In the beginning there was faith – which is childish; trust – which is vain; and illusion – which is dangerous.
ELIE WIESELI don’t want my past to become anyone else’s future.
More Elie Wiesel Quotes
-
-
We must not see any person as an abstraction. Instead, we must see in every person a universe with its own secrets, with its own treasures, with its own sources of anguish, and with some measure of triumph.
ELIE WIESEL -
In the face of suffering, one has no right to turn away, not to see.
ELIE WIESEL -
I write to understand as much as to be understood.
ELIE WIESEL -
When a person doesn’t have gratitude, something is missing in his or her humanity.
ELIE WIESEL -
Just as man cannot live without dreams, he cannot live without hope. If dreams reflect the past, hope summons the future.
ELIE WIESEL -
Mankind must remember that peace is not God’s gift to his creatures; peace is our gift to each other.
ELIE WIESEL -
For nearly 3,500 years Exodus has left such an imprint on people’s memories that I cannot imagine it had been invented just as a legend or a tale.
ELIE WIESEL -
To remain silent and indifferent is the greatest sin of all.
ELIE WIESEL -
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.
ELIE WIESEL -
Gratitude is a word that I cherish. Gratitude is what defines the happiness and humanity of the human being.
ELIE WIESEL -
A Jew must be sensitive to the pain of all human beings. A Jew cannot remain indifferent to human suffering… The mission of the Jewish people has never been to make the world more Jewish, but to make it more human.
ELIE WIESEL -
Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented.
ELIE WIESEL -
My faith is a wounded faith, but my life is not without faith. I didn’t divorce God, but I’m quarrelling and arguing and questioning, it’s a wounded faith.
ELIE WIESEL -
I swore never to be silent whenever and wherever human beings endure suffering and humiliation.
ELIE WIESEL -
But where was I to start? The world is so vast, I shall start with the country I knew best, my own. But my country is so very large. I had better start with my town. But my town, too, is large. I had best start with my street. No, my home. No, my family. Never mind, I shall start with myself.
ELIE WIESEL -
Anything you want to say about God you better make sure you can say in front of a pit of burning babies.
ELIE WIESEL -
Be careful with words, they’re dangerous. Be wary of them. They begat either demons or angels. It’s up to you to give life to one or the other. Be careful, I tell you, nothing is as dangerous as giving free rein to words
ELIE WIESEL -
Every Jew, somewhere in his being, should set apart a zone of hate – healthy virile hate – for what the German personifies and for what persists in the German.
ELIE WIESEL -
The opposite of love is not hate, but indifference. Indifference creates evil. Hatred is evil itself. Indifference is what allows evil to be strong, what gives it power.
ELIE WIESEL -
One person of integrity can make a difference.
ELIE WIESEL -
Once you bring life into the world, you must protect it. We must protect it by changing the world.
ELIE WIESEL -
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.
ELIE WIESEL -
All collective judgments are wrong. Only racists make them. No human race is superior; no religious faith is inferior.
ELIE WIESEL -
In the word question, there is a beautiful word – quest. I love that word.
ELIE WIESEL -
In order to fly, you have to give up the ground you are standing on.
ELIE WIESEL -
Today, as yesterday, a nation is judged by its attitude towards refugees.
ELIE WIESEL