Faith In Elie Wiesel's Night

Faith can be a backbone, a sense of organization in a person’s beliefs. In other words, it is able to bring a collection of viewpoints together and view it as one. Faith, neither based on facts, nor used for a sense of comfort to people, can impact one’s life tremendously. This term “faith” is merely based on his/her spiritual apprehension to a belief in God or their own version of the Bible. By way of example, Elie Wiesel, a survivor of the Holocaust, gives a first-person account of his experience. Although this may seem more factual than personal, the novel, Night, written by Elie Wiesel, brings the Holocaust to a new spiritual level. Instead of the Holocaust being just a historical event that took place during the early-1930s to the mid-1940s,

Wiesel ties in his progressive struggles within himself to trust in God and the Kabbalah, a Jewish tradition of a mystical interpretation of the Bible.

Throughout the Holocaust, Wiesel came face-to-face with many obstacles in which he considers giving up on himself, his father, and God. This put a strain on his relationship with God due to the fact that Wiesel blamed most sins committed within the novel on God. While revealing his personal experience during the Holocaust in the novel, Night, Wiesel puts a strain on his relationship with God and uses theology to describe the importance of faith in someone’s life.

Unlike a normal child, Wiesel was particularly focused on studying the Kabbalah and portraying the ways of God through his own acts. Furthermore, the beginning of the novel shows that Wiesel held more of an interest in the spiritual and theological ways of thinking and studying. In further detail, Wiesel had always been surrounded with influencers of the religion. These were people who were so engrossed in the Jewish interpretations of the Bible that they lived by God’s words every day. Some parts of this sparked an interest in learning about the morals of his religion, but mainly it

