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I don't believe in collective guilt. The children of killers are not killers, but children.
Elie Wiesel
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Elie Wiesel
Age: 87 †
Born: 1928
Born: September 30
Died: 2016
Died: July 2
Autobiographer
Humanist
Journalist
Judaic Scholar
Novelist
Philosopher
Political Activist
Professor
Translator
University Teacher
Writer
Sighetu Marmaţiei
Eliezer Wiesel
A-7713
Élie Wiesel
Killers
Collectives
Collective
Guilt
Children
Believe
More quotes by Elie Wiesel
I remember those faces of people who were good I saw that. I saw a father who gave his bread to his son and his son gave back the bread to his father. That, to me, was such a defeat of the enemies, will of the enemies, theories of the enemies, aspirations, here [in Auschwitz].
Elie Wiesel
I listen to music when I write. I need the musical background. Classical music. I'm behind the times. I'm still with Baroque music, Gregorian chant, the requiems, and with the quartets of Beethoven and Brahms. That is what I need for the climate, for the surroundings, for the landscape: the music.
Elie Wiesel
You cross a border and the policeman or the frontier policeman look at you, What are you doing here? Why are you coming? How long will you stay? Well, if I had nearly enough years, I would write a novel about being a refugee.
Elie Wiesel
What I do, I want to do with all my being.
Elie Wiesel
I'm not a political person. I usually beware of political persons. I know many, but I'm not one of them. I have no political ambitions.
Elie Wiesel
Indifference is the sign of sickness, a sickness of the soul more contagious than any other.
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
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
Perhaps some day someone will explain how, on the level of man, Auschwitz was possible but on the level of God, it will forever remain the most disturbing of mysteries.
Elie Wiesel
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
[Chinese] are a huge empire now, you'll soon be - in a few years two billion people in the world. So, you should be more compassionate, more understanding. And above all, you don't need all their trouble.
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
Because I remember, I despair. Because I remember, I have the duty to reject despair.
Elie Wiesel
I wanted to come back to Sighet to tell you the story of my death. So that you could prepare yourselves while there was still time. To live? I don't attach any importance to my life any more. I'm alone. No, I wanted to come back, and to warn you. And see how it is, no one will listen to me.
Elie Wiesel
I came to the conclusion that I am free to choose my own suffering. But I am not free to consent to someone else's suffering.
Elie Wiesel
The story of Abraham and the sacrifice of Isaac are nowhere in any other tradition.
Elie Wiesel
every question possessed a power that was lost in the answer . . .
Elie Wiesel
The opposite of faith is not heresy but indifference
Elie Wiesel
It is by his freedom that a man knows himself, by his sovereignty over his own life that a man measures himself.
Elie Wiesel
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.
Elie Wiesel
