Arthur Ocean Waskow (1933–2025)

Favorite Passages

When either community mourns the death only of those on "its side" who have been killed by those on "the other side," the outcome is often more rage, more hatred, and more death. If we can share the grief for those dead on both "sides," we are more likely to see each other as human beings and move toward ending the violence. - p. 59-60, Rabbi Arthur Waskow

Now, thousands of years later, Israelis and Palestinians are locked in mortal battle over the precise measurement of whose land is whose. The painful attempt not to be cheated is, ironically, cheating both of them out of peace and fellowship and trust. And all the while, it was precisely Abraham's decision not to invoke his right as the elder to chose the land that would be his. It is a painful lesson lost. The even greater concern is that unless both peoples discover that less can be more, the more their rights they get - unlike Abraham, who was willing to trust the soul of the other - the poorer in spirit they will all be. - p. 97, Joan Chittister

A human being is capable of holding vastly different and paradoxical points of view at the same time. We seem to have so many different voices within us, and our motivations are often unconscious. So simply nodding in agreement is no guarantee that I will act the way I intend. ... So I find myself called not to more thoughts but bigger thoughts and feelings accompanied by real action, based on the experience of a greater reality we all share. - p. 132-33. Murshid Saadi Shakur Chisti