As were are starting to finish up Elie Wiesel’s memoir Night, I am starting to get a better understanding of how it was living as a Jew in the concentration camps during the holocaust. “ 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?” (Wiesel 66). In this passage in the book, I am getting an understanding on how the Jews faith was starting to diminish, and how they were starting to question God’s existence. I do enjoy Wiesel’s writing for this very reason: that he takes us into his thinking, and makes it as though we are there with him, questioning God’s existence also. In addition to the first quote where Wiesel was losing faith he writes later: “Where is merciful God, where is He?” someone behind me was asking. (Wiesel 64). Right now, mostly all the Jews were questioning their faith. All of them were asking the same question: How could our God be doing these things to us? Was there even a God? Today at the museum, there was a man speaking talking about how he survived the Holocaust, and how there was a man thanking God during the harsh times. The man asked him how he could be thanking God, and he said he was because he was thankful that God hadn’t made him into one of the ruthless Germans.
This experience of the Holocaust affect me on an emotional level. Before this experience I did not know much about the Holocaust I just had heard of horrible man named Adolf Hitler and the genocide he had created. After reading the book Night and after the documentaries and films that we watched I've been slapped by reality. I've been dwelling a lot on my own as well, about how people could have so much hatred on the people who are their neighbors. Just ordinary people that have so much hatred. I'm just so confused how people could just back stab their neighbors as soon as a new political party rose. Ordinary people turning into monsters you don't see that everyday. I've taken away so many things from this unit. I think the thing that just draws me the most from in this unit is to never forget. So many innocent people died just because of what they practiced and what they look like. So the least I can do is memorialize them by never forgetting what happened to them....
I agree with everything you have said and find it really interesting how you remembered your experience at the holocaust museum and used it in your blog. I am glad this book means as much to you as it does for me. The only thing I think you should add is specifying that it is not just any museum but the holocaust museum.
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed reading your post Dylan. Although I was a little confused what theme you are trying to convey. It looks like your theme is loss and gain of faith or just faith by itself. But if that was to be your theme I think you did great job.
ReplyDelete