This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
Henry David Thoreau, born David Henry Thoreau
After the first blush of sin comes its indifference.
Saint Isaac of Nineveh, also Isaac the Syrian, Isaac of Qatar and Isaac Syrus NULL
There is no sin which cannot be pardoned except that one which lacks repentance, and there is no gift which is not augmented save that which remains without acknowledgement. For the portion of the fool is small in his eyes.
Sin |
People under delusion accumulate tainted merits but do not tread the Path. They are under the impression that to accumulate merits and to tread the Path are one and the same thing. Though their merits for alms-giving and offerings are infinite. They do not realize that the ultimate source of sin lies in the three poisons within their own mind. They expect to expiate their sins by accumulating merit. Without knowing that felicities obtained in future lives have nothing to do with the expiation of sins. Why not get rid of the sin within our own mind, for this is true repentance?
Only a theoretical deity is left to any man who has ceased to commune with God and a theoretical deity saves no man from sin and disheartenment.
God | Man | Sin | Theoretical | God |
Osho, born Chandra Mohan Jain, also known as Acharya Rajneesh and Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh NULL
Awareness means that whatsoever is happening in the moment is happening with complete consciousness; you are present there. If you are present when anger is happening, anger cannot happen. It can happen only when you are fast asleep. When you are present, immediate, transformation starts in your being, because when you are present, aware, many things are simply not possible. All that is called sin is not possible if you are aware. So, in fact, there is only one sin and that is unawareness.
Osho, born Chandra Mohan Jain, also known as Acharya Rajneesh and Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh NULL
Sin is a technique of the pseudo-religions. A true religion has no need of the concept at all. The pseudo-religion cannot live without the concept of sin, because sin is the technique of creating guilt in people.
Brethren, it is easier to declaim against a thousand sins of others, than to mortify one sin in ourselves.
Sin |
To celebrate is to contemplate the singularity of the moment and to enhance the singularity of the self. What was shall not be again... Every moment is a new arrival, a new bestowal. How to welcome the moment? How to respond to the marvel? The cardinal sin is in our failure not to sense the grandeur of the moment, the marvel and mystery of being, the possibility of quiet exaltation. The man of our time is losing the power of celebration. Instead of celebrating, he seeks to be amused or entertained. Celebration is an active state, an act of expressing reverence or appreciation. To be entertained is a passive state - it is to receive pleasure afforded by an amusing act or a spectacle... Celebration is a confrontation, giving attention to the transcendent meaning of one’s actions. Celebration is an act of expressing respect or reverence for that which one needs or honors... inward appreciation, lending spiritual form to everyday acts.
Attention | Failure | Giving | Lending | Man | Meaning | Mystery | Pleasure | Power | Quiet | Receive | Respect | Reverence | Sense | Sin | Singularity | Time | Respect | Failure |
Exaltation is gone from the synagogue, from the church, and also from many a classroom and university. The cardinal sin is boredom, and the major failure the denial to our young of moments of exaltation.
John Henry Newman, aka Cardinal Newman and Blessed John Henry Newman
Everyone who breathes, high and low, educated and ignorant, young and old, man and woman, has a mission, has a work. We are not sent into this world for nothing; we are not born at random; we are not here, that we may go to bed at night, and get up in the morning, toil for our bread, eat and drink, laugh and joke, sin when we have a mind, and reform when we are tired of sinning, rear a family and die. God sees every one of us; He creates every soul, . . . for a purpose.
Josiah Gilbert Holland, also Joshua Gilbert Holland
We often wonder that certain men and women are left by God to the commission of sins that shock us. We wonder how, under the temptation of a single hour, they fall from the very heights of virtue and of honor into sin and shame. The fact is that there are no such falls as these, or there are next to none. These men and women are those who have dallied with temptation - have exposed themselves to the influence of it, and have been weakened and corrupted by it.
God | Honor | Influence | Men | Sin | Temptation | Virtue | Virtue | Wonder | God | Temptation |
Josiah Gilbert Holland, also Joshua Gilbert Holland
A man does not necessarily sin who does that which our reason and our conscience condemn.
Conscience | Man | Reason | Sin |
Behavior now must be changed from within the new consciousness rather than from Mosaic laws carving behavior from without. Sin and desire are now within conscious desire and conscious contrition, rather than in the external behaviors of the decalogue and the penances of temple sacrifice and community punishment. The divine kingdom to be regained is psychological not physical. It is metaphorical not literal. It is "within" not in extenso.
Behavior | Consciousness | Desire | Sacrifice | Sin |
Lao Tzu, ne Li Urh, also Laotse, Lao Tse, Lao Tse, Lao Zi, Laozi, Lao Zi, La-tsze
There is no greater curse than the lack of contentment. No greater sin than the desire for possession. Therefore, he who is contented with contentment shall always be content.
Contentment | Desire | Sin |
Leo Tolstoy, aka Count Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy or Tolstoi
My principal sin is doubt. I doubt everything, and am in doubt most of the time.
I feel, like all modern Americans, no consciousness of sin and simply do not believe in it. All I know is that if God loves me only half as much as my mother does, he will not send me to Hell. That is a final fact of my inner consciousness, and for no religion could I deny its truth.
Consciousness | God | Mother | Religion | Sin | Will | God |
Pope Leo I, aka Pope Leo The Great, Pope Saint Leo I NULL
There is for all one common measure of joy, because as our Lord the destroyer of sin and death finds none free from charge, so is He come to free us all.