Top 100 Theological Quotes
#1. My heart is properly cultivated ... and is not left to wither under the burden of cold erudition, and my religious feelings are not deadened by theological inquiries.
Friedrich Schleiermacher
#2. Deep down in the heart of every person is a hidden desire to reinterpret Jesus in light of our own culture, political bent, or favorite theological belief.
Francis Chan
#3. Theological error is the most pernicious of errors; it strikes at man's center and separates him from his Creator and Redeemer. God insisted not only that Israelites should judge their own hearts and cast aside falsehood about Him but that they should also confront it wherever it emerged.
Max Anders
#4. And now they say my heart is failing. The doctor used the term "angina pectoris," which has a theological sound, like misericordia.
Marilynne Robinson
#5. The essence of a religious approach to the world, it seems to me, is to be found, not in the imposition of theological dogma, but in the recognition of what is actually there.
John Barton
#6. He remembered his old tutor at theological college telling him, 'There is something in each of us that cannot be naturally loved. We need to remember this about ourselves when we think of others.' On
James Runcie
#7. In summary, Schmucker argued that theology was contextual in nature, and that theological systems and expressions - indeed the church itself - had to be changed to accommodate their cultural and philosophical setting.
Albert B. Collver
#8. One of my realizations in such an earthy atmosphere was that many of the burning theological issues in the church were neither burning nor theological.
Brennan Manning
#9. In deciding among theological views, one should be something of a consequentialist: the choice of one theological position over another should be, if not actually determined, at least heavily conditioned by the fact that it implies a better ethical outcome than the alternatives.
David Novak
#10. And then I met Jerry and he's such a creative fiction writer, and I don't know if there's ever been a team put together the way we are - where one person does the theological way out and suggestions, and the other person goes into the cave and does the fiction writing.
Tim LaHaye
#11. Many Christians have put the political cart before the theological horse.
Michael Babcock
#12. We can talk about God's justice and love from now to the end of time. But until our theological discourse engages white supremacy in a way that empowers poor people to fight the monster, then our theology is not worth the paper it is written on. In
Frederick W. Schmidt Jr.
#13. I would never accept the recommendation of the theological faculty.
Jan Hus
#14. I think unknowing is the most important theological idea for me. Unlearning the things you think you know.
Darcey Steinke
#15. Those who take refuge behind theological barbed wire fences, quite often wish they could have more freedom of thought, but fear the change to the great ocean of truth as they would a cold bath.
Luther Burbank
#16. The ideal is that your faith not be rigid and unpliable, but instead that it is capable of being stretched and remolded over time, and that your theological and spiritual life grows deeper and more mature with the passing years.
Adam Hamilton
#17. Scholasticism, a concept which does not bear criticism, is a theological concept specifically designed to sustain faith in the immortality of the soul.
Miguel De Unamuno
#18. I think one of the most important directions to be pursued in the 'sciences of human action' is to develop a natural-law ethics based on nature rather than, or at least to supplement, ethics based on theological revelation.
Murray Rothbard
#19. Theological discourse can be, in and of itself, a form of identity and solidarity.
Namsoon Kang
#20. A quite specific astonishment stands at the beginning of every theological perception, inquiry, and thought.
Karl Barth
#21. The church is not a theological classroom. It is a conversion, confession, repentance, reconciliation, forgiveness and sanctification center, where flawed people place their faith in Christ, gather to know and love him better, and learn to love others as he designed.
Paul David Tripp
#22. We establish no religion in this country, nor will we ever. But we poison our society when we remove its theological underpinnings. We court corruption when we leave society devoid of belief.
Jeff Miller
#23. God has hardwired me to thoroughly enjoy and be sharpened by good and friendly theological discussion about the gospel.
Tullian Tchividjian
#24. ONCE remove the old arena of theological quarrels, and you will throw open the whole world to the most horrible, the most hopeless, the most endless, the most truly interminable quarrels; the untheological quarrels.
Gilbert K. Chesterton
#25. Heresy is usually quite sophisticated, actually has a meaning, and is to be taken very seriously. It is therefore to be carefully distinguished from turgid, pretentious, badly-written Bullsgeshichte, to use the technical German theological term.
Carl R. Trueman
#26. Our normal sense of the person as a lonely island of consciousness, is a dramatic illusion based on theological imagery.
