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Heaven

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The heavens are declaring the glory of God; the skies above proclaim the work of his hands.
~ David, Psalm 19:1

Heaven may refer to the physical heavens, the sky, the seemingly endless expanse of the universe beyond, or to otherworldly realms, often in an "afterlife plane" of existence, attested to in various religions or spiritual philosophies. This is often described as the holiest possible place, accessible by people according to various standards of divinity, goodness, piety, faith or awareness.

Quotes

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There was no pain when I awoke,
No pain at all. Rest, like a goad,
Spurred my eyes open — and light broke
Upon them like a million swords:
And she was there. There are no words.

Heaven is for a moment's span.
And ever. ~ Stephen Vincent Benét

I see Heaven's glories shine,
And Faith shines equal, arming me from Fear. ~ Emily Brontë
All the way to heaven is heaven; and as those angels, which came from heaven hither, bring heaven with them, and are in heaven here, so that soul that goes to heaven, meets heaven here. ~ John Donne
While the wish of many individuals is to arrive at heaven, we daily behold them on the way to hell. ~ Reverend William Scott Downey
The redeemed shall walk there. ~ Isaiah 35:9
To everything (turn, turn, turn)
There is a season (turn, turn, turn)
And a time for every purpose under heaven. ~ Pete Seeger
All in heaven take joy in sharing their delights and blessings with others. ~ Emanuel Swedenborg
Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. There will be great earthquakes, and in one place after another food shortages and pestilences; and there will be fearful sights and from heaven great signs.
Jesus
  • I don't believe in an afterlife, so I don't have to spend my whole life fearing hell, or fearing heaven even more. For whatever the tortures of hell, I think the boredom of heaven would be even worse.
    • Isaac Asimov as quoted in Philosophy on the Go (2007) by Joey Green, p. 222
  • I cannot be content with less than heaven;
    Living, and comprehensive of all life.
    Thee, universal heaven, celestial all;
    Thee, sacred seat of intellective time;
    Field of the soul's best wisdom: home of truth,
    Star-throned.
  • If our Creator has so bountifully provided for our existence here, which is but momentary, and for our temporal wants, which will soon be forgotten, how much more must He have done for our enjoyment in the everlasting world?
    • Hosea Ballou, as quoted in Biography of Rev. Hosea Ballou (1854) p. 261.
  • “The point is: what happens in heaven?”
    “Unknowable wonderfulness?”
    “Nonsense. The answer is nothing. Nothing can happen because if something happens, in fact if something can happen, then it doesn’t represent eternity. Our lives are about development, mutation and the possibility of change; that is almost a definition of what life is: change.”
    “Have you always thought that?”
    “If you disable change, if you effectively stop time, if you prevent the possibility of the alteration of an individual’s circumstances—and that must incluust have death.”
    “There are those de at least the possibility that they alter for the worse—then you don’t have life after death; you jwho believe that after death the soul is recreated into another being.”
    “That is conservative and a little stupid, certainly, but not actually idiotic.”
    “And there are those who believe that, upon death, the soul is allowed to create its own universe.”
    “Monomaniacal and laughable as well as provably wrong.”
    “There there are those who believe that the soul—”
    “Well, there are all sorts of different beliefs. However, the ones that interest me are those concerning the idea of heaven. That’s the idiocy it annoys me that others cannot see.”
  • Heaven will be inherited by every man who has heaven in his soul. "The kingdom of God is within you."
    • Henry Ward Beecher, Life Thoughts: Gathered from the Extemporaneous Discourses of Henry Ward Beecher.

  • There was no pain when I awoke,
    No pain at all.     Rest, like a goad,
    Spurred my eyes open — and light broke
    Upon them like a million swords:
    And she was there. There are no words.

    Heaven is for a moment's span.
    And ever.

