...influential writers who lived during this time period was Elie Wiesel. Wiesel’s Night is a memoir depicting the journey of a young boy, Eliezer, who experienced the Holocaust at a very young age. The Nazis occupied Hungary in the spring of 1944, and Eliezer and his family are deported to a concentration camp. While at several different concentration camps, Eliezer faces a variety of different situations, and he learns to adapt to his circumstances. As his father becomes weaker and weaker throughout the memoir, Elie starts to develop mixed emotions for him. During...
Words: 1498 - Pages: 6
...good luck trying to find it. Sayonara, au revoir, adios, bye. Elie Wiesel’s Night deals with his loss of faith in his God. Wiesel’s problem can be root all the way back to 1942, the beginning of Elie’s awakening, his first insight into the real world, his first insight into the Holocaust. The Holocaust was a horrid event, of ruthless killing, of senseless slaughter, destroying families, and a whirlwind of destruction. Under strain, ones happiness and ones faith is slowly whittled under the knife of opposition and pressure. Elie has lost so much through out his life, losing his family, his friends, but most importantly his faith. The first example of Elie loosing his faith is when he arrived at Auschwitz, Elie and his father are directed to go to the left; a prisoner then informs them that they are on their way to the crematory, Elie’s father recites the Kaddish or prayer for the dead, revolt rises up inside of Elie and he questions God, “Why should I bless His name? The Eternal, lord of the Universe, the All-Powerful and Terrible, was silent. What had I to thank Him for? (Wiesel 31)”. Elie is hopeless, his situation rendering him of his beliefs unable to believe that a holy being could cause such grief. He was stricken with terror that even after his prayers, his deep devotion to the great “lord” that God has thrust him into this “hell”. Another example of prisoners in the concentration camp loosing their faith in Night is when the Pipel, a young child, was hung in front of the...
Words: 779 - Pages: 4
...1 Symbolic Interaction, Functional Analysis, and Conflict Theory of Elie Wiesels’s Night Introduction 2 Symbolic Interaction, Functional Analysis, and Conflict Theory of Elie Wiesels’s “Night” Elie Wiesel’s Night begins in Sighet, Transylvania, 1941 when he was a teenager. He begins talking about a life before his world, along with his family, was torn apart. His family was Jewish, and he wanted to study Cabbala. He was very much involved in his faith and wanted to further pursue it by studying Cabbala, but his father would not let him. “There are no Cabbalists in Sighet.” (pg 4). He was very close with his shtibl, Moishe the Beadle, who later was taken by Hungarian Police and expelled from Sighet because he was a foreign Jew. Once they were taken over by the Gestapo, the babies were used as target practice and the adults were shot. Moishe managed to escape because he was shot in his leg and was able to get back to Sighet to tell Elie what happened. He also tried to tell everyone in town what had happened to him and the rest of the foreign Jews, but no one believed him and he was branded insane. 1944 was when the town of Sighet was split into two ghettos, and no one could leave the town. Shortly after that, the Hungarian police told everyone in town to turn in their valuables (gold, jewelry, etc.) because they were going to the first concentration camp, Auschwitz. This is where Elie and his father were separated from his mother and sisters, and never heard from or...
Words: 2465 - Pages: 10
...resist the desire of death. In a beautiful villanelle dedicated to his father, Thomas told him: “do not go gentle into that good night,” but to “rage, rage against the dying of the light” (Thomas, 1 and 3). Thomas hoped that his father would find the strength to not give up in his fight for life. Their familial love gave his father the hope to do the seemingly impossible and defy death, for a little longer. Hope is key to surviving in any situation, but it takes a lot of emotional strength to maintain. During the Holocaust, this was truer than ever for millions of people, who faced death every day, and were tortured, starved, and violated. Their hope in religion, the goodness of humanity, and themselves were continually tested and most victims’ hope were eventually lost because of their suffering. One survivor, Elie Wiesel, wrote a memoir, Night, sharing his experiences during the Holocaust and in a concentration camp, and solemnly displaying his progression of hope. Elie's gradual loss of hope caused him to lose the emotional strength that he needs to survive, which made him desperate to cling on to the familial identity that was...
Words: 1708 - Pages: 7
...of Jewish people who had a large faith in humanity or in what we all called God and Elie Wiesel was one of them. Their faith in humanity ended up being lost during the second Great War, which is commonly known as War World II. Though, after the war and after they were saved by the Allies, little by little their faith in humanity and God slowly came back. Even the truest believers, like Elie Wiesel, can lose their faith in all of humanity and even who they call God, but once you are shown even a slightest bit of kindness, you can gain it all back. In the very beginning of Elie Wiesel’s novel, Night, based off his experiences during the World War II, all he wanted was someone to help him in his studies of the Kabbalah. Even though his father thought him to be too young that did not stop Elie from pursuing his dreams. He ended up finding a teacher for his studies of the Kabbalah in Moishe the Beadle. Elie was not the only Jewish child whose studies meant a lot to him. David Weiss Halivini was another child who had big dreams and an even larger faith. He had a dream of being a rabbi of a small village in the Carpathian Mountains (Fox). Though he had to put his dreams on hold after the Germans came and put his family into the ghettos, just like Elie’s family. Also like Elie, he continued with his studies, not wanting to put his dreams on hold because he was moved into a ghetto. Not only did Jewish families have a strong faith in humanity, but Germans who were a part of the Hitler’s...
