Ben-Hur (1959 film) Quotations

Ben-Hur is a 1959 film about a Jewish prince who is betrayed and sent into slavery by a Roman friend, but later regains his freedom and returns for revenge. It went on to win eleven Academy Awards, including best picture for 1959.

Directed by William Wyler. Written by Karl Tunberg, based on the novel Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ by Lew Wallace.

A Tale of the Christ taglines

Judah Ben-Hur

You may conquer the land, you may slaughter the people. That is not the end. We will rise again.

Rome is an affront to God. Rome is strangling my people and my country and the whole earth, but not forever. I tell you, the day Rome falls, there will be a shout of freedom such as the world has never heard before.

[to Messala] May God grant me vengeance. I pray that you live till I return.

Messala

Be wise, Judah. It's a Roman world. If you want to live in it, you must become part of it...I tell you, Judah, it's no accident that one small village on the Tiber was chosen to rule the world...It wasn't just our legions...No, it was fate that chose us to civilize the world - and we have. Our roads and our ships connect every corner of the earth, Roman law, architecture, literature and the glory of the human race.

It's an insane world, but in it there's one sanity, the loyalty of old friends. Judah, we must believe in one another.

[to Judah] I wanted your help. Now you have given it to me. By making this example of you, I discourage treason. By condemning, without hesitation, an old friend, I shall be feared.

Quintus Arrius

[to Judah] You have the spirit to fight back but the good sense to control it. Your eyes are full of hate, Forty-One. That's good. Hate keeps a man alive. It gives him strength.

[to Judah] In his eagerness to save you, your God has also saved the Roman fleet.

Sheik Ilderim

One wife? One god, that I can understand - but one wife! That is not civilized. It is not generous.

[to Judah] The Star of David, will shine out for your people and my people together and blind the eyes of Rome.

Others

Simonides: Do not pity me, Master Judah. In fact, I'm twice the man I was. There's Mallet, my other half. We met in the dungeons at the citadel. We were released on the same day, Mallet without a tongue and I without life in my legs. Since then, I have been his tongue and he has been my legs. Together, we make a considerable man.

Sextus: There's also a wild man in the desert named John the Baptist and a young carpenter's son who goes around doing magic tricks, miracles they call them...This man is different. He teaches that God is near, in every man. It's actually quite profound, some of it.

Esther: I've seen too much what hate can do. My father is burned up with it. But I've heard of a young rabbi who says that forgiveness is greater and love more powerful than hatred. I believe it.

Pontius Pilate: Where there is greatness, great government or power, even great feeling or compassion, error also is great.

Dialogue

Sextus: You can break a man's skull. You can arrest him. You can throw him into a dungeon. But how do you fight an idea?

Messala: Sir, you ask how to fight an idea. Well, I'll tell you how... with another idea!

Arrius: What is your name, Forty-One?

Judah: [pause] Judah Ben-Hur.

Arrius: Judah Ben-Hur... Let me die.

Judah: [repeating Arrius' words on board the galleys] We keep you alive to serve this ship. Row well and live.

Messala: What do you think you see? The smashed body of a wretched animal? There's enough of a man still left here for you to hate. Let me help you...You think they're dead. Your mother and sister. Dead. And the race over. It isn't over, Judah. They're not dead.

Judah: Where are they? Where are they? Where are they?

Messala: Look for them in the Valley of the Lepers, if you can recognize them. It goes on. It goes on, Judah. The race, the race is not over.

Judah: Almost at the moment He died, I heard Him say, "Father, forgive them for they know not what they do."

Esther: Even then.

Judah: Even then. And I felt His voice take the sword out of my hand.

Judah: If you were not a bride I'll kiss you good bye

Esther: If I were not a bride there would not be good bye to say

Taglines

A Tale of the Christ

The World's Most Honored Motion Picture

The Entertainment Experience of a Lifetime!

Cast

Charlton Heston - Judah Ben-Hur
Jack Hawkins - Quintus Arrius
Haya Harareet - Esther
Stephen Boyd - Messala
Hugh Griffith - Sheik Ilderim
Martha Scott - Miriam
Cathy O'Donnell - Tirzah
Sam Jaffe - Simonides
Finlay Currie - Balthazar/Narrator in pre-credits sequence
Frank Thring - Pontius Pilate
Terence Longdon - Drusus
George Relph - Tiberius Caesar
André Morell - Sextus

Quoternity