  • HEAVEN, n. A place where the wicked cease from troubling you with talk of their personal affairs, and the good listen with attention while you expound your own.
    • Ambrose Bierce, The Cynic's Dictionary (1906); republished as The Devil's Dictionary (1911).
  • The vision of Christ that thou dost see
    Is my vision's greatest enemy.
    Thine has a great hook nose like thine;
    Mine has a snub nose like to mine.
    Thine is the Friend of all Mankind;
    Mine speaks in parables to the blind.
    Thine loves the same world that mine hates;
    Thy heaven doors are my hell gates.
  • (Devachan is) the “land of gods” literally; a condition, a state of mental bliss. Philosophically a mental condition analogous to, but far more vivid and real than, the most vivid dream. It is the state after death of most mortals.
  • Let heaven exist, though my own place may be in hell. Let me be tortured and battered and annihilated, but let there be one instant, one creature, wherein thy enormous Library may find its justification.
  • Heaven does not make holiness, but holiness makes heaven; because if you do not give yourself in sympathy to goodness, goodness cannot give itself in influence to you.
  • God’s in His heaven—
All’s right with the world!
  • All places are distant from heaven alike.
    • Robert Burton, The Anatomy of Melancholy (1621), Part II, Section III. Memb. 4.
  • When we come to a comparison of heaven and earth, then we may indeed not only forget all about the present life, but even despise and scorn it.
    • John Calvin Golden Booklet of the True Christian Life, pg. 74.
  • All the way to Heaven is heaven because He said,"'I am the Way."
  • It's Christmas in Heaven
    The snow falls from the sky
    But it's nice and warm, and everyone
    Looks smart and wears a tie
It's Christmas in Heaven
There's great films on TV
'The sound of music' twice an hour
And 'Jaws' one, two, and three
There's gifts for all the family
There's toiletries and trains
There's Sony Walkman headphone sets
And the latest video games
  • When I see your heavens, the works of your fingers,
The moon and the stars that you have prepared,
What is mortal man that you keep him in mind,
And a son of man that you take care of him?
  • Howling is the noise of hell, singing the voice of heaven; sadness the damp of hell, rejoicing the serenity of heaven. And he that hath not this joy here, lacks one of the best pieces of his evidence for the joys of heaven; and hath neglected or refused that earnest, by which God uses to bind his bargain, that true joy in this world shall flow into the joy of heaven, as a river flows into the sea; this joy shall not be put out in death, and a new joy kindled in me in heaven; but as my soul, as soon as it is out of my body, is in heaven, and does not stay for the possession of heaven, nor for the fruition of the sight of God, till it be ascended through air, and lire, and moon, and sun, and planets and firmament, to that place which we conceive to be heaven, but without the thousandth part of a minute's stop, as soon as it issues, is in a glorious light, which is heaven, (for all the way to heaven is heaven; and as those angels, which came from heaven hither, bring heaven with them, and are in heaven here, so that soul that goes to heaven, meets heaven here ; and as those angels do not divest heaven by coming, so these souls invest heaven, in their going.) As my soul shall not go towards heaven, but go by heaven to heaven, to the heaven of heavens, so the true joy of a good soul in this world is the very joy of heaven
    • John Donne in Sermon LXVI in The Works of John Donne: With a Memoir of His Life (1839) edited by Henry Alford, p. 177.
  • He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain that which he cannot lose.
    • Jim Elliot, The Journals of Jim Elliot (28 October 1949).
  • Buffy: I was happy. Wherever I was... I was happy... at peace. I knew that everyone I cared about was all right. I knew it. Time... didn't mean anything. Nothing had form. But I was still me, you know? And I was warm. And I was loved. And I was finished. Complete. I - I don't understand theology or dimensions, any of it really... but I think I was in heaven. And now I'm not. I was torn out of there. Pulled out, by my friends. Everything here is hard and bright and violent. Everything I feel, everything I touch. This is Hell. Just getting through the next moment, and the one after that. Knowing what I've lost. They can never know. Never.
  • Grace respects the gifts of nature, adds to their power and value by purifying, elevating and bringing them to completion. The world of spirits and glorified bodies will be no less glowingly varied, contrasted, individual in its members than this earth and its inhabitants. There you will see every man as God created him, with his own special qualities fixed in their perfection: to the great surprise, no doubt, of those simple, harmless folk who smile superiorly and fear that heaven would bore them.
    • Henri Gheon, The Secret of St John Bosco, translated by F. J. Sheed (London: Sheed and Ward, 1935), Foreword, p. 8.
  • Heaven is the day of which grace is the dawn; the rich, ripe fruit of which grace is the lovely flower; the inner shrine of that most glorious temple to which grace forms the approach and outer court.
    • Thomas Guthrie, Christ and the Inheritance of the Saints (1859), p. 22.
  • Well, now, like I told that other fellow, I ain't going to set foot in heaven without rip.
    • Mr. Simpson, The Hunt written by Earl Hamner, Jr.
  • Nothing is further than Earth from Heaven: nothing is nearer than Heaven to Earth.
  • Going back to more ancient times, the four pillars were broken; the nine provinces were in tatters. Heaven did not completely cover [the earth]; Earth did not hold up [Heaven] all the way around [its circumference]. Fires blazed out of control and could not be extinguished; water flooded in great expanses and would not recede. Ferocious animals ate blameless people; predatory birds snatched the elderly and the weak. Thereupon, Nüwa smelted together five-colored stones in order to patch up the azure sky, cut off the legs of the great turtle to set them up as the four pillars, killed the black dragon to provide relief for Ji Province, and piled up reeds and cinders to stop the surging waters. The azure sky was patched; the four pillars were set up; the surging waters were drained; the province of Ji was tranquil; crafty vermin died off; blameless people [preserved their] lives.
    • The Huainanzi: A Guide to the Theory and Practice of Government in Early Han ...An Liu, John S. Major p.224
  • For look! I am creating new heavens and a new earth;
And the former things will not be called to mind,
Nor will they come up into the heart.
  • The redeemed shall walk there.
  • Heaven will be no heaven to me if I do not meet my wife there.
    • Andrew Jackson, in a statement shortly before his death, as quoted in Life of Andrew Jackson (1860) by James Parton, p. 679
  • Anas said, Allah be well-pleased with him: The Messenger of Allah said, upon him blessings and peace: “The servant in Paradise shall be married with seventy wives.” Someone said, “Messenger of Allah, can he bear it?” He said: “He will be given strength for a hundred.” From Zayd ibn Arqam, Allah be well-pleased with him, when an incredulous Jew or Christian asked the Prophet, upon him blessings and peace, “Are you claiming that a man will eat and drink in Paradise??” He replied: “Yes, by the One in Whose hand is my soul, and each of them will be given the strength of a hundred men in his eating, drinking, coitus, and pleasure.”
    • Sifat al-Janna, al-`Uqayli in the Du`afa’, and Musnad of Abu Bakr al-Bazzar
  • I say unto you, that likewise joy shall be in heaven over one sinner that repenteth, more than over ninety and nine just persons, which need no repentance.
  • Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. There will be great earthquakes, and in one place after another food shortages and pestilences; and there will be fearful sights and from heaven great signs.
  • No one has ascended into heaven, but He who descended from heaven: the Son of Man. "As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up; so that whoever believes will in Him have eternal life.
    • John 3:14
  • And war broke out in heaven: Mi′cha·el and his angels battled with the dragon, and the dragon and its angels battled 8 but it did not prevail, neither was a place found for them any longer in heaven. 9 So down the great dragon was hurled, the original serpent, the one called Devil and Satan, who is misleading the entire inhabited earth; he was hurled down to the earth, and his angels were hurled down with him. 10 And I heard a loud voice in heaven say:
