More handpicked essays just for you.
Character analysis essay on Elie Wiesel the Night
Character analysis essay on Elie Wiesel the Night
Character analysis essay on Elie Wiesel the Night
Don’t take our word for it - see why 10 million students trust us with their essay needs.
Some people say that living through hard times can make you stronger. It is a crucible that you come out of with a more powerful soul. In the memoir Night, by Eliezer Wiesel, Elie and his family are sent to concentration camps throughout Germany. Eliezer is employed to do very taxing jobs in these camps, and he is rarely given any ration of food or rest. This essay is meant to evaluate these horrific events and how they affected the author, Eliezer Wiesel. Throughout the Holocaust Eliezer matured faster and more than anybody should. First of all, The Holocaust caused Eliezer to be weakened in his faith. In the beginning of chapter five Eliezer is thinking and finds himself accusing God for abandoning the very people that worshiped him. On page 67 it says, “Blessed be God’s name? Why, but why should I bless him? Every fiber in me rebelled. Because he caused thousands of children to burn in mass graves.” This statement shows a major drop in Eliezer’s religious security. It shows that he thinks he can’t trust God anymore. This passage shows that Elie has lost all stability in his faith. The Holocaust has broken Eliezer’s foundation for his faith in his religion. Also, in time, Eliezer became desensitized to the evil and inhumanity of the camps he was held in. On page 104 Eliezer and …show more content…
On page 32 Elie and his father have just been separated from the rest of their family and Eliezer thinks, “We did not know, as yet, which was the better side, right or left, which road led to prison and which led to the crematoria. Still, I was happy, I was near my father.” Eliezer's thoughts prove that even though they are in a life threatening situation Elie can be happy because he is with his father. Eliezer was able to create an unbreakable bond with his father because they were able to support each other when their lives were being
Throughout his recollections, it is clear that Elie has a constant struggle with his belief in God. Prior to Auschwitz, Elie was motivated, even eager to learn about Jewish mysticism. Yet, after he had been exposed to the reality of the concentration camps, Elie began to question God. According to Elie, God “caused thousands of children to burn...He kept six crematoria working day and night...He created Auschwitz, Birkenau, [and] Buna”(67). Elie could not believe the atrocities going on around him. He could not believe that the God he followed tolerated such things. During times of sorrow, when everyone was praying and sanctifying His name, Elie no longer wanted to praise the Lord; he was at the point of giving up. The fact that the “Terrible Master of the Universe, chose to be silent”(33) caused Elie to lose hope and faith. When one cho...
In the memoir, Night, Elie Wiesel remembers his time at Auschwitz during the Holocaust. Elie begins to lose his faith in God after his faith is tested many times while at the concentration camp. Elie conveys to us how horrific events have changed the way he looks at his faith and God. Through comments such as, “Never shall I forget those moments which murdered my God, my soul, and turned my dreams into dust,” he reveals the toll that the Holocaust has taken on him. The novel begins during the years of 1942-1944 in Sighet, Transylvannia, Romania. Elie Wiesel and his family are deported and Elie is forced to live through many horrific events. Several events such as deportation, seeing dead bodies while at Auschwitz, and separation from his mother and sisters, make Elie start to question his absolute faith in God.
Eliezer was very religious but his father was very unsentimental and didn’t support him in his beliefs. When rumors started to arouse, he begged his father to leave, but he wouldn’t. Once the curtain finally rose, it was too late for the Jews. They were kept in ghettos until they were to be transported. They had to pack up their things and then were sent to the smaller ghetto. Now they are in the cattle cars, waiting for their departure.
He applies tone by quoting the men who are questioning God. they are angry and frustrated that God is not there to set them free. Moreover, Elie uses repetition to utilize the theme. He repeats the same line over and over again to get the reader to commemorate. Lastly, he employs irony in his story. Elie realizes how ironic it is to worship someone who will not even give you mercy. The Jews that went through Holocaust experienced more pain than anyone should ever go through. It was very hard for more of them to hold onto their
In the beginning of the story, Eliezer is a boy who doesn’t see much and strictly follows the religion he is in. He sees nothing more and nothing less. However he is able to grow as the story continues. This clear as the story begins and shows the things he values. The book stated “why do you cry when you pray?” he asked,as though he knew me well… “why do you pray”... “I don't
Eliezer’s horrible experiences at Auschwitz left him caught up in his sorrows and anger toward God. His loss of faith in God arises at Auschwitz. He doubts arise when he first sees the furnace pits in which the Nazis are burning babies. This horrifying experience ...
This quote from Eliezer was his final statement about the effect the Holocaust has had on him. The Holocaust has made many people lose their faith in God, their will to live, and it had a lasting impact on all the Jews.
A simple act of kindness and support can possibly be the savior to someone else’s misery. In the novel, Night, written by Eliezer Wiesel, Elie portrays the daily lifestyle of the Jews during the Holocaust, and shares his personal experiences. He goes through hardships as he travels from the ghettos to the concentration camps with his one and only family member remaining, his father. The S.S. soldiers take the author’s mother and his two sisters away from him as they arrive at the ghetto because they separating women from men. Throughout the novel, Elie experiences personality adaptations and loses his faith in God all due to the loss of humanity in his world. With this in mind, he bases his survival on his determination and not his luck. Eliezer survives the Holocaust as a result to the hope he provides for his father and the support he receives from others throughout his journey.
