We Who Wrestle with God Quotes

“When the wrong principle is established as supreme—when a false king is set upon the throne or an impious ethos prevails—the people quickly find themselves deprived of the very water of life. More deeply, however, a kingdom oriented around the wrong pole—that worships the wrong gods, so to speak—suffers psychologically or spiritually.”
― Jordan B. Peterson, We Who Wrestle with God: Perceptions of the Divine

“There can be no wealth in the absence of a true moral order.”
― Jordan B. Peterson, We Who Wrestle With God: Perceptions of the Divine

“The hedonist, possessed by his desire, may even identify with that god, in the moment or even quasi-permanently (quasi because there will be no real commitment, as that would require precisely the sacrifice that is being rejected). He may presume ownership or, more truly, sovereignty over his current whim (“I am what it is that wants, within me”); claim sexual proclivity or other desire, for example, as the very hallmark of personal being and becoming. This makes every hedonist a polytheist, willing to invite in and to celebrate or worship (that is, to place at the pinnacle or make foundational) the diverse range of spirits corresponding to his or her momentary impulses and drives. All claims to the contrary, however: someone possessed by lust, anger, hunger, or envy is not the master of that ancient motivation or hierarchy of motivation but its slave. The orgiastic and materialistic worshippers of the golden calf are hardly masters of their own fate.”
― Jordan B. Peterson, We Who Wrestle with God: Perceptions of the Divine

“You may feel small or insignificant in comparison, but only because you confront something greater, and there is in that very act of encountering what is greater the realization that greater itself exists, and that it can and should be strived toward.”
― Jordan B. Peterson, We Who Wrestle with God: Perceptions of the Divine

“that which you most need to find will be found where you least want to look.”[”
― Jordan B. Peterson, We Who Wrestle with God: Perceptions of the Divine

“The Bible is the library of stories on which the most productive, freest, and most stable and peaceful societies the world has ever known are predicated—the foundation of the West, plain and simple.”
― Jordan B. Peterson, We Who Wrestle with God: Perceptions of the Divine

“Much of the imagery within the Book of Revelation is an exploration of the collapse into this dynamic of hedonism and force or compulsion, which is eternally emblematic of the end of times.”
― Jordan B. Peterson, We Who Wrestle with God: Perceptions of the Divine

“This sequence of creation means, in the second place, not only that life should and will manifest itself more abundantly but also that it will do so in the constant upward spiral—from good to very good—that might serve as the definition of heaven itself. That is Jacob’s Ladder, the process that is eternally making everything as it should be but is somehow also improving, finding new pathways to higher orders of the true, the beautiful, and the good.”
― Jordan B. Peterson, We Who Wrestle with God: Perceptions of the Divine

“correctivo cuando”
― Jordan B. Peterson, Nosotros que luchamos con Dios: Una nueva perspectiva sobre la mayor historia jamás contada (No Ficción)

“Whatever occupies our attention—whatever we are conscious of, however briefly—is thus something elevated for the moment to the highest place, celebrated and worshipped, whether we know it or not.”
― Jordan B. Peterson, We Who Wrestle with God: Perceptions of the Divine

“Matthew 3:28–30).”
― Jordan B. Peterson, We Who Wrestle with God: Perceptions of the Divine

“Abel’s sacrifices are met with praise, while Cain’s are not. Cain gets nowhere in his life not because God or the world is arbitrary but because his sacrifices are insufficient. This is an insistence that echoes the divine prohibition against consuming the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil; the insistence that there is an implicit moral order—the suffusing of the whole of the being and becoming with the creative spirit that is its Originator and Continuer. It is not up to man or woman to usurp the right to create that moral order, or to attempt to circumvent its strictures pridefully, or in a Machiavellian or otherwise manipulative and false manner. Instead, we are built, so to speak, to honor and reflect that order—to adapt to it, to interpret signs of failure not as insufficiency on the part of the cosmos and its creator, but as evidence of personal insufficiency, to strive such that only what is best is offered and, if that is not good enough, to search for something better yet.”
― Jordan B. Peterson, We Who Wrestle with God: Perceptions of the Divine

“What, then, is the moral of the story? What is its point, or aim? The insistence that life more abundant requires a complete and total commitment, with every glance, with every word, with every action. We are called upon, in the face of life’s overwhelming difficulties and opportunities, to offer no less than absolutely everything we have—everything, conceptualized more appropriately, that we have been given and should be grateful for (rather than, say, “proud of”).”
― Jordan B. Peterson, We Who Wrestle with God: Perceptions of the Divine

