Quotes from Harold S. Kushner

About a third of my cases are suffering from no clinically defineable neurosis, but from the senselessness and emptiness of their lives. This can be described as the general neurosis of our time.

What might have been" is a pretty good definition of Hell.

Events do not reflect God's choices. They happen at random, and randomness is another name for chaos… And chaos is evil; not wrong, not malevolent, but evil nonetheless.

God is a God I can believe in.

Wrong behavior carries with it the seeds of its own retribution.

To believe in God is not to affirm His existence. To believe in God means to trust God, to rely on God to be there for you when you are afflicted by despair, to light your path when you are uncertain as to what to do.

We have made the 20th century the century of the individual. For most of human history, a person was part of a family, part of a clan or tribe or neighborhood. People defined themselves on the basis of their relationships to other people, not on the basis of their individual achievements.

For Judaism, sin is a deed, not a condition.

Let me suggest that at the core of Jewish God-talk is the unshakable conviction that God's most dominant attribute is His commitment to justice rather than power. Earthly kings lust for power, for total control, and are prepared to sacrifice justice, to hurt innocent people, to hold on to power. But as far as the God of Israel is concerned, in a conflict between justice and power, justice will prevail. God will not do wrong. That more than anything gives Job reason to hope. A

We can do our best to change people, to summon them to be whom they are capable of being, but ultimately they only people we will always have the power to change will be ourselves.

To be a husband or wife, to be a parent, is inevitably to be aware of so many disappointing, exasperating things about your mate or child, but at the same time to see those people in depth, to see them with both eyes, and to be reminded of why you still love them.

True success consists not in becoming the person you dreamed of being when you were young, but in becoming the person you were meant to be, the person you are capable of being when you are at your best.

But, of course, we cannot choose. We can only try to cope. That is what one does with sorrow, with tragedy, with any misfortune. We do not try to explain it. We do not try to explain it. We do not justify it by telling ourselves that we somehow deserve it. We do not even accept it. We survive it. We recognize its unfairness and defiantly choose to go on living.

Why did they say that? Why did they assume that they were somehow responsible for this tragedy? Who taught them to believe in a God who would strike down an attractive, gifted young woman without warning as punishment for someone else's ritual infraction?

There will be dark days, days of loss and days of failure, but they will not last forever. The light will always return to chase away the darkness, the sun will always come out again after the rain, and the human spirit will always rise above failure. Fear will assault us, but we will not be afraid, "for Thou art with me.

Sometimes, if we can't find another person to dump our anger on, we turn it on ourselves. The textbook definition of depression is anger turned inward instead of being discharged outward.

when you are able to forgive yourself and to forgive people around you for not being perfect, I will recognize you as My child.

Tell the righteous it shall be well with them, for they shall eat the fruit of their deeds. Woe to the wicked, it shall be ill with him, for what his hands have done shall be done to him. (Isaiah 3:10–11)

Do you not know this, that from time immemorial, Since man was first set on earth, The joy of the wicked has been brief?… Though evil is sweet to his taste, His food in his bowels turns to venom within him. (20:4–5, 12–14) In

The author of the Twenty-third Psalm makes a similar point. When all is going smoothly in his life, surrounded by green pastures and still waters, the psalmist talks about God, referring to God as He. But when he finds himself for the first time in the valley of the shadow of death and discovers that God has not abandoned him, only then does he say for the first time, "for Thou art with me.

My list of the worst offenses against God would begin with hurting another person, cheating another person, shaming another person.

believe in God is not to affirm His existence. To believe in God means to trust God, to rely on God to be there for you when you are afflicted by despair, to light your path when you are uncertain as to what to do.

We cheat death, not by living forever, but by bearing, raising, and educating children to keep our souls, our values, and even our names alive. One generation, scarred and often embittered by experience, gives way to another, born in innocence and hope.

I know that this is a painful time for you. But I know that you will get through it all right, because God never sends us more of a burden than we can bear. God only let this happen to you because He knows that you are strong enough to handle it." Harriet Schiff remembers her reaction to those words: "If only I was a weaker person, Robbie would still be alive.