Nikos Kazantzakis Quotes

But we, O blockhead, with dogged spite and armored love
shall force those deaf dark powers to grow ears and hear us!
I know that God is earless, eyeless, and heartless too,
a brainless Dragon Worm that crawls on earth and hopes
in anguish and then in secret that we'll give him soul,
for then he, too, may sprout ears, eyes, to match his growth,
but God is clay in my ten fingers, and I mould him!

Every man has his folly, but the greatest folly of all … is not to have one.

All my life one of my greatest desires has been to travel-to see and touch unknown countries, to swim in unknown seas, to circle the globe, observing new lands, seas, people, and ideas with insatiable appetite, to see everything for the first time and for the last time, casting a slow, prolonged glance, then to close my eyes and feel the riches deposit themselves inside me calmly or stormily according to their pleasure, until time passes them at last through its fine sieve, straining the quintessence out of all the joys and sorrows.

Life is a crusade in the service of God. Whether we wished to or not, we set out as crusaders to free — not the Holy Sepulchre — but that God buried in matter and in our souls. Every body, every soul is a Holy Sepulcher. Every seed of grain is a Holy Sepulchre; let us free it! The brain is a Holy Sepulchre, God sprawls within it and battles with death; let us run to his assistance!

We come from a dark abyss, we end in a dark abyss, and we call the luminous interval life.

At every moment of crisis an array of men risk their lives in the front ranks as standard-bearers of God to fight and take upon themselves the whole responsibility of the battle. Once long ago it was the priests, the kings, the noblemen, or the burghers who created civilizations and set divinity free. Today God is the common worker made savage by toil and rage and hunger

When you've made up your mind, no use lagging behind, go ahead and no relenting,
Let your youth have free reign, it won't come again, so be bold and no repenting.

عنما تتملكنا الكآبة فعلينا أنا نمنح أنفسنا وقتاً طيباً

دع الناس مطمئنين, أيها الرئيس لاتفتح أعينهم, فما الذي سيرون؟ بؤسهم! دعهم إذن مستمرين في أحلامهم.

We do not struggle for ourselves, nor for our race, not even for humanity. We do not struggle for Earth, nor for ideas. All these are the precious yet provisional stairs of our ascending God, and they crumble away as soon as he steps upon them in his ascent. In the smallest lightning flash of our lives, we feel all of God treading upon us, and suddenly we understand: if we all desire it intensely, if we organize all the visible and invisible powers of earth and fling them upward, if we all battle together like fellow combatants eternally vigilant — then the Universe might possibly be saved. It is not God who will save us — it is we who will save God, by battling, by creating, and by transmuting matter into spirit.

Death's dry bones glowed with light in the erotic dark
but he woke not nor felt the two warm bodies merge;
the male worm then took heart and in his wife's ear whispered:
"With one sweet kiss, dear wife, we've conquered conquering Death!"

إن الأحزان كلها أيها الرئيس ، تشطر قلبي إلى قطعتين .
لكنه هذا المليء بالندوب ، المثخن بالجراح ، سرعان ما يلتصق على نفسه ، ولا يعود للجرح وجود .
إنني مليء بالجراح التي تحولت إلى مجرد ندوب ولهذا فإنني أستطيع أن أتحمل الضربات .

I knew that over and above the truth, there exists another duty which is much more important and much more human.

Love’s feet are always pleased to step on ashes.

Is he good? Or is he bad? That's the only thing I ask nowadays. And as I grow older — I'd swear this on the last crust I eat — I feel I shan't even go on asking that! Whether a man's good or bad, I'm sorry for him, for all of 'em. The sight of a man just rends my insides, even if I act as though I don't care a damn! There he is, poor devil, I think, he also eats and drinks and makes love and is frightened, whoever he is: he has his God and his devil just the same, and he'll peg out and lie as stiff as a board beneath the ground and be food for worms, just the same. Poor devil! We're all brothers! All worm-meat!