Huston Smith
Huston Smith
Huston Cummings Smithis a religious studies scholar in the United States. His book The World's Religionshas sold over two million copies and remains a popular introduction to comparative religion...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionTheologian
Date of Birth31 May 1919
CountryUnited States of America
apart assumption began chinese factor group unit viability
The Chinese began with the assumption that the group is the fundamental unit of reality. Individuals? Sure, we can factor them out from their groups, but let us not think that they as individuals have any viability apart from their group.
You subtract Christianity from Huston Smith, and there is no Huston Smith left.
art difficulty sacred
It's often difficult for us to act compassionately, but sacred art eases the difficulty by ennobling us.
acted assumed brought god happen human jesus life orthodox thinking
I happen to be a Christian. I was brought up and drenched in that. I am very orthodox in thinking that Jesus acted in his life the way God would have acted if God had assumed human form.
across billion pure science universe
Pure science - this vision of the universe as 15 billion light years across - I am bedazzled and awed by it.
altered consciousness given history human religion
No one in human history has given as much thought to the interweaving of altered states of consciousness and religion as I have.
connection deserved morality
There is no connection between morality and disaster, Are we going to think that they deserved that? That would be atrocious.
christianity found third-grade
When I read the Upanishads, which are part of Vedanta, I found a profundity of worldview that made my Christianity seem like third grade.
islands wonder shoreline
As known unknowns become known; unknown unknowns proliferate; the larger the island of knowledge, the longer the shoreline of wonder.
blessed pride vanity
'Blessed are the poor in spirit, for they shall see God' suggested to me a heavenly welfare program for the meek. Today that saying reveals an astute insight into egotism, about how those with swollen pride or vanity cannot see anything larger than themselves.
eras allies spirituality
In the post-individualistic era, science and spirituality will become allies, and human beings will realize a vast potentiality now only dimly felt.
dust divinity
We are a blend of dust and divinity.
religious teaching loss
One reason education undoes belief is its teaching of evolution; Darwin's own drift from orthodoxy to agnosticism was symptomatic. Martin Lings is probably right in saying that more cases of loss of religious faith are to be traced to the theory of evolution ... than to anything else.
art law essence
Every society and religion has rules, for both have moral laws. And the essence of morality consists, as in art, of drawing the line somewhere.