Words: 1770 - Pages: 8
...In today’s day, we respect the past but rarely delve into it except for certain days. Elie Wiesel’s book Night is the self-account of Wiesel’s life in the Holocaust. It reflects back to the time through the eyes of a Jewish boy living in the awful conditions. It tells the story from the first few steps that Hitler takes, to when the camps was liberated. Wiesel delivered a powerful message "of peace, atonement and human dignity" to humanity. The Final Days is a film about resistance in Nazi Germany of one woman in particular. The movie starts off showing the main character having fun and there is light and laughter. This quickly changes as it shows her with members of the White Rose, an Anti-Nazi organization. She was caught and found guilty. This movie is a true story based on an actual Sophie Scholl who lived throughout this and was a member of the White Rose. Although one is about standing up for your rights not matter the consequence, and one is about knowing when hope is but a lost phrase, barely living in your mind. While that is all true, they also have a lot of differences, for instance, they have very different main characters who come from different parts and are effected by the war in different ways, each story is told in very different ways and each has its own meaning, and they have different messages that are portrayed throughout each. In the memoir Night, Elie starts off as a regular Jewish boy in Sighet, Transylvania. He was a teenager when his family...
Words: 956 - Pages: 4
...Can literature help us remember the past? Night, Perils of Indifference, and Acceptance Speech all have things in common. They can connect to different themes and they connect to one another. Literature has a big part in this world and it helps us remember past events, just like the Holocaust. In Elie Wiesel’s Acceptance Speech he says, “Who would allow such crime to be committed? How could the world remain silent?” This kinda ties back to theme 3 - breaking the silence on cruel acts is a way to break the cycle of repetition. He’s asking why would the world remain silent? He wanted people to break the silence when the crime was being committed. In this speech it also says “one person of integrity, can make a difference, a difference of life and death.” And this kinda connects to the prompt because it’s saying that you,...
Words: 640 - Pages: 3
... Can a person maintain a stronger growing faith and untouched humanity ideas during an evil historic event like the Holocaust? Elie Wiesel’s book, Night, will answer this question. Throughout history humanity has faced numerous tragic event caused either by nature or human beings, both of God’s creations. The Holocaust, which means “sacrifice by fire”, began in 1933 when Adolf Hitler came to power in Germany. During the Holocaust the Jews were the most affected. The Nazis killed eleven million Jews, almost two-thirds of all the Jewish population living in Europe. Jews were not the only ones the Holocaust targeted; Gypsies, homosexuals, and Jehovah’s Witnesses were also victims of Hitler’s plan. In recent years, events like The Twin Towers terrorist attack in 2001 and the 2004 Indian Ocean Tsunami have brought enormous suffering to the world, suffering that can somehow be compared to the one lived during the Holocaust. Continuing is the analysis of Elie Wiesel’s horrific experiences during the Holocaust. Did these experiences affect his faith? Was his perception of humanity ideas impacted? The book Night starts describing Elie’s faith as one indestructible. As young as he was he had deep knowledge of Jewish mysticism studies. Elie believed in God; a God of love and unlimited power. He was told that God is the master creator of all world’s wonders and that these wonders where the emanation of the divine world. Elie concluded that if God was the creator of everything in the physical...
Words: 1226 - Pages: 5
...influence of his father's liberal brand of Judaism, and following in his mother and grandfather's tradition of learning Jewish spiritual teachings, Eliezer was a largely quiet child, in the small town of Sighet. Eventually the Nazis arrived in 1944, and soon forced all of the town's native Jewish population into Ghettos(The Elie Wiesel Foundation for Humanity). Soon after, the invading Nazis deported all of Sighet's Jewish population into work camps. And for many months, Eliezar and his father Shlomo, had to endure grueling , inhumane conditions in the life of the work camp. Despite all of these conditions, Eliezar managed to pull through.. however.. at the cost, of losing his father....
Words: 267 - Pages: 2
...Appearance vs. Reality In the novel Night (1956), Elie Wiesel illustrates the horror that he faces through the Holocaust. Wiesel’s drive to get out of the concentration camp with his father alive causes him to be directed through all of these challenges. When it seems that everything is lost time after time again, he starts to lose himself and his humanity. Wiesel’s detailed descriptions of the Jews denying their inevitable truth that had shown right in front of them is also later shown that not only did the Jewish community, not face their own reality, however Elie Wiesel finds it hard to face his reality through this tough time. The play Oedipus Rex (420) by (Sophocles) also demonstrates the tragedy of how sensitive our mentality can...
