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Sinai Quotes

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Sinai Quotes

“If the Palestinian people really wish to decide that they will battle to the very end to prevent partition or annexation of even an inch of their ancestral soil, then I have to concede that that is their right. I even think that a sixty-year rather botched experiment in marginal quasi-statehood is something that the Jewish people could consider abandoning. It represents barely an instant in our drawn-out and arduous history, and it's already been agreed even by the heirs of Ze'ev Jabotinsky that the whole scheme is unrealizable in 'Judaea and Samaria,' let alone in Gaza or Sinai. But it's flat-out intolerable to be solicited to endorse a side-by-side Palestinian homeland and then to discover that there are sinuous two-faced apologists explaining away the suicide-murder of Jewish civilians in Tel Aviv, a city which would be part of a Jewish state or community under any conceivable 'solution.' There's that word again...”

IsraelPalestineGazaJewsPartitionIsraeli Palestinian ConflictSinaiPalestiniansAnnexationFinal SolutionSuicide AttackTel AvivJudaea And SamariaZe Ev Jabotinsky
Book:Hitch 22: A Memoir
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“If the Pentateuch be true, religious persecution is a duty. The dungeons of the Inquisition were temples, and the clank of every chain upon the limbs of heresy was music in the ear of God. If the Pentateuch was inspired, every heretic should be destroyed; and every man who advocates a fact inconsistent with the sacred book, should be consumed by sword and flame. In the Old Testament no one is told to reason with a heretic, and not one word is said about relying upon argument, upon education, nor upon intellectual development—nothing except simple brute force. Is there to-day a christian who will say that four thousand years ago, it was the duty of a husband to kill his wife if she differed with him upon the subject of religion? Is there one who will now say that, under such circumstances, the wife ought to have been killed? Why should God be so jealous of the wooden idols of the heathen? Could he not compete with Baal? Was he envious of the success of the Egyptian magicians? Was it not possible for him to make such a convincing display of his power as to silence forever the voice of unbelief? Did this God have to resort to force to make converts? Was he so ignorant of the structure of the human mind as to believe all honest doubt a crime? If he wished to do away with the idolatry of the Canaanites, why did he not appear to them? Why did he not give them the tables of the law? Why did he only make known his will to a few wandering savages in the desert of Sinai? Will some theologian have the kindness to answer these questions? Will some minister, who now believes in religious liberty, and eloquently denounces the intolerance of Catholicism, explain these things; will he tell us why he worships an intolerant God? Is a god who will burn a soul forever in another world, better than a christian who burns the body for a few hours in this? Is there no intellectual liberty in heaven? Do the angels all discuss questions on the same side? Are all the investigators in perdition? Will the penitent thief, winged and crowned, laugh at the honest folks in hell? Will the agony of the damned increase or decrease the happiness of God? Will there be, in the universe, an eternal auto da fe?”

MindReasonGodChristianLawReligionUniverseForceHeavenWishEducationSilenceMusicChristianityKindnessPowerHellDoubtWifeMagicHonestCrimeDutyHusbandBibleArgumentEternityCatholicInspiredJewIntellectIgnorantFlamesTemplesCatholicismJealousInvestigationIntoleranceLaughEgyptPersecutionAngelsWillJudaismTheologianDeath PenaltyFactHeresyIdolatryUnbeliefHereticJehovahInquisitionDungeonsReligious LibertyBrute ForceThiefYahwehThe BiblePerditionSinaiSubjectMagiciansReligious PersecutionMinisterConvertsPentateuchBaalCanaanitesAuto Da FePenitentSinai Desert
Book:Some Mistakes of Moses
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“Monotheism at Sinai, primitive Christianity, messianic socialism: these are the three supreme moments in which Western culture is presented with what Ibsen termed "the claims of the ideal." These are the three stages, profoundly interrelated, through which Western consciousness is forced to experience the blackmail of transcendence.”

