Elie Wiesel Quotes

I pray to the God within me that He will give me the strength to ask Him the right questions.

Think higher, feel deeper.

No one is as capable of gratitude as one who has emerged from the kingdom of night.

MARIA: The people can say anything they please—
MENDEL: Right. Under one condition: that they do not say it.

Whoever survives a test, whatever it may be, must tell the story. That is his duty.

When I woke up, it was daylight. That is when I remembered that I had a father. During the alert, I had followed the mob, not taking care of him. I knew he was running out of strength, close to death, and yet had abandoned him.
I went to look for him.
Yet at the same time a thought crept into my mind: If only I didn't find him! If only I were relieved of this responsibility, I could use all my strength to fight for my own survival, to take care of myself...Instantly, I felt ashamed, ashamed of myself forever.

Life is really fascinated only by death. It vibrates only when it comes in contact with death.

To forget would not only be dangerous but offensive. to forget the dead would be akin to killing them a second time.

Usu­al­ly, very ear­ly in the morn­ing. Ger­man la­bor­ers were go­ing to work. They would stop and look at us with­out sur­prise. One day when we had come to a stop, a work­er took a piece of bread out of his bag and threw it in­to a wag­on. There was a stam­pede. Dozens of starv­ing men fought des­per­ate­ly over a few crumbs. The work­er watched the spec­ta­cle with great interest. Years later, I witnessed a sim­ilar spec­ta­cle in Aden. Our ship’s pas­sen­gers amused them­selves by throw­ing coins to the “natives,” who dove to retrieve them. An el­egant Parisian la­dy took great plea­sure in this game. When I no­ticed two chil­dren des­perate­ly fighting in the wa­ter, one try­ing to stran­gle the oth­er, I implored the la­dy: “Please, don’t throw any more coins!” “Why not?” said she. “I like to give char­ity…

The stars were only sparks of the fire which devoured us. Should that fire die out one day, there would be nothing left in the sky but dead stars, dead eyes.

There may be times when we are powerless to prevent injustice, but there must never be a time when we fail to protest. The Talmud tells us that by saving a single human being, man can save the world.

Never shall I forget these things, even if I am condemned to life as long as God himself

For the dead and the living, we must bear witness.

Never shall I forget the little faces of the children, whose bodies turned into wreaths of smoke beneath a silent blue sky.

Indifference, to me, is the epitome of evil.