Words: 932 - Pages: 4
...In Elie Wiesel's Holocaust memoir Night, Elie witnesses the dehumanization of the Jewish people by the Nazis as he experiences the loss of his humanity by the Nazi party.Elie first experiences dehumanization when he is forced into living in the local Ghetto in his hometown of Sighet Transylvania. As he is deported from the Sighet Ghetto, the Hungarian Police pack the Jews into the cattle cars where they experience brutal conditions and many die. After their long and grueling trip to the concentration camp they are subject to more dehumanization in the form of slave labor and mass killings of their friends and relatives. Thus being a few of the may reasons why dehumanization is a terrible act that cannot be allowed Dehumanazation was a terrible...
Words: 635 - Pages: 3
...The book, “Night” by Elie Wiesel is a first person person narrative of Wiesel’s time in Auschwitz, the obstacles he has to surpass and the sacrifices he has to make in order to stay alive and how his faith waivers as his desperation to survive increases. As one of the millions of Jew-ish survivors of the Holocaust, Wiesel shares his personal story from his point of view bringing the themes of faith and desperation to surface. The desperation to survive changes Wiesel’s be-lief in God from one of unquestioning faith to a cynical more callous view. As the book unfolds these two themes present themselves and are tied to the storyline and Wiesel’s disposition and mental state. Throughout the book, Wiesel often talks about his faith and how...
Words: 896 - Pages: 4
...The Loss of Humanity In the Death camps the victims lost their humanity through their horrible treatment. The Nazis lost theirs through their actions. During the holocaust the humanity of the people affected changed. In the book Night, Elie Wiesel recounts how the guards lost their humanity, through the horrors that they put him through. In the reading from Unbroken by Laura Hillenbrand the prisoners were humiliated and tortured to death. The horrible lack of humanity that the guards possesed can be found not only in concentration camps during the holocaust, but all around the world at many different times. When people stop seeing others as equals, or fellow humans they begin to lose their humanity. While at a japanese prisoner camp louie and phil were degraded and tortured on a daily basis, “Every day, at gunpoint, Louie was forced to stand up and dance, staggering through Charleston while his guards roared with laughter”(Hillenbrand 1). The guards showed no sympathy towards the prisoners they were draconian. Because Japan was at war with the United States the guards saw all of the United States citizens as enemies. They begin to lose their humanity when they do this. To add to that, the hate that they have towards the prisoners just fuels the other sides hate. War...
Words: 593 - Pages: 3
...many influential quotes Elie Wiesel has stated. Elie Wiesel is a nobel peace prize winner and has written dozens of fiction and nonfiction, addressing and crusaded against abuse and intolerance around the world inspired by his dreadful times in the Holocaust, including “Night”. In the book, Elie was only 15 when he and his family were taken and separated in Auschwitz because they were Jews. Throughout Auschwitz Elie experiences many horrid events that forever changed and shaped him into who he is today. and In the novel “Night” by Elie Wiesel, the main character, Elie, was effected by the events in the book because he lost his faith, gave up on humanity, and was physiological changed. Throughout Elie’s experiences during his time spent at Auschwitz, he started to lose his faith in God. Elie started to rebel and question God. Elie Wiesel stated in the text “Why, but why would I bless him? Every fiber in me rebelled” (Page 67). Elie clearly had lost his faith. The thought of rebelling occurred after so many people died having no power. “He caused thousands of children to burn in His mass graves?...Kept six crematoria working day and night… had created Auschwitz, Birkenau, Buna, and so many factories of death?” Elie also implies on page 67. Elie had heart-provoking thoughts occuring on how people could never worship the Lord and believe...
Words: 959 - Pages: 4
...| Night: By Eli Wiesel Essay Word Count:665 By: Carlos Guerrero Prof. Ted Johnston English 1301 TR 11:30 08 November 2014 We can know the end of the story just by knowing that Ellie Wiesel wrote the book. We know it because this book is about survival. Physically we know Ellie Wiesel survived the holocaust, but does any psychological or spiritual part of him died during the holocaust? Elie Wiesel wrote about all the horrible torture, brutality, degradation, lost, and inhumanities he suffered by the Nazis just because he’s Jewish. Considering Elie was just a teenager, all he had to go through could turn his faith, religion, humanity, or beliefs. Before the Nazis took Elie and his family we could notice that Elie was a strong, religious boy who wanted to learn the Cabbala. Moshe the Beadle taught him it, and answered all Elie’s questions. By the point of Elie learning the Cabbala his faith was very strong. Elie compared praying with breathing, it is something so important for him that he does it without thinking. He’s faith in god is unconditional, and he believes since God is good and its everywhere, then his world and everything in it must be good too. I believe Elie knowing the Cabbala took an important role in his spiritual survival. Elie Wiesel was devoted to his faith to God, humanity of others, and a sense of justice in the world; which eventually we know are beliefs challenged by the holocaust events. One of the first events occurred to Elie was...
Words: 669 - Pages: 3
