When I confront a human being as my Thou and speak the basic word I-Thou to him, then he is no thing among things nor does he consist of things. He is no longer He or She, a dot in the world grid of space and time, nor a condition to be experienced and described, a loose bundle of named qualities. Neighborless and seamless, he is Thou and fills the firmament. Not as if there were nothing but he; but everything else lives in his light.

The world is not comprehensible, but it is embraceable: through the embracing of one of its beings.

Everything depends on inner change; when this has taken place, then, and only then does the world change.

When people come to you for help, do not turn them off with pious words, saying, 'Have faith and take your troubles to God.' Act instead as though there were no God, as though there were only one person in the world who could help -- only yourself.

The atheist staring from his attic window is often nearer to God than the believer caught up in his own false image of God.

Every person born in this world represents something new, something that never existed before, something original and unique.

All journeys have secret destinations of which the traveller is unaware.