Founders Of Religions

"What is the natural law of money? It says, ‘Do not detain and hoard me. Circulate me. Give away as much as comes your way."

"A person whose intentions are to serve others will be rewarded with worldly happiness; and the one who has intentions to hurt will be punished with worldly unhappiness. However, the Self cannot be attained through serving others. Until one attains the Self, one should maintain an obliging nature."

"The Lord (Lord Mahavira) says that if you want moksha, go to a Gnani Purush and if you want worldly happiness, then serve your parents and your guru. Endless happiness can be attained by taking care of your parents."

"One who does not allow discord [with the wife] to happen even for a minute is considered a [true] husband. Look after this relationship in the same way that you would not allow the relationship with a friend to spoil. If you do not look after your relationship with your friend, then the friendship will break. (Quote Number: #147)"

"If the law of fidelity to one’s own wife is being practiced, then it [sexuality] is considered within limits. That will take one to a higher life-form. What is the ‘limit’ [criteria related to sexuality] of going to final liberation (moksha)? Fidelity to one’s own wife. (Quote Number: #3624)"

"Do not obstruct money if it comes your way and do not go digging for it if it does not."

"What is family life? In family life, love should prevail and be present at all times."

"Wealth comes your way when you give help to others, not otherwise. Wealth comes to those who have the desire to give. It comes to those who believe in giving."

"There is tremendous energy in the word ‘yes’ and tremendous weakness in the word ‘no’. (Quote Number: #709)"

"Actions do not need to be changed; just change your vision. (Quote Number: #507)"

"There are only two things, ‘positive’ and ‘negative’. If you remain negative, whom would nature help? We should not have ‘negative’ in our dictionary. (Quote Number: #706)"

"If it has become spoiled externally due to the circumstances, then let it be spoiled; but make sure it does not get spoiled internally. If you do not have the capacity to repay the debt, then keep the clarity within that, ‘I want to repay it.’ Since you did not let it get spoilt internally, there will come a time when the debt will get repaid."

"When is one considered to have learnt to become a husband? It is when the wife continuously experiences veneration (respect) for him. (Quote Number: #151)"

"When people are contemptuous or engaged in bad mouthing others, wealth will not come their way"

"One becomes bad himself when he sees or calls others bad. When others appear good to him, he will become good himself. (Quote Number: #1220)"

"Accept each other's fault; then, your married life will be full of happiness."

"All businesses have two sons, one’s name is profit and the other’s name is loss. No one likes the son named loss, but nevertheless both will be there. They will always be born."

"Comfortable (favorable) circumstance ‘polishes’ one and uncomfortable (unfavorable) circumstances ‘moulds’ one. What problem do we have with either of the two? (Quote Number: #138)"

"Relation with another man or a woman, other than one’s own husband or a wife, is a direct cause for a life in hell. (Quote Number: #677)"

"Problem does not lie in being a husband; the problem is with acting as a husband (being bossy). (Quote Number: #149)"

"Obstacles to money will remain as long as you harbor the desire to earn it. When you become inattentive to money, it will come to you in abundance."

"A strange phenomenal event took place in the deserts of Arabia, when hundreds of thousands of the dead became alive within a few days, and those who had been corrupted through generations took on Divine colour. The blind began to see, and the tongues of the dumb began to flow with Divine wisdom. Such a revolution took place in the world as no eye had seen and no ear had heard of before....Do you realise what this was?.... All this was brought about by prayers during the darkness of nights of one who had been wholly lost in God, which created an uproar in the world and manifested such wonders as seemed impossible at the hands of that un-lettered helpless person. O Allah; Send down blessings and peace on him and on his followers in Proportion to his concern and suffering for the Muslim Ummah (the people of Islam), and shower upon him the light of Thy mercy for ever."

"The task for which God has appointed me is that I should remove the malaise that afflicts the relationship between God and His creatures and restore the relationship of love and sincerity between them. Through the proclamation of truth and by putting an end to religious conflicts, I should bring about peace and manifest the Divine verities that have become hidden from the eyes of the world. I am called upon to demonstrate spirituality which lies buried under egoistic darkness. It is for me to demonstrate by practice, and not by words alone, the Divine powers which penetrate into a human being and are manifested through prayer or attention. Above all, it ismy task to re-establish in people’s hearts the eternal plant of the pure and shining Unity of God which is free from every impurity of polytheism, and which has now completely disappeared. All this will be accomplished, not through my power, but through the power of the Almighty God, Who is the God of heaven and earth."

