The Zürau Aphorisms
Franz Kafka
Top 10 Best Quotes
“There is a destination but no way there; what we refer to as way is hesitation.”
“Leopards break into the temple and drink all the sacrificial vessels dry; it keeps happening; in the end, it can be calculated in advance and is incorporated into the ritual.”
“The Expulsion from Paradise is eternal in its principal aspect: this makes it irrevocable, and our living in this world inevitable, but the eternal nature of the process has the effect that not only could we remain forever in Paradise, but that we are currently there, whether we know it or not.”
“The crows assert that a single crow could destroy the heavens. This is certainly true, but it proves nothing against the heavens, because heaven means precisely: the impossibility of crows.”
“In the struggle between yourself and the world, second the world. (Im Kampf zwischen Dir und der Welt, sekundiere der Welt)”
“You can withdraw from the sufferings of the world — that possibility is open to you and accords with your nature — but perhaps that withdrawal is the only suffering you might be able to avoid.”
“In the struggle between yourself and the world, hold the world’s coat.”
“Why then do you fear love in particular more than earthly existence in general?” Kafka replied as if from an astral distance: “You write: ‘Why be more afraid of love than of other things in life?’ And just before that: ‘I experienced the intermittently divine for the first time, and more frequently than elsewhere, in love.’ If you conjoin these two sentences, it’s as if you had said: ‘Why not fear every bush in the same way that you fear the burning bush?”
“For Kafka, paradise wasn’t a place where people lived in the past and of which a memory has survived, but rather a perennial, hidden presence. In every moment, an immense, encompassing obstacle prevents us from seeing it. That obstacle is nothing other than the expulsion from paradise—a process Kafka called “eternal in its principal aspect.”
“There are two cardinal sins from which all others spring: impatience and laziness. Because of impatience we were driven out of Paradise, because of laziness we cannot return. Perhaps, however, there is only one cardinal sin: impatience. Because of impatience we were driven out, because of impatience we cannot return.”
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Book Keywords:
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