How Elie Wiesel’s Views on God Changed Throughout Her Memoir Night
And in spite of myself, a prayer formed inside me, a prayer to this God in whom I no longer believed. Oh God, Master of the Universe, give me the strength to never do what Rabbi Eliahu’s son has done.” Night by Elie Wiesel is a book narrated by a teenage boy who is jewish and is taken to concentration camps in 1944 with his family and other jewish people in his neighborhood, the novel is about his experience while he’s in the concentration camp with his father he tells about the trauma he had experienced while being there. This novel is about the holocaust.
Elie Wiesel had lost his faith in the goodness and justice of God, through the trauma he had experienced while he was in the concentration camps, he had lost all his faith in God he would wonder why God had done that and why he didn’t stop it, he no longer believed in him. “Never shall I forget those moments which murdered my god and soul and turned my dreams into dust…” (pg 32).
He questioned himself why did the Germans want him dead, why did God let such a horrifying thing happen? “I did not doubt God’s existence, but I doubted his absolute justice…” (pg 42) Elie had lost everything, he had lost his mother and sister while going in the concentration camp “men to the left! Women to the right…” (pg 27)
Elie struggled so much while he was in the concentration camps, his father weakened in health and aged, he did not have the strength to survive on his own he needed Elies support, he knew if he didn’t help his father he would die. But he also needed to care for him and he felt guilty.
Elie lost many hope and faith while he was in the concentration camp, would he die?, would he live? The pipel and two other men were hung and of course, died immediately but the pipel was too light and did not die like the other men. He did not look dead, his skin was not pale, his tongue was red, his eyes were still normal. The man was just hanging there alive. While that happened, he heard a man say “where’s God now?” and he asked himself where is he? Multiple times.
Elie loses faith in God, every minute he loses more. Every day he sees another person being killed. He doesn’t understand why its happening and if there even is a God Because why would he allow for that to happen and continue? He saw kids being dumped into flames “Never shall I forget those flames which consumed which consumed my faith forever… Never shall I forget these moments which murdered my God and soul and turned my dreams into dust… Never” (pg 32) when he watch them die and suffer by being burned, he lost feelings, hope and faith for God.
To conclude, the holocaust still affects our modern society the holocaust made us have the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the UN Genocide Convention, and the Catholic Church radically changed their theology, which thus enabled the jewish people to enjoy better relations with the Catholic Church today. Also according to Gerstenfeld we always wonder wheter another holocaust could happen and for this reason, school teach and make students study over the holocaust. There are many reasons why the holocaust still impacts out modern society today. The impact is enormous.