“Now have come to pass the salvation and the power and the kingdom of our God and the authority of his Christ, because the accuser of our brothers has been hurled down, who accuses them day and night before our God!
  • From the acorn, quickly sprouting,
    Mighty Tursas, tall and hardy, Grows the oak-tree, tall and stately,
    Pressed compactly all the grasses, From the ground enriched by ashes,
    That the maidens had been raking, Newly raked by water-maidens;
    When a fire within them kindles, Spread the oak-tree's many branches,
    And the flames shot up to heaven, Rounds itself a broad corona,
    Till the windrows burned to ashes, Raises it above the storm-clouds;
    Only ashes now remaining
    Far it stretches out its branches,
    Of the grasses raked together. Stops the white-clouds in their courses,
    In the ashes of the windrows, With its branches hides the sunlight,
    Tender leaves the giant places, With its many leaves, the moonbeams,
    In the leaves he plants an acorn, And the starlight dies in heaven.
    • Kalevala, Rune II. translated by John Martin Crawford (1888). [1]
  • Blessed is the pilgrim, who in every place, and at all times of this his banishment in the body, calling upon the holy name of Jesus, calleth to mind his native heavenly land, where his blessed Master, the King of saints and angels, waiteth to receive him. Blessed is the pilgrim who seeketh not an abiding place unto himself in this world; but longeth to be dissolved, and be with Christ in heaven.
  • Who goes to Deva Chan? The personal Ego of course, but beatified, purified, holy. Every Ego [soul] —the combination of the sixth and seventh principles—which, after the period of unconscious gestation is reborn into the Deva-Chan, is of necessity as innocent and pure as a new-born babe. The fact of his being reborn at all, shows the preponderance of good over evil in his old personality. And while the Karma (of evil) steps aside for the time being to follow him in his future earth-reincarnation, he brings along with him but the Karma of his good deeds, words, and thoughts into this Deva-Chan. Bad is a relative term for us... and the Law of Retribution is the only law that never errs. Hence all those who have not slipped down into the mire of unredeemable sin and bestiality—go to the Deva Chan. They will have to pay for their sins, voluntary and involuntary, later on. Meanwhile, they are rewarded; receive the effects of the causes produced by them. Of course it is a state, one, so to say, of intense selfishness, during which an Ego reaps the reward of his unselfishness on earth. He is completely engrossed in the bliss of all his personal earthly affections, preferences and thoughts, and gathers in the fruit of his meritorious actions. No pain, no grief nor even the shadow of a sorrow comes to darken the bright horizon of his unalloyed happiness: for, it is a state of perpetual "Maya."
  • Most emphatically the Deva-Chan is not solely the heritage of adepts, and most decidedly there is a heaven—if you must use this astro-geographical Christian term—for an immense number of those who have gone before."... For years, decades, centuries and milleniums, often times multiplied by something more. It all depends upon the duration of Karma. Fill with oil Den's little cup and a city Reservoir of water, and lighting both see which bums the longer, the Ego is the wick and Karma the oil: the difference in the quantity of the latter (in the cup and the reservoir) suggesting to you the great difference in the duration of various Karmas. Every effect must be proportionate to the cause. And, as man's terms of incarnate existence bear but a small proportion to his periods of inter-natal existence in the manvantaric cycle, so the good thoughts, words, and deeds of any one of these lives on a globe are causative of effects, the working out of which requires far more time than the evolution of the causes occupied.
  • The generous who is always just, and the just who is always generous, may, unannounced, approach the throne of heaven.
    • Johann Kaspar Lavater, as quoted in Laconics: or, the Best Words of the Best Authors (1929) by John Timbs.
In the future... the glories of the heaven world will also be open to his sight, and he will realize that man needs only a development of faculty in order to place him at once, here and now, in the midst of all the bliss that that wondrous life can give. ~ Charles Webster Leadbeater
  • Instead of consigning some men to heaven and some to hell, as moderm theology does, it would be more true to say that every man must pass through both the states which are typified by those names. Every man must pass through the astral plane on his way to the heaven world. Every man at the end of his astral life will attain that heaven world, unless he be a person so entirely elementary, so entirely degraded as never yet to have had any unselfish thought or feeling. If that be so, there can indeed be no heaven world for him, because all these selfish desires and feelings belong exclusively to the astral plane, and they will find their result on that plane.
  • Our religious friends argue much about heaven and hell and are terribly afraid of the latter indeed it would sometimes almost seem as though they were afraid of the former as well, from the manner in which they exert themselves to avoid going there. In the future no questions or disputes about these conditions will be possible, because man will see for himself that there is no hell, though he will also see very clearly that those who live an evil life are by that fact storing up for themselves very undesirable results and a very unpleasant time in the astral life. The glories of the heaven world will also be open to his sight, and he will realize that man needs only a development of faculty in order to place him at once, here and now, in the midst of all the bliss that that wondrous life can give.
  • Our religious friends argue much about heaven and hell and are terribly afraid of the latter indeed it would sometimes almost seem as though they were afraid of the former as well, from the manner in which they exert themselves to avoid going there/ In the future no questions or disputes about these conditions will be possible, because man will see for himself that there is no hell, though he will also see very clearly that those who live an evil life are by that fact storing up for themselves very undesirable results and a very unpleasant time in the astral life. The glories of the heaven world will also be open to his sight, and he will realize that man needs only a development of faculty in order to place him at once, here and now, in the midst of all the bliss that that wondrous life can give.
  • Aim at heaven and you will get earth 'thrown in': aim at earth and you will get neither.
    • C. S. Lewis, Mere Christianity (1952), Book III, Chapter 10 "Hope".
  • The hasty multitude
    Admiring enter'd, and the work some praise,
    And some the architect: his hand was known
    In heaven by many a tower'd structure high,
    Where scepter'd angels held their residence,
    And sat as princes.
  • Though in heav'n the trees
    Of life ambrosial fruitage bear, and vines
    Yield nectar.
  • Heaven open'd wide
    Her ever-during gates, harmonious sound
    On golden hinges moving.
  • Had Jesus completed his mission as the Messiah on earth, the Kingdom of Heaven on earth would have been established in his day. The Kingdom of Heaven in heaven would also have been realized at that time, once people of perfect character living in the Kingdom of Heaven on earth had passed into the spirit world as divine spirits. However, because Jesus died on the cross, the Kingdom of Heaven on earth was not realized. The earth never saw the appearance of people who had reached the level of a divine spirit. No one has ever become a citizen of the Kingdom of Heaven in the spirit world, which was created as the home of divine spirits. Therefore, the Kingdom of Heaven in heaven remains empty and incomplete.
  • Through death Christian's soul goes to—1st. Perfect purity 2dly. Fullness of joy. 3dly. Everlasting freedom. 4thly. Perfect rest. 5thly. Health and fruition. 6thly. Complete security. 7thly. Substantial and eternal good.
  • 且吾所以知天之愛民之厚者有矣，曰以磨為日月星辰，以昭道之；制為四時春秋冬夏，以紀綱之；雷降雪霜雨露，以長遂五穀麻絲，使民得而財利之；列為山川谿谷，播賦百事，以臨司民之善否；為王公侯伯，使之賞賢而罰暴；賊金木鳥獸，從事乎五穀麻絲，以為民衣食之財。自古及今，未嘗不有此也。
