Terrorized by the Enemy Hitler, a German, viewed Jews as his enemies because he believed that the Jews were the cause of the first World War, which killed over 100,000 Germans. From the time period of 1933-1945, the Jewish community experienced massive genocide from the attack of the Nazis that were in favor of Hitler. In the novel Night by Elie Wiesel, Elie’s experience in Auschwitz changes his mindset because the German culture influences him to question his belief of the Jewish religion through torturous beatings creating mental scars.
The sanctifying of God during a time of war and horror enables Elie to question if he openly believes in Judaism, as if he would be murdered for believing in God and not following the footsteps of Hitler.
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For example, Elie stated that he “...had ceased to pray. I concurred with Job! I was not denying His existence, but I doubted His absolute justice.” (45). Elie’s faith in God displays that he has major doubt about the reasoning and significance about why him and his father were suffering through this disastrous event. He states that he “ceased to pray”, which demonstrates how he does not care to keep up with his morals through a time of despair and injustice. It is not that Elie doubted the existence of God, he just doubted that God had healthy intentions of this event and that the millions of Jews were being “punished” for the previous years that they were not at fault for. Later in the novel, Elie further explains why he felt insecure and skeptic about the reasoning behind this cataclysmic event. “Why, but why would I bless Him? Because He caused thousands of children to burn in His mass graves? Because in His great might, He had created Auschwitz, Birkenau, Buna, and so many other factories of death. How could I say to Him: Blessed by Thou, Almighty, Master of the Universe, who chose us among all nations to be tortured day and night, to watch us as our fathers, our mothers, our brothers end up in the furnaces?” (67). Elie genuinely vents about the way he thinks about God, the way he despises and feels misguided by the Almighty who is supposed to lead his followers to a place where chaos will no longer be available. To a place where millions are supposed to feel safe and secure, while also enabling to put their faith and loyalty to someone who will guide them to adventures in life that will not be treacherous. But, He requires that his followers must put faith in Him and are able to die for their optimism in
Elie loses complete faith in god in many points where god let him down. He struggles physically and mentally for life and no longer believes there is a god. Elie worked hard to save himself and asks god many times to help him and take him out of the misery he was facing. "Why should I sanctify his name? The Almighty, the eternal, and terrible Master of the Universe, chose to be silent..."(page 33). Elie was confused, because he doesn’t know why the Germans would kill his race amongst many others, and he does not know why god could let such thing happen to innocent people. "I did not deny god's existence, but I doubted his absolute justice..."(page 42). These conditions gave him confidence, and a courage to
“What are You, my God? I thought angrily. How do You compare to this stricken mass gathered to affirm to You their faith, their anger, their defiance? What does Your grandeur mean, Master of the Universe, in the face of all this cowardice, this decay, and this misery? Why do you go on troubling these poor people’s wounded minds, their ailing bodies?” - page 66. Elie starts questioning god, because his friends and family members die and suffer. He didn't see any humanity in germans soldiers actions. “Poor Akiba Drumer, if only he could have kept his faith in God, if only he could have considered this suffering a divine test, he would not have been swept away by the selection. But as soon as he felt the first chinks in his faith, he lost all incentive to fight and opened the door to death.” - page 76. It is important to keep your faith, furthermore Akiba Drumer is a perfect example of the person who lost one. When you lose your faith there better be person who loves you and will make you fight through it. Elie and his father had each other for the support and
Throughout the time Elie lived through the Holocaust, his devotion and relationship with God greatly changed. In the beginning of his life, Elie was a devoted observant Jew, who studied everyday, and went the synagogue and cry. He was also trying to convince his father to study the Kabbalah, so he could later become a Rabbi. But while in the camps, with all of the suffering, and labor, Elie begins to question God. While his dad was praying, Elie began to feel anger, “Why should I sanctify His name? The Almighty, the eternal and terrible Master of the Universe, chose to be silent. What was there to thank Him for?” (Wiesel 33). Elie sees what is happening around them, with people being burned and killed, and becomes
Adolf Hitler, most widely known as the orchestrator of the Holocaust during World War II committed genocide across the nation, but his reasons for this mass murdering come down to one point; jealousy. As a young man Hitler had a yearning to succeed at anything he set his mind on, and being rejected by art academy’s and living as a homeless man for a part of his life began his envy for others who had succeeded, unlike himself. While Hitler was volunteering for the German army in World War I, he was temporarily blinded due to a gas attack and during this period he claimed to have received his calling, “He was to liberate Germany and make it free from what he saw as the ever-present source of decay within German racial purity; the Jew” (Dufner 15). From his point of view Jews were all he could see, and it disgusted him, so in order for him to fulfill what he believed he was meant to do, he must rid of Jews across Germany. The novel Night by Elie Wiesel and Adolf Hitler are both complex and unimaginable, but they both express belief and their own knowledge of the same situation but from different point of views. Adolf Hitler, urged by his self-hatred began his own plan for the extermination of Jews and even as far as world domination.
