“Physics filled me with awe, put me in touch with a sense of original causes. Physics brought me closer to God. That feeling stayed with me throughout my years in science. Whenever one of my students came to me with a scientific project, I asked only one question, ‘Will it bring you nearer to God?’”

“The first verses of Genesis were very moving to me as a kid. The whole idea of creation--the mystery and the philosophy of it. It sank in on me, and it’s something I still feel.”

“‘When you’re doing physics, you’re wrestling with a champ,’ he liked to say. ‘You’re trying to find out how God made the world, just like Jacob wrestling with the angel.’ Physics brought Rabi nearer to God because the world was His creation. And like God, physics was infinite and certainly not trivial.”