    • I know Heaven loves men dearly not without reason. Heaven ordered the sun, the moon, and the stars to enlighten and guide them. Heaven ordained the four seasons, Spring, Autumn, Winter, and Summer, to regulate them. Heaven sent down snow, frost, rain, and dew to grow the five grains and flax and silk that so the people could use and enjoy them. Heaven established the hills and rivers, ravines and valleys, and arranged many things to minister to man's good or bring him evil. He appointed the dukes and lords to reward the virtuous and punish the wicked, and to gather metal and wood, birds and beasts, and to engage in cultivating the five grains and flax and silk to provide for the people's food and clothing. This has been so from antiquity to the present.
    • Mozi's Will of Heaven (天志), Chapter 27, Paragraph 6, ca. 5th Century BCE
  • The number of levels in Heaven is the number of verses in the Qur'an. Thus, when a reciter of the Qur'an enters into Heaven, it will be said to him: 'Go up one level for every verse that you can recite.' Thus, no one will be in a higher level than the one who has memorized the entire Qur'an.
    • Muhammad, Biharul Anwar, Volume 92, Page 22; note that the Qur'an has 6,236 verses.
  • The people of the Qur’an (those who recite and those who memorize the Qur’an) will be in the highest level (in Heaven) from amongst all of the people with the exception of the Prophets and Messengers. Thus, do not seek to degrade the people of the Qur’an, nor take away their rights, for surely they have been given a high rank by Allah.
  • The Prophet said, "Nobody who dies and finds good from Allah (in the hereafter) would wish to come back to this world even if he were given the whole world and whatever is in it, except the martyr who, on seeing the superiority of martyrdom, would like to come back to the world and get killed again (in Allah's cause). The Prophet said, "A single endeavor (of fighting) in Allah's cause in the afternoon or in the forenoon is better than all the world and whatever is in it. A place in Paradise as small as the bow or lash of one of you is better than all the world and whatever is in it. And if a houri from Paradise appeared to the people of the earth, she would fill the space between Heaven and the Earth with light and pleasant scent and her head cover is better than the world and whatever is in it."
  • It is a nice place, actually, one of those infinitely rare situations where one is rewarded commensurately to one’s efforts. Surely that is Heaven by any man’s definition?
  • Have you been wondering just where we are? After all, theologians have debated for centuries over the exact location of Heaven. Some have said that Heaven can be found beyond the stars. Some say it exists in the heart of Man, and others claim that it does not exist at all, that God is dead, or at least unemployed.
  • Stan: What purpose does school have? The Bible says the only goal in this life is to praise God and get into heaven.
  • The heavens declare the glory of God ; and the firmament showeth his handywork.
  • Each time we sleep with a Houri we find her virgin. Besides, the penis of the Elected never softens. The erection is eternal; the sensation that you feel each time you make love is utterly delicious and out of this world and were you to experience it in this world you would faint. Each chosen one [i.e. Muslim] will marry seventy [sic] houris, besides the women he married on earth, and all will have appetizing vaginas.
    • Al-Itqan fi Ulum al-Qur'an, p. 351
  • And in the earth are signs for those who are sure, And in yourselves do you not see? And in the heavens is your sustenance and that which you are promised. So by the Lord of the heavens and the earth! it is surely the truth, just as you speak.
    • Quran 51:20-23
  • Who would want to be trapped in a house with an indomitable telepathic despot and have to guard your thoughts –or be voluntarily mindless- and endure that existence forever and ever?
  • Judas: All your followers are blind
    Too much Heaven on their minds
    It was beautiful but now it's sour
    Yes, it's all, all gone sour.
  • To everything (turn, turn, turn)
    There is a season (turn, turn, turn)
    And a time for every purpose under heaven.
  • Sure he's not in hell; he's in Arthur's bosom, if ever man went to Arthur's bosom.
  • And, father cardinal, I have heard you say
    That we shall see and know our friends in heaven:
    If that be true, I shall see my boy again;
    For since the birth of Cain, the first male child,
    To him that did but yesterday suspire,
    There was not such a gracious creature born.
  • Well, God's above all; and there be souls must be saved, and there be souls must not be saved.
  • All places that the eye of heaven visits,
    Are to a wise man ports and happy havens.
  • But now what about the person who was so avid to judge, to vent his resentment, his powerless indignation, upon someone else without really knowing anything about what he was judging; what if in eternity he discovers, and is compelled to admit, that the person he judged was not only to be excused but that he was a most noble, unselfish, and magnanimous person! It has been said that some day in eternity we (hoping, alas, that we ourselves will not be excluded) shall with amazement miss this one and that one whom we had definitely expected to find there; but will we not with amazement also see that one and that one whom we would have summarily excluded and see that he was far better than we ourselves, not as if he had become that later, but precisely in that which made the judger decide to exclude him. Yet the person who loves believes all things. With the blessed joy of amazement, he will someday see that he was right; and if he made a mistake by believing too much of the good-to believe the good is itself a blessing. Lovingly to believe the good is certainly no defect-but then one does not make a mistake by it either. Mistrustingly to believe nothing at all (which is entirely different from knowledge about the equilibrium of opposite possibilities) and lovingly to believe all things are not a cognition, nor a cognitive conclusion, but a choice that occurs when knowledge has placed the opposite possibilities in equilibrium; and in this choice, which, to be sure, is in the form of a judgment of others, the one judging will be disclosed.
  • Heaven, as conventionally conceived, is a place so inane, so dull, so useless, so miserable, that nobody has ever ventured to describe a whole day in heaven, though plenty of people have described a day at the seaside.
  • But will God in very deed dwell with men on the earth? behold, heaven and the heaven of heavens cannot contain thee; how much less this house which I have built!
  • Heaven's not a place that you go when you die, it's that moment in life when you actually feel alive
  • It was mentioned by Daraj Ibn Abi Hatim, that Abu al-Haytham 'Adullah Ibn Wahb narrated from Abu Sa'id al-Khudhri, who heard the Prophet Muhammad PBUH saying, 'The smallest reward for the people of Heaven is an abode where there are eighty thousand servants and seventy-two houri, over which stands a dome decorated with pearls, aquamarine and ruby, as wide as the distance from al-Jabiyyah to San'a.
    • Al-Tirmidhi, Vol. 4, Ch. 21, No. 2687
  • Everyone wants to go to heaven but no one wants to die.
  • Yet stay, heaven gates are not so highly arch'd As princes' palaces; they that enter there, Must go upon their knees.
  • The propitious smiles of Heaven can never be expected on a nation that disregards the eternal rules of order and right, which Heaven itself has ordained.
  • Thomas Daggett: Some people lose their faith because Heaven shows them too little. But how many people lose their faith because Heaven showed them too much?
  • If Christians have the monopoly of salvation, over whom will they rule? And how will this promise be fulfilled, that to faithful servants is given the authority over five or ten cities (Luke 19:17-19)? It is no fun to be king over empty towns. So they will be populated by those who have not been faithful servants. We Christians will be in the heavenly Jerusalem, but there will also be nations walking in its light (Revelation 21:24). The leaves of the tree of life will serve for the healing of the nations (Revelation 22:2), which means that there will be in the life beyond people who need a cure for their souls.
  • Abu Umama narrated: "The Messenger of God said, 'Everyone that God admits into paradise will be married to 72 wives; two of them are houris and seventy of his inheritance of the [female] dwellers of hell. All of them will have libidinous sex organs and he will have an ever-erect penis.' "
    • Sunan Ibn Majah, Zuhd (Book of Abstinence) 39
  • Certainly heaven is something we all need, however, we should not imagine it anthropomorphically. [...] I believe that we certainly cannot rule out the possibility of an existence outside of space and time, mass, energies and charges. In heaven there can be anything but that.

