A Quote by Stephen Colbert

Leaving religious texts open too interpretation is the downfall of religion itself. If it is truly the word of God then there is no room for interpretation; you either take all of it or none. There is no selective belief

Stephen Colbert

Quote Author

Stephen Colbert
American - Comedian
Born: May 13, 1964

The real problem is not the religion itself, but its insistence that the interpretation it offers of the world is the only valid interpretation.

Avtarjeet Singh Dhanjal

ISIS itself, it draws its central belief system from the Koran and from the writings of the Prophet Muhammad. That is undeniable. And it's a medieval interpretation of it. It is a literal interpretation of it.

Jack Keane

Theater is about interpretation and what an actor and what a director brings to a piece too. I'm open to it every time I work with a director and a group of actors. I have to be open to that interpretation. I'm not one of those hysterical playwrights that come and say, "This is not what I intended to do." It's one rendition of the piece.

Nilo Cruz

Make a mistake in the interpretation of one of Shakespeare’s plays, falsely scan a piece of Spenserian verse, and there is unlikely to be an entailment of eternal consequence; but we cannot lightly accept a similar laxity in the interpretation of Scripture. We are dealing with God’s thoughts: we are obligated to take the greatest pains to understand them truly and to explain them clearly.

D. A. Carson

God either rules as sovereign in interpretation over *all* areas of life or none.

Greg L. Bahnsen

Religion by itself was not meant to be a divisive tool. All of our religious teachings have similar rules, such as a commitment to peace and nonviolence, and care for women and widows and orphans. What has destroyed a coming together is men's interpretation of religion.

Leymah Gbowee

Reality is ultimately a selective act of perception and interpretation. A shift in our perception and interpretation enables us to break old habits and awaken new possibilities for balance, healing, and transformation.

David Simon

To avoid the hard necessity of either obeying or rejecting the plain instructions of our Lord in the New Testament we take refuge in a liberal interpretation of them. We evangelicals also know how to avoid the sharp point of obedience by means of fine and intricate explanations. These are tailor-made for the flesh. They excuse disobedience, comfort carnality and make the words of Christ of none effect. And the essence of it all is that Christ simply could not have meant what He said. His teachings are accepted even theoretically only after they have been weakened by interpretation.

Aiden Wilson Tozer

The god hypothesis is no longer of any pragmatic value for the interpretation or comprehension of nature, and indeed often stands in the way of better and truer interpretation. Operationally, God is beginning to resemble not a ruler, but the last fading smile of a cosmic Cheshire Cat.

Julian Huxley

You can compare Holmes and Watson to great Shakespearean characters, in a way. They've been played by hundreds of actors over the years, and each one is a different interpretation - the source material can take that form of interpretation.

Jude Law

I studied scriptural interpretation, which is more about how people get meaning out of texts, looking at stuff in the Old Testament - Muslims, Christians, Jews, different interpretations of the same texts.

Win Butler

You can think too highly of your interpretations of Scripture, but you cannot think too highly of Scriptures interpretation of itself. You can exaggerate your authority in handling the Scriptures, but you cannot exaggerate the Scriptures authority to handle you. You can use the word of God to come to wrong conclusions, but you cannot find any wrong conclusions in the word of God.

Kevin DeYoung

The challenge for a writer looking at history is to figure out what is history and what is myth. After all, what you are looking at is an interpretation of history, and so at some level, it becomes an interpretation of an interpretation.

Dan Brown

Perception is a selective act of attention and interpretation.

Deepak Chopra

You must test your own religious claims and texts by the same standards you apply to other religions. If your religion's claims and texts fair no better, then your religion is just as false as theirs is.