Marcus Borg Quotes

• The Christian life is not about pleasing God the finger-shaker and judge. It is not about believing now or being good now for the sake of heaven later. It is about entering a relationship in the present that begins to change everything now. Spirituality is about this process: the opening of the heart to the God who is already here.

  Marcus Borg

  Life, Relationship, Change

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• The Bible is a human product: it tells us how our religious ancestors saw things, not how God sees things

  Marcus Borg

  Religious, Saws, Ancestor

  Marcus Borg (2014). “Convictions: A manifesto for progressive Christians”, p.81, SPCK

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• So, is there an afterlife, and if so, what will it be like? I don't have a clue. But I am confident that the one who has buoyed us up in life will also buoy us up through death. We die into God. What more that means, I do not know. But that is all I need to know.

  Marcus Borg

  Mean, Afterlife, Needs

  Marcus Borg (2012). “Speaking Christian: Recovering the lost meaning of Christian words”, p.107, SPCK

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• God loves us already and has from our very beginning. The Christian life is not about believing or doing what we need to believe or do so that we can be saved. Rather, it's about seeing what is already true – that God loves us already – and then beginning to live in this relationship. It is about becoming conscious of and intentional about a deepening relationship with God.

  Marcus Borg

  Christian, Believe, Becoming

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• The point is not that Jesus was a good guy who accepted everybody, and thus we should do the same (though that would be good). Rather, his teachings and behaviour reflect an alternative social vision. Jesus was not talking about how to be good and how to behave within the framework of a domination system. He was a critic of the domination system itself.

  Marcus Borg

  Jesus, Teaching, Talking

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• The Bible is true, and some of it actually happened.

  Marcus Borg

  Happened

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• Christianity's goal is not escape from this world. It loves this world and seeks to change it for the better.

  Marcus Borg

  Goal, World, Christianity

  Marcus Borg (2012). “Speaking Christian: Recovering the lost meaning of Christian words”, p.103, SPCK

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• I affirm, along with many others, that the major enduring religions of the world are all valid and legitimate. I see them as the responses to the experience of God in the various cultures in which each originated. To be Christian means to find the decisive revelation of God in Jesus. To be Muslim means to find the decisive revelation of God in the Koran.

  Marcus Borg

  Christian, Jesus, Mean

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• I would argue that the truth of Easter does not depend on whether there was an empty tomb, or whether anything happened to the body of Jesus. ... I do not see the Christian tradition as exclusively true, or the Bible as the unique and infallible revelation of God. ... It makes no historical sense to say, 'Jesus was killed for the sins of the world.' ... I am one of those Christians who does not believe in the virgin birth, nor in the star of Bethlehem, nor in the journeys of the wisemen, nor in the shepherds coming to the manger, as facts of history.

  Marcus Borg

  Christian, Jesus, Easter

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• I let go of the notion that the Bible is a divine product. I learned that it is a human cultural product, the product of two ancient communities, biblical Israel and early Christianity. As such, it contained their understandings and affirmations, not statements coming directly or somewhat directly from God. . . . I realized that whatever "divine revelation" and the "inspiration of the Bible" meant (if they meant anything), they did not mean that the Bible was a divine product with divine authority.

  Marcus Borg

  Letting Go, Inspiration, Mean

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• One of God's central qualities is compassion, a word that in Hebrew is related to the word for "womb." Not only is compassion a female image suggesting source of life and nourishment but it also has a feeling dimension: God as compassionate Spirit feels for us as a mother feels for the children of her womb. Spirit feels the suffering of the world and participates in it. . . .

  Marcus Borg

  Mother, Children, Compassion

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• People who think of God as a warrior may become warriors themselves, whether in a Christian crusade, a Muslim jihad, or an apocalyptically oriented militia. People who think of God as righteous are likely to emphasize righteousness themselves, just as those who think of God as compassionate are likely to emphasize compassion. People who think God is angry at the world are likely to be angry at the world themselves.

  Marcus Borg

  Christian, Warrior, Thinking

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• Jesus disclosed that God is compassionate. Jesus spoke of God that way: "Be compassionate, as God is compassionate." Compassion is the primary quality of the central figures in two of his most famous parables: the father in the parable of the Prodigal Son and the Good Samaritan. And Jesus himself, as a manifestation of the sacred, is often spoken of as embodying compassion.

  Marcus Borg

  Jesus, Father, Son

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• God’s dream for us is not simply peace of mind, but peace on earth.

  Marcus Borg

  Dream, Mind, Earth

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• Imagine that it’s not about the self and its concerns, about ‘what’s in it for me,’ whether that be a blessed afterlife or prosperity in this life.

  Marcus Borg

  Blessed, Afterlife, Self

  "Marcus Borg, Liberal Scholar on Historical Jesus, Dies at 72" by Laurie Goodstein, www.nytimes.com. January 26, 2015.

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• Seminary also introduced me to the historical study of Jesus and Christian origins. I learned from my professors and the readings they assigned that Jesus almost certainly was not born of a virgin, did not think of himself as the Son of God, and did not see his purpose as dying for the sins of the world. .. I also found the claim that Jesus and Christianity were the only way of salvation to be troublesome.

  Marcus Borg

  Christian, Jesus, Reading

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• 'Believing' cannot tip the scales in making a historical judgement about whether something really happened. I can choose to believe that George Washington threw a silver dollar across the Rappahannock, but my believing that he did it has nothing to do with whether or not he really did do it. So also with the story of Jesus walking on water: Believing that he did it has nothing to do with whether he really did do it. 'Belief' cannot be the basis for historical conclusions; it has no direct relevance.

  Marcus Borg

  Faith, Jesus, Believe

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• It is important to show people ways that we can reclaim Christianity from some of the misunderstandings of our time.

  Marcus Borg

  People, Important, Christianity

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• Reality is permeated, indeed flooded, with divine creativity, nourishment, and care.

  Marcus Borg

  Creativity, Reality, Care

  Marcus Borg (1998). “Conflict, Holiness, and Politics in the Teachings of Jesus”, p.243, Bloomsbury Publishing USA

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• How can women be in the image of God if God cannot be imaged in female form?

  Marcus Borg

  Female, Form, God Image

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• To be Christian means to find the decisive revelation of God in Jesus. To be Muslim means to find the decisive revelation of God in the Koran. To be Jewish means to find the decisive revelation of God in the Torah, and so forth.

  Marcus Borg

  Christian, Jesus, Mean

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• When tradition is thought to state the way things really are, it becomes the director and judge of our lives; we are, in effect, imprisoned by it. On the other hand, tradition can be understood as a pointer to that which is beyond tradition: the sacred. Then it functions not as a prison but as a lens.

  Marcus Borg

  Hands, Judging, Directors

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• People remember stories much better than they remember a straight list of teachings.

  Marcus Borg

  Teaching, People, Remember

  "Interview with Marcus Borg on his first novel, ‘Putting Away Childish Things’". Interview with David Crumm, www.readthespirit.com.

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• The titles of Jesus (son of God, messiah, light of the world, etc.) are not found in the earliest layer of tradition and are not part of self proclamation of Jesus. This does not make them wrong. Rather, they are the voice of the community, statements about what people around Jesus thought of him.

  Marcus Borg

  Jesus, Son, Light

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• Some people find the experience and practice of compassion as a spiritual discipline to be a more direct route to the transformation of the heart than prayer. It is not that prayer does not or should not play a role in their lives, but their way to the opening of the heart lies through deeds of compassion. "Just do it" summarizes this path of transformation.

  Marcus Borg

  Spiritual, Prayer, Lying

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