Theme Analysis Essay: Having and Losing Faith In God Freedom of religion is a fundamental human right that protects all people. Religions faith can be tested under certain circumstances, which can falter the relationship one can have with their God. In the memoir Night, by Elie Wiesel, the author creates the universal theme that religious faith is questioned and challenged during traumatic events. Throughout the story, we see many relationships with God scarcely survive, and some completely fail entirely. For the duration of the memoir, Wiesel uses plenty of narrative elements to help convey this theme. He uses plot and setting to help depict the situation the characters are in, and how that tests their relationship with God. He also uses …show more content…
Many who had a faith, had their relationship with God put through several trials and tribulations. Some relationships prevailed, and some failed, but the questioning was fundamental. As Moshe the Beadle says, “I pray to the God within me that He will give me the strength to ask Him the right questions.” (pg 33) The Holocaust forced many people to ask horrible questions concerning their relationship with God, but the fact that one is asking the questions in the first place, still proves their faith. For example, once Wisel found himself in the concentration camps, he started to question God, and why he permit something as horrible as the Holocaust to occur. On page 33, he asks, “Why should I sanctify is name?...What was there to thank him for?” Elie starts to question why he should continue to have a relationship with God, because He had allowed a traumatic event, such as the Holocaust to exist, proving the relationship to be challenged. As the story continues, Wiesel proceeded to ask himself questions. On page 67 he asks, “Blessed be God’s name? But why would I bless Him?” This quote is coming from the same person, who when asked why he prays, he replied with why do we breathe. Eliza was once a strong follower in Judaism, and although he questioned God, and the religion itself, his faith in God never truly went away. Once he was put in the traumatic situation of the Holocaust, his relationship with God was challenged, and
In most cases, people will do what they have to do in order to survive. The book Night is about a young boy named Elie, and how he survived in multiple concentration camps. By reading Night we can see that family is the key to survival, which is important because those who don’t have family can often die. The main reason that Elie survives is because he had his father there with him for almost the whole time.
The memoir Night is a text that displays several theme topics with deeply rooted emotional ties. One theme that is expressed and explored in Night is self preservation versus family commitment. An instance nearing the beginning of the story involves the former maid of the Wiesel family offering a safe place at her village so the family would not be taken away to the concentration camps. In response, Elie’s father tells Elie and his two elder sisters, "If you wish, go there. I shall stay here with your mother and the little one…" Elie and his sisters refuse, which demonstrates how they would rather keep their family together than protect themselves.
Furthermore, while living in a concentration camp named “Buna”, Elie bears witness to the heartless hanging of a young boy whose death left sadness in the eyes of many. Overhearing a man say “For God’s sake where is God ?” Elie’s innervoice said “Where He is ? This is where-- hanging here from this gallows...”(65). Wiesel, utilizing the cruelty of the Nazis, portrays that the killing of the young boy evokes such raw sadness and pain that it causes Elie to feel as if the Nazis had killed God himself.
Kristyn Batkins Mrs. Lafferty English 11 April 24, 2023 Adapting to what we are giving In the book Night, I think the most important theme is survival, the basic needs and psychological needs he needs to survive that he is missing. Going with the Maslow hierarchy they kept moving down in the needs to the bottom where they were not even giving the basic needs needed to survive and keep going. Where they are struggling with themself on not having what they need in life as humans. With psychological needs, you need relationships and family and during this Ellie got separated from his family and only had his dad left, and he also encountered negative human interaction which he had to adapt to, to survive. ¨Men to the left!
World War II was a dark and cruel period that normal people sadly had to go through. "Night" is an amazing novel that really explains some of the things that people went through during the Holocaust. As a young boy Elie witnessed many traumatizing things. Over the course of the novel Elie developed different conflicts and themes that go with one another; one main theme is humanity. Elie wrote this novel to show everyone the darkest period of his life.
My theme for night was the preservation of self over others. Throughout the book many people become selfish and start to care only of themselves including Elie. The reason why I chose this as my theme is because I find it very interesting how under certain situations people change very rapidly. Elie soon comes to realize this , but does little to change it. Mostly ,because he needs to be this way in order to survive.
“ You don 't need religion to have morals. If you can 't determine right from wrong, then you lack empathy not religion. ”- unknown. Night by Elie Wiesel, during World War II, in Germany and Poland, Jewish people taken to concentration camps and forced to do labor.
People endure hardships every day, but it is how they choose to react to them that is most important. One such hardship was the Holocaust, which was the murdering of millions of people at the Nazi concentration camps throughout the course of WWII. Eleven million Jews, homosexuals, and gypsies were killed during this genocide. Every survivor of these concentration camps was forced to decide between hiding or vocalizing the crimes they had seen committed, and many couldn’t find the strength to speak up. Thankfully, there were those such as Elie Wiesel, who didn’t rest.
Wiesel's loss of faith was brought on by the absence of God. This resulted in him questioning why it was God's will to allow Jews to suffer and die the way they had. Another portrayal of religious confliction within Wiesel was the statement of his faith being consumed by the flames along with the corpses of children (Wiesel 34). Therefore, he no longer believed God was the almighty savior everyone had set Him out to be or even present before them. To conclude, his experiences within Nazi confinement changed what he believed in and caused him to change how he thought and began questioning God because of the actions He allowed to take
“The greatness of a man is not in how much wealth he acquires, but in his integrity and his ability to affect those around him positively.” (Bob Marley) Throughout history there are few people remembered for their integrity, for their tyranny, dishonesty, selfishness, yes, but integrity is such a rare true thing that is untouchable by those around those who possess it. It shines through the darkness. For instance, William Wilberforce, born and raised in a wealthy traditional family was involved in abolitionism,promoting education for the underprivileged, Christianity, strict uprightness and health and wellbeing of animals.
“Yes, you can lose somebody overnight, yes, your whole life can be turned upside down. Life is short. It can come and go like a feather in the wind. ”- Shania Twain.
In the memoir Night, the narrator Elie Wiesel recounts a moment when he questioned God, ¨Blessed be God’s name? Why, but why would I bless him? Every fiber in me rebelled, he caused thousands of children to burn his Mass graves?¨(Wiesel 68). Overall, Wiesel does not follow the words of God and is not believing in him anymore because he thinks God is the one thatś letting all the inhumanity occur. One theme in Night is that inhumanity can cause disbelief or incredulity.
The Holocaust affects Jews in a way that seems unimaginable, and most of these effects seem to have been universal experiences; however, in the matter of faith, Jews in the concentration camp described in Elie Wiesel’s Night are affected differently and at different rates. The main character, Elie, loses his faith quickly after the sights he witnesses (as well as many others); other Jews hold on much longer and still pray in the face of total destruction. In the beginning, all of the Jews are more or less equally faithful in their God and religion.
Family “Father! Father! Wake up. They’re going to throw you outside… No!
Night Critical Abdoul Bikienga Johann Schiller once said “It is not flesh and blood, but the heart which makes us fathers and sons”. But what happens when the night darkens our hearts our hearts? The Holocaust memoir Night does a phenomenal job of portraying possibly the most horrifying outcomes in such a situation. Through subtle and effective language, Wiesel is able to put into words the fearsome experiences he and his father went through in Auschwitz during the Holocaust. In his holocaust memoir, Night, Elie Wiesel utilizes imagery to show the effect that self-preservation can have on father son relationships.