Night Essay

Matthew Breitman         711

            The Holocaust was a time where many people lost faith in God, because they wondered how someone could do such a thing. Elie Wiesel, was going back and forth. Elie Wiesel is the author of his memoir Night. Night is about Wiesel’s experience surviving in the concentration camps such as Buna, Auschwitz-Birkenau, and Buchenwald. Wiesel loses almost all his faith in God, and while doing so, he almost loses faith in humanity. But now Elie Wiesel believes in him. Wiesel struggled to believe there was a God out there during the Holocaust, but now as an eighty six year-old man, he has slowly picked it back up.

            In the beginning of the book, Wiesel believes and prays to God. He is very religious and is studying the Kabbalah and the Torah. As he gets thrown into the concentration camps he begins to question God. Wiesel says, “Blessed be God's name? Why, but why would I bless Him? Every fiber in me rebelled. Because He caused thousands of children to burn in His mass graves? Because he kept six crematoria working day and night, including Sabbath and the Holy Days? 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 be Thou, Almighty, Master of the Universe, who chose us among all nations to be tortured day and night, to watch as our fathers, our mothers, our brothers, end up in the furnaces? Praised be Thy Holy Name, for having chosen us to be slaughtered on Thine altar?” (Pg. 67) I believe this is a very powerful quote in the book because it really shows how Elie Wiesel thinks of God, and how he questions him. He wonders why someone would do such a thing. Why would Wiesel pray to God, the being that put him in these concentration camps? Wiesel is taking a different approach than many other Jews. He’s saying that God put them in this place, that God is basically the leader of the Nazi regime. Because he did this to the Jews. Many other Jews said that God didn't help them, but they never said he did this to them. Wiesel is confused, because after all those years of praying, what does he get in return. Death, torture, starvation. Wiesel blames God for all this, for killing Jews, for starving him, and for demolishing his teenage life. A little earlier in the book, as Wiesel witnesses the hanging of three men, “Behind me, I heard the same man asking: ‘For God's sake, where is God? And from within me, I heard a voice answer: ‘Where He is? This is where--hanging here from this gallows...’” (Pg. 65) Wiesel is saying that God is dead. There can’t be a God. Wiesel was going through such terrible things that made him believe that it was God’s fault. The man that said “where is God” questions God, because he’s saying how God could to these things and just stare. Stare at people being hung and a little boy choking to death. Wiesel’s explanation, is that there is no God. And if there was, he died. Because God can’t do such terrible things. No one can do such things. This quote was very powerful, because Wiesel is struggling through the entire book, thinking where God is. But he is trying to find a way that God is alive. But now he gave up, he says he’s dead. Because how could the God that he prayed for pay him in return, by shooting babies in front of his very eyes, burn people in crematories, and starve them in concentration camps. I would believe God was dead. Wiesel also might have meant that God was dead inside. Because Wiesel can’t believe that God could do such a thing. He thought that God was dead inside for creating the Holocaust. When Elie Wiesel was in the concentration camps, he questioned God, and ended up almost losing his beliefs in him.

            As Elie Wiesel grew older, his beliefs in God changed, because he reacquainted with God. In an interview with Nadine Epstein on http://www.momentmag.com/heart-to-heart-with-elie-wiesel/, Nadine asks, “NE: In Night, you write, “Never shall I forget those moments that murdered my God and my soul and turned my dreams to ashes.” Has your approach to God changed since, and did you think about God in the hospital?” And Elie Wiesel answers “EW: What I wrote in Night is a protest and a question, and I stand by every word I wrote. It’s an outcry, an agonizing outcry. I come from a very religious background. I spoke to God, against God, but the next day, somebody managed to smuggle in a pair of tefillin, portions of bread, and together with my father we got up early and stood in line just to say the morning prayers. My disappointment was with man—what should I expect of man, both good and bad. But with God, the question, “Where is God?” has obsessed me for many years and still does without an answer. Even in the hospital, I couldn't not think about that question. Without faith there is no question. I remain profoundly attached, of course, to my parents and grandparents. I said, “What good do I do to them if I say goodbye to God?” But I didn't, because what good would it do to them? It’s really because of my grandfather and my father that I say to God, I pray to you and I bless your name.” Wiesel still can’t answer the question, "where is God." He started thinking of it when he was sent to concentration camps, and still is now. He can’t answer it, because he has so many different answers. He also questions it. Wiesel probably thinks about where God was when he was suffering. Or where God is now. Or even is God out there. And after many years of obsessing over the question, he still hasn't found an answer. Wiesel also says that he was switching sides all the time. He believed in God at one moment, and then didn't in the other. What I found interesting is that the only reason Wiesel prays to God, is for his family. I always thought, why he would believe in God, after all that God put him through. It made no sense to me. But Wiesel says that he never said goodbye to God, because what good would it do to his grandfather and father. In another interview between Oprah Winfrey and Wiesel on http://www.oprah.com/omagazine/Oprah-Interviews-Elie-Wiesel, Wiesel expands a little on his thoughts about God. Oprah says, “Where are you and God with each other these days?” And Wiesel answers, “We still have a few problems! But even in the camps, I never divorced God. After the war, I went on praying to God. I was angry. I protested. I'm still protesting—and occasionally, I'm still angry. But it's not because of the past, but the present. When I see victims of a tragedy—and especially children—I say to God, "Don't tell me that you have nothing to do with this. You are everywhere—you are God." This shows that Wiesel never left God during the Holocaust, even though he made it very unobvious in Night. His question for God has always, and will always be, “where are you.” Wiesel believes that God is out there but Wiesel is angry with him. What surprised me is that Wiesel is angry at God, not only because of the past, but also the present. He is frustrated at God because of all the deaths and "victims of tragedy,” that are currently happening now. He is especially irritated with what God does to the children. After the Holocaust Wiesel saw God in a different way. He blames God for many of the bad things happening in the world. Wiesel sees the other side of God. Not the one that saves the Jews, and makes the world a better place, but the one that has flaws, and the one who created the Holocaust. Wiesel never left God, but he struggled to have faith in him during the Holocaust. He questions God, asks him, “where are you,” but still believes in him.

            In conclusion, as Wiesel grew older, he questioned God, but now as an 86 year old man, he prays to God for his family. Wiesel almost lost faith in God during the Holocaust, but to this day, he says he never lost faith. I believe Wiesel’s faith in God represented his faith in himself. Elie Wiesel struggled to survive, but he held onto that faith in God, and in himself. As long as he had faith in God, he had faith in himself. Elie Wiesel is an amazing man, and one of the very few Holocaust survivors who still believe in God. Many gave up after the war. I have spoken with many Holocaust survivors, and many had seemed to believe that there was no God, but others still went to synagogue. In Night, religion was a big part of Elie Wiesel’s life. That’s what kept him, and many others going. If Wiesel had lost religion in the beginning of the Holocaust, he could be just one more death added to those six million. To still believe in God, you had to have courage and determination. So if you were in the Holocaust, would you still believe in God? Would you think of him in a different way, and see his other side?