MomentsCultureThreeConsciousnessChristianityStageIdealsClaimsWesternSupremeSocialismPrimitiveTranscendenceWestern CultureBlackmailMonotheismSinaiIbsen
Author:George Steiner
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“I do believe that half a dozen commonplace attorneys could so mystify and misconstrue the Ten Commandments, and so confuse Moses' surroundings on Mount Sinai, that the great law-giver, if he returned to this planet, would doubt his own identity, abjure every one of his deliverances, yea, even commend the very sins he so clearly forbade his people.”

PeopleIfsBelieveLawSinHalfDoubtIdentityPlanetsTenDozenCommandmentsSurroundingsGiverMosesCommonplaceAttorneyDeliveranceTen CommandmentsSinai
Author:Elizabeth Cady Stanton
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“The bloody massacre in Bangladesh quickly covered over the memory of the Russian invasion of Czechoslovakia, the assassination of Allende drowned out the groans of Bangladesh, the war in the Sinai Desert made people forget Allende, the Cambodian massacre made people forget Sinai, and so on and so forth until ultimately everyone lets everything be forgotten.”

PeopleMadeWarMemoriesForgetForgottenDesertCoveredBloodyInvasionAssassinationMassacresBangladeshSinaiCzechoslovakia
Author:Milan Kundera
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“Moses does not encounter the living God at the mall. He finds Him (or is found by Him) somewhere out in the deserts of Sinai, a long way from the comforts of Egypt... Where did the great prophet Elijah go to recover his strength? To the wild. As did John the Baptist, and his cousin, Jesus, Who is led by the Spirit into the wilderness.”

WayLongDoeInspirationSpiritFaithFoundJesusComfortChristian InspirationalDesertProphetEncountersWildernessEgyptCousinLong WayMosesBaptistsMallsElijahSinaiJohn The Baptist
Book:Captivating Revised and Updated: Unveiling the Mystery of a Woman's Soul
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“While the Passover narrative [in Exodus] energizes Israel's imagination toward justice, Israel's hard work of implementation of that imaginative scenario was done at Mt. Sinai. . . . Moses' difficult work at Sinai is to transform the narrative vision of the Exodus into a sustainable social practice that has institutional staying-power, credibility, and authority.”

HardDoneSocialDifficultImaginationJusticeVisionPracticeHard WorkAuthorityIsraelNarrativeStayingImaginativeCredibilityScenariosMosesImplementationExodusStaying PowerSinaiDifficult Work
Book:The Covenanted Self: Explorations in Law and Covenant
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“You have to take the long view. First, when Moses came down from Mt. Sinai, man has already progressed to the point where a commandment against cannibalism was no longer necessary. And, second, it's like pissing on a boulder. For the first few thousand years, you don't see any effect. But after that, you start to see a definite impact.”

MenYearsFirstsLongViewsEffectsThousandImpactCommandmentsThousand YearsDefiniteMosesCannibalismBouldersSinai
Author:I. F. Stone
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“Orthodox Jews, or, as they are known in the Talmud, the Really Chosen Ones, are committed to the idea that the entire Torah was dictated by God verbatim to Moses at Mount Sinai... Other forms of Judaism dispute this claim, although it does explain certain passages in the first Torah, such as, I'm sorry, am I boring you? and What do you like better, Moses, Lord Almighty or Big Hoohah?”

FirstsDoeIdeasBigsFormCertainKnownLordClaimsSorryCommittedJewBoringChosenOrthodoxPassagesAlmightyI'm SorryJudaismDisputesMosesTorahChosen OneSinai
Author:Jon Stewart
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“God may thunder His commands from Mount Sinai and men may fear, yet remain at heart exactly as they were before. But let a man once see his God down in the arena as a Man-suffering, tempted, sweating, and agonized, finally dying a criminal's death-and he is a hard man indeed who is untouched.”

MenHeartMayHardSufferingJesusChristDyingJesus ChristCriminalsCommandArenaTemptedThunderSweatingSinai
Book:The newborn Christian: 114 readings from J.B. Phillips
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“The law given from Sinai was a civil and municipal as well as a moral and religious code; it contained many statutes . . . of universal application-laws essential to the existence of men in society, and most of which have been enacted by every nation which ever professed any code of laws.”