Hoyt's New Cyclopedia Of Practical Quotations

[edit]
Quotes reported in Hoyt's New Cyclopedia Of Practical Quotations (1922), p. 359-62.
  • Love lent me wings; my path was like a stair;
    A lamp unto my feet, that sun was given;
    And death was safety and great joy to find;
    But dying now, I shall not climb to Heaven.
  • Nunc ille vivit in sinu Abraham.
    • Now he [Nebridius] lives in Abraham's bosom.
    • St. Augustine, Confessions, Book IX. 3. De Anima, Book IV. 16. 24. He explains that Abraham's bosom is the remote and secret abode of quiet. Founded on Luke, XVI. 23.
  • Spend in pure converse our eternal day;
    Think each in each, immediately wise;
    Learn all we lacked before; hear, know, and say
    What this tumultuous body now denies;
    And feel, who have laid our groping hands away;
    And see, no longer blinded by our eyes.
  • God keeps a niche
    In Heaven, to hold our idols; and albeit
    He brake them to our faces, and denied
    That our close kisses should impair their white,—
    I know we shall behold them raised, complete,
    The dust swept from their beauty, glorified,
    New Memnons singing in the great God-light.
  • To appreciate heaven well
    'Tis good for a man to have some fifteen minutes of hell.
  • The road to heaven lies as near by water as by land.
    • Jeremy Collier, Eccl. Hist. (Ed. 1852), IV. 241. Friar Elston's words, when threatened with drowning by Henry VIII, according to Stow, quoted by Gasquet. Same idea ascribed to Sir Humphry Gilbert when his ship was wrecked off Newfoundland. (1583). Idea taken from an Epigram of Leonidas of Tarentum. See Stobæus—Greek Anthology. Jacob's appendix. No. 48.
  • Heaven means to be one with God.
    • Confucius, quoted by Canon Farrar. Sermons. Eternal Hopes. What Heaven Is. Last line.
  • Where tempests never beat nor billows roar.
  • And so upon this wise I prayed,—
    Great Spirit, give to me
    A heaven not so large as yours
    But large enough for me.
  • Nor can his blessed soul look down from heaven,
    Or break the eternal sabbath of his rest.
  • Since heaven's eternal year is thine.
  • 'Twas whispered in Heaven, 'twas muttered in hell
    And echo caught faintly the sound as it fell.
    On the confines of earth 'twas permitted to rest,
    And the depths of the ocean its presence confessed.
    • Catherine M. Fanshawe, Enigma. (The letter H). ("'Twas in Heaven pronounced, it was muttered in hell." In the original MS).
  • Where billows never break, nor tempests roar.
  • While resignation gently slopes the way;
    And, all his prospects brightening to the last,
    His heaven commences ere the world be past.
  • They had finished her own crown in glory, and she couldn't stay away from the coronation.
  • Eye hath not seen it, my gentle boy!
    Ear hath not heard its deep songs of joy;
    Dreams cannot picture a world so fair—
    Sorrow and death may not enter there;
    Time doth not breathe on its fadeless bloom,
    For beyond the clouds, and beyond the tomb,
    It is there, it is there, my child!
  • All this, and Heaven too!
  • Just are the ways of heaven; from Heaven proceed
    The woes of man; Heaven doom'd the Greeks to bleed.
    • Homer, The Odyssey, Book VIII, line 128. Pope's translation.
  • Nil mortalibus arduum est;
    Cœlum ipsum petimus stultitia.
    • Nothing is difficult to mortals; we strive to reach heaven itself in our folly.
    • Horace, Carmina, Book I. 3. 37.
  • There the wicked cease from troubling, and there the weary be at rest.
    • Job, III. 17.
  • In my father's house are many mansions.
    • John, XIV. 2.
  • Sperre dich, so viel du willst!
    Des Himmels Wege sind des Himmels Wege.
    • Struggle against it as thou wilt, yet Heaven's ways are Heaven's ways.
    • Gotthold Ephraim Lessing, Nathan der Weise, III. 1.
  • Booth led boldly with his big bass drum
    (Are you washed in the blood of the Lamb?)
    The Saints smiled gravely, and they said "He's come."
    (Are you washed in the blood of the Lamb?)
  • When Christ ascended
    Triumphantly from star to star
    He left the gates of Heaven ajar.
  • We see but dimly through the mists and vapors;
    Amid these earthly damps
    What seem to us but sad, funereal tapers
    May be heaven's distant lamps.
  • Cedit item retro, de terra quod fuit ante,
    In terras; et, quod missum est ex ætheris oreis,
    Id rursum cæli relatum templa receptant.
    • What came from the earth returns back to the earth, and the spirit that was sent from heaven, again carried back, is received into the temple of heaven.
    • Lucretius, De Rerum Natura, II. 999.
  • Heaven to me's a fair blue stretch of sky,
    Earth's jest a dusty road.
  • Lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven.
    • Matthew, VI. 20.
  • There is a world above,
    Where parting is unknown;
    A whole eternity of love,
    Form'd for the good alone;
    And faith beholds the dying here
    Translated to that happier sphere.
  • A Persian's Heaven is eas'ly made,
    'Tis but black eyes and lemonade.
  • The way to heaven out of all places is of like length and distance.
  • There's nae sorrow there, John,
    There's neither cauld nor care, John,
    The day is aye fair,
    In the land o' the leal.
  • A sea before
    The Throne is spread;—its pure still glass
    Pictures all earth-scenes as they pass.
    We, on its shore,
    Share, in the bosom of our rest,
    God's knowledge, and are blest.
  • A day in thy courts is better than a thousand. I had rather be a door-keeper in the house of my God than to dwell in the tente of wickedness.
    • Psalms. LXXXIV. 10.
  • Heaven is not always angry when he strikes,
    But most chastises those whom most he likes.
  • The blessed Damozel lean'd out
    From the gold bar of Heaven:
    Her eyes knew more of rest and shade
    Of waters still'd at even;
    She had three lilies in her hand,
    And the stars in her hair were seven.
  • It was the rampart of God's house
    That she was standing on;
    By God built over the sheer depth,
    The which is Space begun;
    So high, that looking downward thence,
    She scarce could see the sun.
  • Non est ad astra mollis e terris via.
    • The ascent from earth to heaven is not easy.
    • Seneca the Younger, Hercules Furens, CCCCXXXVII.
  • Straight is the way to Acheron,
    Whether the spirit's race is run
    From Athens or from Meröe:
    Weep not, far from home to die;
    The wind doth blow in every sky
    That wafts us to that doleful sea.
    • J. A. Symonds, translation P. 37 in Tomson's Selections from the Greek Anthology, in the Canterbury Poets. (Greek is found in Palantine Anthology. No. 3).
  • Who seeks for Heaven alone to save his soul
    May keep the path, but will not reach the goal;
    While he who walks in love may wander far,
    Yet God will bring him where the blessed are.
  • So all we know of what they do above
    Is that they happy are, and that they love.
  • For all we know
    Of what the blessed do above
    Is, that they sing, and that they love.
  • I have been there, and still would go;
    'Tis like a little heaven below.
  • There is a land of pure delight,
    Where saints immortal reign;
    Infinite day excludes the night,
    And pleasures banish pain.
  • One eye on death, and one full fix'd on heaven.
    • Edward Young, Night Thoughts (1742-1745), Night V, line 838.

