Malcolm Bradbury Quotes

Religion stands, the Church blocking the sun.

Now I think one of the reasons why religion developed in the way that it did over the centuries was precisely to curb this murderous bent that we have as human beings.

Religion may have become a codification of morality, and it may fortify it, but it's not the origin of it.

It is conceivable that religion may be morally useful without being intellectually sustainable.

Religion is the recognition of all our duties as divine commands.

There has to be some kind of order and some moral code. I don't know how people can function without a belief in a deity.

If there's one thing for which I admire you, it's your original discovery of the Ten Commandments.

Religion is the last refuge of human savagery.

Muslims are bound to know all the tenets of their religion, to discuss them and to regulate their lives accordingly. Therefore, a purely secular education without religious instructions would be like a body without soul.

Man has made 32 million laws since the Commandments were handed down to Moses on Mount Sinai... but he has never improved on God's law.

The main business of religions is to purify, control, and restrain that excessive and exclusive taste for well-being which men acquire in times of equality.

If God existed, and if He cared for humankind, He would never have given us religion.

For that again, is what all manner of religion essentially is: childish dependency.

I call religion a natural authority, but it has usually been conceived as a supernatural authority.

If faith is lost, there is no security and there is no life for him who does not adhere to religion.

I think you can be cynical about religion on occasion, and certainly skeptical about the degree to which some people use religion to manipulate other people.

Any system of religion that has anything in it that shocks the mind of a child, cannot be true.

If God would have wanted us to live in a permissive society He would have given us Ten Suggestions and not Ten Commandments.

I don't know any institution in this country that... carries more influence than the church.

The difference between religion and morality lies simply in the classical division of things into the divine and the human, if one only interprets this correctly.

The notion that there is no basic value system is far more incoherent or invalid than the notion that there are essential values. Every religion can tell you it has basic values. You ask a Christian, most Christians would say love God and love your neighbor. Is that the entirety of Christianity? No one in his right mind would say it is.

If religion cannot restrain evil, it cannot claim effective power for good.

The institution of religion exists only to keep mankind in order ...

Authentic religion does not require politicians

I see no good reasons why the views given in this volume should shock the religious sensibilities of anyone.