In the novel Night by Elie Wiesel, there are many recurring themes.The theme that comes up the most is man’s inhumanity to other men. Eliezer, a young Jewish boy who lives in the town of Sighet, in Hungarian Transylvania, narrates Night. Elie can always be found studying the Torah with his mentor Moshe the Beadle. A few days later, the Gestapo takes Moshe to an unknown destination. The Gestapo is the secret German police that comes in and takes Jews out of the cities. When Moshe the Beadle returns, everyone in the town thinks that he is crazy because he tells them that people were killed but he escaped.
Elie Wiesel felt the bond breaking and felt like he was stuck to watch over his dad”and i succeeded in bringing back a cup i took a gulp. The rest was for him”. In this case inhumanities circumstances made a loose bond between Elie and his father. In Night the two themes when faced by overwhelming inhumanities are bonds get broken and just ignoring it.
The Jews while in the camp, to keep in touch with their religion, would “[try] to sing a few Hasidic melodies” (45). Despite all of this however, Elie refused to do any of these as he now “doubted [God’s] absolute justice” (45). Elie would start to grow negative feelings towards God as he was upset that he wasn’t doing anything to even help them even one bit, he believed that it was God who put them in this situation but was upset that he decided to do so. Before arriving to the camp, Elie would go out of his way just to further learn about his religion, even if there were obstacles, but after arriving, he starts to doubt God and this decision he gave the Jews. During the Day of Atonement, Jews would fast for a day, Elie however chose not to fast as he believed “there was no longer any reason for [him to do so as he] no longer accepted God’s silence” (69).
Inhumanity Morphs Alone… Forgotten… Hurt… The worst of inhumanity is being caught in it. Many survivors of the Holocaust recognize this and just fall in grief; some just don’t react at all. Either way, the inhumanity that the Holocaust inflicted upon countless souls was not easy to adapt to.
The face of true evil is highlighted in the personal accounts of Elie Wiesel in the memoir Night which details the crimes of the Nazis in concentration camps and the mistreatment and murder of over 6 million innocent civilians. His haunting writing allows people to grasp the most horrifying experience a person or an entire race can endure. According to Elie Wiesel, he writes to transmit the messages and give voices to the millions of dead. So they can show not only how the reader should feel but also how they felt. All the emotions of those who were lost and the personal emotions of the author are transmitted through Elie Wiesel's writing to allow the reader to feel the frustration and sadness of all those six million people.
Through the process of de-humanization instituted by the Nazis, Elie rapidly loses his faith in God. Now, I wish to be clear. At no point does he stop believing in God. Rather, he loses his faith that God is an omnipotent and all-loving God. He sees what is happening all around him to God's own chosen people, and suffers the destruction of his life's most important paradigm, to be replaced with a cynicism and heroic humanism.
