A word is worth a thousand pictures. Elie Wiesel More Quotes by Elie Wiesel More Quotes From Elie Wiesel One can do without solutions. Only the questions matter. We may share them or turn away from them. Elie Wiesel thought-provokingmattermay I rarely speak about God. To God yes. I protest against Him. I shout at Him. But open discourse about the qualities of God, about the problems that God imposes, theodicy, no. And yet He is there, in silence, in filigree. Elie Wiesel qualitysilencegod At Auschwitz, not only man died, but also the idea of man. To live in a world where there is nothing anymore, where the executioner acts as god, as judge-many wanted no part of it. It was its own heart the world incinerated at Auschwitz. Elie Wiesel heartmenideas Nobody is stronger, nobody is weaker than someone who came back. There is nothing you can do to such a person because whatever you could do is less than what has already been done to him. We have already paid the price. Elie Wiesel strongersurvivaldone Acutely aware of the poverty of my means, language became obstacle. At every page I thought, 'That's not it.' So I began again with other verbs and other images. No, that wasn't it either. But what exactly was that it I was searching for? It must have been all that eludes us, hidden behind a veil so as not to be stolen, usurped and trivialized. Words seemed weak and pale. Elie Wiesel elude-uswritingmean Indifference elicits no response. Indifference is not a response. Indifference is not a beginning; it is an end. And, therefore, indifference is always the friend of the enemy, for it benefits the aggressor - never his victim, whose pain is magnified when he or she feels forgotten. Elie Wiesel benefitspainenemy Every nation has its prestigious military academies - or so few of them - that reach not only the virtues of peace but also the art of attaining it? I mean attaining and protecting it by means other than weapons, the tools of war. Why are we surprised whenever war recedes and yields to peace? Elie Wiesel militarywarart No commandment surpasses the one concerning the liberation of hostages, for they are among the starving, the thirsting, the stripped, always in danger of death. Elie Wiesel starvingliberationdanger Look, if I were alone in the world, I would have the right to choose despair, solitude and self-fulfillment. But I am not alone. Elie Wiesel despairsolitudeself The act of writing is for me often nothing more than the secret or conscious desire to carve words on a tombstone: to the memory of a town forever vanished, to the memory of a childhood in exile, to the memory of all those I loved and who, before I could tell them I loved them, went away. Elie Wiesel tombstonewritingmemories It was pitch dark. I could hear only the violin, and it was as though Juliek's soul were the bow. He was playing his life. The whole of his life was gliding on the strings--his last hopes, his charred past, his extinguished future. He played as he would never play again...When I awoke, in the daylight, I could see Juliek, opposite me, slumped over, dead. Near him lay his violin, smashed, trampled, a strange overwhelming little corpse. Elie Wiesel darkoppositespast Life is really fascinated only by death. It vibrates only when it comes in contact with death. Elie Wiesel contactfascinatedlife-is If there is a single theme that dominates all my writings, all my obsessions, it is that of memory-because I fear forgetfulness as much as hatred and death. Elie Wiesel hatredwritingmemories Though we talk peace, we wage war. Sometimes we even wage war in the name of peace. Does that seem paradoxical? Well, war is not afraid of paradoxes. Elie Wiesel namesdoewar Everybody around us was weeping. Someone began to recite Kaddish, the prayer for the dead. I don't know whether, during the history of the Jewish people, men have ever before recited Kaddish for themselves. Elie Wiesel prayermenpeople It may well be that our means are fairly limited and our possibilities restricted when it comes to applying pressure on our government But is this a reason to do nothing? Despair is nor an answer Neither is resignation Resignation only leads to indifference, which is not merely a sin but a punishment. Elie Wiesel punishmentgovernmentmean My ambition really was, even as a child, to be a writer, a commentator, and a teacher, but a teacher of Talmud. Elie Wiesel teachingteacherchildren Granted that every war is madness-civil war, fratricide, is the worst of all; it reaches deeper into ugliness, cruelty and absurdity. Elie Wiesel grantedmadnesswar Therefore, all my adult life, since I began my life as an author, or as a teacher, I always try to listen to the victim. Elie Wiesel teachingtryingteacher It always hurts when you lose a secret. Elie Wiesel loseshurtsecret
