Quotes by Paul Tillich

“Astonishment is the root of philosophy.”

“Man is able to decide for or against reason, he is able to create beyond reason or to destroy below reason”

“man is free, in so far as he has the power of contradicting himself and his essential nature. Man is free even from his freedom; that is, he can surrender his humanity”

“Sometimes I think it is my mission to bring faith to the faithless, and doubt to the faithful.”

“Faith as the state of being ultimately concerned implies love, namely, the desire and urge toward the reunion of the seperated.”

“Faith includes both an immediate awareness of something unconditional and the courage to take the risk of uncertainty upon itself. Faith says "Yes" in spite of the anxiety of "No."Biblical Religion...”

“Only if God IS ultimate reality, can he be our unconditional concern; only then can he be the object of surrender, obedience, and assent. Faith in anything which has only preliminary reality is ido...”

“Faithis a concern of the whole person; it is the most personal concern, and that which determines all others. it is not something which we can produce by the will to believe, but that by which we a...”

“Man is the question he asks about himself, before any question has been formulated. It is, therefore, not surprising that the basic questions were formulated very early in the history of mankind.”

“Our language has wisely sensed these two sides of mans being alone. It has created the word loneliness to express the pain of being alone. And it has created the word solitude to express the glory ...”

“Language has created the word loneliness to express the pain of being alone. And it has created the word solitude to express the glory of being alone.”

“This is biblical ethics. It has little to do with the middle-class ethics of avoiding a few things which are supposed to be wrong and doing a few things which are supposed to be right. Biblical eth...”

“Man lives 'in' meanings, in that which is valid logically, esthetically, religiously. The most fundamental expression of this fact is the language which gives man the power to abstract from the con...”

“Reason is the presupposition of faith, and faith is the fulfillment of reason.”

“Christianity sees in the picture of Jesus as the Christ a human life in which all forms of anxiety are present but in which all forms of despair are absent.”

“Grace strikes us when we are in great pain and restlessness. It strikes us when we walk through the dark valley of a meaningless and empty life. It strikes us when our disgust for our own being, ou...”

“...sin is separation.”

“It is most important for the practice of the Christian ministry, especially in its missionary activities toward those both within and without the Christian culture, to consider pagans, humanists, a...”

“The awareness of the ambiguity of one's highest achievements - as well as one's deepest failures - is a definite symptom of maturity.”

“[a] characteristic of a symbol is that it opens up levels of reality which otherwise are closed for us.[a symbol] also unlocks dimensions and elements of our soul which correspond to the dimensions...”