Elie Wiesel Faith In The Night

“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 into ashes.” said Elie Wiesel, a Nobel Peace Prize winner. The Night written by Elie Wiesel is known as one of the most gruesome and tragic stories to any individual who has read the story of Elie Wiesel. The novel is tragically beautiful because of the honest truth that Elie writes about during his experience in the Holocaust. Throughout Elie’s journey in the concentration camps, he experiences many struggles that no human being should ever have to endure. The one struggle that is constantly resurfacing in the story of Elie Wiesel is of his internal wrestle with his faith. Through inter-dialogue Elie allows us into his thoughts during his stay in the Holocaust. The twisted evil he witnesses is reason enough to lose faith in a higher power. Elie repeatedly brings up his loss of faith making it the most important theme of this devastating journey. Questioning one's faith is no new topic to anyone who has belief in a higher power along

with Elie he no doubt struggles with this topic within because of the cruelty he witnesses, the inhumane ways he and others were treated and the lack of interference from the God almighty.
The first time Elie had realized what tragic events were occurring right before his eyes were when he and his family arrived at the first concentration camp. The men and women were being separated, Elie and his father were walking down a road when he noticed flames in a ditch and something was being burned. As Elie walked closer he noticed that it was small children that were being thrown into the flames. The devastation one went through while witnessing this event can only be explained as horrific. This is the very first significant incidence that he truly questions God’s power. Elie after seeing this horrific event internally says “For the first time I felt anger rising within me. Why should I sanctify His name? The Almighty, the eternal and terrible Master of the Universe, chose to be silent. What was there to thank Him for?” Seeing innocent children being tossed in the flames like they were nothing but trash was horrendous for anyone to bear witness to let alone a fifteen-year boy.
The first day of arriving in Auschwitz the workers, including Elie was given instructions from an SS officer and Elie could not help but notice the disgust in the man’s eyes. Elie proclaims that the SS officer looked at them as were they “a pack of leprous dogs clinging to life.” The dreadful thoughts of worthlessness must have showered down on Elie. The harshness of the SS was as if they nothing but disease-ridden animals not worthy of living. The officers seemed to be offended that Jews were allowed to walk this planet at all and that is expressed greatly on page thirty-nine when Elie’s father tries to ask a question. “The gypsy looked him up and down slowly, from head to foot. As if he wanted to convince himself that this man addressing him was really a creature of flesh and bone, a living being with a body and a belly. Then, as if he had suddenly woken up from a heavy doze, he dealt my father such a clout that he fell to the ground, crawling back to his place on all fours.” Just for speaking to the officer, Elie’s father was greatly punished. It was if it was aN insult just for a Jewish man to speak to the officer. Various inhumane events occur persistently in the Holocaust, and this without a doubt makes Elie question how human beings, who all bleed red are allowed to be treated in such a way under God’s eye.
Throughout all of Elie’s stay in the concentration camp not once had The Almighty God interfered to stop the pain and suffering all around him. Something that really haunted Elie was observing a pipel boy being hung for a crime. The child was described to have the face of an angel, but he was too light for the rope to kill him instantly. The boy remained hanging on the rope, “lingering between life and death.” for more than half an hour this young boy struggled to die. People were screaming and Elie was struggling to understand where was God in this horrific moment. How was God allowing for this boy to suffer? was the question that kept stirring in Elie’s mind. Elie was so deeply traumatized from this event that the meal after observing the appalling incident he could describe it as tasting like corpses.
Due to the atrocities the Jewish experienced during the Holocaust, many lost their faith in humanity and God including Elie Wiesel.

He was so disgusted by the fact that God turned a blind eye to him even though he had always followed God with a blind faith. Elie was abandoned at the time he needed it the most, which was infuriating for him. We see glimpses of Elie questioning and rejecting God, with good reason. The novel Night was most definitely a tragic read, but it is something that everyone should have to read because it teaches us so much on how blind faith is not always going to get us through difficulties we face in life. Elie Wiesel will forever be remembered as the brave man who publicly questioned the existence of God because of his experiences with the cruelty he witnesses, the inhumane ways he and others were treated and the lack of interference from the God

almighty.