MenWellsHas BeensGovernmentLawReligionGivenNationsReligiousExistenceMoralMoralityEssentialsUniversalCodeApplicationStatutesSinai
Book:Letters of John Quincy Adams, to His Son, on the Bible and Its Teachings
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“It is against their own insoluble problem of being human that the dull and base in humanity are in revolt in anti-Semitism. Judaism, nevertheless, together with Hellenism and Christianity is an inalienable component of our Christian Western civilization, the eternal "call to Sinai" against which humanity again and again rebels.”

HumansProblemChristianTogetherHumanityChristianityCivilizationEternalWesternDullRebelAgain And AgainNeverthelessBeing HumanJudaismComponentsRevoltWestern CivilizationAnti SemitismSinaiHellenism
Author:Hermann Rauschning
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“It is one of the ironies of religious history that many mortals err in their understanding of the nature of God and end up rejecting not the real God but their own erroneous and stereotypical image of God. Frequently this is because they have thought of God solely in terms of thunderings at Sinai without pondering substance. . . .”

RealEndsReligionUnderstandingTermReligiousHistoricalMortalsSubstanceIronyPonderingRejectingGod ImageSinaiReligious History
Author:Neal A. Maxwell
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“The voice of God is heard from heaven, declaring the day and hour of Jesus' coming, and delivering the everlasting covenant to His people. Like peals of loudest thunder His words roll through the earth. The Israel of God stand listening, with their eyes fixed upward. Their countenances are lighted up with His glory, and shine as did the face of Moses when he came down from Sinai. The wicked cannot look upon them. And when the blessing is pronounced on those who have honored God by keeping His Sabbath holy, there is a mighty shout of victory.”

PeopleLooksEyeEarthFacesJesusHeavenVoiceHoursHeardListeningVictoryHolyBlessingGloryShiningIsraelFixedLook UpWickedHonoredThunderEverlastingMosesCovenantSabbathDeliveringCountenanceDeclaringVoice Of GodSinai
Book:The Great Controversy—Illustrated
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“Man has made 32 million laws since THE COMMANDMENTS were handed down to Moses on Mount Sinai more than three thousand years ago, but he has never improved on God's law. THE TEN COMMANDMENTS are the principles by which man may live with God and man may live with man. They are the expressions of the mind of God for His creatures. They are the charter and guide of human liberty, for there can be no liberty without the law.”

MenYearsMindHumansMayMadeLawThreeLibertyPrinciplesMillionsExpressionThousandTenCreaturesYears AgoConstitutionGuidesCommandmentsThousand YearsMosesTen CommandmentsCharterSinai
Author:Cecil B. DeMille
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“We should prepare to go over to the offensive. Our aim is to smash Lebanon, Trans-Jordan and Syria. The weak point is Lebanon, for the Moslem regime is artificial and easy for us to undermine. We shall establish a Christian state there and then we will smash the Arab Legion, eliminate Trans-Jordan; Syria will fall to us. We then bomb and move on and take Port Said, Alexandria and Sinai.”

ShouldSaidStatesChristianMovingFallEasyWeakAimIsraelBombsRegimesArtificialOffensiveSyriaIsraeliJordanTransPortZionistZionismLegionLebanonAlexandriaSinaiWeak PointsJewish National
Author:David Ben-Gurion
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“For me chemistry represented an indefinite cloud of future potentialities which enveloped my life to come in black volutes torn by fiery flashes, like those which had hidden Mount Sinai. Like Moses, from that cloud I expected my law, the principle of order in me, around me, and in the world... I would watch the buds swell in spring, the mica glint in the granite, my own hands, and I would say to myself: "I will understand this, too, I will understand everything.”

WorldHandsLawScienceOrderBlackMy OwnPrinciplesWatchesSpringCloudsExpectedChemistryFlashTornMosesBudFieryGraniteSinai
Author:Primo Levi
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