"It is an insult to God to believe in God. For on the one hand it is to suppose that he has perpetrated acts of incalculable cruelty. On the other hand, it is to suppose that he has perversely given his human creatures an instrument—their intellect—which must inevitably lead them, if they are dispassionate and honest, to deny his existence. It is tempting to conclude that if he exists, it is the atheists and agnostics that he loves best, among those with any pretensions to education. For they are the ones who have taken him most seriously." Galen Strawson (b. 1952), British philosopher, literary critic. Quoted in: Independent (London, 24 June 1990).
"With God, what is terrible is that one never knows whether it’s not just a trick of the devil." Jean Anouilh (1910–87), French playwright. The Archbishop, in The Lark.
"If we really think about it, God exists for any single individual who puts his trust in Him, not for the whole of humanity, with its laws, its organizations, and its violence. Humanity is the demon which God does not succeed in destroying." Salvatore Satta (1902–75), Italian jurist, novelist. The Day of Judgment, ch. 15 (1979).
"To place oneself in the position of God is painful: being God is equivalent to being tortured. For being God means that one is in harmony with all that is, including the worst. The existence of the worst evils is unimaginable unless God willed them." Georges Bataille (1897–1962), French novelist, critic. “Bataille, Feydeau and God,” interview with Marguerite Duras in France-Observateur (1957; repr. in Duras, Outside: Selected Writings, 1984).
"If you talk to God, you are praying; if God talks to you, you have schizophrenia." Thomas Szasz (b. 1920), U.S. psychiatrist. The Second Sin, "Schizophrenia" (1973).
"God will provide—ah, if only He would till He does!" Yiddish Proverb.
"If God lived on earth, people would break his windows." Jewish Proverb. Quoted in: Claud Cockburn, Cockburn Sums Up, epigraph (1981).
"I find it interesting that the meanest life, the poorest existence, is attributed to God’s will, but as human beings become more affluent, as their living standard and style begin to ascend the material scale, God descends the scale of responsibility at a commensurate speed." Maya Angelou (b. 1928), U.S. author. I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, vol. 1, ch. 18 (1969).
"It is only the impossible that is possible for God. He has given over the possible to the mechanics of matter and the autonomy of his creatures." Simone Weil (1909–43), French philosopher, mystic. “A War of Religions” (written 1943; published in Selected Essays, ed. by Richard Rees, 1962).
"The dice of God are always loaded." Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–82), U.S. essayist, poet, philosopher. Essays, “Compensation” (First Series, 1841).
"God is indeed dead.
He died of self-horror
when He saw the creature He had made
in His own image."
Irving Layton (b. 1912), Canadian poet. The Whole Bloody Bird, “Aphs” (1969).
"Forgive, O Lord, my little jokes on Thee
And I’ll forgive Thy great big one on me."
Robert Frost (1874–1963), U.S. poet. Cluster of Faith.
"I admit that the generation which produced Stalin, Auschwitz and Hiroshima will take some beating; but the radical and universal consciousness of the death of God is still ahead of us; perhaps we shall have to colonize the stars before it is finally borne in upon us that God is not out there." R. J. Hollingdale (b. 1930), British author, critic, translator. Thomas Mann: A Critical Study, ch. 8 (1971).
"If God wants us to do a thing, he should make his wishes sufficiently clear. Sensible people will wait till he has done this before paying much attention to him." Samuel Butler (1835–1902), English author. Samuel Butler’s Notebooks (1951, p. 116).
"Man appoints, and God disappoints." Miguel de Cervantes (1547–1616), Spanish writer. Sancho Panza, in Don Quixote, pt. 2, bk. 6, ch. 22 (1615; tr. by P. Motteux). [That is a clever twist on the old saying: “Man proposes and God disposes”.]
"If God is male, then male is God. The divine patriarch castrates women as long as he is allowed to live on in the human imagination." Mary Daly (b. 1928), U.S. educator, writer, theologian. Beyond God the Father, ch. 1 (1973).
"God is the immemorial refuge of the incompetent, the helpless, the miserable. They find not only sanctuary in His arms, but also a kind of superiority, soothing to their macerated egos: He will set them above their betters." H. L. Mencken (1880–1956), U.S. journalist. Minority Report: H. L. Mencken’s Notebooks, no. 35 (1956).