Quotes from Nikos Kazantzakis

On the way between nothingness and God, we dance and weep.

She was touched and began to open her heart to me. It was like opening an old chest, full of spices, yellowed love-letters and ancient dresses.

He opened his shirt and lowered his trousers. 'Bring the light over!' he ordered. I held the lamp close to the thin, tanned body. What with deep scars, bullet and sword marks, his body was like a collander. 'Now look at the other side!' He turned round and showed me his back. 'Not a scratch on the back, you see. Do you understand? Now take the lamp back.

I realized that meals, too, are a spiritual service and that meat, bread, and wine are the raw materials from which spirit is formed.

I am not going to kill sin by killing the sinners; I am not going to wage war against evildoers and infidels. I shall preach love, and I shall love; I shall preach concord, and shall practice brotherly love toward everyone in the world.

God hates a half-devil ten times more than an arch-devil!

A fault confessed is half redressed.

Good Lord, just think what poor old God must go through also," he said with a laugh. "He certainly got himself in hot water when he created the world. The fish screams, Don't blind me, Lord; don't let me enter the nets! The fisherman screams, Blind the fish, Lord; make him enter the nets! Which one is God supposed to listen to? Sometimes he listens to the fish, sometimes to the fisherman—and that's the way the world goes round!

ÇocukluÄŸumda büyük at?l?mlar?m, insanüstü heyecanlar?m olmuÅŸtu; yaln?z ba??ma oturup içimi çekerdim, çünkü dünyaya s??m?yordum.

Every one follows his own bent. Man is like a tree. You've never quarrelled with a fig tree because it doesn't bear cherries, have you?

What happened to the crow, Zorba? Well, you see, he used to walk respectably, properly - well, like a crow. But one day he got it into his head to try and strut about like a pigeon. And from that time the poor fellow couldn't for the life of him recall his own way of walking. He was all mixed up, don't you see? He just hobbled about.

Was this man the Messiah whom God had promised him or wasn't he? All the miracles he performed could also be performed by Satan, who could even resurrect the dead. The miracles therefore did not give the rabbi sufficient basis to pass judgment; nor did the prophecies. Satan was a sly and exceedingly powerful archangel. In order to deceive mankind he was capable of making his words and actions fit the holy prophecies to perfection.

I surrender myself to everything. I love, I feel pain, I struggle. The world seems to me wider than the mind, my heart a dark and almighty mystery.

Dios es un incendio, hermano León. Arde. Y nosotros ardemos con Él.

Love responsibility. Say: It is my duty, and mine alone, to save the earth. If it is not saved, then I alone am to blame.

Are you a preacher or a capitalist? You must make up your mind! But how could I choose? I was consumed by the ingenuous desire of uniting these two things, of finding a synthesis in which the irreducible opposites would fraternise, and of winning both the earthly life and the kingdom of the skies.

the totally satisfied Mother even in her insufferable pain because she feels that something immortal has issued from her ephemeral viscera.

Man is a brute,' he said, striking the pebbles with his stick. 'A great brute. Your lordship doesn't realise this. It seems everything's been easy for you, but you ask me! A brute, I tell you! If you're cruel to him, he respects and fears you. If you're kind to him, he plucks your eyes out.

But how can anyone put a bridle on man's vanity and arrogance? But how can Purity walk the earth without covering her feet with mud?

Cine oare a creat acest labirint al nesigurantei, acest templu al trufiei, acest ulcior cu pacate, acest ogor semanat cu mii de viclesuguri, aceasta poarta a iadului, acest cos plin pana la refuz de siretlicuri, aceasta otrava care aduce cu mierea: femeia?

Mi-as exersa perfect cele cinci simturi, pielea intreaga, pentru a se desfata si a intelege. Mi-as umple sufletul cu carne. Mi-as umple carnea cu suflet

In this way, without understanding how, I entered sleep together with Christ's passion and the nightingales' warbling, just as the soul will enter Paradise.

Death had entered my life with a familiar and well-loved face, like a friend come to call for you and who waits patiently in a corner until you have finished your work.

What sort of madness comes over us to make us throw ourselves on another man, when he's done nothing to us, and bite him, cut his nose off, tear his ear out, run him through the guts - and all the time, calling on the Almighty to help us! Does it mean we want the Almighty to go and cut off noses and ears and rip people up?