A Great Utopia (The World of Da-Tong) by Confucius, (BC 551 - 479)

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(The Record of Rites, Book IX,) (full text)

  • When the Great Dao (Tao, perfect order) prevails, the world is like a Commonwealth State shared by all, not a dictatorship.
  • Virtuous, worthy, wise and capable people are chosen as leaders.
  • Honesty and trust are promoted, and good neighborliness cultivated.
  • All people respect and love their own parents and children, as well as the parents and children of others.
  • The aged are cared for until death; adults are employed in jobs that make full use of their abilities; and children are nourished, educated, and fostered;...orphans... the disabled and the diseased are all well taken care of....
  • They hate not to make use of their abilities... they do not necessarily work for their own self-interest.
  • Thus intrigues and conspiracies do not arise, and thievery and robbery do not occur; therefore doors need never be locked.
  • This is the ideal world – a perfect world of equality, fraternity, harmony, welfare, and justice.

Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895)

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Quotes reported in Josiah Hotchkiss Gilbert, Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895).

  • Yes, it is a truth that for a good man,— honored, beloved, useful,— with all around him that God ever gives to His children here;— nay, with all that God could give him of earth, it would be " gain " to die. Heaven is a better, a happier, a more desirable world than this is or can be.
  • One should go to sleep as homesick passengers do, saying " Perhaps in the morning we shall see the shore."
  • Beyond the smiling and the weeping,
    I shall be soon;
    Beyond the waking and the sleeping,
    Beyond the sowing and the reaping,
    I shall be soon!
    Love, rest, and home —
    Sweet hope! Lord, tarry not, but come!
  • We are born for a higher destiny than earth; there is a realm where the rainbow never fades, where the stars will be spread before us like islands that slumber on the ocean, and where the beings that pass before us like shadows will stay in our presence forever.
  • Man has in his power, now developed, nothing more than a mere hint or initial sign of what is to be the real stature of his personality in the process of his everlasting development. We exist here only in the small, that God may have us in a state of flexibility, and bend or fashion us, at the best advantage, to the model of His own great life and character.
  • It doth not yet appear what we shall be. We lie here in our nest, unfledged and weak, guessing dimly at our future, and scarce believing what even now appears. But the power is in us, and that power is finally to be revealed. And what a revelation will that be!
  • In our Father's house it will not be the pearl gate or the streets of gold that will make us happy. But oh, how tran- scendently glad shall we be when we see our Lord. Perhaps in that "upper room," also, He may show us His hands and His side, and we may cry out with happy Thomas, "My Lord and my God!"
  • In heaven, knowledge shall be commensurate with the enlarged powers of the glorified soul.
  • No more fatigue, no more distress,
    Nor sin nor death shall reach the place;
    No groans shall mingle with the songs
    That warble from immortal tongues.
  • What tranquillity will there be in heaven! Who can express the fullness and blessedness of this peace! What a calm is this! How sweet and holy and joyous! What a haven of rest to enter, after having passed through the storms and tempests of this world, in which pride and selfishness and envy and malice and scorn and contempt and contention and vice are as waves of a restless ocean, always rolling, and often dashed about in violence and fury! What a Canaan of rest to come to, after going through this waste and howling wilderness, full of snares and pitfalls and poisonous serpents, where no rest could be found.
  • Every Christian that goes before us from this world is a ransomed spirit waiting to welcome us in heaven.
  • No wearisome days, no sorrowful nights; no hunger or thirst; no anxiety or fears; no envies, no jealousies, no breaches of friendship, no sad separations, no distrusts or forebodings, no self-reproaches, no enmities, no bitter regrets, no tears, no heartaches; "And there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain; for the former things are passed away."
  • What we sow here, we reap there! Can it be supposed that the soul will enjoy a reward or endure a retribution for deeds of which it has no recollection? Is the thing possible? Will it enjoy the bliss of heaven, praising Christ forever as its great Saviour, without any remembrance of the sins and sufferings from which He redeemed and saved it? The idea is absurd.
  • Death must obliterate all memories and affections and ideas and laws, or the awakening in the next world will be amid the welcomes, and loves and raptures of those who left us with tearful farewells, and with dying promises that they would wait to welcomes us when we should arrive. And so they do. Not sorrowfully, not anxiously, but lovingly, they wait to bid us welcome.
  • Blessed loves! how happy they have made us on the earth; what will they be when they have deepened through ages, with no alloy of envy or suspicion or selfishness or sorrow?
  • They are kings and priests unto God. They wear crowns that flash in the everlasting light. They wear robes that are spotlessly white. They wave victorious palms. They sing anthems of such exceeding sweetness as no earthly choirs ever approach. They stand before the throne. They fly on ministries of love. They muse on the top of Mount Zion. They meditate on the banks of the river of life. They are rapturous with ecstasies of love. God wipes away all tears from their eyes.
  • As we look up into these glorious culminations, how grand life becomes! To be forever with the Lord, and forever changing into His likeness, and, still more, forever deepening in the companionship of His thought and bliss, "from glory to glory," — could we desire more?
  • "A little while," and the load
    Shall drop at the pilgrim's feet,
    Where the steep and thorny road
    Doth merge in the golden street.
  • Perhaps heaven may not be so far away as we fancy; and if our eyes were not holden, we should see angels ascending and descending, and blessed spirits thronging all about us.
  • With Christ, and like Christ, and not love our friends! Impossible! when He loves them so tenderly. Going into the fuller presence of Him whose very name is "Love" can never make our hearts less loving.
  • Imagine there's no heaven
    It's easy if you try. No hell below us
    Above us only sky
  • And then, the quiet of the green, inland valleys of our Father's land, where no tempest comes any more, nor the loud winds are ever heard, nor the salt sea is ever seen; but perpetual calm and blessedness; all mystery gone, and all rebellion hushed and silenced, and all unrest at an end forever! "No more sea;" but, instead of that wild and yeasty chaos of turbulent waters, there shall be the river that makes glad the city of God, the river of water of life, that proceeds "out of the throne of God and of the Lamb."
  • And looking back upon "the sea that brought us thither," we shall behold its waters flashing in the light of that everlasting morning, and hear them breaking into music upon the eternal shore. And then, brethren, when all the weary night-watchers on the stormy ocean of life are gathered together around Him who watched with them from His throne on the bordering mountains of eternity, where the day shines forever — then He will seat them at His table in His kingdom, and none will need to ask, "Who art Thou?" or, "Where am I?" " for all shall know it is the Lord," and the full, perfect, unchangeable vision of His blessed face will be heaven.
