One day when I was able to get up, I decided to look at myself in the mirror on the opposite wall. I had not seen myself since the ghetto. From the depths of the mirror, a corpse was contemplating me....
Never shall I forget those flames that consumed my faith forever.
Life belongs to man, but the meaning of life is beyond him.
Just as there are predatory birds, so there are predatory ideas: I came under their spell. . . .Just as the survivors say that no one will ever understand the victims, what I must tell you is that you...
It all belonged to everyone since it no longer belonged to anyone.
In the beginning there was faith—which is childish; trust—which is vain; and illusion—which is dangerous. We believed in God, trusted in man, and lived with the illusion that every one of us has been...
I learned that man lives differently, depending on whether he is in a horizontal or vertical position. The shadows on the walls, on the faces, are not the same.
I have more faith in Hitler than in anyone else. He alone has kept his promises, all his promises, to the Jewish people.
Human suffering anywhere concerns men and women everywhere.
His eyes would suddenly go blank, leaving two gaping wounds, two wells of terror.
He was a past master of making himself seem insignificant, of seeming invisible.
For the survivor who chooses to testify, it is clear: his duty is to bear witness for the dead and for the living.
Even if I wrote on nothing else, it would never be enough, even if all the survivors did nothing but write about their experiences, it would still not be enough.*Response when asked how much longer is...
Blessed be God's name? Why, but why would I bless Him? Every fiber in me rebelled. Because He caused thousands of children to burn in His mass graves? Because he kept six crematoria working day and ni...
And that is why I swore never to be silent whenever and wherever human beings endure suffering and humiliation. We must take sides. Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim. Silence encourages...
A man can laugh while he suffers.
Friendship marks a life even more deeply rhan love. Love risks degenerating into obsession friendship is never anything but sharing.
If the only prayer you say throughout your life is "Thank You," then that will be enough.
Every question possessed a power that was lost in the answer . . .
[The shock of finding a familiar word in an unfamiliar setting.] A SS man would examine us. Whenever he found a weak one, a musulman as we called them, he would write his number down: good for the cre...