Exegetical Essay: Elie's Loss Of Faith

Along with losing his feeling, and will to live, Elie loses faith in his Jewish religion. Before he resided in the concentration camps, his life revolved around his religion. His religion gave him comfort and something to rely on. But when he arrives in the camps, he witnesses death all around him and wonders why his God turns a blind eye to all this chaos. During one of the many hangings that occur in the dreaded camp, a voice behind Elie questions where is their God, and why is he not helping the man who is suffering. This generates new thoughts in Elie, thrusting doubts of his God in his mind. Elie decides on where his God must dwell, “he is hanging here on this gallows” (62). In his mind, he no longer believes in the powers of God, whom he

During one of their prayers everyone prays to their God, except for Elie. He feels an outrage toward his God and questions “why should we bless him”, Elie erupts at the thought “that [God] had had thousands of children working in his pits” (63). He gives up his faithfulness all because of the thought that his God created such a ghastly place. Now that Elie has no allegiance to his God, the prayers and holidays are just a burden to him. On a prominent Jewish holiday, Yom Kippur, the tradition is to fast, but “there was no longer any reason why [Elie] should fast. [He] no longer accepted God’s silence” (66). If God made the concentration camps, if he killed all those people, if he kept the crematories working, why should Elie turn a blind eye to such appalling actions. He refused to practice the religion where so many dreadful actions occurred, and it seemed to him nothing comforting happened. At the time of the Jewish New Year, all the Jews in the concentration camp wished each other a Happy New Year, apart from Elie, who “was afraid of having to wish [his father] a Happy New Year when [he] no longer believed it”