Chaim Potok Quotes

“…everything has a past. Everything – a person, an object, a word, everything. If you don’t know the past, you can’t understand the present and plan properly for the future.”

“It's not a pretty world, Papa.''I've noticed,' my father said softly.”

“I do not bring forgiveness with me, nor forgetfulness. The only ones who can forgive are dead; the living have no right to forget.”

“Every man who has shown the world the way to beauty, to true culture, has been a rebel, a 'universal' without patriotism, without home, who has found his people everywhere.”

“But today we become aware of other readings of the human experience very quickly because of the media and the speed with which people travel the planet.”

“As a species we are always hungry for new knowledge.”

“All of us grow up in particular realities - a home, family, a clan, a small town, a neighborhood. Depending upon how we're brought up, we are either deeply aware of the particular reading of reality into which we are born, or we are peripherally aware of it.”

“Miracles sometimes occur but one has to work terribly hard for them.”

“Have thine own way, Lord! Have thine own way!Thou art the Potter and I am the clay.”

“In Russia I went to a great yeshiva, and in America I work in a carnival.”