came from Wiesel himself to become closer to God in his daily life and through specific prayers. In addition, his family at home or outside of home revolved around the belief of Judaism, yet Wiesel became more interested in learning about the Kabbalah and its morals. For example, the food, the prayers, their language, the holidays celebrated and the holidays shunned were all part of the background of Judaism. In some occasions, stories told by Wiesel’s acquaintances seemed to act as more than a story to him. It almost felt like a personal touch given to him by God (Moore 18). Because Wiesel was surrounded by so many different viewpoints and beliefs, it could be challenging for him at first to find himself when he was being criticized for his morals. The parents of Wiesel’s friends had a very powerful influence on their children, causing them to follow in their footsteps. However, Wiesel grew up differently. He studied on his own and mainly with other citizens at the time. Moishe the Beadle, a local citizen, taught Wiesel all of the importance and backgrounds of his beliefs. Because he related so much to what Moishe the Beadle would say, it felt like a safe haven for Wiesel. The other children surrounding Wiesel were constantly hearing the words of their parents and the other people around them, which influenced the way they acted. For instance, Wiesel writes,
“Jewish children learned to be wary of Christians. Wiesel recalls that sometimes, on Christmas Eve, Christian boys wearing masks and horns carried whips into the streets at night, pretending to hunt for Jews, the people who they claimed killed Jesus. It was a childish game rooted in hatred and fear. In an interview in 1982, Wiesel said, 'As a child, I took it as a law of nature to be hated by the non-Jew. It was clear to me that if I went on the street, sooner or later I would be beaten up’” (Moore 19).
When Wiesel was a child, everyone judged each other based on their skin color, their ethnicity, and their religion. Unfortunately, Wiesel possessed everything that most people did not appreciate. They did not love him for who he truly was on the inside, but judged him for his beliefs. Lisa Moore explains that the children of a different religion and belief were observant of their parents’ words, taking those words and carrying out actions as if the Jewish were sinners. Elie Wiesel viewed many points differently than others. For example, others around him were more concerned with the facts of the religion, while Wiesel viewed the religion in almost a traditional and mystical way of thinking. Due to this, his ways of thinking grew into a bigger perspective, now including his social thinkings and political views (Chmiel 5). Wiesel’s beliefs and viewpoints on God Himself was more than just a religion. It sparked into something bigger. It became a new way of living, not just thinking. Wiesel prefers to get his point across with words of wisdom, rather than using opinions that are unable to be proven. His religion originates with a meaning different from others. Wiesel says in his own words, “Those who know me will confirm that I am not a political person. I have never been involved in anything political. I don't understand politics; to me, it is something extremely obscure. I come from a tradition that aims at conferring an ethical meaning on anything a person does or does not do” (Chmiel 72). Because Wiesel sees his religion in this type of way, it can spark an interest in someone else’s viewpoints which is why his writings can have such a strong impact. Even though Wiesel comes from a background of Judaism, he found a way within himself to make his connection with God more powerful and to make God become a bigger part of his long-lived life during the Holocaust.
At the beginning of the novel, Wiesel had a deep connection with his personal beliefs of God. He felt that no matter how bad a sin may be, God will always be there. Although this is his viewpoint at the beginning of the novel, it may not be the way he feels throughout the Holocaust and at the end. When the novel starts, Wiesel became so fascinated by the stories of the ancient times and the past, that it consumed him for most of his life before the Holocaust. He felt that the words of the Rabbi could determine the future, which grew into excitement for a young child wanting to reach his dreams. Every time he would hear a story, a lightbulb would go off in his head that signifies his imagination spreading. Wiesel would find a way to put himself in someone else’s shoes while listening to a tale and could lose himself in books about his religion. Reading gave him a sense of comfort, allowing him to be himself without any judgment. It gave him a chance to let his mind go freely, wherever he wanted it to (Moore 25). Wiesel felt free while reading about the past, it gave him a sense of impatience that maybe those same, amazing things would happen again someday. To contrast from the way Wiesel felt before the Holocaust, he grew a hatred towards God due to the sins committed by the Germans, and at the end, he completely hated the thought of Him. Because the Jews were treated so terribly, Wiesel felt that it was God’s fault for not “protecting” them from the evil in the world. It just is not possible for God to prevent all sins from happening; the world is too substantial. By way of example, Wiesel states, “What are You, my God? I thought angrily. How do You compare to this stricken mass gathered to affirm to You in their faith, their anger, their defiance? What does Your grandeur mean, Master of the Universe, in the face of all this cowardice, this decay, and this mystery? Why do you go on troubling these poor people's wounded minds, their ailing bodies?” (Wiesel 66). Because Wiesel is constantly blaming the sins of the Germans on God, he will have trouble allowing God back into his life later on. Finally, the novel, Night, shows the transition of Wiesel’s beliefs and viewpoint on God and His works. At the beginning of the novel, Wiesel holds a strong significance behind his interest in learning about God and the Kabbalah. It shows the unusuality in Wiesel’s interests as a young child. But, towards the end of the book, Wiesel wants no parts of the word God and believes that faith is somewhat pointless, considering that his prayers never worked until the end. This shows that there are always going to be strains and hardships on a relationship between a person and God because even God can never be perfect.
Without faith, Wiesel may not have been able to tell this story of theological struggles between himself and God.

Because the novel began with Wiesel’s devotion to learning about his faith and furthering himself with knowledge of God’s ways, it brought the reader along with him to experience his doubts and struggles together. In Wiesel’s eyes, faith can be used to bring together jumbled thoughts inside of a person’s head. It is also used to help oneself order viewpoints that are important into one central idea. This is the perspective of faith. In brief, while writing the novel, Night, Wiesel uses the beauty of theology to explain where he originates from in his beliefs and to why he views God in this way. The struggle and constant tension that was placed upon his relationship between himself and God showed that no relationship can ever be perfect. Therefore, God cannot be perfect either. Based on his speeches and excerpts of his own words after the Holocaust, Wiesel realizes that it is impossible to hate God when God cannot control everything in the world. Blaming God is not the way to solve one’s problems, but by pushing through to the end and telling your story will prevent history from repeating itself

again.