  • The joys of heaven are not the joys of passive contemplation, of dreamy remembrance, of perfect repose; but they are described thus: "They rest not day nor night." "His servants serve Him, and see His face."
  • Will not this be the description of our future being — "reaching forth unto those things which are before?" I believe that we shall thus live through all the eternities that are before us, growing wiser, nobler, stronger, greater; plunging deeper into God, and being more and more filled with more and more of Him. So we shall move forever as in ascending spirals that rise ever higher, and draw ever closer to the throne we compass and to Him that dwells alone; ever perfect, yet ever growing, for we have an inexhaustible Saviour to absorb into our hearts, and we have hearts that never reach the ultimate bound and term of their indefinite possibility of receiving.
  • Heaven is endless longing, accompanied with an endless fruition — a longing which is blessedness, a longing which is life.
  • When this passing world is done,
    When has sunk yon, glowing sun,
    When we stand with Christ in glory,
    Looking o'er life's f1nished story,
    Then, Lord, shall I fully know —
    Not till then — how much I owe.
  • Then re-united to the friends with whom vve took sweet counsel upon earth, we shall recount our toil, only to heighten our ecstasy; and call to mind the toil and the din of war, oniy that, with a more bounding throb and a richer song, we may fee! and celebrate the wonders of redemption.
  • There is not such a great difference between grace and glory after all. Grace is the bud, and glory is the blossom. Grace is glory begun; and glory is grace perfected. It won't come hard to people that are serving God down here to do it when they go up yonder. They will change places, but they won't change employments.
  • Selfishness, eager for a heaven of enjoyment, is quite a different thing in the soul from love and purity and truth, yearning together for what is their natural element.
  • God would never have let us long for our friends with such a strong and holy love, if they were not waiting for us.
  • After the fever of life — after wearinesses, sicknesses, fightings and despondings, languor and fretfulness, struggling and failing, struggling and succeeding — after all the changes and chances of this troubled and unhealthy state, at length comes death — at length the white throne of God — at length the beatific vision.
  • Oh, heaven without my Saviour
    Would be no heaven to me;
    Dim were the walls of jasper —
    Rayless the crystal sea.
    He gilds earth's darkest valleys
    With light and joy and peace;
    What then must be the radiance
    When night and death shall cease?
  • I change my place, but not my company. While here I have sometimes walked with God, and now I go to rest with Him,
  • I shall know the loved who have gone before,
    And joyfully sweet will the meeting be,
    When over the river, the peaceful river,
    The angel of death shall carry me.
  • Rejoice, oh! grieving heart,
    The hours fly past;
    With each some sorrow dies,
    With each some shadow flies,
    Until at last
    The red dawn in the east
    Bids weary night depart,
    And pain is past.
  • All your followers are blind
    Too much heaven on their minds
    It was beautiful, but now it's sour.
  • The Spaniards in Mexico and Peru used to baptize Indian infants and then immediately dash their brains out: by this means they secured these infants went to Heaven.
  • Christ and His cross are not separable in this life, howbeit Christ and His cross part at heaven's door, for there is no house-room for crosses in heaven. One tear, one sigh, one sad heart, one fear, one loss, one thought of trouble cannot find lodging there.
  • Oil, when shall the night be gone, the shadows flee away, and the morning of that long, long day, without cloud or night, dawn.
  • When the day of toil is done,
    When the race of life is run,
    Father, grant Thy wearied one
    Rest for evermore!
    When the heart by sorrow tried
    Feels at length its throbs subside,
    Bring us, where all tears are dried,
    Joy for evermore!
  • O rest of rests! O peace serene, eternal!
    Thou ever livest, and Thou changest never!
    And in the secret of Thy presence dwelleth
    Fullness of joy, forever and forever.
  • We should carry up our affections to the mansions prepared for us above, where eternity is the measure, felicity the state, angels the company, the Lamb the light, and God the inheritance and portion of His people forever.
  • A New Heaven and A New Earth. The inspiration for the title of this book came from a Bible prophecy that seems more applicable now than at any other time in human history. It occurs in both the Old and the New Testament and speaks of the collapse of the existing world order and the arising of “a new heaven and a new earth.”(1) We need to understand here that heaven is not a location but refers to the inner realm of consciousness. This is the esoteric meaning of the word, and this is also its meaning in the teachings of Jesus. Earth, on the other hand, is the outer manifestation in form, which is always a reflection of the inner. Collective human consciousness and life on our planet are intrinsically connected. “A new heaven” is the emergence of a transformed state of human consciousness, and “a new earth” is its reflection in the physical realm. Since human life and human consciousness are intrinsically one with the life of the planet, as the old consciousness dissolves, there are bound to be synchronistic geographic and climatic natural upheavals in many parts of the planet, some of which we are already witnessing now.
    (1) Revelation 21:1 and Isaiah 65:17 (New Revised Standard Version)
  • The New Earth Is No Utopia... All utopian visions have this in common: the mental projection of a future time when all will be well, we will be saved, there will be peace and harmony and the end of our problems. There have been many such utopian visions. Some ended in disappointment, others in disaster. At the core of all utopian visions lies one of the main structural dysfunctions of the old consciousness: looking to the future for salvation. The only existence the future actually has is as a thought form in your mind, so when you look to the future for salvation, you are unconsciously looking to your own mind for salvation. You are trapped in form, and that is ego.
  • “And I saw a new heaven and a new earth,”(1) writes the biblical prophet. The foundation for a new earth is a new heaven – the awakened consciousness. The earth – external reality – is only its outer reflection. The arising of a new heaven and by implication a new earth are not future events that are going to make us free. Nothing is going to make us free because only the present moment can make us free. That realization is the awakening. Awakening as a future event has no meaning because awakening is the realization of Presence. So the new heaven , the awakened consciousness, is not a future state to be achieved. A new heaven and a new earth are arising within you at this moment, and if they are not arising at this moment, they are no more than a thought in your head and therefore not arising at all. What did Jesus tell his disciples? “Heaven is right here in the midst of you.” (2)
    (1.) Revelation 21:1 (New Revised Standard Version). (2.) Luke 17:21 (New Revised Standard Version).
  • O, land of rest, how near thou art! O, judgment-seat of Jesus, how thin are the clouds that veil thee! Through the rifts of cloudland shine rays from this righteous crown. It is "laid up" for him whose hope can never be satisfied with less than the presence of the King.
  • An everlasting tranquillity is, in my imagination, the highest possible felicity, because I know of no felicity on earth higher than that which a peaceful mind and contented heart afford.

