Introduction

Elie Wiesel’s existence begins in Hungary where he is born in a Jewish slum. Life takes a different lane when he lands in concentration camps under the Nazi regime. The period from when he becomes a teenager sees him face the harsh life where his father denies him the opportunity to pursue Cabbala. Elie gets his own master, Moishe the Beadle who significantly tells him to spend time pursuing God through questions and not trying to comprehend His answers. "I pray to the God within me for the strength to ask Him the real questions." (Wiesel 30).

Moishe is among the first prisoners taken by Germans and when he manages to escape and tell people of what Germans were doing to prisoners, he is taken for insane. There then follows a trail of events where he undergoes a series of bizarre encounters including the loss of his sisters and mother. This was a very trying time for Elie in which life drives out the innocence from him completely. In the concentration camps, where they are taken to as Jews, they are subjected to incessant torture and Elie witnesses babies burning in furnaces. The aim of this essay is trying identifying various ideas in the book written by Wiesel, identifying their changes, and at last draft a conclusion from these ideas as well as marking a significant change in his life since it takes a toll on his personal relationship with God.
Changes in ideas about God and Humanity by Elie Wiesel From an innocent religious boy, Wiesel was geared up towards studying theology, life deprived him off the faith and he lost the close relationship with God. At some instance, he cursed when his father prayed that Gods name be sanctified and exalted. In Buna, Elie and other prisoners lost their faith and humanity as well in an attempt to struggle through a life where they are made to see their fellow prisoners get hanged (Wiesel). Life becomes a sequence of migration from one camp to the next where those who stop at any point are shot. In the Buchenwald camp, Elie’s father succumbs to beatings and dysentery. To Elie, it is like he has met his end since his father is all that he had held onto since the split of their family. Remarkably, Elie does not weep over his father, since he is out of tears having been through so much torture and witnessing horrors. The world was just an evil place and all of humankind evil too. To Elie, God had chosen to keep silent and he convinced himself that there was barely anything to thank Deity. Until this moment, Wiesel had seen the zeal to study theology and all the knowledge he had accumulated replaced by a grotesque realization that the world was just a hell and this worked to completely kill his faith. The flames in which his fellow prisoners are consumed in come up as symbolic because to him, His faith in God also is consumed through the period of the Holocaust, which remains a horrific nightmare to the Jewish survivors, Wiesel goes through a life of changes in perspective to humanity and God as vividly brought out. All through his childhood, Wiesel had perceived God as a good God with good plans for them and he would take God’s deeds without a single question. “We believed in God, trusted in man, and lived with the illusion that every one of us has been entrusted with a sacred spark from the Shekinah’s flame; that every one of us carries in his eyes and in his soul a reflection of God's image.” (Wiesel 13). In addition, they knew God was also a punisher for all wrong deeds. As with his religious teachers, the rabbis, the Jews believed that under God’s protection nothing would befall them even when the widespread rumors about the Nazi came to their Sighet town. Wiesel is steadfast in his faith and believed that humanity was all about coexistence and not a man-slaughter-man kind of coexistence. “From the time he began to think, he lived only for God, studying the Talmud, eager to be initiated into the Kabbalah, wholly dedicated to the Almighty” (Wiesel 19). Only time lies as the measure of all that. Soon, the Nazis catch up with them and they are all taken to concentration camps as there about. To Wiesel, there is a gradual change of the perspective of humanity. From the view of a caring people, he starts to view people as oppressors. When Wiesel is at the concentration camps suffering sets in and to them, God is only taking his role of a punisher; as perceived there before, it is all in accordance with Gods plan who has a cause for the suffering, punishment for their evils as they believe. “God is testing us. He wants to find out whether we can dominate our base instincts and kill the Satan within us” (Wiesel 65). They all hold on to the faith that after all this is done salvation will come in and will rescue them. “Where is God's mercy? Where is God? How can I believe, how can anyone believe in this God of Mercy?" (Wiesel 94)

Faith lies within the grasp until he sees fire flames consume bodies at a crematorium. The belief that God has a great plan for the suffering dies out and doubt sets in. He feels that God has deserted them, "For God's sake, where is God?" (Wiesel 21). Even those he perceived to be of immense faith have the same realization hitting hard, including his mentor at the camp, Pinhas who finally gives in his faith after having enough of the tests and suffering. From deep-rooted faith, they all head towards questioning God’s presence through this period. “I was the accuser, God the accused” (Wiesel 23). At some point, he finds himself reevaluating the role of God in His world. From a loving and good God, soon He comes up as a cruel God to the Jews when the Holocaust sets in. By now, Wiesel is convinced that humanity has that evil, dark side which they have taken from their creator. Rather than feel God’s care and mercy, he perceives himself as a toy to God. Elie’s life turns to one of questioning, accusing and blaming God. It gets to the extremes where they consider God to be of help to their oppressors and the murderers being like God. A God of evil and death some brand Him. At the height of all suffering, Wiesel follows the lines of religious scholars and takes to accepting the suffering for what it is. God knew what He was doing and though He did not, the fact would stand; He would remain to be God. Noticeably, Wiesel withholds no hard feelings against God. Rebbe, a Jew also living in Elie’s time consents to this and states that God’s place should not be questioned (Wiesel 35).
Conclusion
In conclusion, it is good to note that there are changes in ideas in God and humanity as seen in the book, ‘Night’ by Wiesel. These ideas have been discussed above in this essay. It is vivid that Wiesel and his fellow Jews have a real test taken on their faith. Their perception towards humanity takes various degrees of change. From a loving God, to a cruel, mad God and to one whose role on earth needs to be reevaluated changes their understanding with the onset and offset of the Holocaust. Humanity is all evil and the extremes to which the evil is manifested lies within their control. The final realization however is that God remains unchanged and for whatever he chooses to do there is no one that can explain or have answers to the questions that arise. He has all answers to His deeds.
Work cited

Wiesel, Elie. Night. New York: Hill and Wang Publishers, 2006.