“Far from being the father of jihad, [Prophet] Mohammad was a peacemaker, who risked his life and nearly lost the loyalty of his closest companions because he was determined to effect a reconciliation with Mecca”

“By prolonged and continued fellowship, the sheep who follow nearby enjoy the shepherd's presence and become his familiar companions. To those closest to him, he shares the choicest portions of the food he's gathered. These happy and content sheep are never in danger. Why? Because they are near the shepherd!”

“[Nathan] wasn't blindly obsessed with a possession. He wasn't crazy. He was a hero--a father who'd risked his life to rescue his son.”

“And if Amsterdam was hell, and if hell was a memory, then he realized that perhaps there was some purpose to his being lost. Cut off from everything that was familiar to him, unable to discover even a single point of reference, he saw that his steps, by taking him nowhere, were taking him him nowhere but into himself. He was wandering inside himself, and he was lost. Far from troubling him, this state of being lost because a source of happiness, of exhilaration. He breathed it into his very bones. As if on the brink of some previously hidden knowledge, he breathed it into his very bones and said to himself, almost triumphantly: I am lost.”

“God raises from the dead he who man slays, he whom his brothers have rejected, finds his father once more. Pray, believe, enter into life the father is there.”

“I understood that Valek’s loyalty to the Commander was without question. His blue eyes held a fierce determination and I knew in my soul that Valek would take his own life after he had taken mine.”