Quotes from Elie Wiesel, Night

Man comes closer to God through the questions he asks Him, he liked to say.

We are all brothers and we are all suffering the same fate. The same smoke floats over all our heads. Help one another. It is the only way to survive. (pg. 39)

Suffering confers no privileges; it is what one does with suffering that matters.

Our lives no longer belong to us alone; they belong to all those who need us desperately.

One day I was able to get up, after gathering all my strength. I wanted to see myself in the mirror hanging on the opposite wall. I had not seen myself since the ghetto. From the depths of the mirror, a corpse gazed back at me. The look in his eyes, as they stared into mine, has never left me.

Why do you pray? he asked me, after a moment. Why did I pray? A strange question. Why did I live? Why did I breathe?

Any one of the fields of ashes in Birkenau carries more weight than all the testimonies about Birkenau.

under an indifferent sky.

This day I ceased to plead. I was no longer capable of lamentation. On the contrary, I felt very strong. I was the accuser, God the accused.

We believed in God, trusted in man, and lived with the illusion that every one of us has been entrusted with a sacred spark.

Violence is not the answer. Terrorism is the most dangerous of answers.