Quotes from Rakim

The truth never wears out.

What was once easy became confused and hard, which brings us back to the mystic question, who is God?

You can look in a book of wrong and learn more right. If you're reading a book that has all wrong in it , you're learning what not to do.

I love Jay-Z, I love Kanye, and I praise the way he's been able to bring more business out of the jungle.

In New York, they kind of rode with me from day one: they understand who I am.

I've always tried to insert consciousness and spirituality in my records, interpreting the writings of all cultures and religions and how they apply to life in modern times.

When you're dealing with a bunch of different producers, you gotta make sure the chemistry fits.

When I broke up with Eric B., I went on a little hiatus. Then all I was trying do is find producers. It's real hard, man.

Without no disrespect to any artist, there's a lot of degrading music out there as far as degrading the culture and degrading society as well. That's individuals that choose to make that kind of music.

Now I got kids and I'm more wise now. Life means more to me than having fun. I'm more calm, more wise, and more cautious.

Now life is imitating art.

Sometimes you can't forgive, but you try to forget.

You know, I got kids. I got sons, and I try to tell them, 'Look, man, when you in the car and you get pulled over, hands on the steering wheel. 'Yes, sir. No sir.' Your job is to either wind up in jail, so I can come get you, or be able to pull off. That's your job.'

Jada, Styles P, the LOX, period. You throw on one of their joints... I'm in the whip; I try to keep my cool in the whip. I don't like bouncing around, getting my crazy on, but it's certain joints you gotta wild out. Roll the window down, blast the joints, let it be heard. That's one of them groups that bang it out.

I was an athlete in college - a quarterback, a leader - so people telling me what to do doesn't work.

You grow, you mature, you live, and you learn. You get a little wiser, and you learn better ways to handle things.

Take 7 emcees put em in a line And add 7 more brothers who think they can rhyme It'll take 7 more before I go for mine And that's 21 emcees ate up at the same time.

I think half of our life is written out for us and things happen the way their supposed to happen.

As far as our physical form, the mind is a great temple. But it has a life span and it dies.

I had a lot of respect for Prodigy. He brought the hood to the booth. When we were trying to shape this rap thing into something, he was one of the cats I respected for bringing the hood into the booth.

To me, sometimes things outside of rap inspire me to rap.

I love Kanye for that. Being a producer, making beats, and being a rapper. He does it all.

Back in the day, rappers were 'bump bump bump ba bump ba bump.' They was rhyming like that, but I was like, 'bababa bump bump babum ba babump bababa bump.'

There are certain things that I wish people knew - certain things that I feel I started and certain things that I'm responsible for. Sometimes you wish people knew where a certain style of rapping came from or who was the first one to say whatever.