Top 267 Quotes & Sayings by Famous Rabbis - Page 3

When you see something that is broken, fix it. When you find something that is lost, return it. When you see something that needs to be done, do it. In that way, you will take care of your world and repair creation.

If you help yourself to the benefits of being married when you are single, you're likely to help yourself to the benefits of being single when you're married.

Therefore, it is forbidden to say anything to anyone that might cause animosity between any two people.

Like sacrifices, prayer is intended to change man, not God. Its purpose is to cultivate a contrite heart, to promote feelings of humility and inadequacy in man, whilst encouraging reliance on Divine assistance.

The fool who traveled is better off than the wise man who stayed home.

The idea of America's religious groups fighting over the limited public money to be made available takes us down the road towards the kind of sectarian competition that has torn so many nations apart, and which our separation of church and state has spared us.

Everybody is unique. Compare not yourself with anybody else lest you spoil God's curriculum.

For any of us to come to the understanding that we are common and unlearned is the accomplishment of a lifetime.

Above all, those to whom the care of young minds has been entrusted should see to it that they respect both the smallest and largest animals as beings which, like people, have been summoned to the joy of life.

Faith is the capacity of the soul to perceive the abiding, the invisible in the visible.

As man acts, God reacts.

The world says that time is money, but I say that money is time. In order to earn enough money to satisfy his desires, one must sacrifice inordinate amounts of time. For me, that sacrifice is too great.

The special life is where the ordinary becomes extraordinary, the natural becomes miraculous, the everyday becomes unique. Finding the magic and wonder within nature is the most assured means by which children rediscover the joy of life.

We all, I think, believe in compassion. If you look at all the world religions, all the main world religions, you'll find within them some teaching concerning compassion.

Every breath drawn by an individual who truly serves God will elicit a responsive chord from the universe around him.

The immemorial ingratitude of rulers and commonwealths is proverbial. Especially common is ingratitude to Israel - the People that has achieved so much of eternal worth, but has rarely succeeded in winning gratitude.

Our emotions can be either corrupted or elevated. Human love was not created to be without premeditated purpose.

From the prophets' dreams of the time when nations would beat their swords into plowshares to today's aspirations of a nuclear-weapons-free world, we have sought to avoid armed conflict and not yield to despair in the search for universal peace. The nuclear threats from Iran, North Korea, and terrorists can only be overcome through international cooperation. We call upon Congressional leaders and those worldwide to join together to ensure the fulfillment of these long-overdue initiatives and the achievement of a safer future without nuclear weapons.

We should learn and reflect to the best of our capacity, but when we reach a point where we are unable to make sense of life, we should supplant faith for understanding, and reflect again on what we do know.

We forgot we have Holy Body not less than our Holy Spirit.

We learn from here the humility of the Holy One, Blessed is He. Since man is in the likeness of the angels, and they would be jealous of him, for this reason, He consulted them.

The desire to be good to all with no restrictions - not in the quantity of those to whom we are good nor in the quality of the good we perform - that is the inner nucleus of the essence of the soul of Israel.

The happiest people I know are people who don't even think about being happy. They just think about being good neighbors, good people. And then happiness sort of sneaks in the back window while they are busy doing good.

A wife is not a man's shadow or subordinate, but his other self, his "helper," in a sense which no other creature on earth can be.

Judaism stands or falls with its belief in the historic actuality of the revelation at Sinai.

You have to fight gravity.

This idea of compassion comes to us because we're made in the image of God, who is ultimately the compassionate one.

Before you can find God, you must lose yourself.

The "burning bush" was not a miracle. It was a test. God wanted to find out whether or not Moses could pay attention to something for more than a few minutes. When Moses did, God spoke. The trick is to pay attention to what is going on around you long enough to behold the miracle without falling asleep. There is another world, right here within this one, whenever we pay attention.

Laughing has always seemed to me to be more Jewish than praying.

The flavour of a fish which comes out of the sea at Acre is not similar to the flavour of a fish which comes out of the sea in Spain.

We live in a divine world.

Whoever raises a righteous child, it is as if he did not die.

You dramatically increase your value to others if you always maintain a calm and pleasant manner.

As an Orthodox Jew I must acknowledge that a society can only be successful if it adheres to God's basic plan. By recognizing that a battle is raging and that, right now, Christian conservatives are leading the side I believe is morally, historically, and intellectually correct, I find myself linking arms with those so many of my coreligionists vilify.

Once Mel Gibson revealed himself to be, like the president, a person of serious religious faith, the gloves came off. Mel Gibson has done a major favor for serious faith, both Jewish and Christian, in America. He has made it "cool" to be religious, but in so doing he has unleashed the hatred of secular America against himself personally, against his work and against his family. God bless him.

All the various component parts of the Hebrew worship subserve this great purpose, the bringing of man into communication with God.

Hold up your hands before your eyes. You are looking at the hands of God.

Everything above and below is one unity.

One whose soul does not wander in the expanses, one who does not seek the light of truth and goodness with all his heart, does not suffer spiritual ruins - but he will also not have his own self-based constructions. Instead, he takes shelter in the shadow of the natural constructions, like rabbits under boulders. But one who has a human soul cannot take shelter in anything other than constructions that he builds with his own spiritual toil.

We can endure much more than we think we can; all human experience testifies to that. All we need to do is learn not to be afraid of pain. Grit your teeth and let it hurt. Don't deny it, don't be overwhelmed by it. It will not last forever. One day, the pain will be gone and you will still be there.

On Shabbat something happens to the world - the world becomes infinite again.

... every entity loses perfection as long as it is not fulfilling its purpose.

Our Sages refer to Prayer as "Service of the Heart". But the heart cannot work properly unless the brain functions to stimulate and control its operation. In the physiology of Prayer, too, the mind plays as vital a role as the heart.

To really observe the Sabbath in our day and age! To cease for a whole day from all business, from all work, amidst the frenzied hurry-scurry of our age! To close the stock exchanges, the stores, the factories - how would it be possible? The pulse of life would stop beating and the world perish! The world perish? To the contrary, it would be saved.

Silence, indifference and inaction were Hitler's principal allies.

Because unity and friendship is so precious that even God wants to be part of it.

You are worried that the religious Right might succeed in forcing their values onto us? I am worried they might fail.

... on every important issue life transcends logic and it is folly to depend on reason alone.

We have confused God with Santa Claus. And we believe that prayer means making a list of everything you don't have but want and trying to persuade God you deserve it. Now I'm sorry, that's not God, that's Santa Claus.

If you concentrate on finding whatever is good in every situation, you will discover that your life will suddenly be filled with gratitude, a feeling that nurtures the soul

We really have no choice but to pray and encourage a return to an America steeped in Judeo-Christian values. It is either that or taking our chances in a society with no values at all. For all Americans the former carries certain risks, but the latter spells certain doom. For now, we should not be deflected by theological debate from the life-saving tasks awaiting us. There is work to be done. We must ensure that America will continue to be part of God's plan for the world.

The best armor is to keep out of range.

Action takes precedence over study.

Ten percent of life is what happens; the other 90 percent is what you do about it.

Among Jews, there is an absence of drunkenness, always a fruitful source of domestic strife and misconduct.

Life is a frail and transitory thing, but it has been given a higher purpose and dignity through the revelation of God's Teaching to Israel, and the resulting dedication of an entire people to God's service.

Receive with simplicity everything that happens to you.

If I were a CEO of a company and ran it like God runs the universe, I'd be fired.

A tiny remnant of a big thing is better than a whole little thing.