Gnostic Quotes
What’s the meaning of life? Aphorisms, maxims and quotations expressing the paradoxical essence of gnosticism.
Gate
"we live in a cage of light an incredible cage animals animals without end" - Ikkyu
"There is, in every man, an animal thus imprisoned, like a galley slave, and there is a gate, and if we open the gate, the animal will rush out, like the slave finding his [...]
Giants
"If I have seen further, it is by standing on the shoulders of giants." - Isaac Newton
"A dwarf on a giant's shoulders sees the further of the two." - George Herbert, 1593-1632
"The Giants who formed this world into its sensual existence and now seem to live in it in chains, [...]
God
"Philosophers call God 'the great unknown.' 'The great misknown' is more like it!" - Joseph Roux, 1834-1905
"I think there are innumerable gods. What we on earth call God is a little tribal God who has made an awful mess. Certainly forces operating through human consciousness control events." - William S. Burroughs
God II
"It is absurd to call him a God of justice and goodness, who inflicts evil indiscriminately on the good and the wicked, upon the innocent and the guilty. It is idle to demand the the unfortunate should console themselves for their misfortunes in the very arms of the one who alone is the author [...]
God III
"If God lived on earth, people would break his windows." - Jewish Proverb
"Why attack God? He may be as miserable as we are." - Erik Satie, 1866-1925
"Perhaps God is not dead; perhaps God is himself mad…" - R. D. Laing, The Fact of Life, pub. A.D.1976
"Operationally, God is [...]
Gods
"I believe there are many gods not one and always in conflict. Well, if there are a gods who created and control what's going on here, you can tell a lot about them by what is going on. I assume they are colonists. And so anything you can see here you can infer is [...]
Gods II
"Man's responsibility increases as that of the gods decreases." - Andre Gide, Journals
"Ultimately a hero is a man who would argue with the gods, and so awakens devils to contest his vision." - Norman Mailer, The Presidential Papers, pub. A.D. 1963
"Once apparently the chief concern and masterpiece of the gods, [...]
Gods Thought
"The universe is one of God's thoughts." - Friedrich von Schiller, 1759-1805
"The universe is merely a fleeting idea in God's mind - a pretty uncomfortable thought, particularly if you've just made a down payment on a house." - Woody Allen, Getting Even
Good & Bad
"Generally, it may be stated that what people consider to be good is really bad, and most of the things that are considered bad are really good." - Maimonides, Preservation of Youth, pub. 1190
"The greater part of what my neighbors call good I believe in my soul to be bad, and if [...]
Good & Evil
"The essence of morality is a questioning about morality; and the decisive move of human life is to use ceaselessly all light to look for the origin of the opposition between good and evil." - Georges Bataille, 1897-1962
"So far as we are human, what we do must be either evil or good: [...]
Gravity
"The idea that God is an oversized white male with a flowing beard who sits in the sky and tallies the fall of every sparrow is ludicrous. But if by God one means the set of physical laws that govern the universe, then clearly there is such a God. This God is emotionally unsatisfying… [...]
Great Library
"Part of my fear arose from the dim understanding that I was a prisoner within a prisoner, that even as I was imprisoned with a body similar to those around me, so this body was imprisoned within the great library." - H.P. Lovecraft, The Shadow out of Space, from The Watchers out of Time, [...]
Growth
"Everybody wants to be somebody; nobody wants to grow." - Goethe
"All growth is a leap in the dark, a spontaneous, unpremeditated act without benefit of experience." - Henry Miller
