Dangers of Fear

Irish Playwright, George Bernard Shaw, once said, “The worst sin toward our fellow creatures is not to hate them, but to be indifferent to them; that's the essence of inhumanity.” Inhumanity is mankind’s worse attribute. Ordinary humans sometimes are driven to the point were they have no choice but to think of themselves. This indifference can result in inhumanity. One of the most famous example used today, is the Holocaust. Elie Wiesel’s memoir, Night, demonstrates how fear is a deliberating force that causes people to act in ways they never thought possible. After being forced into concentration camps, Elie and his family have seen and done such cruel acts that have traumatized him for life. His fears rob Elie of his innocence and lead him to lose faith along with the breakdown close relationships.

Throughout the book, it is clear that Elie has a constant struggle with the belief in god. Prior to Auschwitz, Elie was eager, even motivated to learn about the Jewish mystics. Yet, after he has 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 atrocity going on around him. He could not believe that the God he follows 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. Keeping silent about such inhumanity is just as destructive as the ones causing the savagery. Elie could not believe ...

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...o adulthood. When Elie was finally released and for the first time in years seen himself in a mirror and “from the depths of the mirror, a corpse was contemplating” (115) him. Despite the fact that Elie physically survived Auschwitz, he was emotionally dead. The many traumatizing experiences he had been through affected Elie in such a way that made him lose his innocence along with the will to live. His reason of survival was purely luck.

Fear can cause people to irrationalize their thinking and act in an unreasonable manner. For example, the fear of death lead to the prisoners to deprioritize the people close to them. Even the disbelief in such an uncaring God in such a quick time is considered unreasonable. From the start, Elie was forced into adulthood without a choice. Well, if inhumanity and fear can turn people into animals, how does Elie avoid this fate?