"The sum total and the essence of our belief is: "There is none worthy of worship except Allah, and Muhammad (saw) is the Messenger of Allah". Our firm belief, which we uphold in this life and with which, by God’s grace, we shall leave this worldly abode, is that our Lord and Master, Muhammad, the Chosen One, is Khatamun-Nabiyyin [Seal of the Prophets] and Khairul-Mursalin [the best among the Messengers.] Through him faith was perfected and the blessing, through which one can reach God by adopting the path of salvation, has reached its pinnacle."

"Salat is an instrument for delivery from sin. It is a quality of the Salat that it makes a person secure against sin and vice. So seek a Salat of that type and try to make your Salat such."

"I do not need the Ottoman Sultanate, nor am I inclined to meet their consuls. There is only one Sultan for me and He is the One who presides over the Heaven and the Earth."

"The Holy Quran clearly forbids the use of force for the spread of the faith and directs its propagation through its inherent qualities and the good example of the Muslims. Do not be misled by the notion that in the beginning the Muslims were commanded to take up the sword. That sword was not taken up for the spread of the faith, but in self-defence against the enemies of Islam and for the purpose of establishing peace and security. It was no part of the purpose of taking it up to have recourse to coercion in the matter of faith"."

"The method of establishing perfect spiritual relationship with God that the Holy Quran teaches us is Islam, meaning devoting one's whole life to the cause of God and being occupied with the supplications which we have been taught in '. This is the essence of Islam. Complete surrender to God and the supplication taught in Surah Fatihah are the only methods of meeting God and drinking the water of true salvation."

"Repentance and seeking forgiveness from God is a tried and tested means that never fails."

"Without doubt, a truly mighty and powerful person is not one who can move a mountain from its place, not in the least. True courage is to muster the strength to reform one's morals."

"The charge advanced against me and my Jama‘at, that we do not believe in the Holy Prophet (pbuh) as the Seal of Prophets, is altogether false. The strength, certainty, comprehension and insight with which we acknowledge and believe in the Holy Prophet (pbuh) as the Seal of the Prophets, cannot even be dreamed of by the other Muslims; they do not have the capacity to comprehend the reality and the mystery comprised in the Seal of Prophethood. They have merely heard an expression from their ancestors but they are unaware of its import and do not know what it signifies and what is meant by believing in it. But we believe with full comprehension—and God Almighty knows this well—that the Holy Prophet (pbuh) is the Seal of the Prophets. God Almighty has disclosed the reality of the Seal of Prophethood in such a manner that we derive special delight from its contemplation which cannot be conceived of by anyone except those who have drunk deep at this fountain. We can illustrate the Seal of Prophethood by the example of the moon, which begins as a crescent and arrives at its perfection on the fourteenth night when it is called the full moon. In the same manner, the excellences of Prophethood reached their climax in the Holy Prophet (pbuh). Those who believe that Prophethood has been closed compulsorily and that the Holy Prophet (pbuh) should not be regarded as being superior even to the Prophet Jonas have not understood the reality of the Seal of Prophethood and do not have true knowledge of his superiority and excellences. Despite their own ignorance and lack of understanding, they charge us with denying the Seal of Prophethood. What shall I say concerning such invalids and how shall I express my pity for them!"

"Do you consider a man to be a Christian by whose bread no hungry man is ever filled?"

"Let no man judge himself to be a Christian, unless he is one who both follows the teaching of Christ and imitates his example."

"He is a Christian"

"Their faith alone will not profit them, because they have not done works of righteousness."

"Unless a man has despised worldly things, he shall not receive those which are divine."

"Whenever I have to speak on the subject of moral instruction and conduct of a holy life, it is my practice first to demonstrate the power and quality of human nature and to show what it is capable of achieving, and then to go on to encourage the mind of my listener to consider the idea of different kinds of virtues, in case it may be of little or no profit to him to be summoned to pursue ends which he has perhaps assumed hitherto to be beyond his reach; for we can never end upon the path of virtue unless we have hope as our guide and compassion."

