Tolerance Quotes

“To others, I am as they perceive me, and they address me based on their preferences. I have no objection to people's perception.”
― Suman Pokhrel

“The successful are not tolerated.”
― Aeschylus, The Ancient Greek Drama Collection: The Plays of Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides

“I judge people by their own principles—not by my own.”
― Martin Luther King Jr.

“The sacred icons of Dutch society were broken in the 1960s, as elsewhere in the Western world, when the churches lost their grip on people’s lives, when government authority was something to challenge, not obey, when sexual taboos were publicly and privately breached, and when—rather in line with the original Enlightenment—people opened their eyes and ears to civilizations outside the West. The rebellions of the 1960s contained irrational, indeed antirational, and sometimes violent strains, and the fashion for such far-flung exotica as Maoism sometimes turned into a revolt against liberalism and democracy. One by one the religious and political pillars that supported the established order of the Netherlands were cut away. The tolerance of other cultures, often barely understood, that spread with new waves of immigration, was sometimes just that—tolerance—and sometimes sheer indifference, bred by a lack of confidence in values and institutions that needed to be defended.”
― Ian Buruma, Murder in Amsterdam: The Death of Theo van Gogh and the Limits of Tolerance

“When different religion managed to coexist peacefully for a long period, the visibility of other religion tended to weaken one's conviction of the unique excellence of one's own.”
― Ritchie Robertson, The Enlightenment: The Pursuit of Happiness 1680-1790

“Plenty Room For All (The Sonnet)

Turban, Hijab, Habit or Tuxedo,
Wear whatever feels like second skin.
No need to justify to judgmental apes,
Life's too short to be wasted on fiends.

Let them just fade away,
as vestigials of evolution.
Savagery requires treatment,
not serious consideration.

To be treated as a human being,
One must behave as human being.
Faith, intellect, both are poison,
If the heart remains ever so mean.

There's plenty room for all thoughts,
No matter the measures of books 'n brain.
Fiction, reason, all are welcome,
On my earth where but love reigns.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Either Right or Human: 300 Limericks of Inclusion

“Turban, Hijab, Habit or Tuxedo,
Wear whatever feels like second skin.
No need to justify to judgmental apes,
Life's too short to be wasted on fiends.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Either Right or Human: 300 Limericks of Inclusion

“He, who expurgated the cord of faith and love, has no bearing in the scheme of life.”
― Daniel ANIKOR

“Not everything illogical is superstition,
Not everything logical aids civilization.
Facts and fiction both have a place,
in civilizing the world for human race.
To know their place, first you gotta be human.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Either Right or Human: 300 Limericks of Inclusion

“No matter my rational outlook of the universe as a scientist, I have great admiration for pastors who actively encourage their parishioners to look outside the christian tradition and garner a whole perspective of life. I feel a hearty closeness to these people of faith, which I cannot put in words. And believe you me, the number of such progressive faithworkers is increasing by leaps and bounds, which only reinforces my dream of a unified planet.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Yaralardan Yangın Doğar: Explorers of Night are Emperors of Dawn

“Atheism has never been the focus in any of my work. If your own exploration of nature and the universe makes you outgrow the influence of ancestral myths, that's great - if not, it doesn't matter to me one bit. So long as you are a decent human being, your psychological necessity of a personal deity or the lack of it, is irrelevant outside our personal life.

If you stop believing in God, that won't magically make you a better person than you already are - in the same way - if you start believing in God, it won't magically make you a better person than you already are. Neither faith nor intellect makes a person good - if a person is good, they know how to use their faith or intellect for good. So, I repeat, what's needed, is not the end of religion, but the end of religious intolerance.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Yaralardan Yangın Doğar: Explorers of Night are Emperors of Dawn

“Take my Bible, Koran & Vedas,
Take my Origin of Species.
Throw me to the fires of hell,
My life will still smell of roses.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Bulletproof Backbone: Injustice Not Allowed on My Watch

“Shared existence is only existence.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Iman Insaniyat, Mazhab Muhabbat: Pani, Agua, Water, It's All One

“Islam may soon become the majority religion in countries whose churches have been turned more and more into tourist sites, apartment houses, theaters, and places of entertainment. The French scholar Olivier Roy is right: Islam is now a European religion. How Europeans, Muslims as well as non-Muslims, cope with this is the question that will decide our future. And what better place to watch the drama unfold than the Netherlands, where freedom came from a revolt against Catholic Spain, where ideals of tolerance and diversity became a badge of national honor, and where political Islam struck its first blow against a man whose deepest conviction was that freedom of speech included the freedom to insult.”
― Ian Buruma, Murder in Amsterdam: The Death of Theo van Gogh and the Limits of Tolerance

