Elie Wiesel quotes

Most people think that shadows follow, precede or surround beings or objects. The truth is that they also surround words, ideas, desires, deeds, impulses and memories.

Wherever men and women are persecuted because of their race, religion, or political views, that place must - at that moment - become the center of the universe.

I don't know much about politics, and I don't want to know. That's why I rarely involve myself in politics.

I'm a teacher and a writer; my life is words. When I see the denigration of language, it hurts me, and it's easy to denigrate a word by trivializing it.

I was very, very religious. And of course I wrote about it in 'Night.' I questioned God's silence. So I questioned. I don't have an answer for that. Does it mean that I stopped having faith? No. I have faith, but I question it.

Mankind must remember that peace is not God's gift to his creatures; peace is our gift to each other.

Peace is our gift to each other.

I decided to devote my life to telling the story because I felt that having survived I owe something to the dead. and anyone who does not remember betrays them again.

Mankind must remember that peace is not God's gift to his creatures; peace is our gift to each other.

I have not lost faith in God. I have moments of anger and protest. Sometimes I've been closer to him for that reason.

Wherever men and women are persecuted because of their race, religion, or political views, that place must - at that moment - become the center of the universe.

No human race is superior; no religious faith is inferior. All collective judgments are wrong. Only racists make them.

I marvel at the resilience of the Jewish people. Their best characteristic is their desire to remember. No other people has such an obsession with memory.

In Jewish history there are no coincidences.

Religion is not man's relationship to God, it is man's relationship to man.

I have not lost faith in God. I have moments of anger and protest. Sometimes I've been closer to him for that reason.

Hope is like peace. It is not a gift from God. It is a gift only we can give one another.

There may be times when we are powerless to prevent injustice, but there must never be a time when we fail to protest.

Friendship marks a life even more deeply than love. Love risks degenerating into obsession, friendship is never anything but sharing.

When a person doesn't have gratitude, something is missing in his or her humanity. A person can almost be defined by his or her attitude toward gratitude.

Hope is like peace. It is not a gift from God. It is a gift only we can give one another.

My greatest disappointment is that I believe that those of us who went through the war and tried to write about it, about their experience, became messengers. We have given the message, and nothing changed.

Because of indifference, one dies before one actually dies.

After all, God is God because he remembers.

Human beings should be held accountable. Leave God alone. He has enough problems.

I have not lost faith in God. I have moments of anger and protest. Sometimes I've been closer to him for that reason.

I have not lost faith in God. I have moments of anger and protest. Sometimes I've been closer to him for that reason.

I was very, very religious. And of course I wrote about it in 'Night.' I questioned God's silence. So I questioned. I don't have an answer for that. Does it mean that I stopped having faith? No. I have faith, but I question it.

Friendship marks a life even more deeply than love. Love risks degenerating into obsession, friendship is never anything but sharing.

Hope is like peace. It is not a gift from God. It is a gift only we can give one another.

Just as despair can come to one only from other human beings, hope, too, can be given to one only by other human beings.

It all happened so fast. The ghetto. The deportation. The sealed cattle car. The fiery altar upon which the history of our people and the future of mankind were meant to be sacrificed.

In any society, fanatics who hate don't hate only me - they hate you, too. They hate everybody.

Wherever men and women are persecuted because of their race, religion, or political views, that place must - at that moment - become the center of the universe.

It all happened so fast. The ghetto. The deportation. The sealed cattle car. The fiery altar upon which the history of our people and the future of mankind were meant to be sacrificed.

Not to transmit an experience is to betray it.

What does mysticism really mean? It means the way to attain knowledge. It's close to philosophy, except in philosophy you go horizontally while in mysticism you go vertically.

Religion is not man's relationship to God, it is man's relationship to man.

When a person doesn't have gratitude, something is missing in his or her humanity.

I do not recall a Jewish home without a book on the table.

Without memory, there is no culture. Without memory, there would be no civilization, no society, no future.

For me, every hour is grace. And I feel gratitude in my heart each time I can meet someone and look at his or her smile.

It all happened so fast. The ghetto. The deportation. The sealed cattle car. The fiery altar upon which the history of our people and the future of mankind were meant to be sacrificed.

My greatest disappointment is that I believe that those of us who went through the war and tried to write about it, about their experience, became messengers. We have given the message, and nothing changed.

Without memory, there is no culture. Without memory, there would be no civilization, no society, no future.

Friendship marks a life even more deeply than love. Love risks degenerating into obsession, friendship is never anything but sharing.

My greatest disappointment is that I believe that those of us who went through the war and tried to write about it, about their experience, became messengers. We have given the message, and nothing changed.

Human beings should be held accountable. Leave God alone. He has enough problems.

No one may speak for the dead, no one may interpret their mutilated dreams and visions.

Religion is not man's relationship to God, it is man's relationship to man.