Children are taught to obey their parents, and adults are taught to obey the rules and regulations of society. This fabric is essential for the world to function properly.
Several acts of obedience are also mentioned in the sacred texts of every religion. It is said that one can achieve true enlightenment by obeying God. In this article, you will find the most inspirational obedience quotes and sayings to read and share with friends. Scroll down to read all the quotes.
Famous Obedience Quotes
The most popular obedience quotes by world-famous authors collected from a variety of sources are as follows.
"A person is bound to work in obedience to and in conformity to that person's own nature."
– Mahatma Gandhi
"I don't do what I'm told, but I might do what you want if you ask me nicely."
- 'City Of Ashes', Cassandra Clare.
"Blind obedience is a sign of weakness. Faithful obedience is a sign of strength."
- Bob Lonsberry.
"You are evidence of your mother's strength, especially if you are a rebellious knucklehead and regardless she has always maintained her sanity."
- 'Killosophy', Criss Jami.
"Better than worshiping gods is obedience to the laws of righteousness."
- Buddha.
"Fear is a strange soil. It grows obedience like corn, which grow in straight lines to make weeding easier. But sometimes it grows the potatoes of defiance, which flourish underground."
- 'Small Gods', Terry Pratchett.
"Obedience of the law is demanded; not asked as a favor."
- Theodore Roosevelt.
"Obedience to lawful authority is the foundation of manly character."
- Robert E. Lee.
"Obedience and resignation are our personal offerings upon the altar of duty."
– Hosea Ballou.
"My father has always broken the rules for those he loves, just as my mother has always kept them for the same reason."
- Ally Condie.
"I hope you will find some way to break the rules and make a little trouble out there. And I also hope that you will choose to make some of that trouble on behalf of women."
- Nora Ephron.
"If we cooperate with Him in loving obedience, God will manifest Himself to us, and that manifestation will be the difference between a nominal Christian life and a life radiant with the light of His face."
- A.W Tozer.
"Obedience completes itself in understanding."
- Phillips Brooks.
"In obedience there is always fear, and fear darkens the mind."
– Jiddu Krishnamurti.
"If you will pardon my saying so," Tharkay said, "you will never satisfy them on that point: the last thing you or Temeraire will ever give anyone is quiet obedience. Have you considered it might be better not to try?"
- 'Tongues Of Serpents', Naomi Novik.
"Obedience is the opener of eyes."
– George Macdonald.
"For there is no obedience without humility, nor humility without charity."
- St. Catherine of Siena.
Obedience Quotes For Inspiration
These obedience quotes by thinkers and educators will serve as a huge source of inspiration.
"Disobedience is the true foundation of liberty. The obedient must be slaves."
- Henry David Thoreau.
"The eye that mocketh at his father, and despiseth to obey his mother, the ravens of the valley shall pick it out, and the young eagles shall eat it."
- Solomon.
"The greatest crimes in the world are not committed by people breaking the rules but by people following the rules. It's people who follow orders that drop bombs and massacre villages."
- 'Wall And Piece', Bansky.
"Obedience brings success; exact obedience brings miracles."
- Russell M. Nelson.
"I finally know the difference between pleasing and loving, obeying and respecting. It has taken me so many years to be okay with being different, and with being this alive, this intense."
- 'I Am An Emotional Creature', Eve Ensler.
"Obedience simulates subordination as fear of the police simulates honesty."
- George Bernard Shaw.
"Obedience isn't a lack of fear. It's just doing it scared."
- Jen Hatmaker.
"Rebellion to tyrants is obedience to God."
- John Bradshaw.
"If, in the quiet of your heart, you feel something should be done, stop and consider whether it is in line with the character and teaching of Jesus. If so, obey that impulse to do it, and in doing so you will find it was God guiding you."
- Eric Liddell.
"God favors men and women who delight in being made worthy of happiness before the happiness itself."
- 'Killosophy', Criss Jami.
"Obeying orders just to obey is the mark of a person who has ceased to think. Remember, it is better to suffer for doing what is right rather than for doing what is wrong."
- 'Ashes', Ilsa J. Brick.
"Obedience is an act of faith; disobedience is the result of unbelief."
- Edwin Louis Cole.
"Humility is a Divine property and the perfection of the Christian life. It is attained through obedience. He who is not obedient cannot gain humility. There are very few in the world today who have obedience. Our humility is in proportion to our obedience."