Alan Watts
#27. It was easy enough to invent theological-sounding passages, provided you used the right language. Most people presumed you were quoting something too obscure for them to recognise.
Alex Scarrow
#28. (Note: If you don't appreciate a little humor in the midst of critically important theological issues, you may not have come to the same conclusion I have, which is this: I don't have to take myself too seriously in order to take God seriously.)
Angie Smith
#29. In fact, I believe that theological interpretation runs the risk of jeopardizing what it means to be a responsible biblical hermeneut, by attempting to overlook or negate, whether consciously or not, a biblical hermeneutic.
Stanley E. Porter Jr.
#30. To me the gospel is not a great mass of theological jargon. It is a simple and beautiful and logical thing, with one quiet truth following another in orderly sequence. I do not fret over the mysteries. I do not worry whether the heavenly gates swing or slide. I am only concerned that they open.
Gordon B. Hinckley
#31. We can be only too grateful that an Archbishop of Braga should have immersed himself so deeply in theological speculation, armed and equipped as he was for war, with his coat of mail, his broadsword dangling from the
Jose Saramago
#32. We must not think of this merely as a theological or metaphysical question. For
Roger Scruton
#33. Perhaps the main stumbling block to a better, and more fruitful, theological relationship with Judaism and the Jewish people has been the tendency of many Christian theologians to see the Christ event as the end of history.
David Novak
#34. Day by day we are summoned beyond a safe theological "knowledge of description" to one of unpredictable "acquaintance.
Susan S. Phillips
#35. The issue of the environment as seen by Pope Francis is not a matter of purely scientific or, indeed, theological debate: it involves economic and political views on how the world's poor can be brought out of poverty while protecting the environment.
John Cornwell
#36. The fact that monasticism preceded the identification of greed as a primal sin is an important reminder that our very ability to name sin is a theological achievement.
Stanley Hauerwas
#37. [Albert] Schweitzer thus carved out his own path through the first half of this century, a lonely and learned giant amidst the hordes of noisy and shallow theological pygmies.
N. T. Wright
#38. If a man cannot serve two masters, neither can Christianity, or several thousand of them as the case may be.
E.A. Bucchianeri
#39. All theological lore is becoming distasteful to me.
Wilfred Owen
#40. The preaching of the gospel is not to persuade people to agree with me in my theological views. The preaching of the gospel so far as I am concerned, is to bring people into personal association with that person with whom I have fellowship.
William Warren Prescott
#41. Many readers fail to realize this, but 'The Color Purple' is a theological text. It is about the reclamation of one's original God: the earth and nature.
Alice Walker
#42. No statement, theological or otherwise, should be made that would not be credible in the presence of burning children.
Irving Greenberg
#43. If you ask people in England where does Tom Wright sit on the theological spectrum, they say, "Well he's an evangelical of course," as though, come on, get used to it.
N. T. Wright
#44. If we want any hope of reversing troubling church trends, especially among young people, we must focus not on tribal heritage, denominational branding, theological hair-splitting, or pharisaical purity. We must focus on Jesus - and his sacrificial love for us and all people.
Thom Schultz
#45. Give yourself to reading.' ... You need to read. Renounce as much as you will all light literature, but study as much as possible sound theological works,
especially the Puritanic writers, and expositions of the Bible.
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
#46. The 'Heirs of Alexandria' series mixes the Renaissance with magic and demons, based on a changed theological history.
Eric Flint
#47. But now it's kind of a given that a 15-year-old would have a record deal and sell a quarter of a million records. No one's expecting her to answer any deep theological questions. And I'll tell you, I was asked some deep theological questions from the git-go.
Amy Grant
#49. Pragmatism, consumerism, self-help moralism, and narcissism are simply the symptoms of a disease that is, at its heart, theological:
Michael S. Horton
#50. The most malicious kind of hatred is that which is built upon a theological foundation.
George Sarton
#51. The later-afternoon air of our exhalations hung in brief clouds before us. The thought balloon of my own breath said, "How have I found myself here?" It was not a theological question. It was one of transportation and neurology.
Lorrie Moore
#52. Speaking figuratively, the study of theology often produces overgrown youths whose internal organs have not correspondingly developed. This is a characteristic of adolescence. There is actually something like theological puberty.
