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The greatest mystery in life is not life itself, but death. Death is the culmination of life, the ultimate blossoming of life. In death the whole life is summed up, in death you arrive. Life is a pilgrimage towards death. From the very beginning, death is coming. From the moment of birth, death has started coming towards you, you have started moving towards death.
RajneeshWe are left with nothing but death, the irreducible fact of our own mortality. Death after a long illness we can accept with resignation. Even accidental death we can ascribe to fate. But for a man to die of no apparent cause, for a man to die simply because he is a man, brings us so close to the invisible boundary between life and death that we no longer know which side we are on. Life becomes death, and it is as if this death has owned this life all along. Death without warning. Which is to say: life stops. And it can stop at any moment.
Paul AusterEyes like streams of melting snow, cold with the things she does not know. Heaven above and Hell beneath, liquid flames to hide her grief. Death, death, death with no release. Death, death, death with no release.
Kiersten WhiteThe biblical lifestyle is always a witness of resistance to the status quo in politics, economics, and all society. It is a witness of resurrection from death. Paradoxically, those who embark on the biblical witness constantly risk death - through execution, exile, imprisonment, persecution, defamation, or harassment - at the behest of the rulers of this age. Yet those who do not resist the rulers of the present darkness are consigned to a moral death, the death of their humanness. That, of all the ways of dying, is the most ignominious.
William StringfellowFor Death must be somewhere in a society; if it is no longer (or less intensely) in religion, it must be elsewhere; perhaps in this image which produces Death while trying to preserve life. Contemporary with the withdrawal of rites, Photography may correspond to the intrusion, in our modern society, of an asymbolic Death, outside of religion, outside of ritual, a kind of abrupt dive into literal Death.
Roland BarthesWhat we put into every moment is all we have. You can drug yourself to death or you can smoke yourself to death or eat yourself to death, or you can do everything right and be healthy and then get hit by a car. Life is so great, such a neat thing, and yet all during it we have to face death, which can make you nuts and depressed.
Gilda RadnerHuman stories are practically always about one thing, really, aren't they? Death. The inevitability of death. . . . . . (quoting an obituary) 'There is no such thing as a natural death. Nothing that ever happens to man is natural, since his presence calls the whole world into question. All men must die, but for every man his death is an accident, and even if he knows it he would sense to it an unjustifiable violation.' Well, you may agree with the words or not, but those are the key spring of The Lord Of The Rings
J. R. R. TolkienWhy do we cling to life and why are we afraid of death? You may not have thought about it. The reason why we cling so much to life and why we are afraid of death is just inconceivable. We cling to life so much because we do not know how to live. We cling to life so much because really we are not alive. And time is passing and death is coming nearer and nearer. And we are afraid that death is coming near and we have not lived yet.
RajneeshGangsters live for the action. The closer to death, the nearer to the heated coil of the moment, the more alive they feel. Most would rather succumb to a barrage of bullets from a roomful of sworn enemies than to the debilitation of old age, dying the death of the feeble. A gangster becomes as addicted to the thrill of the battle and the potential to die in the midst of it as he does to he more attractive lures in his path. In his world, the potential for death exists every day. The better gangsters don't shy away from such a dreaded possibility but rather find comfort in its proximity.
Lorenzo CarcaterraDon't depend on death to liberate you from your imperfections. You are exactly the same after death as you were before. Nothing changes; you only give up the body. If you are a thief or a liar or a cheater before death, you don't become an angel merely by dying. If such were possible, then let us all go and jump in the ocean now and become angels at once! Whatever you have made of yourself thus far, so will you be hereafter. And when you reincarnate, you will bring that same nature with you. To change, you have to make the effort. This world is the place to do it.
Paramahansa YoganandaWhatever thought grips the mind at the time of death is the one which will propel it and decide for it the nature of its future birth. Thus if one wants to attain god after death, one has to think of him steadfastly... This is not as simple as it sounds, for at the time of death the mind automatically flies to the thought of an object (i.e. money, love) which has possessed it during its sojourn in the world. Thus one must think of god constantly.
Stephen MitchellDeath is a vast mystery, but there are two things we can say about it: It is absolutely certain that we will die, and it is uncertain when or how we will die. The only surety we have, then, is this uncertainty about the hour of our death, which we seize on as the excuse to postpone facing death directly. We are like children who cover their eyes in a game of hide and seek and think that no one can see them.
