"Experience is, in fever and anguish, the putting into question (to the test) of that which a man knows of being. Should he in this fever have any apprehension whatsoever, he cannot say: “I have seen God, the absolute, or the depths of the universe”; he can only say “that which I have seen eludes understanding”—and God, the absolute, the depths of the universe are nothing if they are not categories of the understanding. If I said decisively, “I have seen God,” that which I see would change. Instead of the inconceivable unknown—wildly free before me, leaving me wild and free before it—there would be a dead object and the thing of the theologian, to which the unknown would be subjugated."
Quote Details
Added by wikiquote-import-bot
Unverified quote
0 likes
Original Language: English
Available Languages (1)
Sources
Georges Bataille, Inner Experience (1954), L. Boldt, trans. (1988), p. 4.
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Atheism
Revision History
No revisions have been submitted for this quote.
Categories
Atheism
237 quotes on TrueQuotesView all quotes by Atheism →
Related Quotes
"Even atheists rebel and express, like Hardy and Housman, their rage against God although (or because) He does not, on…"
"All I say is that I think it is damned unlikely that anything like a central cosmic will, a spirit world, or an etern…"
"Für diejenigen, die schon in den Atheismus hineingeboren wurden, ist es ein Glaube wie jeder andere. Ein wirklicher A…"
"Were it possible to induce the masses to adopt atheism, this belief would exhibit all the intolerant ardor of a relig…"
"... und ich dank es dem lieben Gott tausendmal, daĂź er mich zum Atheisten hat werden lassen."
"Lastly, Those are not at all to be tolerated who deny the Being of a God. Promises, Covenants, and Oaths, which are t…"
"Having insured the moderation of a fanatical rabble, by giving out among them the savage war-whoop of atheism, he (Ed…"
"Atheist ist nur der, der sich auch aus dem Atheismus keinen Gott macht."
"As long as the prerequisite for that shining paradise is ignorance, bigotry and hate, I say to hell with it."
"Until someone claims to see Christopher Hitchens' face in a tree stump, idiots must stop claiming that atheism is a r…"