"It was because God wished to bestow on the rational creature the gift of doing good of his own free will and the capacity to exercise free choice, by implanting in man the possibility of choosing either alternative. ... He could not claim to possess the good of his own volition, unless he was the kind of creature that could also have possessed evil. Our most excellent creator wished us to be able to do either but actually to do only one, that is, good, which he also commanded, giving us the capacity to do evil only so that we might do His will by exercising our own. That being so, this very capacity to do evil is also good – good, I say, because it makes the good part better by making it voluntary and independent, not bound by necessity but free to decide for itself."

"Yet we do not defend the good of nature to such an extent that we claim that it cannot do evil, since we undoubtedly declare also that it is capable of good and evil; we merely try to protect it from an unjust charge, so that we may not seem to be forced to do evil through a fault of our nature, when, in fact, we do neither good nor evil without the exercise of our will and always have the freedom to do one of the two, being always able to do either."

"Under the plea that it is impossible not to sin, they are given a false sense of security in sinning ... Anyone who hears that it is not possible for him to be without sin will not even try to be what he judges to be impossible, and the man who does not try to be without sin must perforce sin all the time, and all the more boldly because he enjoys the false security of believing that it is impossible for him not to sin ... But if he were to hear that he is able not to sin, then he would have exerted himself to fulfil what he now knows to be possible when he is striving to fulfil it, to achieve his purpose for the most part, even if not entirely."

"If you depart from evil but fail to do good, you transgress the law, which is fulfilled not simply by abominating evil deeds but also by performing good works."

"Love of wealth is insatiable, desire for honour knows no fulfilment; possessions destined to meet with a speedy end are sought endlessly. But divine wisdom, heavenly riches, immortal honours we neglect in our indifference and sloth, and, as for spiritual riches, either we do not touch them at all or, if we get a slight taste of them, we at once suppose that we have had enough. The divine Wisdom invites us to its feasts in quite different terms: Those who eat me, she says, will hunger for more, and those who drink me will thirst for more (Sir.24.21). No one can have enough of such feasts or ever suffers from squeamishness because he has had too much: the more he drinks from that source the greater will be each man's capacity and eagerness for more."

"When will a man guilty of any crime or sin accept with a tranquil mind that his wickedness is a product of his own will, not of necessity, and allow what he now strives to attribute to nature to be ascribed to his own free choice? It affords endless comfort to transgressors of the divine law if they are able to believe that their failure to do something is due to inability rather than disinclination, since they understand from their natural wisdom that no one can be judged for failing to do the impossible and that what is justifiable on grounds of impossibility is either a small sin or none at all."

"We can never enter upon the path to virtue unless we have hope as our guide and companion."

"Whenever I have to speak on the subject of moral instruction and the conduct of a holy life, it is my practice first to demonstrate the power and quality of human nature."

"The best incentive for the mind consists in teaching it that it is possible to do anything which one really wants to do."

"We must now take precautions to prevent you from being embarrassed by something in which the ignorant majority is at fault for lack of proper consideration, and so from supposing with them, that man has not been created truly good simply because he is able to do evil. ... If you reconsider this matter carefully and force your mind to apply a more acute understanding to it, it will be revealed to you that man's status is better and higher for the very reason for which it is thought to be inferior: it is on this choice between two ways, on this freedom to choose either alternative, that the glory of the rational mind is based, it is in this that the whole honor of our nature consists, it is from this that its dignity is derived."

"Nothing impossible has been commanded by the God of justice and majesty. ... Why do we indulge in pointless evasions, advancing the frailty of our own nature as an objection to the one who commands us? No one knows better the true measure of our strength than he who has given it to us nor does anyone understand better how much we are able to do than he who has given us this very capacity of ours to be able; nor has he who is just wished to command anything impossible or he who is good intended to condemn a man for doing what he could not avoid doing."

"Akhenaten’s temples incorporated vast open-air courts with offering tables and unroofed shrines. The cult image, of course, was no longer a statue hidden deep in the sanctuary, but the Aten above."

"Without the basis for proper diagnosis, the charge of madness is best avoided … but clearly Akhenaten had an original mind. He developed a vision of how God should be honoured, and had the determination and means to turn that vision into reality."