Zitate von Reinhold Niebuhr

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Reinhold Niebuhr

Geburtstag: 21. Juni 1892
Todesdatum: 1. Juni 1971

Karl Paul Reinhold Niebuhr war ein einflussreicher amerikanischer Theologe, Philosoph und Politikwissenschaftler.

Zitate Reinhold Niebuhr

„Gott gebe mir die Gelassenheit, Dinge hinzunehmen, die ich nicht ändern kann, den Mut, Dinge zu ändern, die ich ändern kann, und die Weisheit, das eine vom anderen zu unterscheiden.“

— Reinhold Niebuhr
Gelassenheitsgebet in der verbreiteten Übersetzung Theodor Wilhelms aus dessen 1951 unter dem Pseudonym Friedrich Oetinger erschienenen Buch Wendepunkt der politischen Erziehung; oft fälschlich Friedrich Christoph Oetinger zugeschrieben. Siehe Referat von Dr. Eberhard Zwink, Württembergische Landesbibliothek Stuttgart http://www.wlb-stuttgart.de/sammlungen/handschriften/bestand/nachlaesse-und-autographen/oetinger-archiv/gelassenheitsgebet/, 19. Februar 2007. Siehe auch Gelassenheitsgebet Original engl.: "God, give us grace to accept with serenity the things that cannot be changed, courage to change the things that should be changed, and the wisdom to distinguish the one from the other."

Über Weisheit, Über Gott, Über Ehe, Mut

„Des Menschen Sinn für Gerechtigkeit macht Demokratie möglich, seine Neigung zur Ungerechtigkeit aber macht Demokratie notwendig.“

— Reinhold Niebuhr
Die Kinder des Lichts und die Kinder der Finsternis, Kaiser München 1947, Seite 10 books.google http://books.google.de/books?id=xY4_AAAAIAAJ&q=%22neigung+zur%22. “Man’s capacity for justice makes democracy possible; but man’s inclination to injustice makes democracy necessary.” - The Children of Light and the Children of Darkness. A Vindication of Democracy and a Critique of Its Traditional Defense. Scribner's New York 1944. Foreword

Über Menschen, Über Gerechtigkeit, Sinn, Demokratie

„Our dreams of bringing the whole of human history under the control of the human will are ironically refuted by the fact that no group of idealists can easily move the pattern of history toward the desired goal of peace and justice. The recalcitrant forces in the historical drama have a power and persistence beyond our reckoning.“

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— Reinhold Niebuhr
The Irony of American History (1952)

„Change what cannot be accepted and accept what cannot be changed.“

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— Reinhold Niebuhr

„The more complex the world situation becomes, the more scientific and rational analysis you have to have, the less you can do with simple good will and sentiment.“

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— Reinhold Niebuhr
The Mike Wallace Interview (1958), Context: The more complex the world situation becomes, the more scientific and rational analysis you have to have, the less you can do with simple good will and sentiment. Nonetheless, the human situation is so, and this is why I think that the Christian faith is right as against simple forms of secularism. That it believes that there is in man a radical freedom, and this freedom is creative but it is also destructive — and there's nothing that prevents this from being both creative and destructive. That's why history is not an answer to our problem, because history complicates, enlarges every problem of human existence.

„The inertia of society is so stubborn that no one will move against it, if he cannot believe that it can be more easily overcome than is actually the case.“

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— Reinhold Niebuhr, book Moral Man and Immoral Society
Moral Man and Immoral Society (1932), Context: The naïve faith of the proletarian is the faith of the man of action. Rationality belongs to the cool observers. There is of course an element of illusion in the faith of the proletarian, as there is in all faith. But it is a necessary illusion, without which some truth is obscured. The inertia of society is so stubborn that no one will move against it, if he cannot believe that it can be more easily overcome than is actually the case. p.221

„There were experiences in previous centuries which might well have challenged this unqualified optimism.“

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— Reinhold Niebuhr
Faith and History: A Comparison of Christian and Modern Views of History (1949), Context: There were experiences in previous centuries which might well have challenged this unqualified optimism. But the expansion of man's power over nature proceeded at such a pace that all doubts were quieted, allowing the nineteenth century to become the “century of hope” and to express the modern mood in its most extravagant terms. History, refusing to move by the calendar, actually permitted the nineteenth century to indulge its illusions into the twentieth. Then came the deluge. Since 1914 one tragic experience has followed another, as if history had been designed to refute the vain delusions of modern man.