“Bible, Vedas, Koran
(Sonnet 1274)

Take my Bible,
Take my Vedas;
Take my Koran,
Take my Suttas;
Take my Darwin,
Take my creation;
Take my Aquinas,
Take my Atom;
Take my myths,
Take my reason;
Take my facts,
Take my fiction;
Take the whole lot,
I'll still be human.
My humanity thrives beyond
all dualities of facts and fiction.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Bulletproof Backbone: Injustice Not Allowed on My Watch

“Tolerance, tolerance, tolerance!
Nay - acceptance, acceptance, acceptance!
Accept people for who they are,
to change them never you desire!
To see love, you gotta be love incarnate.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Iman Insaniyat, Mazhab Muhabbat: Pani, Agua, Water, It's All One

“The best reason for exposing oneself to foreign ways is to generate a sense of vitality and
awareness – an interest in life which can come only when one lives through the shock of
contrast and difference.”
― Edward T. Hall, The Silent Language

“At the heart of every flourishing democracy is the unyielding commitment to free speech. It is the beacon that illuminates the path towards a more just and equitable society, where every citizen is empowered to participate in shaping the collective narrative. Embracing free speech isn't just about tolerating dissent; it's a celebration of intellectual diversity, a recognition that the strength of a nation lies in the unfettered expression of its people.”
― James William Steven Parker

“It's not enough to outgrow the divisions in culture, we must also outgrow the divisions in intellect. For example, if you think theology is all about the supernatural, it doesn't mean the entire field of theology is nonsense, it just means, you are studying the wrong kind of theology – you are stuck with an archaic notion of theology. Likewise, if you think science is all about cold facts and figures, then you are studying the wrong kind of science – you are stuck with an archaic notion of science.

Till you develop a common humane ground underneath your feet, all the facts and all the faith won't do you any good.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Insan Himalayanoğlu: It's Time to Defect

“What is Naskar (The Sonnet)

Naskar is a culture unto themselves,
Naskar is a nation unto themselves.
Naskar is a planet unto themselves,
Naskar is a paradigm unto themselves.

Naskar culture is integration,
Naskar nation is world nation.
Naskar planet is borderless,
Naskar paradigm is undivision.

Naskar is not a he or she,
Naskar is the whole of humanity.
Naskar is neither east nor west,
Naskarosphere is conscious unity.

Naskar is just a lesser synonym,
The original name is Human Being.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Visvavatan: 100 Demilitarization Sonnets

“Don't Have to Agree, to Love (Sonnet 1347)

You don't have to agree with a person
completely, to love them - accept them.
There are a few, I disagree with plenty,
yet till death, I'll fight for them.

Not all that Rumi wrote apply today,
yet I love Mevlana like my own brother.
Even more of Aquinas are out of date,
yet like a friend I love my Thomas.

Heart doesn't care about consensus of the brain,
Heart only cares for an inexplicable closeness.
Intellect has no bearing over heart's closeness,
Often intellect is a barrier to life's wholeness.

Intellect is boon, but only when it helps wholeness.
Being right is not necessarily the mark of goodness.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Visvavatan: 100 Demilitarization Sonnets

“Heart doesn't care about consensus of the brain.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Visvavatan: 100 Demilitarization Sonnets

“You don't have to agree with a person completely, to love them.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Visvavatan: 100 Demilitarization Sonnets

“A hundred hajj won't make you holy, if your heart is ever cold and dead.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Dervis Vadisi: 100 Promissory Sonnets

“In the world it is called tolerance but in hell it is called despair. The sin that believes in nothing, seeks to know nothing, enjoys nothing, finds purpose in nothing lives for nothing but remains alive because there is nothing which it would die for.”
― Dorothy Sayers

“I have learned silence from the talkative, toleration from the intolerant, and kindness from the unkind; yet, strange, I am ungrateful to these teachers.”
― Kahlil Gibran, Sand and Foam

“Agony is the next level beyond tolerance.”
― Wyatt Pringle Jr

“Ardent critics of religion are just as animal as fundamentalists.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Dervis Vadisi: 100 Promissory Sonnets

“Close your eyes, turn off facts and fiction; There's an alley leading from my heart to yours.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Dervis Vadisi: 100 Promissory Sonnets

“What is human is also kind,
Kindness is supreme sanity.
Acceptance is love in practice,
Love is the truest upward mobility.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Yüz Şiirlerin Yüzüğü (Ring of 100 Poems, Bilingual Edition): 100 Turkish Poems with Translations