“the fundamental moral, rather than factual question—might well be, “What or how should you offer, or sacrifice, to God, to solve the problem of what is acceptable to God—the problem of what is likely to be successful, in the highest of possible senses?” The answer proffered by the ancient authors? The best you have—or heaven help you: or, even more starkly, “If you bring forth what is within you, what you bring forth will save you. If you do not bring forth what is within you, what you do not bring forth will destroy you.”[68] It is in establishing this relationship between talent, opportunity, and responsibility that God ensures the maintenance of the eternal balance of justice. This is the meaning of the analogous warning, “For unto whomsoever much is given, of him shall be much required” (Luke 12:48). The level of sacrifice demanded by the divine is proportionate to the degree of privilege awarded however apparently arbitrarily to the fortunate or withheld from the lowly.”
― Jordan B. Peterson, We Who Wrestle with God: Perceptions of the Divine

“When we sacrifice, we bargain with the future. We give up something now in the faith that our offering will be returned, and with interest. The future is the unrealized horizon of possibility, the chaos obtained at the beginning of time, the potential that still confronts our Logos in the here and now—the very realm of trouble and opportunity or dragon and treasure that eternally confronts us. When we sacrifice—when we work—we establish what is in effect a contractual relationship with that possibility and, simultaneously, with the community, our future “higher” or “deeper” self, and becoming itself. We are, in effect, making a deal: I will give up something now. As a result, I will receive something—and something better—in the future. It might be argued that this deal is made not with God but with the social world, even “the patriarchy.”
― Jordan B. Peterson, We Who Wrestle with God: Perceptions of the Divine

“How much do we suffer because suffering is inevitable, given the limits of our mortal frames, and how much because we presume too much in our pride?”
― Jordan B. Peterson, We Who Wrestle with God: Perceptions of the Divine

“This is a matter of definition, in the final analysis – and therefore, of faith. [The divine] is real insofar as its pursuit makes pain bearable, keeps anxiety at bay; and inspires the hope that springs eternal in the human breast. It is real insofar as it establishes the benevolent and intelligible cosmic order, that infinite place of sinful toil or faithful play. It is as real as the force that opposes pride and calls those who sacrifice improperly to their knees. It is as real as the further reaches of the human imagination, striving fully upward.”
― Jordan B. Peterson, We Who Wrestle with God: Perceptions of the Divine

“Hello.” “Hello.” “You’re not too crowded?” “No, it’s all right.” “Have you been in the jug a long time?” “Long enough.” “Are you past the halfway mark?” “Just.” “Look over there: how poverty-stricken our villages are—straw thatch, crooked huts.” “An inheritance from the Tsarist regime.” “Well, but we’ve already had thirty Soviet years.” “That’s an insignificant period historically.” “It’s terrible that the collective farmers are starving.” “But have you looked in all their ovens?” “Just ask any collective farmer in our compartment.” “Everyone in jail is embittered and prejudiced.” “But I’ve seen collective farms myself.” “That means they were uncharacteristic.” (The goatee had never been in any of them—that way it was simpler.) “Just ask the old folks: under the Tsar they were well fed, well clothed, and they used to have so many holidays.” “I’m not even going to ask. It’s a subjective trait of human memory to praise everything in the past. The cow that died is the one that gave twice the milk. [Sometimes he even cited proverbs!] And our people don’t like holidays. They like to work.” “But why is there a shortage of bread in many cities?” “When?” “Right before the war, for example.” “Not true! Before the war, in fact, everything had been worked out.” “Listen, at that time in all the cities on the Volga there were queues of thousands of people…” “Some local failure in supply. But more likely your memory is failing you.” “But there’s a shortage now!” “ ‘Old wives’ tales. We have from seven to eight billion poods of grain.” “And the grain itself is rotten.” “Not at all. We have been successful in developing new varieties of grain.”[…] And so forth. He is imperturbable. He speaks in a language which requires no effort of the mind. And arguing with him is like walking through a desert. It’s about people like that that they say: “He made the rounds of all the smithies and came home unshod.”[”
― Jordan B. Peterson, We Who Wrestle with God: Perceptions of the Divine

“The attempt to make the moral enterprise a matter of human judgment rather than to leave in place a necessary minimum of assumptions is to make the prideful move that transforms the rock upon which the house would otherwise stand into the sand that shifts, moves, and devours when the storm comes.”
― Jordan B. Peterson, We Who Wrestle with God: Perceptions of the Divine

“A stitch in time saves nine—”
― Jordan B. Peterson, We Who Wrestle with God: Perceptions of the Divine

“This inversion of value enables not so much the stewardship of the earth as the exploitation of those deemed no more worthy than the lowest forms of life—exploitation by exactly the sorts of people who eternally step forward to abuse such advantage.”
― Jordan B. Peterson, We Who Wrestle with God: Perceptions of the Divine

“This is a discovery of unparalleled magnitude: the possibility of establishing a relationship with God by attending”
― Jordan B. Peterson, We Who Wrestle with God: Perceptions of the Divine