„If the man of power were to take a message of absolute honesty and absolute love seriously he would lose his power, or would divest himself of it.“

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— Reinhold Niebuhr
Christianity and Power Politics (1936), Context: In the simple and decadent individualism of the Oxford group movement there is no understanding of the fact that the man of power is always to a certain degree an anti-Christ. "All power," said Lord Acton with cynical realism, "corrupts; and absolute power corrupts absolutely." If the man of power were to take a message of absolute honesty and absolute love seriously he would lose his power, or would divest himself of it. This is not to imply that the world can get along without power and that it is not preferable that men of conscience should wield it rather than scoundrels. But if men of power had not only conscience but also something of the gospel's insight into the intricacies of social sin in the world, they would know that they could never extricate themselves completely from the sinfulness of power, even while they were wielding it ostensibly for the common good. (Chapter 29: "Hitler and Buchman")

„Therefore we must be saved by the final form of love which is forgiveness.“

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— Reinhold Niebuhr
The Irony of American History (1952), Context: Nothing that is worth doing can be achieved in our lifetime; therefore we must be saved by hope. Nothing which is true or beautiful or good makes complete sense in any immediate context of history; therefore we must be saved by faith. Nothing we do, however virtuous, can be accomplished alone; therefore we are saved by love. No virtuous act is quite as virtuous from the standpoint of our friend or foe as it is from our standpoint. Therefore we must be saved by the final form of love which is forgiveness. p. 63

„The naïve faith of the proletarian is the faith of the man of action. Rationality belongs to the cool observers.“

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„The inevitable hypocrisy, which is associated with the all the collective activities of the human race, springs chiefly from this source: that individuals have a moral code which makes the actions of collective man an outrage to their conscience.“

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— Reinhold Niebuhr, book Moral Man and Immoral Society
Moral Man and Immoral Society (1932), Context: The inevitable hypocrisy, which is associated with the all the collective activities of the human race, springs chiefly from this source: that individuals have a moral code which makes the actions of collective man an outrage to their conscience. They therefore invent romantic and moral interpretations of the real facts, preferring to obscure rather than reveal the true character of their collective behavior. Sometimes they are as anxious to offer moral justifications for the brutalities from which they suffer as for those which they commit. The fact that the hypocrisy of man's group behavior... expresses itself not only in terms of self-justification but in terms of moral justification of human behavior in general, symbolizes one of the tragedies of the human spirit: its inability to conform its collective life to its individual ideals. As individuals, men believe they ought to love and serve each other and establish justice between each other. As racial, economic and national groups they take for themselves, whatever their power can command. pp. 8-9

„Human existence is obviously distinguished from animal life by its qualified participation in creation. Within limits it breaks the forms of nature and creates new configurations of vitality.“

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— Reinhold Niebuhr
The Nature and Destiny of Man: A Christian Interpretation (1941), Context: Human existence is obviously distinguished from animal life by its qualified participation in creation. Within limits it breaks the forms of nature and creates new configurations of vitality. Its transcendence over natural process offers it the opportunity of interfering with the established forms and unities of vitality as nature knows them.

„Historical communities are, in short, more deeply involved in nature and time than the individual.“

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— Reinhold Niebuhr
The Nature and Destiny of Man: A Christian Interpretation (1941), Context: The brotherhood of the community is indeed the ground in which the individual is ethically realized. But the community is the frustration as well as the realization of individual life. Its collective egotism is an offense to his conscience; its institutional injustices negate the ideal of justice; and such brotherhood as it achieves is limited by ethnic and geographic boundaries. Historical communities are, in short, more deeply involved in nature and time than the individual.

„Sometimes they are as anxious to offer moral justifications for the brutalities from which they suffer as for those which they commit.“

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„We take, and must continue to take, morally hazardous actions to preserve our civilization.“

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— Reinhold Niebuhr
The Irony of American History (1952), Context: We take, and must continue to take, morally hazardous actions to preserve our civilization. We must exercise our power. But we ought neither to believe that a nation is capable of perfect disinterestedness in its exercise, nor become complacent about a particular degree of interest and passion which corrupt the justice by which the exercise of power is legitimatized.

„I wouldn't judge a man by the presuppositions of his life, but only by the fruits of his life.“

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— Reinhold Niebuhr
The Mike Wallace Interview (1958), Context: My personal attitude toward atheists is the same attitude that I have toward Christians, and would be governed by a very orthodox text: "By their fruits shall ye know them." I wouldn't judge a man by the presuppositions of his life, but only by the fruits of his life. And the fruits — the relevant fruits — are, I'd say, a sense of charity, a sense of proportion, a sense of justice. And whether the man is an atheist or a Christian, I would judge him by his fruits, and I have therefore many agnostic friends.