We are biological creatures. We are born, we live, we die. There is no transcendent purpose to existence. At best we are creatures of reason, and by using reason we can cure ourselves of emotional excess. Purged of both hope and fear, we find courage in the face of helplessness, insignificance and uncertainty.

If we are to cherish freedom, and to guard it, we must remember what the alternative is: the bread of affliction and the bitter herbs of slavery.

The greatest single antidote to violence is conversation.

Marriage, sanctified by the bond of fidelity, is the nearest life gets to a work of art.

The Holocaust survivors are among the most inspiring people I have had the privilege to meet.

In Judaism faith means wrestling with God as Jacob once wrestled with an angel.

Food prices are often kept artificially high. The result is that the Millennium Development Goals set out by the United Nations at the start of the new millennium are not being reached. Fine words have not yet been turned into deeds.