John Adams
John Adams

I will insist that the Hebrews have done more to civilize men than any other nation. If I were an atheist, and believed in blind eternal fate, I should still believe that fate had ordained the Jews to be the most essential instrument for civilizing the nations.

Schāh Walī Allāh ad-Dihlawī
Schāh Walī Allāh ad-Dihlawī

It is the general authority to undertake the establishment of religion through the revival of religious sciences, the establishment of the pillars of Islam, the organization of jihad and its related functions of maintenance of armies, financing the soldiers, and allocation of their rightful portions from the spoils of war, administration of justice, enforcement of [the limits ordained by Allah,

including the punishment for crimes (hudud)], elimination of injustice, and enjoining good and forbidding evil, to be exercised on behalf of the Prophet… It is no mercy to them to stop at intellectually establishing the truth of Religion to them. Rather, true mercy towards them is to compel them so that Faith finds a way to their minds despite themselves. It is like a bitter medicine

administered to a sick man. Moreover, there can be no compulsion without eliminating those who are a source of great harm or aggression, or liquidating their force, and capturing their riches, so as to render them incapable of posing any challenge to Religion. Thus their followers and progeny are able to enter the faith with free and conscious submission… Jihad made it possible for the early

followers of Islam from the Muhajirun and the Ansar to be instrumental in the entry of the Quraysh and the people around them into the fold of Islam. Subsequently, God destined that Mesopotamia and Syria be conquered at their hands. Later on it was through the Muslims of these areas that God made the empires of the Persians and Romans to be subdued. And again, it was through the Muslims of these

newly conquered realms that God actualized the conquests of India, Turkey and Sudan. In this way, the benefits of jihad multiply incessantly, and it becomes, in that respect, similar to creating an endowment, building inns and other kinds of recurring charities.… Jihad is an exercise replete with tremendous benefits for the Muslim community, and it is the instrument of jihad alone that can bring

about their victory.… The supremacy of his Religion over all other religions cannot be realized without jihad and the necessary preparation for it, including the procurement of its instruments. Therefore, if the Prophet’s followers abandon jihad and pursue the tails of cows [that is, become farmers] they will soon be overcome by disgrace, and the people of other religions will overpower them.

Aischylos
Aischylos

But ancient Arrogance, or soon or late,
When strikes the hour ordained by Fate,
Breedeth new Arrogance, which still
Revels, wild wantoner in human ill.

Peter Akinola
Peter Akinola

By your victory at the polls, you have put to shame the revisionists and their agenda in the Church of Christ, and particularly in the Episcopal Church of United States of America (ECUSA). I hope that by your election victory, these ordained men and women will feel rebuked and be forced to repent of this grievous sin of repudiating the word of God, and to seek genuine restoration.

Muhammad ibn al-Qasim
Muhammad ibn al-Qasim

Such was the erosion of demography and prosperity that after the capture of Brahmanabad, "all people, the merchants, artisans and agriculturists were divided separately into their respective classes, and (only) ten thousand men, high and low, were counted. Muhammad Qasim then ordered twelve dirhams weight of silver (i. e., twelve silver coins or their equivalent) to be assigned to each man (for

rehabilitation), because all their property had been plundered."15 The Brahmans, "the attendants of the temples were likewise in distress. For fear of the (Muslim) army, the alms and bread were not regularly given to them, and therefore they were reduced to poverty."16 From the destruction of Debal to the end of the campaign temples had been broken with the zeal of an iconoclast and their purohits

and other dependents had no employment, no income. "It was ordained (by Qasim) that the Brahman should, like beggars, take a copper basin in their hands, go to the doors of the houses, and take whatever grain or other thing that might be offered to them, so that they might not remain unprovided for."

Baruch Ashlag
Baruch Ashlag

The goal of creation is—to please the creation, i. e. the Creator wants to fill us with the very best. And until a man receives all the very perfect and the very best that has been ordained for him by the Creator, he experiences the lack of everything, and this is the sign that he hasn’t yet reached the goal of the creation.

Baruch Ashlag
Baruch Ashlag

A man has been entrusted to receive the Goal of creation by correcting himself. This action is called: Which has been created by the Creator to be done.” This correction is the obtaining of the intention to bestow.” Only in the degree of obtaining such an intention does a man become capable to receive what has been ordained for him by the Creator.

Julian Assange
Julian Assange

This is not justice; never could this be justice, the verdict was ordained long ago. Its function is not to determine questions such as guilt or innocence, or truth or falsehood. It is a public relations exercise, designed to provide the government with an alibi for posterity. It is a show of wasteful vengeance; a theatrical warning to people of conscience.

Benjamin Fish Austin
Benjamin Fish Austin

A difficulty in seeking Truth is the notion that certain men are ordained of heaven to seek Truth for all mankind and that we are to accept their acquisitions in the place of seeking for ourselves. We can never attain Truth by proxy. By divine ordination every man is an original investigator of Truth. He denies his own reason who hands over his religious views and opinions to any priest or

religious teacher… We are to accept nothing on the opinions of others. What another man has thought and believed, what a Church Council or synod has formulated is nothing to me, only that it may be a reason for personal investigation ending in acceptance or rejection as I may find it in harmony with reason and well established truth.

Báb
Báb

He who doeth good unto Me, it is as if he doeth good unto God, His angels and the entire company of His loved ones. He who doeth evil unto Me, it is as if he doeth evil unto God and His chosen ones. Nay, too exalted is the station of God and of His loved ones for any person’s good or evil deed to reach their holy threshold. Whatever reacheth Me is ordained to reach Me; and that which hath come

unto Me, to him who giveth will it revert. By the One in Whose hand is My soul, he hath cast no one but himself into prison. For assuredly whatsoever God hath decreed for Me shall come to pass and naught else save that which God hath ordained for us shall ever touch us. Woe betide him from whose hands floweth evil, and blessed the man from whose hands floweth good. Unto no one do I take My plaint

save to God; for He is the best of judges. Every state of adversity or bliss is from Him alone, and He is the All-Powerful, the Almighty.