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Felix Adler war ein US-amerikanischer Philosoph deutsch-jüdischer Herkunft. Er war Professor für hebräische und orientalische Literatur an der Cornell University in Ithaca, NY.

Er wurde als Sohn des Alzeyer Rabbiners Dr. Samuel Adler geboren, der 1857 mit ihm nach Amerika auswanderte. Felix Adler studierte an der Columbia University, kehrte nach Deutschland zurück und promovierte an der Universität Heidelberg. 1874 ging er wieder in die USA, wo er für zwei Jahre als Professor für hebräische und orientalische Literatur an der Cornell University tätig war.

1876 gründete Adler in New York die für einen säkularen Humanismus eintretende „Society for Ethical Culture“, deren moralischer und geistiger Führer er bis zu seinem Tod blieb. Adler fand Anhänger für seine Ideen zunächst in vielen Staaten der USA, bald aber auch in einigen europäischen Staaten. Ein wichtiger Vertreter dieser Anschauungen im deutschen Sprachraum war der im Anschluss an Ludwig Feuerbach wirkende Wiener Philosophieprofessor Friedrich Jodl als Mitbegründer und Vorstand der „Deutschen Gesellschaft für Ethische Kultur“. Das Bestreben dieser Gesellschaften wird als ethische Bewegung bezeichnet.

Von 1902 bis 1918 war Adler Professor für „Politische und Soziale Ethik“ an der Columbia University. Er war auch Gründer von The Ethical Record und The International Journal of Ethics , rief 1900 den New York Philosophy Club ins Leben und war ab 1928 bis zu seinem Tod Präsident der American Philosophical Association.

✵ 13. August 1851 – 24. April 1933
Felix Adler Foto
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Felix Adler: Zitate auf Englisch

“In order to join vigorously in the moral work of the world I must believe that somehow the best I can accomplish will endure, will leave its trace on things, will aid the final consummation.”

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Felix Adler

Section 4 : Moral Ideals
Founding Address (1876), Life and Destiny (1913)

“Good deeds remain good, no matter whether we know how the world was made or not. Vile deeds are vile, no matter whether we know or do not know what, after death, will be the fate of the doer. We know, at least, what his fate is now, namely, to be wedded to the vileness.
The question for anyone to decide, who hesitates between good and evil, is whether he aspires to be a full-weight man, or merely the fragment, nay, the counterfeit of a man. Only he who ceaselessly aims at moral completeness is, in the true sense, a human being.”

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Felix Adler

Section 9 : Ethical Outlook
Founding Address (1876), Life and Destiny (1913)

“When we are about to set forth on a path hitherto untried and likely to lead our lives in a new direction, it appears eminently desirable and proper that we should, in the first place, briefly review the public and private life of the day, in order to determine whether the essential elements that make up the happiness of states and individuals are all duly provided, and if not, where the need lies and how it can best be supplied.”

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Felix Adler

Founding Address (1876)

“Why in this world of ours there should be so much suffering no one knows. But this we know; that, evil existing, the world being such as it is, we can win from evil, if we choose, an inestimable good, namely — the conviction that there is in us a power not of the senses, the conviction that spirit exists, and exists in us.
A sceptic may say that in a world ideally conceivable we might have secured this precious conviction without the necessity of undergoing the ordeal of pain. To which the reply is: that in a world ideally conceivable what he says may be true; but in the world as it is, with which alone we are concerned, we have ample cause for gratitude that we can turn suffering to such far-reaching account, that we can distil from the bitter root this divine elixir; that by manfully bearing the pains of the senses, inexplicable though they be, we are able to gain the certainty that a power not born of the senses exists in us, operates in us. It is this effect of pain that accounts for the serenity and peace of many patient sufferers, a peace and a serenity which surround their bed of misery with a kind of halo.”

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Felix Adler

Section 7 : Spiritual Progress
Founding Address (1876), Life and Destiny (1913)

“The radiant future stretches forth its arms toward us, and binds us to be willing servants to its work, willingly to accept those limitations of the individual will which are indispensable in the service of a far-off cause, a service which at the same time disciplines and ennobles the individual himself.”

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Felix Adler

Founding Address (1876), Some Characteristics of the American Ethical Movement (1925)

“The peace that passeth understanding is that which comes when the pain is not relieved, which subsists in the midst of the painful situation, suffusing it, which springs out of the pain itself, which shimmers on the crest of the wave of pain, which is the spear of frustration transfigured into the shaft of light. It is upon those we love that we must anchor ourselves spiritually in the last moments. The sense of interconnectedness with them stands out vividly by way of contrast at the very moment when our mortal connection with them is about to be dissolved. And the intertwining of our life with theirs, the living in the life that is in them, is but a part of our living in the infinite manifold of the spiritual life. The thought of this, as apprehended, not in terms of knowledge, but in immediate experience, begets the peace that passeth understanding. And it is upon the bosom of that peace that we can pass safely out of the realm of time and space.”