When Elie endured and witnessed so much aggression, he began to express anger towards God. For the first time, Elie felt “anger rising within [him]. [He questioned], why should I sanctify his name? The Almighty, the eternal and terrible Master of the Universe, chose to be silent. What was there to thank him for?” (Wiesel, 33). By including the words, “sanctify” and “terrible”, Elie advocated that God did not deserve holy recognition and significance that people still gave him. The specific words create a powerful meaning, which imply how Elie’s positive view towards God had changed. Before the Holocaust, Elie respected and honored God, but had reflected a change in his beliefs when God remained silent despite the amount of sufferings he had created. Elie felt that God should have been capable to save the Jews from their unfair persecution. Additionally, he doubted God’s defined character when he arrived at the Birkenau concentration camp. Elie thought, “Never shall I forget those moments that murdered my God and my soul and turned my dreams to ashes.” (Wiesel, 34) He says that God has died in his eyes. Elie was traumatized by the horrific events that God had allowed to happen to human beings, which caused Elie’s faith to shatter. Particularly, Elie doubted God’s justice because he let millions of Jews and other prisoners die in concentration
In the book Night by Elie Wiesel, he tells his story of the Holocaust and how the Nazis tried to destroy the jewish race.. In the Holocaust, the Nazis thought the Jews were less than them. Elie tells the story of how the Nazis tried to eliminate the Jews. . The Naizs treated the Jewish people badly because they dehumanized them, they treated them as they were nothing, and the Nazis destroyed the Jews from the inside out.
While Elie was in the concentration camp he changed the way he acted. This new behavior led him to develop new character traits. While Ellie was in the concentration camp he became angry at many things. For example “I would have dug my nails into the criminals flesh” (Wisel 39). Elie shows extreme anger when the Nazi officials are beating Elie’s father. Elie was angry because the Nazi soldiers were not treating them nicely and keeping them in poor conditions. Elie was usually not a person to display anger, but he shows this when his family members are being hurt. Elie wants to stand up for what is right and for his family members. Despite his studying, Elie wavered in his belief in Kabbalah while he was at the camp. Elie was a religious boy before he went to Auschwitz, but while in the camp, he became angry at God. In the book Elie says, “‘Where are You, my God?’” (66). Elie is wondering why God is not helping the Jews. Elie had complete faith in his religion until he experienced and witnessed such horrible suffering. He had been taught that God will punish evil and save the righteous. However, when Elie saw that God was not helping the Jews situation,
Eliezer begins to lose his faith in God when he first arrives at the concentration camp in Auschwitz. After Eliezer arrives in Auschwitz he catches people praying to God: “ For the first time, I felt anger rising within me. Why should I sanctify His name? The Almighty, the eternal and terrible Master of the Universe, chose to be silent. What was there to to thank Him for” (33)? Elie and his father have just been separated from the rest of their family, and are quickly losing the little hope they have that they will be able to get out of there alive. EIie sees a truck full of babies being unloaded and thrown into a fire, and he wonders why God is doing absolutely nothing to stop it. Later in the book on the eve of Rosh Hashanah, “What are You, my God? I thought angrily… Why, but why would I bless him? Every fiber in me rebelled. Because he caused thousands of children to burn in his mass graves (66-67)? In this quote from the book, Eliezer is questioning God and asking him why he should praise him. Elie has lost his faith in the idea that God will save the Jews from their horrible imprisonment. Elie starts to believe that man is stronger and greater than God, and that he is alone in a world without God.
When looking through the history of humanity, an alarming pattern begins to emerge: the pattern of oppression. Since the beginning of civilization, humans have constantly sought to oppress one-another and establish superiority over another group of people. In the book Nights, Elie Wiesel details his petrifying experience of oppression in Nazi Concentration camps, perpetrated by the Nazi Regime and its collaborators. What happened to Wiesel and the rest of Europe’s Jews was a hate crime like the world had never seen before. But where exactly could so much “evil” come from?