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Quotes from Theses on the Philosophy of History — Walter Benjamin

1892–1940 Germany

← All quotes by Walter Benjamin

16 quotes

There is no document of civilization which is not at the same time a document of barbarism.

Theses on the Philosophy of History (1940)

To articulate the past historically does not mean to recognize it ‘the way it really was’ (Ranke). It means to seize hold of a memory as it flashes up at a moment of danger.

Theses on the Philosophy of History (1940)

The tradition of the oppressed teaches us that the "state of emergency" in which we live is not the exception but the rule.

Theses on the Philosophy of History (1940)

Nothing that has ever happened should be regarded as lost for history.

Theses on the Philosophy of History (1940)

Our image of happiness is indissolubly bound up with the image of the past.

Theses on the Philosophy of History (1940)

There is no document of civilization that is not at the same time a document of barbarism.

Theses on the Philosophy of History (1940)

The true picture of the past flits by. The past can be seized only as an image which flashes up at the instant when it can be recognized and is never seen again.

Theses on the Philosophy of History (1940)

The nourishing fruit of the historically understood contains time as a precious but tasteless seed.

Theses on the Philosophy of History (1940)

The historical materialist leaves it to others to be drained by the whore called "Once upon a time" in historicism's bordello.

Theses on the Philosophy of History (1940)

Thinking involves not only the flow of thoughts, but their arrest as well.

Theses on the Philosophy of History (1940)

This is how one pictures the angel of history. His face is turned toward the past.

Theses on the Philosophy of History (1940)

In every era the attempt must be made anew to wrest tradition away from a conformism that is about to overpower it. The Messiah comes not only as the redeemer, he comes as the subduer of Antichrist.

Theses on the Philosophy of History (1940)

The good tidings which the historian of the past brings with throbbing heart may be lost in a void the very moment he opens his mouth.

Theses on the Philosophy of History (1940)

The present, which, as a model of Messianic time, comprises the entire history of mankind in an enormous abridgment, coincides with the stature which the history of mankind has in the universe.

Theses on the Philosophy of History (1940)

There is a secret agreement between past generations and the present one. Our coming was expected on earth. Like every generation that preceded us, we have been endowed with a weak Messianic power, a power to which the past has a claim. That claim cannot be settled cheaply.

Theses on the Philosophy of History (1940)

This storm is what we call progress.

Theses on the Philosophy of History (1940)

Attribution

Quotes and notes from Wikiquote: Walter Benjamin (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0.