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Felix Adler

Book IV, Ch. 10 "The Last Outlook On Life"
Founding Address (1876), An Ethical Philosopy of Life (1918)

“The fact that there is a spiritual power in us, that is to say, a power which testifies to the unity of our life with the life of others, which impels us to regard others as other selves — this fact conies home to us even more forcibly in sorrow than in joy. It is thrown into clearest relief on the background of pain.
In the glow of achievement we are apt to be full of a false self-importance. But in moments of weakness we realise, through contrast, the infinitely superior strength of the power whose very humble organs and ministers we are. It is then we come to understand that, isolated from it, we are nothing; at one with it, identified with it, we participate in its eternal nature, in its resistless course.”

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Felix Adler

Section 1 : The Meaning of Life
Founding Address (1876), Life and Destiny (1913)

“We call him a hero who maintains himself, single-handed, against superior numbers. We call him a master-horseman who sits a fiery and vicious steed, guiding him at will. And in like manner, we call him a moral hero who conquers the enemies within his own breast — and we admire and revere the soul which can ride its own passions and force them into obedience to the dictates of reason.”

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Felix Adler

Section 4 : Moral Ideals
Founding Address (1876), Life and Destiny (1913)

“Why should there be any more the old dividing line between man and his brother-man? why should the fires of prejudice flare up anew between us? why should we not maintain this common ground which we have found at last, and hedge it round, and protect it — the stronghold of freedom and of all the humanities for the long years to come?”

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Felix Adler

Founding Address (1876)

“It is the nature of the noble and the good and the wise that they impart to us of their nobility and their goodness and their wisdom while they live, making it natural for us to breathe the air they breathe and giving us confidence in our own untested powers. And the same influence in more ethereal fashion they continue to exert after they are gone.”

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Felix Adler

Section 8 : Suffering and Consolation
Founding Address (1876), Life and Destiny (1913)

“Already complaints are multiplying on every hand that that most gracious quality of all that adorns the age of childhood — the quality of reverence — is fast fading from our schools and households; that the oldtime respect for father and mother is diminished, and grown rarer and more uncertain.”

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Felix Adler

Founding Address (1876)

“Ethical religion can be real only to those who are engaged in ceaseless efforts at moral improvement. By moving upward we acquire faith in an upward movement, without limit.”

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Felix Adler

Section 2 : Religion
Founding Address (1876), Life and Destiny (1913)

“Where the roots of private virtue are diseased, the fruit of public probity cannot but be corrupt.”

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Felix Adler

Founding Address (1876)

“Gladness, in some instances, springs from a natural buoyancy of temperament, and is quite consistent with shallowness and superficiality of character. In other cases it is coincident with the swift flow of the currents of the blood, and ceases when the stream flows more slowly and begins to stagnate. Or it is due to gifts which an exceptional good fortune showers into the laps of favoured mortals. Gladness of this sort comes with happiness and departs with it.
But the purified gladness of which I speak is not dependent on these accidents. It is the mark of the ripest wisdom, and is based on the conviction, gained through experience, that life is worth living, that the victory is assured, and that the ends we pursue are of such excellence as to be incapable of ultimate defeat.”

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Felix Adler

Section 4 : Moral Ideals
Founding Address (1876), Life and Destiny (1913)

“We propose to entirely exclude prayer and every form of ritual. Thus shall we avoid even the appearance of interfering with those to whom prayer and ritual, as a mode of expressing religious sentiment, are dear. And on the other hand we shall be just to those who have ceased to regard them as satisfactory and dispensed with them in their own persons.”

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Felix Adler

Founding Address (1876)

“What I state as certain is certain for me. It has approved itself as such in my experience. Let others consult their experience, and see how far it tallies with that which is here set forth.”

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Felix Adler

Book I, Ch. 1 "Prelude"
Founding Address (1876), An Ethical Philosopy of Life (1918)

“Statesmen and Philanthropists are busy suggesting remedies for the cure of these great evils. But the renovation of our Civil Service, the reform of our Primaries, and whatever other measures may be devised, they all depend in the last instance upon the fidelity of those to whom their execution must be entrusted. They will all fail unless the root of the evil be attacked, unless the conscience of men be aroused, the confusion of right and wrong checked, and the loftier purposes of our being again brought powerfully home to the hearts of the people.”

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Felix Adler

Founding Address (1876)

“Religion is a wizard, a sibyl. She faces the wreck of worlds, and prophesies restoration. She faces a sky blood-red with sunset colours that deepen into darkness, and prophesies dawn. She faces death, and prophesies life.”