Sogyal RinpocheDeath during adolescence feels unfair. We're young. We're invincible. Death is supposed to come with old age. When death breaks into our lives and steals our innocence, its finality leaves us unnaturally older. There are too many elderly young people.
Sara ShandlerMany a life has been injured by the constant expectation of death. It is life we have to do with, not death. The best preparation for the night is to work diligently while the day lasts. The best preparation for death is life.
George MacDonaldFear seems to have many causes. Fear of loss, fear of failure, fear of being hurt, and so on, but ultimately all fear is the ego's fear of death, of annihilation. To the ego, death is always just around the corner. In this mind-identified state, fear of death affects every aspect of your life.
Eckhart TolleLove is strong as death; but nothing else is as strong as either; and both, love and death, met in Christ. How strong and powerful upon you, then, should that instruction be, that comes to you from both these, the love and death of Jesus Christ!
John DonneThe earthly form of Christ is the form that died on the cross. The image of God is the image of Christ crucified. It is to this image that the life of the disciples must be conformed; in other words, they must be conformed to his death (Phil 3.10, Rom 6.4) The Christian life is a life of crucifixion (Gal 2.19) In baptism the form of Christ's death is impressed upon his own. They are dead to the flesh and to sin, they are dead to the world, and the world is dead to them (Gal 6.14). Anybody living in the strength of Christ's baptism lives in the strength of Christ's death.
Dietrich BonhoefferSmall things such as this have saved me: how much I love my mother โ even after all these years. How powerfully I carry her within me. My grief is tremendous but my love is bigger. So is yours. You are not grieving your sonโs death because his death was ugly and unfair. Youโre grieving it because you loved him truly. The beauty in that is greater than the bitterness of his death.
Cheryl StrayedOnce you teach people to say what they do not understand, it is easy enough to get them to say anything you like. v One could wish no easier death than that of Socrates, calmly discussing philosophy with his friends; one could fear nothing worse than that of Jesus, dying in torment, among the insults, the mockery, the curses of the whole nation. In the midst of these terrible sufferings, Jesus prays for his cruel murderers. Yes, if the life and death of Socrates are those of a philosopher, the life and death of Christ are those of a God.
Jean-Jacques RousseauWhy should I fear death? If I am, death is not. If death is, I am not. Why should I fear that which can only exist when I do not?
EpicurusMy fear was not of death itself, but a death without meaning. I wanted my death to be something the people could relate to, a basis for further mobilization of the community.
Huey NewtonThe cruelty of death lies in the fact that it brings the real sorrow of the end, but not the end. The greatest cruelty of death: an apparent end causes a real sorrow. Our salvation is death, but not this one.
Franz KafkaPicture a tall, dark figure, surrounded by cornfields... NO, YOU CAN'T RIDE A CAT. WHO EVER HEARD OF THE DEATH OF RATS RIDING A CAT? THE DEATH OF RATS WOULD RIDE SOME KIND OF DOG. Picture more fields, a great horizon-spanning network of fields, rolling in gentle waves... DON'T ASK ME I DON'T KNOW. SOME KIND OF TERRIER, MAYBE. ...fields of corn, alive, whispering in the breeze... RIGHT, AND THE DEATH OF FLEAS CAN RIDE IT TOO. THAT WAY YOU KILL TWO BIRDS WITH ONE STONE. ...awaiting the clockwork of the seasons. METAPHORICALLY.
Terry PratchettI come from the state of Michigan. We were the first English-speaking government in the world to outlaw the death penalty, back in the 1840s. We have never had, as a state, the death penalty in Michigan. I was raised with that, and even Republicans in Michigan, nobody would even think of putting a measure on the ballot to have the death penalty.
Michael MooreWe all owe life a death, an inevitable death which we can meet. But the unnecessary death that wastes life denies all consolation.
Laura BohannanDoras II was a somewhat absentminded king, It is said, when Death came to summon him, Doras granted Death the usual formal audience and then dismissed him from his presence. Death was too embarrassed to return until many years later- Ka'a Orto'o, Gnomic Utterances
Diana Wynne JonesI don't care who I have to fight! If he rips my arms out, I'll kick him to death! If he rips my legs off, I'll bite him to death! If he rips my head off, I'll stare him to death! And if he gouges out my eyes, I'll curse him from the grave! Even If i'm torn to shreds, I'm taking Sasuke back from Orochimaru!
