Frasi di Elie Wiesel

pagina 2

“L'opposto dell'amore non è odio, è indifferenza. L'opposto dell'arte non è il brutto, è l'indifferenza. L'opposto della fede non è eresia, è indifferenza. E l'opposto della vita non è la morte, è l'indifferenza.”

“Mai dimenticherò quella notte, la prima notte nel campo, che ha fatto della mia vita una lunga notte e per sette volte sprangata.
Mai dimenticherò quel fumo.
Mai dimenticherò i piccoli volti dei bambini di cui avevo visto i corpi trasformarsi in volute di fumo sotto un cielo muto.
Mai dimenticherò quelle fiamme che bruciarono per sempre la mia Fede.
Mai dimenticherò quel silenzio notturno che mi ha tolto per l'eternità il desiderio di vivere.
Mai dimenticherò quegli istanti che assassinarono il mio Dio e la mia anima, e i miei sogni, che presero il volto del deserto.
Mai dimenticherò tutto ciò, anche se fossi condannato a vivere quanto Dio stesso. Mai.”

“Volevano ad ogni costo uccidere l'ultimo ebreo sul pianeta. Oggi ci si potrebbe chiedere: perché la memoria, perché ricordare, perché infliggere un dolore tale? In fondo per i morti è tardi ma per i vivi no. Se non si può annullare il tormento, si può invece sperare, riflettere, prendere coscienza.”

“Chi ascolta un superstite dell'Olocausto diventa a sua volta un testimone.”

“Se con l'Olocausto Dio ha scelto di interrogare l'uomo, spetta a questi rispondere con una ricerca che ha Dio per oggetto.”

“Omicidio a sangue freddo e cultura non si escludono a vicenda. Se l'Olocausto ci ha dimostrato qualcosa, è che una persona può amare la poesia e comunque uccidere i bambini.”

“Ci dovrebbe essere un comandamento biblico "Non devi odiare".”

“Questo minuto aveva più di sessanta secondi.”

“Only the guilty are guilty. Their children are not.”

“For in the end, it is all about memory, its sources and its magnitude, and, of course, its consequences.”

“I swore never to be silent whenever and wherever human beings endure suffering and humiliation. We must always take sides.”

“I shall always remember that smile. From what world did it come from?”

“Wherever men and women are persecuted because of their race, religion, or political views, that place must at that moment become the center of the universe.”

“We must not see any person as an abstraction. Instead, we must see in every person a universe with its own secrets, with its own treasures, with its own sources of anguish, and with some measure of triumph.”

“They are committing the greatest indignity human beings can inflict on one another: telling people who have suffered excruciating pain and loss that their pain and loss were illusions.”

“There are victories of the soul and spirit. Sometimes, even if you lose, you win.”

“I don't want my past to become anyone else's future.”

“I told him that I did not believe that they could burn people in our age, that humanity would never tolerate it…”

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

“Ultimately, the only power to which man should aspire is that which he exercises over himself.”

“Indifference is the sign of sickness, a sickness of the soul more contagious than any other.”

“… I believe it important to emphasize how strongly I feel that books, just like people, have a destiny. Some invite sorrow, others joy, some both.”

“Most people think that shadows follow, precede or surround beings or objects. The truth is that they also surround words, ideas, desires, deeds, impulses and memories.”

“No human being is illegal.”

“Did I write it so as not to go mad or, on the contrary, to go mad in order to understand the nature of madness?”

“Love makes everything complicated.”

“In the beginning there was faith - which is childish; trust - which is vain; and illusion - which is dangerous.”

“Those who kept silent yesterday will remain silent tomorrow.”

“I feel that books, just like people, have a destiny. Some invite sorrow, others joy, some both.”

“Music does not replace words, it gives tone to the words”

“I write to understand as much as to be understood.”

“Better that one heart be broken a thousand times in the retelling, he has decided, if it means that a thousand other hearts need not be broken at all.”

“I am not so naïve as to believe that this slim volume will change the course of history or shake the conscience of the world. Books no longer have the power they once did. Those who kept silent yesterday will remain silent tomorrow.”

“[Moishe] explained to me, with great emphasis, that every question possessed a power that was lost in the answer….
And why do you pray, Moishe?' I asked him.
I pray to the God within me for the strength to ask Him the real questions.”

“The opposite of love is not hate, it's indifference.”

“Bread, soup - these were my whole life. I was a body. Perhaps less than that even: a starved stomach. The stomach alone was aware of the passage of time.”

“I've been fighting my entire adult life for men and women everywhere to be equal and to be different. But there is one right I would not grant anyone. And that is the right to be indifferent.”