Helmut Thielicke
#53. the best imagery used to depict the theological enterprise is that of pilgrimage. Biblically we read of Christians described as those who belong to "the Way" (e.g., Acts 9:2; 19:19, 23; 24:14, 22), for they are "sojourners" (1 Pet 2:11)
Kelly M. Kapic
#54. Of learned men, the clergy show the lowest development of professional ethics. Any pastor is free to cadge customers from the divines of rival sects, and to denounce the divines themselves as theological quacks.
H.L. Mencken
#55. In his sufferings, Job has learned that God is greater than his theology. This is a truth we all need to learn. We tend to think we know how God will act in every situation. And the moment we have God neatly confined in our little theological box. He does something surprising!
Ray C. Stedman
#56. Ninety percent of [contemporary philosophers] see their principle task as that of beating religion out of men's heads ... We are far from being able to provide scientific basis for the theological world view.
Kurt Godel
#57. I soon learned to separate theological from moral prejudices, and I gave up looking for a supernatural origin of evil. A
Friedrich Nietzsche
#58. Well, isn't that just like religion for you, Archie," he said. "One day it's a nice way to spend your weekends and the next you're in the middle of a righteous theological clusterfuck.
John Scalzi
#59. When we think about global warming at all, the arguments tend to be ideological, theological and economic.
Bill McKibben
#60. We imagine that our theological/conceptual systems are the means by which we know God as God is. I truly believe that such postures and perspectives put us in danger of conceptual idolatry, worshiping our ideas of and frameworks for God.
Tim Keel
#61. If your theological convictions are not producing a deeper love for others, then it's time to rethink some stuff.
Tullian Tchividjian
#62. His hands had been reddened, as all men's hands have been, in the slaying before the foundation of the world; now, if he chose, he would dip them again in the same blood. 'Mercy,' he groaned ...
C.S. Lewis
#63. 'Rozabal' was theological while 'Chanakya' is political. Unlike 'Rozabal,' which was about research, the aim of 'Chanakya' is plot, plot, plot, which carries the character. The common DNA, of course, is history.
Ashwin Sanghi
#64. [Recent evidence regarding quantum mechanics is] sufficient to rule out all theological options but one - the Bible's.
Hugh Ross
#65. As liberty and intelligence have increased the people have more and more revolted against the theological dogmas that contradict common sense and wound the tenderest sensibilities of the soul.
Catharine Beecher
#66. Science and vivisection make no appeal to a theological idea, much less a political one. You can argue with a theologian or a politician, but doctors are sacrosanct. They know; you do not. Science has its mystique much more powerful than any religion active today.
Brenda Ueland
#67. Children, after being limbs of Satan in traditional theology and mystically illuminated angels in the minds of educational reformers, have reverted to being little devils; not theological demons inspired by the evil one, but scientific Freudian abominations inspired by the unconscious.
Bertrand Russell
#68. We rarely read the Bible to discover truth; more often, we wish to harmonize it with our belief system and see its meaning in light of our preconceived theological system
Anonymous
#69. Questions about God's existence, self disclosure, saving action and almighty power reminded me of my inadequacies. For me the theo in theology had become little more than a question mark. I could confidently discuss philosophy, psychology and social change, but God made me uneasy.
Thomas C. Oden
#70. The first reason for the preponderant influence of those Evangelicals who define themselves as advocates of Religious Right theological and political ideologies is that they have both the financial means and technological know-how to make widespread use of modern electronic forms of communication.
Tony Campolo
#72. Much theological discussion is wasted, not because the words used have no possible meaning, but because the people who use them don't mean anything by them.
Rosemary Haughton
#73. But a man with an experience is never at the mercy of a man with only an argument ... If we can lead people into the manifest presence of God, all false theological houses of cards will tumble down.
Tommy Tenney
#74. Theology is Anthropology ... [T]he distinction which is made, or rather supposed to be made, between the theological and anthropological predicates resolves itself into an absurdity.
Ludwig Feuerbach
#75. The story of Lazarus not only demonstrates Christ's divine power over death (both physical and spiritual); it also demonstrates the converse theological truth
namely, that the dead cannot raise themselves.
John F. MacArthur Jr.
