• Susan Seligson

    Susan Seligson has written for many publications and websites, including the New York Times Magazine, The Atlantic, the Boston Globe, Yankee, Outside, Redbook, the Times of London, Salon.com, Radar.com, and Nerve.com. Profile

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There are 34 comments on Elie Wiesel (Hon.’74), Spokesman for Peace and Human Rights, Dies at 87

    1. The world has lost a “righteous man”. A soft-spoken person with a pen and message that roars into the ages. Never forget!

  1. If I’m not mistaken, Elie Weisel lectured at BU in the 1960s before he joined the faculty. The world suffers a tremendous loss upon his death; may no one Forget! My deepest sympathy to his family…Alev Hasholom

  2. We have lost an eloquent giant. He shall be forever missed. Like Dr. King, I am proud to be a fellow member of the BU family with Professor Wiesel.

  3. Like Martin Luther King, Jr., Barbara Jordan and Howard Thurman, Elie Wiesel has left Boston University and the world a better place than he found it.
    My condolences to his family and friends.

  4. One regret I have is that during my years st BU that I never was able to get into his classes. I later had the pleasure to see him pray and speak with him in nyc at 5yh avenue synagogue and at 92 Y events. Baruch Dayan ha-emet. Only g-d is the true judge. Rest in peace and may your consciousness remain for all time with the works.

  5. Mr. Wiesel’s deal leaves me feeling sad. I was once again reading one of his books this week never thinking he would die so soon. I feel a loss of one of the too few moral forces I need to know are in the world. His death makes me want to be a better person. That is a tribute. I so wish I could have studied with him. I went to BU in graduate program in l973. Was he there? If so, what a loss.
    Blessings on his family and those to carrhy on his message. In my own small way I hope to do that also. He was a great man and I love his white hair and open smile even there was no belly laugh. We should all wwrite the writers we love before they die. Twice this month learning this. Claire Holcomb

  6. As a graduate of BU (1963) I takes me proud that a man such as Elie Wiesel chose to teach there for so many years. People like Mr Wiesel who managed to survive the Holocaust and to use the horrific experience they endured as a means to help make others understand that this should never happen again to anyone any where Were and are a gift to humanity. To me this ability to touch so many lives for good is nothing short of miraculous. I had a friend who felt that because she survived, carrying a photo of her parents in the hem of her dress for six unimaginably horrible years, it was her mission to do good works. She was national president of the Literacy Council, nationally active with the Red Cross and Hadassah and when she began to speak publicly she was a force of nature. People like this are obviously extraordinary, but must also be Angels. Their minds and their hearts not embodying bitterness and hatred, but love and life and a burning desire to move humanity forward and help people to choose good rather than evil. Mr. Wiesel will be missed by all mankind.

  7. Yes, I remember it well.How proud I was to be a BU grad when I heard about Elie
    Weisel’s affiliation with Boston University. Just think, we walked Commonwealth
    Avenue together.

  8. The one time I got to hear Elie Wiesel speak left an indelible impression on me. II was an encounter with a man who lived and breathed the humanity that he beckoned us to delve deep within to find, to access and to act on. Thank you for this most beautiful article. May Elie Wiesel’s memory be for a blessing and may we each in our own way continue his work and life mission.

  9. What a beautiful man. I graduated B.U. one year before he came to be staff member. I remember a friend telling me about it and I’m only sorry I wasn’t born a bit later …so that I could have studied with him!

  10. For many years my wife Patty and I have hosted an annual speakers series here in London. This annual event was motivated in large part by the desire to share with the broader London BU community the knowledge and views of the University’s many talented professors. We had Elie Wiesel in mind when we launched this initiative. Professor Wiesel was our distinguished lecturer on October 23, 2002, during the run-up to the second Iraq War.
    His talk, “Imagining Peace, Against Indifference” was well-received by a large audience at Freemasons’ Hall here in London – an audience which included then president John Silber. Patty and I had the good fortune to enjoy an evening with Elie and his wife Marion at the theatre on the evening preceding his talk, and we were able to join him for a small dinner gathering following the lecture. Our then twenty-year old daughter Erin remembers well her conversation with Professor Wiesel, and his emphasis on the importance of remaining engaged as citizens during times of crisis. Elie Wiesel’s death represents a huge loss, particularly at this strange time in American and British political life. I am sure that most of your readers will agree that his message will continue to resonate in a world constantly beset with crises when anxieties and petty misunderstandings can often give rise to prejudices which in turn can determine the course of events.

  11. Your presentation of his life, history and tragedy suffered by all persons during the Second World War was and is a graphic report which needs to be read over and over again from one generation to the next. Thanks for the presentation.

  12. As one whose family left Germany in 1927, we escaped the savage bestiality of the Nazi regime. Had we stayed there we too would have been taken in as “partial Jews” (my Grandfather was the product of the rape of a great aunt) by a Jewish professor from Heidelberg.

  13. In 1977 i was a student in Elie Wiesels class. Through his lectures- which at that time were 30 students and so i had the priveledge of being in a class like environment- he shared the horrors of what people are capable of phychologically. This must have been hard to relive his whole life- but i thank him for giving me the mental framework and language to never forget- to bear witness-to carry on his mission-as best i can with my children and friends. He provided a moral compass for generations to come. His passing has made it even more evident that it is now our generations responsibility to set a moral compass and right where we see humanity go wrong. Thank you professor Wiesel.

