Quotes about Belief

Conversion is not the source of truth, but the source of certainty with regard to the truth.

It is, moreover, of the greatest importance for every believer, particularly for the dogmatician, to know which Scriptural truths, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, have been brought to universal recognition in the church of Christ. By this process, after all, the church is kept from immediately mistaking a private opinion for the truth of God.

conversion is a necessary and moral duty for every man.

Religious experience is neither the source nor the foundation of religious truth

All worldviews, therefore, end in an eschatology and all efforts at reformation are animated by faith in the future.

Faith, which forms its positive side is at the same time cognitio and fiducia, a trustful knowledge and a knowing trust.

Ethical culture must be a philosophy of revelation or it cannot exist.

Christian religion cannot abandon this supernaturalism without annihilating itself.

Theology leads through soteriology to eschatology.

Eschatology lives in the heart of all.

One arrives at metaphysics, at a philosophy of religion, only if from another source one has gained the certainty that religion is not just an interesting phenomenon—comparable to belief in witches and ghosts—but truth, the truth that God exists, reveals himself, and is knowable.

In case a dogma is not based on divine authority, it is wrong to call it by that name, and it should not have a place in the faith of the church.