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Felix Adler

Section 2 : Religion
Founding Address (1876), Life and Destiny (1913)

“Spiritual evolution is the progressive advance of mankind toward a state of things in which the light of ethical perfection shall be reflected from the face of human society; that is, in which all men shall live and move and have their being in mutually promoting the highest life of each and all. It means that the object of social reformation shall not be a mere change in the conditions under which men live, but a change in human nature itself. It means that we shall look forward consciously to the breaking forth of new powers in ourselves, to the release, through our own efforts, of capacities dimly latent in us.”

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Felix Adler

Some Characteristics of the American Ethical Movement (1925)

“I believe in the supreme excellence of righteousness; I believe that the law of righteousness will triumph in the universe over all evil; I believe that in the attempt to fulfil the law of righteousness, however imperfect it must remain, are to be found the inspiration, the consolation, and the sanctification of human existence.
We live in order to finish an, as yet, unfinished universe, unfinished so far as the human, that is, the highest part of it, is concerned. We live in order to develop the superior qualities of man which are, as yet, for the most part latent.”

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Felix Adler

Section 9 : Ethical Outlook
Life and Destiny (1913)

“The frontier of the higher life is everywhere contiguous to the common life, and we can cross the border at any moment. The higher life is as real as the grosser things in which we put our trust. But our eyes must be anointed so that we may see it.
The office of the religious teacher is to be a seer, and to make others see, and thus to win them into the upward way.”

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Felix Adler

Section 9 : Ethical Outlook
Life and Destiny (1913)

“We should teach our children nothing which they shall ever need to unlearn; we should strive to transmit to them the best possessions, the truest thought, the noblest sentiments of the age in which we live.”

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Felix Adler

Section 9 : Ethical Outlook
Life and Destiny (1913)

“To those who are longing for a higher life, who deeply feel the need of religious satisfactions, we suggest that there is a way in which the demands of the head and the heart may be reconciled. Religion is not necessarily allied with dogma, a new kind of faith is possible, based not upon legend and tradition, not upon the authority of any book, but upon the moral nature of man.”

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Felix Adler

Life and Destiny (1913)

“There may be, and there ought to be, progress in the moral sphere. The moral truths which we have inherited from the past need to be expanded and restated. In times of misfortune we require for our support something of which the truth is beyond all question, in which we can put an implicit trust, " though the heavens should fall."”

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Felix Adler

A merely borrowed belief is, at such time, like a rotten plank across a raging torrent. The moment we step upon it, it gives way beneath our feet.
Section 9 : Ethical Outlook
Life and Destiny (1913)

“The question what to believe is perhaps the most momentous that anyone can put to himself. Our beliefs are not to be classed among the luxuries, but among the necessaries of existence. They become particularly important in times of trouble. They are like the life-boats carried by ocean ships. As long as the sea is smooth and there is every appearance of a prosperous voyage, the passengers seldom take note of the boats or inquire into their sea-worthiness. But when the storm breaks and danger approaches, then the capacity of the boats and their soundness become matters of the first importance.”

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Felix Adler

Section 9 : Ethical Outlook
Life and Destiny (1913)

“The right for the right's sake is the motto which everyone should take for his own life. With that as a standard of value we can descend into our hearts, appraise ourselves, and determine in how far we already are moral beings, in how far not yet.”

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Felix Adler

Section 9 : Ethical Outlook
Life and Destiny (1913)

“The bitter, yet merciful, lesson which death teaches us is to distinguish the gold from the tinsel, the true values from the worthless chaff.
The terrible events of life are great eye-openers. They force us to learn that which it is wholesome for us to know, but which habitually we try to ignore — namely, that really we have no claim on a long life ; that we are each of us liable to be called off at any moment, and that the main point is not how long we live, but with what meaning we fill the short allotted span — for short it is at best.”

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Felix Adler

Life and Destiny (1913)

“Let us learn from the lips of death the lessons of life. Let us live truly while we live, live for what is true and good and lasting. And let the memory of our dead help us to do this. For they are not wholly separated from us, if we remain loyal to them. In spirit they are with us. And we may think of them as silent, invisible, but real presences in our households.”

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Life and Destiny (1913)

“Our loss, indeed, will always remain loss, and no preaching or teaching can ever make it otherwise. But the question is whether it shall weaken and embitter, or strengthen and purify us, and lead us to raise to the dead we mourn a monument in our lives that shall be better than any pillared chapel or storied marble tomb.”

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Felix Adler

Section 8 : Suffering and Consolation
Life and Destiny (1913)

“The condition of all progress is experience. We go wrong a thousand times before we find the right path. We struggle, and grope, and hurt ourselves until we learn the use of things, and this is true of things spiritual as well as of material things. Pain is unavoidable, but it acquires a new and higher meaning when we perceive that it is the price humanity must pay for an invaluable good.”

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Felix Adler

Section 8 : Suffering and Consolation
Life and Destiny (1913)

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