Rabbinic literature can be studied in two different ways, in two directions, one might say. It can be studied quantitatively or qualitatively – or, as my father once put it, horizontally or vertically. The former involves covering as much material as possible, without attempting to wrest it from it all its implications and intricacies; the latter involves confining oneself to one single area until it is exhaustively covered, and then going on to new material.

Basically it’s none of our business how somebody manages to grow, if only he does grow, if only we’re on the trail of the law of our own growth.

It hurts a father to see a son this way. It makes no difference what age the son is; it hurts.

You paint it,” he responds. “You are a specialist in darkness.” I tell him, “I didn’t live through it.” He says, “We all lived through it, everyone; all of humanity lived through it. Was Picasso in Guernica? Did Guido Reni see with his own eyes the slaughter of little children in Bethlehem?

Isn’t it better to arrest and prosecute a hundred innocent people and catch among them one spy than to let the spy go free?

There’s a rabbi in the Talmud who even says there’s no atonement for lashon hara.

A man does not always remain at the same stage. He is always ascending or descending. When he reaches the top, he must concern himself with the probability that he will fall. When he reaches the bottom, he must strive once again to climb to the top. That is the nature of man. When the soul of a man is in its darkest night, he must strive constantly for new light. When one thinks there is only an end, that is when one must struggle for the new beginning.

Weeks of longing and solitude: twin muses of creation.

Each work seems to give me the most trouble at the time I’m working on it.

I held it close to my face and smelled the ink. I have always loved the smell of ink in a new book.