
“If I were asked for a one-sentence sound
bite on religion, I would say I was against it.”
“If I were asked for a one-sentence sound
bite on religion, I would say I was against it.”
S’il fallait absolument choisir, j’aimerais mieux faire une chose immorale qu’une chose cruelle.
Le Lys Rouge http://fr.wikisource.org/wiki/Le_Lys_rouge/I [The Red Lily] (1894), ch. 1
I. Asimov: A Memoir (1994)
Context: If I were not an atheist, I would believe in a God who would choose to save people on the basis of the totality of their lives and not the pattern of their words. I think he would prefer an honest and righteous atheist to a TV preacher whose every word is God, God, God, and whose every deed is foul, foul, foul.
I would also want a God who would not allow a Hell. Infinite torture can only be a punishment for infinite evil, and I don't believe that infinite evil can be said to exist even in the case of Hitler. Besides, if most human governments are civilized enough to try to eliminate torture and outlaw cruel and unusual punishments, can we expect anything less of an all-merciful God?
I feel that if there were an afterlife, punishment for evil would be reasonable and of a fixed term. And I feel that the longest and worst punishment should be reserved for those who slandered God by inventing Hell.
“If I had to choose, I would rather have birds than airplanes.”
"Is Civilization Progress?" in Reader's Digest (July 1964)
Source: A Theory of Justice (1971; 1975; 1999), Chapter IV, Section 33, p. 209
Source: Wooden: A Lifetime of Observations and Reflections On and Off the Court