  14. Prof. & Nobel prize laureate Elie Wiesel has clealy shown what a human being can accomplish from man’s humanity to man, teaching, hohesty and integrety, forgiveness and peace and the basic human rights to mention but few. I and my wife are alumni and while he was not our professor, we certainly knew, heard and read about all his contribution to Boston University. We are proud of him and glad to be associated with him through BU. Thanks to BU for adding Prof. Wiesel to the list of what makes BU ring bells from Martin Luther King to Wiesel and so on. Looking at the life of this man from Holocaust to present day, its time for the world to say ‘ Nevver Again ‘. On behalf of my family and friends, may his soul rest in peace and may God comfor his family and BU.

  15. Elie Wiesel’s life exemplifies the resilience of the human spirit. His legacy of tolerance, active opposition to prejudice and inhumanity, and a deep respect of human rights is reflected in the lives of the many people he touched. Mr. Wiesel showed that one person can make a difference.

  16. One voice reverberated as tho 6 million were able to speak up. When Elie Wiesel spoke wrote or lectured he brought forth the story of all who perished or suffered in the Holocaust . Would that the world would remember when confronted with the savagery ocuring in the middle East and beyond.

  17. I am profoundly moved by his life and testament. At 83 yrs old, I remember at age 12, 1945 first seeing pictures of concentration camps and the inmates. That was the end of childhood for me. Those hideous crimes happened . let no one deny it.

  18. I am sad to learn about Professor Wiesel’s passing. As daughter and granddaughter of Holocaust survivors in Poland I was introduced to many of the topics discussed in Professor’ Wiesel’s books and lectures from early childhood. The horrors endured by innocent people included not only Jews but others from different political and ethnic groups. I do hope that Professor Wiesel’s legacy and contributions to highlight peace and understanding will live for ever in our complex world.

  19. Elie Weisel is most definitely a example of not only how one person can make a difference in changing the world but how to make all those who either read, listened or had privilege to sit with him, to become missionaries as consciousness change agents in their own way. He was jarred in his youth by hate and death yet lived to jar the soul of the world from disbelief into believing there is a place for each one of us on this planet.

  20. It was an honor to have met Professor Wiesel and to attend his lectures at BU. I still hear his voice, so passionate and resolute, in the midst of such horror, pain. Remember, he repeated. Witness.
    The most memorial part of my BU education was Dean George Makechnie, Rabbi Polak, and Professor Wiesel. Thank you and rest in peace Professor Wiesel.
    Sarahi Lim Baro (CAS ’96).

  21. Like many of you I was fortunate enough to take the class with Professor Wiesel. I was a graduate student at Brandeis and was able to take a “consortium school course” on the Book of Job in 1989. One of the highlights of the class was an optional 20 minutes in a one on one discussion in Professor Wiesel’s study. Students could bring any issue, any topic. Thinking back on that time, I feel incredibly lucky to have gleaned many life lessons from our collective mentor and teacher. Please keep sharing.

  22. This man touched my life when I first heard him speak at the 1974 graduation ceremonies. Saturday was my birthday. To think that I was out celebrating “my day” and my retirement when he passed from this world saddens me. Your article is a wonderful testament to an incredible man. He’s in my prayers although I’m not sure he “needs” them.

  23. A very well-written piece honoring a most noble man, Ms. Seligson. I am extremely grateful to my high school English teacher who made Prof. Wiesel’s memoir Night a required reading in our class over 30 years ago thereby “introducing” me to this remarkable man. It is one of the first texts which left an indelible mark on me as an adolescent. Thank you, Prof. Wiesel. May you rest in peace.

  24. I chose BU School of Theology in the 1980s in large part for the opportunity to study with Prof. Wiesel. I had just returned from a year in Israel living on a kibbutz founded by Holocaust survivors; I was delving into roots of Christian anti-Semitism and deeply disturbed by my research. As I journeyed towards ordination, Prof Wiesel was a patient, kind, and passionate listener who supported my vocational wrestling matches. I had two or three classes with him, and count him as my great mentor in faith, ethics, and pastoral care. Much of my own professional life has been devoted to interfaith dialogue, with tribute to my beloved teacher.

  25. If I may presume to add to Susan Seligson’s heartwarming article, it is to pay tribute to Elie’s additional important role in BU’s University Professors Program (UNI). He not only taught to standing room-only classes but provided warm support and always wise counsel in the administration of that Program. And,as I fondly recollect our meetings over mid-morning cups of tea, he frequently leavened his remarks with unexpected shaft of wit and impish asides…I mourn the passing of a truly great man and a good friend. In piam memoriam, Elie..

  26. Throughout the 1950s, literature on the holocaust, both fiction and non-fiction, was scant and bland. But with the publication of Elie Wiesel’s “Night”, in 1960, the world changed. No longer could European politicians and intelligentsia sweep the murder of 6 million Jews under a rug. No longer would America Jews be naive about the near extinction of their people. More than anyone else, Professor Elie Wiesel put western civilization on notice that the Jewish people will never forget and never surrender. Boston University was his home and for that, we should all be grateful and proud

  27. Thank you so much for this thoughtful piece. We should all strive to leave the world a better place than we found it, and no one embodied this ideal more than Professor Wiesel. Hearing him speak during my time at BU was an enormous privilege. The world feels the sudden loss of your wisdom, kindness, and pureness of heart acutely, sir.

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