"If we are to negotiate the coming years safely, we may need a new kind of leadership. To put it more precisely, we need the rediscovery of an ancient kind of leadership that has rarely been given the prominence it deserves. I mean the leader as teacher."

"Since the 18th century, many Western intellectuals have predicted religion's imminent demise."

"Britain, relative to the U.S., is a highly secular society. Philanthropy alone cannot fill the gap left by government cutbacks. And the sources of altruism go deep into our evolutionary past."

"The Jewish festival of freedom is the oldest continuously observed religious ritual in the world. Across the centuries, Passover has never lost its power to inspire the imagination of successive generations of Jews with its annually re-enacted drama of slavery and liberation."

"Both tears and sweat are salty, but they render a different result. Tears will get you sympathy; sweat will get you change."

"Sometimes I have these fantasies of just moving to a foreign country and coming back with a full head of hair. Or not even come back! Make a new life there with hair... Change my name, just see what happens."

"It is evident that skepticism, while it makes no actual change in man, always makes him feel better."

"In the long term we can hope that religion will change the nature of man and reduce conflict. But history is not encouraging in this respect. The bloodiest wars in history have been religious wars."