Whoever, then, thinks that he understands the Holy Scriptures, or any part of them, but puts such an interpretation upon them as does not tend to build up this twofold love of God and our neighbor, does not yet understand them as he ought.

I can understand myself in believing, although in addition I can in a relative misunderstanding comprehend the human aspect of this life: but comprehend faith or comprehend Christ, I cannot.

If you cannot understand something, then you have understood it incorrectly.

He who thinks that God is not comprehended, by him God is comprehended; but he who thinks that God is comprehended knows him not. God is unknown to those who know him, and is known to those who do not know him at all.

One who intends to understand grasps even the slightest hint, but the one who has no intention to understand never comprehends, no matter how loudly you shout.

No one who reads the gospels thoughtfully and sympathetically will maintain that Jesus—whether God or man—was incapable of making himself completely understood. We must therefore seek for a better explanation of the confusion that exists among the avowed believers in the divinity of Christ, as well as among those who deny the divinity of Christ.

Now that we have dealt, therefore, with this point, that the divine scriptures were inspired by the Holy Spirit, it appears necessary also to explain how some men have involved themselves in numerous errors through not reading or understanding them aright, because the method by which we should approach the interpretation of the divine writings is unknown to the multitude. For the Jews, owing to their hardness of heart and their desire to appear wise in their own sight. They have refused to believe in our Lord and Savior because they suppose that the prophecies that relate to him must be understood literally.

Anyone who wants to be understood will never know the delight of being
understood, because this happens only to the complex and misunderstood;simple souls, the ones whom other people can understand, never feel a desire to be understood.

Anyone who wants to be understood will never know the delight of being understood, because this happens only to the complex and misunderstood; simple souls, the ones whom other people can understand, never feel a desire to be understood.

Unless you really understand others, you can hardly attain your own self-understanding.

Never will he understand the sufferings of another, who has not experienced them himself, though he have divine Reason and the nature of a genuine devil!

Whoever seizes a mathematical book without devotion, whoever does not read it as if it were God's word, doesn't understand it.

this is the last word of Western and Eastern wisdom alike. The Hindu Upanishads say: He who thinks that God is not comprehended, by him God is comprehended; but he who thinks that God is comprehended knows him not. God is unknown to those who know him, and is known to those who do not know him at all. Goethe says it in words which, to the modern mind, may be plainer: The highest to which man can attain is wonder; and if the prime phenomenon makes him wonder, let him be content; nothing higher can it give him, and nothing further should he seek for behind it; here is the limit.

We have never even begun to understand a people until we have found something that we do not understand. So long as we find the character easy to read, we are reading into it our own character.