The tragedy of the situation lies in the fact that there is no other choice but crude pagan religion and true Christianity. But in true Christianity man is alone; not only alone, but also the enemy of the majority. And people choose neither one nor the other and remain without faith, whatever it may be.
Yesterday, while taking notes, I didn't understand something about the resurrection. Resurrection means that you come out of the grave of your person through love into the life of the Whole, into the loving consciousness of all those with whom you are connected by communication, touch, readiness to love everything. And all this, hidden to me in time and space, does not even exist. There is only God, that beginning of non-spatiality and timelessness that is in me.
The divine "I" is that "I" that has self-consciousness. The hand, the foot, the nose, the stomach, the brain have no self-consciousness. It has no self-consciousness or unity of all, which is like a dead body. It has self-consciousness something indefinite, free, omnipotent in its spiritual domain.
When we read, we must remember that it is a communication with those close to us and therefore it must be loving, not to be angry with those who do not write well, but to pity them.
The Christianity of Constantine, adopted by the peoples, is like the signing by a careless man of a contract in which the demands of the other party are hidden by clever wording, so that only what is advantageous is seen. And the result was what could be called "you've entered the club, you have to play" (Tolstoy uses an equivalent Russian proverb.). November 22nd
If men pray for the sake of the future salvation of the soul, and for the sake of this future live well, then they are doing the right thing, although they are wrongly explaining the reasons for their activity, projecting into time, into the future, what is being done in the present.
Man is a vessel with two holes, love enters through the first (from God), and life emanates from the other (like a teapot). All that is required of man is to keep both orifices clean for his own good. One is greater, through him God's love enters. It must be kept clean by being freed from selfish passions. The cleanliness of the second hole, from which life emanates, depends on the liberation, the removal of everything that prevents love towards people: irritability, pride, greed.
Yes, passion is the mother of all vices, especially mental ones, false reasoning: politics, science, theology.
You can and must blame your arrogance only on yourself. Because any controversy can be considered arrogance.
Is it proper for youth to want what I want (salvation of the soul), closeness to God? It is clear to me that I cannot wish for anything else, because I am facing death. But to young people, poor things, it seems to them that there are many things worthy of being desired, besides this, the only necessary one.
It is good to pray in solitude, but apart from this prayer and almost more necessary than it is to pray when we communicate with every man, be he a tsar or a beggar. Let us pray, that is, let us remember that the time has come to live with all the powers of the soul.
I thought we had to prepare to die properly. And I remembered that all life from childhood is gradual death, therefore we must always prepare, without ceasing.
At first it seems strange that the man who does something bad becomes even worse. It would seem that he should calm down, he did what he wanted. But it happens like this because his conscience, his conscience rebukes him and he has to justify himself, if not in front of others, then in front of himself, and to justify himself he commits a new evil with a vengeance *.
Sins are therefore sins, that is, mistakes, because they have consequences contrary to the purpose in which they are committed. Indulgence through food, drink, sexual instinct, wealth, aggrandizement cause the feeling of joy to decrease due to satiety.
The absence of religion brings with it, as a result of the absence of the only thing proper to man, the work on his own being, the necessity of transferring this work to others, it causes the foolishness of the behavior, so widespread in our times, the judgment of others and the care of the order of the external material world, not of the inner world.
It's time for man to know his worth. How amazing, the consciousness of his spirituality gives man the supreme consciousness of his dignity and at the same time the lowest humility. The consciousness of dignity, which does not mean self-aggrandizement or haughtiness, but has higher requirements than arrogance, and humility, which does not mean submission to man, but lowers man much lower.
What madness, to labor for the order of life! Live for yourself, for God, and life will turn out in the best way. While people live badly, full of cruelty, tsars, ministers, revolutionaries all want to order through this bad life a good life.
"But how not to order life, how not to support the existing order, not to concern yourself with these orders, otherwise everything perishes." But even so, everything perished long ago and is maintained only by the fact that it continues to destroy. Like a ruined, debt-ridden man who can't help but add to his debts to continue the only way of life he knows.
It is overwhelming to pervert the thought of educated people and keep it intact in the uneducated. The cause is the denial of the soul by the learned and its recognition by the unlearned.
The definition of the world as a result of the movement of matter, according to Marx, Engels, Feuerbach, Dietzgen, is much more complicated, incomparably harder and more confused, and especially more unfounded than the definition given by God.
Without religion, that is, without an established relationship with the spiritual infinite, man is nothing more than a tailless monkey who knows how to make phonographs, balloons, bombs, etc.
It is good to treat people as if you were saying goodbye to them before death. And you won't be wrong. Isn't it all the same if half an hour or half a century separates you from death?
It is good to remember that every day, every hour is a postponement of death. Then all that is external and happens to you is of little importance (what is an injury, sickness, poverty, the loss of a friend compared to death?), and making the best use of the remaining time takes on immense importance. Yes, reminder dies.
Only the man who endures violence can be free, not the one who commits it.
What can console you for dying, when you are just beginning to understand how to live and begin to live? The fact that it is not you who lives, but humanity, all that is spiritual lives through God. Join Him and you will not die.
Man was commanded to increase love (this commandment carries it in the heart), and he arranges the comfort of his life. Like a laborer who is told to sow, plant, and he forgets, or goes in one ear and out the other, but remembers to level the ground, rake, smooth, and level, rake, smooth the earth that has already turned green. It seems to him that this is his only job.
The purpose of life is not to be great, rich, powerful, but to guard your soul.
Religion is the relationship with God. Idolaters have this relationship, but the most learned man does not. The idolater is incomparably above.
Moving from a religion you've lived in to a new one, to a new relationship with God, is no joke, it's a hard thing.
Humility and the consciousness of your human dignity are one and the same thing, which is not compatible with pride, ambition, or wealth.