Swami Ashokananda was a brilliant and accomplished spiritual teacher in the West. — Huston Smith Copy Share Image
If we take the world’s enduring religions at their best, we discover the distilled wisdom of the human race. — Huston Smith Copy Share Image
First of all, my persuasion is what really breeds violence is political differences. But because religion serves as the soul of community,… — Huston Smith Copy Share Image
“Such power as I possess for working in the political field has derived from my experiments in the spiritual field.” — Huston Smith Copy Share Image
“Religion arose out of celebration and its opposite, bereavement, both of which cry out for collective expression.” — Huston Smith Copy Share Image
In the post-individualistic era, science and spirituality will become allies, and human beings will realize a vast potentiality now only dimly felt. — Huston Smith Copy Share Image
No one in human history has given as much thought to the interweaving of altered states of consciousness and religion as I… — Huston Smith Copy Share Image
A nation can assume that the addition of the words "under God" to its pledge of allegiance gives evidence that its citizens… — Huston Smith Copy Share Image
Every society and religion has rules, for both have moral laws. And the essence of morality consists, as in art, of drawing… — Huston Smith Copy Share Image
Most mystics do not want to read religious wisdom; they want to be it. A postcard of a beautiful lake is not… — Huston Smith Copy Share Image
“The Infinite discloses itself, as much of itself as our finite minds can comprehend, by building the universal grammars of language and… — Huston Smith Copy Share Image
“God has made different religions to suit different aspirations, times, and countries. All doctrines are only so many paths; but a path… — Huston Smith Copy Share Image
'Blessed are the poor in spirit, for they shall see God' suggested to me a heavenly welfare program for the meek. Today… — Huston Smith Copy Share Image
the heart of religion is not altered states but altered traits of character. For me, then, the test of a substance's religious… — Huston Smith Copy Share Image
Modernity sees humanity as having ascended from what is inferior to it - life begins in slime and ends in intelligence -… — Huston Smith Copy Share Image
Walnuts have a shell, and they have a kernel. Religions are the same. They have an essence, but then they have a… — Huston Smith Copy Share Image
I don't want to justify religion in terms of its benefits to us. I believe that, on balance, it does a lot… — Huston Smith Copy Share Image
“Muhammad adhered meticulously to the charter he forged for Medina, which - grounded as it was in the Quranic injunction, "Let there… — Huston Smith Copy Share Image
“Never during its pilgrimage is the human spirit completely adrift and alone. From start to finish its nucleus is the Atman, the… — Huston Smith Copy Share Image
Historically, religion has given people another world to live in, a world more adaptive to the human spirit. As a student of… — Huston Smith Copy Share Image
“Building upon this early conception of the Church, Christians came to think of it as having a double aspect. Insofar as it… — Huston Smith Copy Share Image
“How many planes there are, we do not know. The levels of nature that science discriminates give us no clue, for these… — Huston Smith Copy Share Image
“The only power that can effect transformations of the order (of Jesus) is love. It remained for the 20th century to discover… — Huston Smith Copy Share Image
The modern period adds social ethics to religions agenda, for we now realize that social structures are not like laws of nature.… — Huston Smith Copy Share Image
“The disciples of Jesus “found themselves thinking that if divine goodness were to manifest itself in human form, this (he) is how… — Huston Smith Copy Share Image
Seen through the eyes of faith, religion's future is secure. As long as there are human beings, there will be religion for… — Huston Smith Copy Share Image
I've spent the last 50 years or so steeping myself in the world's religions, and I've done my homework. I've gone to… — Huston Smith Copy Share Image
The faith I was born into formed me. I come from a missionary family - I grew up in China - and… — Huston Smith Copy Share Image
Religion teaches us that our lives here on earth are to be used for transformation. — Huston Smith Copy Share Image
I think it matters almost infinitely that we practice one of the authentic religions. But if you mean does it make any… — Huston Smith Copy Share Image
A religion made up solely of heightened religious experiences would not be a religion at all. ...The major religious traditions address the… — Huston Smith Copy Share Image
Entheogens are not to be lightly trifled with... However, if taken with the right attitude and in the proper setting, psychoactive drugs… — Huston Smith Copy Share Image
Institutions are not pretty. Show me a pretty government. Healing is wonderful, but the American Medical Association? Learning is wonderful, but universities?… — Huston Smith Copy Share Image
The notion that Western religions are more rigid than those of Asia is overdrawn. Ours is the most permissive society history has… — Huston Smith Copy Share Image
I'm not a chauvinist. I'm a universalist. I think that God imploded, like a spiritual big bang, to launch the eight civilizations… — Huston Smith Copy Share Image
God has to speak to each person in their own language, in their own idioms. Take Spanish, Chinese. You can express the… — Huston Smith Copy Share Image
“The Transcendent was my morning meal, we had the Eternal at lunch, and I ate a slice of the Infinite at dinner.” — Huston Smith Copy Share Image
The first koan do not have rational answers. They are techniques devised over the millennia for triggering an actual experience. — Huston Smith Copy Share Image
We all carry it within us: supreme strength, the fullness of wisdom, unquenchable joy. It is never thwarted, and cannot be destroyed. — Huston Smith Copy Share Image
A nation can assume that the addition of the words "under God" to its pledge of allegiance gives evidence that its citizens actually believe… — Huston Smith Copy Share Image
“Some friends accused me of whoring after the Infinite. Well, what better whoredom is there?” — Huston Smith Copy Share Image
Imagine a man besottedly in love: he won't waste time speculating whether other women equally merit his affection. — Huston Smith Copy Share Image
“If my opinion that substance requires a true unity were founded only on a definition I had formulated in opposition to common usage, *then… — Huston Smith Copy Share Image
The New Age movement looks like a mixed bag. I see much in it that seems good: It's optimistic; it's enthusiastic; it has the… — Huston Smith Copy Share Image
Science can prove nothing about God, because God lies outside its province. — Huston Smith Copy Share Image
I had assumed that Bush's seemingly inflexible policy to support Sharon was for political reasons of his getting elected. But as to whether he… — Huston Smith Copy Share Image
“How many planes there are, we do not know. The levels of nature that science discriminates give us no clue, for these all pertain… — Huston Smith Copy Share Image