#76. But what is the theological cost of viewing ministry as management and pastors as professional organizers, albeit in charge of spiritual organizations? What is lost in the switch is the biblical vision of the pastor as a shepherd of a flock of souls. Such
Iain M. Duguid
#77. when a Greek or Roman individual wanted to communicate a concept, he or she would typically write a theological treatise or lay out a rhetorical argument or speech about the topic. When a Hebrew teacher would seek to communicate something, he would often convey the message through a story.
Robert F. Gallaty
#78. The unattended garden will soon be overrun with weeds; the heart that fails to cultivate truth and root out error will shortly be a theological wilderness.
Aiden Wilson Tozer
#79. The first-century Jews who wrote about Jesus had already made up their minds about who he was. They were constructing a theological argument about the nature and function of Jesus as Christ, not composing a historical biography about a human being.
Reza Aslan
#80. Each of us has had plenty of experience with technology, but few of us have the theoretical or theological tools to make sense of the consequences of our use of technology.
Tim Challies
#81. Lewis created a new kind of marriage between theological reflection and poetic imagination.
Alister E. McGrath
#82. As a pastor, I recognize that in theological terms, narcissists want to be the center of attention, like a god, and have people worship them by paying attention to them, buying the products they promote, and emulating their behavior.
Mark Driscoll
#83. Religious traditions hold enormous value, extraordinary wisdom, breathtaking insights into the human experience, but they are limited to the degree that there has not been a new theological idea expressed by any of the major religions for thousands of years.
Neale Donald Walsch
#84. The law is this: that each of our leading conceptions-each branch of our knowledge-passes successively through three different theoretical conditions: the Theological, or fictitious: the Metaphysical, or abstract; and the Scientific, or positive.
Auguste Comte
#86. You can latch onto theological ideas that are, in fact, not accurate, and refuse to let them go. I think we've seen this a few times in church history.
Frederica Mathewes-Green
#87. The Book of Revelation has all the authority, in these theological uplands, of military orders in time of war. The people turn to it for light upon all their problems, spiritual and secular.
H.L. Mencken
#88. Theological reflection takes place within history, but the history within which it takes place is an ongoing, open-ended process.
David Novak
#89. The foundation of worship in the heart is not emotional ... it is theological.
Sinclair B. Ferguson
#90. The exegetical foundations would appear to be weak, and one shouldn't build huge theological edifices, no matter how splendid or consistent, on weak foundations.
Ben Witherington III
#91. I am in complete alignment with my thinking with this statement by F. F. Bruce: 'Whether our approach is theological or historical, it does matter whether the New Testament documents are reliable or not'."
~R. Alan Woods [2013]
R. Alan Woods
#92. And thus toleration produced not only mutual indulgence, but even religious concord. The superstition of the people was not embittered theological rancor.
Edward Gibbon
#93. How to explain Time and Separateness back to God, Who had never thought of them, Who could let the whole world come to grief in a scattering moment?
Eudora Welty
#94. Biblical literacy and theological expertise are not, therefore, the end of the Word but a God-ordained means to an end, and the end is a radically transformed life because the worship at the center of that life has been reclaimed.
Paul David Tripp
#95. If we must play the theological game, let us never forget that it is a game. Religion, it seems to me, can survive only as a consciously accepted system of make-believe.
Aldous Huxley
#96. You can spend forty years teaching people to be awake to the fact of the mystery and then some fellow with no more theological sense than a jackrabbit gets himself a radio ministry and all your work is forgotten.
Marilynne Robinson
#97. In any theological struggle, the first thousand years are always the bitterest.
Philip Jenkins
#98. All our problems are theological ones, William Temple said. All of them have to do with our relationship to God and his to us, and this is precisely why it makes sense to come to God with them.
Elisabeth Elliot
#99. Missionary zeal does not grow out of intellectual beliefs, nor out of theological arguments, but out of love. If I do not love a person I am not moved to help him by proofs that he is in need; if I do love him, I wait for no proof of a special need to urge me to help him.
Roland Allen
#100. Religion is the theological equivalent of a quick-buck insurance scam, where you pay in your premium year after year, and then, when you need the benefits you paid for so - pardon the pun - so religiously, you discover the company that took your money does not, in fact, exist.
Stephen King