― 'Our Thoughts Determine Our Lives: The Life And Teachings Of Elder Thaddeus of Vitovnica', Elder Thaddeus of Vitovnica.
Thought-Provoking Obedience Quotes
These quotes are best as taglines and captions and will help to start your day on a positive note.
(The act of obedience can either uplift or scatter your life.)
"The smart way to keep people passive and obedient is to strictly limit the spectrum of acceptable opinion, but allow very lively debate within that spectrum...."
- 'The Common Good', Noam Chomsky.
The virtue of obedience makes the will supple. It inspires the courage with which to fulfill the most difficult tasks.
- John Vianney.
"Obedience is your responsibility, the outcome is God's!"
– Steven Furtick.
"God is God. Because he is God, He is worthy of my trust and obedience. I will find rest nowhere but in His holy will that is unspeakably beyond my largest notions of what he is up to."
- Elisabeth Elliot.
"One act of obedience is better than one hundred sermons."
- Dietrich Bonhoeffer.
"Obedience indeed is only the pitiful and cowardly egotism of him who thinks that he can do something better than reason."
- Percy Bysshe Shelley.
"The disappearance of a sense of responsibility is the most far-reaching consequence of submission to authority."
― Stanley Milgram.
"If you wish to abrogate all responsibility for your moral and intellectual independence, then by all means - conform with the herd and obey blindly."
- 'The Crane War', Graeme Rodaughan.
"A great work is made out of a combination of obedience and liberty."
- Nadia Boulanger.
"Let thy child's first lesson be obedience, and the second may be what thou wilt."
- Thomas Fuller.
"The essence in obedience consists in the fact that a person comes to view himself as an instrument for carrying out another person's wishes and he therefore no longer regards himself as responsible for his actions."
- 'Obedience To Authority', Stanley Milgram.
"I think He made one law of that kind in order that there might be obedience. In all these other matters what you call obeying Him is but doing what seems good in your own eyes also. Is love content with that?"
- 'Perelandra', C.S Lewis.
"Obedience is less painful than regret."
– Christine Caine
"It isn't right to be obedient only when things go well; it is much harder to be a good, obedient soldier when things go badly and times are hard. Obedience and faith at such time is a virtue."
"Wilhelm Keitel.
"Obedience to the word in humility of mind never confuses."
– John Nelson Darby.
Motivational Obedience Quotes
These obedience quotes are a true source of motivation. Read them to get some much-needed inner peace.
"Every now and then I like to do as I'm told, just to confuse people."
- 'Melting Stones', Tamora Pierce.
"Any fool can "obey" an order ... the clever thing is to interpret it."
- William Boyd.
"A culture fixated on female thinness is not an obsession about female beauty, but an obsession about female obedience."
- 'The Beauty Myth', Naomi Wolf.
"True obedience is true freedom."
- Henry Ward Beecher.
"The great test of life is obedience to God."
- Ezra Taft Benson.
"Disobedience, in the eyes of any one who has read history, is man's original virtue. It is through disobedience that progress has been made, through disobedience and through rebellion."
- Oscar Wilde.
"Obedience is the primary object of all sound education."
- Elizabeth Missing Sewell.
"Does it make sense to pray for guidance about the future if we are not obeying in the thing that lies before us today? How many momentous events in Scripture depended on one person's seemingly small act of obedience!"
- 'Quest For Love: True Stories of Passion And Purity', Elisabeth Elliot.
"When obedience is so impious, revolt is a necessity."
- Pierre Corneille.
"The distance between your knowledge of truth and your obedience is called lack of integrity. And the amount of negative behavior--or lack of integrity--a person exhibits is directly proportional to their amount of pain."
- 'Orange Jumpsuits: Letter To The God Of Freedom', Tara Leigh Cobble.
"Liberty is obedience to the law which one has laid down for oneself."
– Jean-Jacques Rousseau.
"Men are free when they are obeying some deep, inward voice of religious belief. Obeying from within."
- 'Studies In Classic American Literature', D.H Lawrence.
"Obedience is the mother of success and is wedded to safety."
– Aeschylus.
"Obedience is the crown and honour of all virtue."
– Martin Luther.
"The reasonableness of the command to obey parents is clear to children, even when quite young."
- Noah Webster.