Masashi KishimotoNot much music left inside us for life to dance to. Our youth has gone to the ends of the earth to die in the silence of the truth. And where, I ask you, can a man escape to, when he hasn't enough madness left inside him? The truth is an endless death agony. The truth is death. You have to choose: death or lies. I've never been able to kill myself.
Louis-Ferdinand CelineSunsets and death; death and therefore kisses, kisses and consequently birth and then death for yet another generation of sunset watchers.
Aldous HuxleyThere's nothing to mourn about death any more than there is to mourn about the growing of a flower. What is terrible is not death but the lives people live or don't live up until their death.
Charles BukowskiI think actual death will be a lot easier than dying on stage. Cause - you know - if you do [actual death] right, you can go looking good. Maybe with a little quip [like]: 'I loved everybody.' But dying on stage...Oh, God!
Joan Riversthe only real time as far as Buddhism is concerned is right now. Right now there is no old age or death because old age and death are descriptions of things as they are now when we compare them to things as they used to be.
Brad WarnerI don't know what it is about death that makes it so hard. I suppose it's the one-sided communication; the fact that we never get to ask our loved one if she suffered, if she is happy wherever she is now...if she is somewhere. It's the question mark that comes with death that we can't face, not the period.
Jodi PicoultThe alternative to fanaticism and to death is not some miraculous realization that someone has been wrong and he has to apologize. No, the answer to fanaticism and to death is curiosity and compromise and concession.
Amos OzI think death and sex go together. If you shoot about sex in a funny way, it's different. But when you are doing sex in a serious way, death is always around.
Jesus FrancoDeath has such great importance in this society that it affects everything. I learned from my guru that death is not the enemy, I see it as another moment. Yet it's the end of an incarnation and means going on to other incarnations.
Ram DassI had at one point this rather depressing image of some alien culture seeing the death of this planet - coming down in their spaceships and sniffing around; finding all our skeletons sitting around our TV sets and trying to work out why our end came before its time and they come to the conclusion that we amused ourselves to death.
Roger WatersWe have a limit, a very discouraging, humiliating limit: death. That's why we like all the things that we assume have no limits and, therefore, no end. It's a way of escaping thoughts about death. We like lists because we don't want to die.
Umberto EcoIf man had his way, the plan of redemption would be an endless and bloody conflict. In reality, salvation was bought not by Jesus fist, but by His nail-pierced hands; not by muscle but by love; not by vengeance but by forgiveness; not by force but by sacrifice. Jesus Christ our Lord surrendered in order that He might win; He destroyed His enemies by dying for them and conquered death by allowing death to conquer Him.
Aiden Wilson TozerThey say martyrdom is the highest rank a believer can achieve! Do not believe in this! The highest rank is the life itself, it is the existence itself! There is no rank in death, but only nothingness! Rank exists only in life! Stick to the life, stay away from death! Neither kill nor die!
Mehmet Murat IldanNear-death experiences release a lot of endorphins, resulting in a natural high," Tod whispered. "And it's totally true that one passion feeds another." "You know we're way past 'near-death', right?" "My endorphins aren't listening to you.
Rachel VincentBy profession I am a soldier and take pride in that fact. But I am prouder - infinitely prouder - to be a father. A soldier destroys in order to build; the father only builds, never destroys. The one has the potentiality of death; the other embodies creation and life. And while the hordes of death are mighty, the battalions of life are mightier still. It is my hope that my son, when I am gone, will remember me not from the battle field but in the home repeating with him our simple daily prayer, Our Father Who Art in Heaven.
Douglas MacArthurThey, then, who are destined to die, need not be careful to inquire what death they are to die, but into what place death will usher them.
Saint AugustineWhat makes people want to live forever? I don't think it's limited to our materialistic society of today. Even back to Christian times, they were writing about eternal life after death. So even in death there was a discussion of eternal life. I think this is a universal human desire. It's a horrible thought that this conscious being of ours - with our beautiful bodies - is one day going to decay and die. I don't think it so much has to do with the fear of meeting God, as it is just the thought that this all ends.
Michael Savage