So long as still within the innermost heart a Jewish spirit sings,
so long as the eye looks eastward,
gazing toward Zion, our hope is not lost -
that hope of two millennia,
to be a free people in our land,
the land of Zion and Jerusalem.
- Hatikvah, literally "The Hope," Israel's national anthem

Jews do not live alone. As a result of what the world has done to us, it may find a way to save itself. By now it must admit that we do have in our possession the key to survival. We have not survived centuries of atrocities for nothing.
Because we know the murder that there continues to be in this world, we know how hopeless our battle may appear. Today we have to fight murder and absurdity, and give meaning to the battle, if not our hope.
- adapted from a meditational reading from a memorial service in modern Jewish worship

The intelligent heart does not deny reality. We must not forget the grief of yesterday, not ignore the pain of today. But yesterday is the past. It cannot tell us what tomorrow will bring. If there is goodness at the heart of life, then its power, like the power of evil, is real. Which shall prevail? Moment by moment we choose between them. If we choose rightly, and often enough, the broken fragments of our world will be restored to wholeness. Through this we are able to sustain our faith as we pray for strength and help.
- adapted from a meditational reading from a memorial service in modern Jewish worship

In the presence of eyes
which witnessed the slaughter,
which saw the oppression
the heart could not bear,
and as witness the heart
that once taught compassion
until the days came to pass
that crushed human feeling,
I have taken an oath: To remember it all,
to remember, not once to forget!
Forget not one thing to the last generation
when degradation shall cease,
to the last, to its ending,
when the rod of instruction
shall have come to conclusion.
An oath: Not in vain passed over
the night of the terror.
An oath: No morning shall see me at flesh-pots again
An oath: Lest from this we learned nothing.
- adapted from a meditational reading from a memorial service in modern Jewish worship

"I believe in the sun,
even when it is not shining.
I believe in love,
even when I don't feel it.
I believe in God,
even when there is silence."
-Words scratched on the walls of a cellar in Cologne, Germany by a Jew hiding from Nazi persecution.

When asked, "After all that has happened to you, how can you believe in God?" Eli Wiesel responded, "After all that has happened to me, how can I not believe in God?"