If you make a determination that [story of Abraham and the sacrifice of Isaac] is not historical, do you throw it away? I don't think we can say whether it's precisely, scientifically historical.

This is the duty of our generation as we enter the twenty-first century - solidarity with the weak, the persecuted, the lonely, the sick, and those in despair. It is expressed by the desire to give a noble and humanizing meaning to a community in which all members will define themselves not by their own identity but by that of others.

Knowledge does not corrupt, unless it is arrogant; but then it is not true knowledge.

[Shirat ha-Yam ] is one of the earliest, if not the earliest, pieces of Biblical literature that we possess. It is much closer to history than later traditions of the Exodus.

My interpretation is different. God asks Cain, "Where is your brother Abel?" [Genesis 4:9] And Cain answers "Lo yadati, "I don't know" or "I didn't know." Then comes a period, followed by "Am I my brother's keeper?"

Sometimes I think I prefer the storyteller in [Roman Vishniac] to the photographer. But aren't they one and the same?

I think so. 9/11 has been a turning point in American history, there's no doubt about that.