Eliezer loses faith in god. He struggles physically and mentally for life and no longer believes there is a god. "Never shall I forget those moments which murdered my god and my soul and turned my dreams to dust..."(pg 32). Elie worked hard to save himself and asks god many times to help him and take him out of his misery. "Why should I bless his name? The eternal, lord of the universe, the all-powerful and terrible was silent..."(pg 31). Eliezer is confused, because he does not know why the Germans would kill his face, and does not know why god could let such a thing happen. "I did not deny god's existence, but I doubted his absolute justice..."(pg 42). These conditions gave him confidence, and courage to live.
Elie shows son bonds through the book by dynamic character, by seeing how different he was. Elie shows that his relationship changed from before and the relationship they have now. When they were at the concentration at the selections Elie said “We didn’t know, as yet, which was the better side, right or left, which road led to prison and which to the crematoria. Still, I was happy, I was near my father” (Wiesel 32). Elie doesn’t know if he was going to die or to live, but he was just happy because he was near his father. He is starting to have a good relationship with his dad, because he wants to be next to
In the beginning of the memoir, Elie is an extremely passionate and devout Jew, but as the story progresses, Elie sees horrendous things in the concentration camps, and as a result, he slowly loses his faith. Elie displays his extreme devotion in the beginning stages of the memoir when he states, “By day I studied Talmud and by night I would run to the synagogue to weep over the destruction of the Temple. I cried because something inside me felt the need to cry” (Wiesel 4). Elie is clearly very fond of learning more about his religion and connecting to God in a spiritual way. Furthermore, Elie is only thirteen years old, so when he says he cries because he feels the need to cry, he is exhibiting incredible passion. Elie reveals signs of change and begins to lose his faith in God just a few moments after arriving at the concentration camp when he says, “Never shall I forget those flames that consumed my faith forever. Never shall I forget those moments that murdered my God and my soul and turned my dreams to ashes” (Wiesel 34). Elie exclaims that he cannot worship God anymore due to the awful things he has seen at Auschwitz. He does not want to believe in the being that could have allowed these awful events to happen. This is a completely different Elie from the loving and caring Elie in the ghetto. Elie also uses rep...
Eliezer discovers even though his father can no longer protect him, Eliezer still cares for his father and wants the best for him. This is an example of what one would do in the parental role in a relationship. Eliezer has now taken on the role of the father, while his father has taken a reverse direction and has become the dependent child. I find that the relationship between Eliezer and his father demonstrates a switch in roles during their time in concentration camp. The dark conditions were a void for all of the relationships in camp.
Many themes exist in Night, Elie Wiesel’s nightmarish story of his Holocaust experience. From normal life in a small town to physical abuse in concentration camps, Night chronicles the journey of Wiesel’s teenage years. Neither Wiesel nor any of the Jews in Sighet could have imagined the horrors that would befall them as their lived changed under the Nazi regime. The Jews all lived peaceful, civilized lives before German occupation. Eliezer Wiesel was concerned with mysticism and his father was “more involved with the welfare of others than with that of his own kin” (4). This would change in the coming weeks, as Jews are segregated, sent to camps, and both physically and emotionally abused. These changes and abuse would dehumanize men and cause them to revert to basic instincts. Wiesel and his peers devolve from civilized human beings to savage animals during the course of Night.
At the beginning of the book, Eliezer was in the higher levels of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. This hierarchy starts at the bottom with physiological needs, and progresses upwards with safety needs, belonging and love, esteem, and finally self-actualization. Eliezer was working with his love and belonging needs with respect to his religion. He was obsessed with the Jewish scripture. He wanted to learn. He was an extremely intellectual teenager. He would study the Jewish scripture with Moche the Beadle. "We would read together, ten times over, the same page of the Zohar. Not to learn it by hear, but to extract the divine essence from it." His views on the divinity of God do not endure through the Holocaust and the concentration camps.
This new behavior lead him to develop new character traits. While Ellie was in the concentration camp he became angry at many things, for example “I would have dug my nails into the criminals flesh” (Wisel 39). Elie shows extreme anger when the Nazi officials are beating Elie’s father. Elie was angry because the Nazi soldiers were not treating them nicely and putting them in poor conditions. Elie is usually not a person for anger but he shows this when his family members are being hurt. Elie wants to stand up for what is right and for his family members. Despite his studying, Elie wavered in his belief in Kabbalah while he was at the camp. In the book Elie says, “‘Where are You, my God?’” (66). Elie is wondering why God is not helping the Jews. Elie had complete faith in his religion until now, when he is starting to question his beliefs. He had learned that God will punish evil and save the righteous. However, when Elie saw that God was not helping the Jews situation then asked himself the question, “Is God real?”. Elie became worried because he felt he had lost a companion that always seemed by his side at all times. He lost hope. While Elie was in the camp he had changed the way he acted towards his Dad. Before Elie was sent to the camp Elie had a love hate relationship with his dad. However while they were in the camp together they became closer. Elie showed this when, “I tightened my grip on my