the darkness does not comprehend.
Source: 2000s, Letter to a Christian Nation (2006), p. 51
Context: Atheism is not a philosophy - it is not even a view of the world. It is simply an admission of the obvious. In fact, "atheism" is a term that should not even exist. No one ever needs to identify himself as a "non-astrologer" or a "non-alchemist." We do not have words for people who doubt that Elvis is still alive or that aliens have traversed the galaxy only to molest ranchers and their cattle. Atheism is nothing more than the noises reasonable people make in the presence of unjustified religious beliefs.
Understanding Islam Through Hadis, Voice of India, Second Reprint, 1987, Pp. 115-16.
Understanding Islam Through Hadis (1983)
The small god in Ch. 44 : the visitor
The Visitor (2002)
Context: Not many years before the Happening, one of your country's largest religious bodies officially declared that their book was holier than their God, thus simultaneously and corporately breaking several commandments of their own religion, particularly the first one. Of course they liked the book better! It was full of magic and contradictions that they could quote to reinforce their bigoted and hateful opinions, as I well know, for I chose many parts of it from among the scrolls and epistles that were lying around in caves here and there. They're correct that a god picked out the material; they just have the wrong god doing it.
Address on religious factions (1981)
Context: There is no position on which people are so immovable as their religious beliefs. There is no more powerful ally one can claim in a debate than Jesus Christ, or God, or Allah, or whatever one calls this supreme being. But like any powerful weapon, the use of God's name on one's behalf should be used sparingly. The religious factions that are growing throughout our land are not using their religious clout with wisdom. They are trying to force government leaders into following their position 100 percent. If you disagree with these religious groups on a particular moral issue, they complain, they threaten you with a loss of money or votes or both.
“What is it: is man only a blunder of God, or God only a blunder of man?”
Wie? ist der Mensch nur ein Fehlgriff Gottes? Oder Gott nur ein Fehlgriff des Menschen?
Maxims and Arrows, 7
Variant: Which? Is man one of God's blunders or is God one of man's blunders?
Source: Twilight of the Idols (1888)
"In Egypt Land," December 30, 1946
TIME magazine (1939-1948)