The Ancient Wisdom, by Annie Besant, (1897)

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  • The seventh, the highest, subdivision of Kâmaloka, is occupied almost entirely by intellectual men and women who were either pronouncedly materialistic while on earth, or who are so wedded to the ways in which knowledge is gained by the lower mind in the physical body that they continue its pursuit in the old ways, though with enlarged faculties. One recalls Charles Lamb’s dislike of the idea that in heaven knowledge would have to be gained “by some awkward process of intuition” instead of through his beloved books. Many a student lives for long years, sometimes for centuries – according to H.P.Blavatsky – literally in the astral library, conning eagerly all books that deal with his favourite subject, and perfectly contented with his lot. p. 104
  • On the mental plane, in both its great divisions, exist numberless Intelligences, whose lowest bodies are formed of the luminous matter and elemental essence of that plane – Shining ones who guide the processes of natural order, overlooking the hosts of lower entities before spoken of, and yielding submission in their several hierarchies to their great overlords of the seven Elements. (These are the Arûpa and Rûpa Devas of the Hindus and the Buddhists, the “Lords of the heavenly and the earthly” of the Zoroastrians, the Archangels and Angels of the Christians and Mahomedans). p. 115
  • The word Devachan is the theosophical name for heaven, and, literally translated, means the shining land, or the Land of the Gods. (Devasthan, the place of the Gods, is the Sanskrit equivalent. It is the Svarga of the Hindus; the Sukhâvati of the Buddhists; the Heaven of the Zoroastrians and Christians, and of the less materialised among the Mohammedans). It is a specially guarded part of the mental plane, whence all sorrow and all evil are excluded by the action of the great spiritual Intelligences who superintend human evolution; and it is inhabited by human beings who have cast off their physical and astral bodies, and who pass into it when their stay in Kâmaloka is completed. p. 138

In heaven, all they think, is at once reproduced in form, for the rare and subtle matter of the heaven-world is mind stuff, the medium in which the mind normally works when free from passion, and it takes shape with every mental impulse. Each man, therefore, in a very real sense, makes his own heaven, and the beauty of his surroundings is definitely increased, according to the wealth and energy of his mind. As the soul develops his powers, his heaven grows more and more subtle and exquisite; all the limitations in heaven are self-created, and heaven expands and deepens with the expansion and deepening of the soul. p. 142

See also

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