Simone Weil Quotes

Happiness is a mystery, like religion, and should never be rationalised.

Our spiritual mission is not to ignore the darkness, but to bring light TO the darkness. Ignoring darkness does not dispel it; only the light does. That is the difference between denial and transcendence.

So many religions are there because so many people are unhappy. A happy person needs no religion; a happy person needs no temple, no church - because for a happy person the whole universe is a temple, the whole existence is a church. The happy person has nothing like religious activity because his whole life is religious.

Was there nought better than to enjoy? No feat which, done, would make time break, And let us pent-up creatures through Into eternity, our due? No forcing earth teach heaven's employ?

If one feels the need of something grand, something infinite, something that makes one feel aware of God, one need not go far to find it.

What is important is not the length of life, but the depth of life. What is important is not to make life longer, but to take your soul out of time, as every sublime act does.

Heaven is in everything: follow the light, hide in the cloudiness and begin in what is. Do this and your understanding will be like not understanding and your wisdom will be like not being wise. By not being wise you will become wise later.

There are many sources of spirituality; religion may be the most common, but it is by no means the only. Anything that generates a sense of awe may be a source of spirituality. Science does this in spades.

I think there's a lot that's beautiful about religion and very inspiring, obviously, but I do think that God needs to be rescued from religion actually.

The essence of religion, in my view, is the thirst for an end higher than natural ends.

Religion is the great balm of existence because it takes us outside ourselves, connects us to something larger

God made us: invented us as a man invents an engine. A car is made to run on petrol, and it would not run properly on anything else. Now God designed the human machine to run on Himself. He Himself is the fuel our spirits were designed to burn, or the food our spirits were designed to feed on. There is no other. That is why it is just no good asking God to make us happy in our own way without bothering about religion. God cannot give us a happiness and peace apart from Himself, because it is not there.

It wasn't that [he] believed in religion, or a God, or an afterlife. He just knew it was impossible to feel this much love and for it to end.

I was maybe 5 or 6, and my grandmother would begin sitting me in the Quaker meeting house. I asked my grandmother, 'What am I supposed to do?' and she said, 'Just wait, we're going inside to greet the light.' I liked that—this idea to go inside to find that light within, literally as well as figuratively.

In spite of my study, I have learned. Every grand religion begins in light. Yet only hearts hold light. Pages cannot. I have paper in my hands. Give these words to the world and they will be loved and understood by those who already know their truth. The truth doesn't burn. The truth waits for anyone who wishes to find it... only these pages will burn. At one with the stars... with the pages and their love... one with everything that is, that ever was or will be. One.

Begin now, as you read these words, as you sit in your chair, to offer your whole selves, utterly and in joyful abandon, in quiet, glad surrender to Him who is within. In secret ejaculations of praise, turn in humble wonder to the Light, faint though it may be.

There is obviously a great human need for religion because life seems to be such a mystery.

Heaven is comfort, but it's still not living.

Both light and shadow are the dance of Love. Love has no cause, it is the astrolabe of God's secrets. Lover and loving are inseparable and timeless. Although I may try to describe love, when I experience it, I am speechless. Although I may try to write about love, I am rendered helpless. My pen breaks, and the paper slips away at the ineffable place where lover loving and loved are one. Every moment is made glorious by the light of Love.

When we pray for death we really desire a fuller life.

People who want to rise above a well-cooked meal and a well-tailored garment, are out of their spiritual minds.

Religion seems to have always offered us that false duality ... the silences of infinite space or the cozy comfort of inner certainty.

The one true freedom in life is to come to terms with death, and as early as possible, for death is an event that embraces all our lives. And the only way to have a good death is to lead a good life. The more we do God's will, the less unfinished business we leave behind when we die.

In the now, time ceases to exist and we experience a presence that is all-absorbing, completely at peace, and totally satisfying.

Religion, in India, means realisation and nothing short of that.