A Quote by John Taylor Gatto

Self-knowledge is the only basis of true knowledge.

John Taylor Gatto

Quote Topics

Basis Knowledge Only Self Self-Knowledge True True Knowledge

Quote Author

John Taylor Gatto
American - Educator
Born: December 15, 1935

First, my people must be taught the knowledge of self. Then and only then will they be able to under-stand others and that which surrounds them. Anyone who does not have a knowledge of self is considered a victim of either amnesia or unconsciousness and is not very competent. The lack of knowledge of self is a prevailing condition among my people here in America. Gaining the knowledge of self makes us unite into a great unity. Knowledge of self makes you take on the great virtue of learning.

Elijah Muhammad

Self-knowledge is not the knowledge of a dead self, self-knowledge is the knowledge of the process of the self. It is an alive phenomenon. The self is not a thing, it is an event, it is a process. Never think in terms of things, the self is not there inside you just like a thing waiting in your room. The self is a process: changing, moving, arriving at new altitudes, moving into new planes, going deeper into new depths. Each moment much work is going on and the only way to encounter this self is to encounter it in relationship.

Rajneesh

That knowledge which purifies the mind and heart alone is true Knowledge, all else is only a negation of Knowledge.

Ramakrishna

We achieve self knowledge through the Kundalini. Now the journey starts towards God knowledge. Without self knowledge one cannot know about God as actualised knowledge.

Nirmala Srivastava

So the problem in the West is that, especially in places like the USA, a person will obtain this much knowledge and immediately think that they have a large amount of knowledge. And then start to act on the basis of what they think, they posses. Instead of having this much knowledge and realizing that in fact this is only this much knowledge and the amount of where you can go there is where you came is much bigger than where you've already gotten.

Robert Svoboda

True wisdom consists in two things: Knowledge of God and Knowledge of Self.

John Calvin

Science can only be comprehended epistemologically, which means as one category of possible knowledge, as long as knowledge is not equated either effusively with the absolute knowledge of a great philosophy or blindly with scientistic self-understanding of the actual business of research.

Jurgen Habermas

Under whatever name or form we worship It, It leads us on to knowledge of the nameless, formless Absolute. Yet, to see one's true Self in the Absolute, to subside into It and be one with "It, this is the true Knowledge of the Truth.

Ramana Maharshi

Advocates of knowledge management as the next big thing have advanced the proposition that what companies need is more intellectual capital. While that is undeniably true, its only partly true. What those advocates are forgetting is that knowledge is only useful if you do something with it.

Jeffrey Pfeffer

Knowledge is happiness, because to have knowledge - broad, deep knowledge - is to know true ends from false, and lofty things from low.

Helen Keller

Understanding of the self only arises in relationship, in watching yourself in relationship to people, ideas, and things; to trees, the earth, and the world around you and within you. Relationship is the mirror in which the self is revealed. Without self-knowledge there is no basis for right thought and action.

Jiddu Krishnamurti

Islam is a religion based upon knowledge, and a denial of the possibility and objectivity of knowledge would involve the destruction of the fundamental basis upon which not only the religion, but all the sciences are rooted.

Syed Muhammad Naquib al-Attas

Without knowledge of self there is no knowledge of God Our wisdom, in so far as it ought to be deemed true and solid Wisdom, consists almost entirely of two parts: the knowledge of God and of ourselves. But as these are connected together by many ties, it is not easy to determine which of the two precedes and gives birth to the other.

John Calvin

Opportunism towards knowledge is a utilitarian demand that knowledge must be immediately practical. Just like with sociology where we hope its purpose is to serve society, however, the true purpose of sociology lies in its impracticality. It cannot become practical or else it loses its meaning. Perhaps we should learn a different kind of knowledge: the knowledge to question knowledge.