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We are, the great spiritual writers insist, most fully ourselves when we give ourselves away, and it is egotism that holds us back from that transcendent experience that has been called God, Nirvana, Brahman, or the Tao.

— Karen Armstrong The Spiral Staircase: My Climb Out of Darkness (2004)

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More quotes by Karen Armstrong

Religion is hard work. Its insights are not self-evident and have to be cultivated in the same way as an appreciation of art, music, or poetry must be developed.

The Case for God (2009)

Monotheism is essentially inimical to tribalism: it demands that a people unite in a single community.

Muhammad: A Biography of The Prophet (2001)

A project like Pangea, which enables us to enter in to the situations of others, imaginatively, is fulfilling what the religions call the Golden Rule...

Karen Armstrong Joins Pangea Day! (2008)

If it is not tempered by compassion, and empathy, reason can lead men and women into a moral void.

I say that religion isn’t about believing things. It’s ethical alchemy. It’s about behaving in a way that changes you, that gives you intimations of holiness and sacredness.

Profile at TEDprize.org (2009)

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Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: Karen Armstrong (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.