People come to the assumption that god doesn 't exist after a tragic accident or naturaldisaster. In the book Night by Elie Wiesel, Loss of faith is shown through questions whether ornot to believe in God during a disaster, giving up on God, and people 's judgement on God 'spower to let people die even though they pray to Him. Elie Wiesel from Night is going through tough times questioning his faith in God for letting innocent people die the same way peopleduring a disaster question their faith in God.To begin, the evidence provided explains whether or not a person should believe in a godduring a natural disaster. The first piece of evidence from the book night has Elie questioning ifhe should even bless God. “Why, but why would I bless Him? …show more content…
Continuing on, people judge God 's power to let people die even though they pray to Him.Elie yells at God for his bad judgment for killing innocent people. “...you cause the heavens torain down fire and damnation. But look at these men whom you have betrayed, allowing them tobe tortured, slaughtered, gassed, and burned, what do they do? They pray before you! Theypraise your name!” (pg.68) The evidence relates to the topic because they are doubting God 'spower by saying that He is letting people get tortured, gassed, and burned. The evidence pointsout people 's suffering and questions towards God. “He’d obviously been in the rubble searchingfor his daughter. In one hand, he was holding her Barbie doll and in the other a rosary, and hewas shouting up to the ceiling of the basketball court, ‘My God, My God, why have you forsakenme?’ It was unbearable.”(Emma-Jane Kirby,“A Question of Faith in the Face of Disaster”) Bothof the pieces of evidence are related because both are questioning God 's judgment of killinginnocent people whom they pray to. People judge God 's power to let people die even though theypray to God.In conclusion, questioning whether or not to believe in God after or during a naturaldisaster, losing faith in God, and people 's judgement of God 's power to allow people to die eventhough they pray to him. The three main points lead to the thesis showing how Elie questionedGod’s power. Elie Wiesel from Night is going through tough times questioning his religion inGod for letting innocent
He bitterly thinks that God is showing cowardice by not aiding His people in their troubled times. Although religion is one of the most important components in Elie’s life, this is quickly stripped away when the traumatic events around Elie occur. By the way he angrily thinks about God’s absence during the difficult times, it can be inferred that his faith in God is decreasing with each passing moment. Wiesel shows that the deaths around him causes trauma in which his emotions and his mind are implicated. The trauma that he experiences pushes him to the extent of questioning the one constant component in his life, which is God.
Where’s God? How can I belive, how can anyone believe in this God of Mercy?”(83). Elie states basically god doesn’t exist, if he did they would of been saved but they are left to suffer. At this point it would take something pretty miraculous to spark back Elie's faith. Finally, Elie finds himself saying, “And in spite of myself, a prayer rose in my heart, to that God in whom I no longer believed.
Elie continued to be angry at Him. Thousands of prisoners were repeating the prayer “Blessed be God’s name…” (Page 67). But Elie was concerned why should he bless Him? Everything inside Elie opposed it.
On the eve of Rosh Hashanah, the Jews gathered in silence, worshiping God. Elie is in shock that they still praise Him despite the terrible things they have endeavored. He even goes into lengths to say, “Praised be Thy Holy Name, for having chosen us to be slaughtered on Thine altar? ,” (pg. 67) and he even begins to think about how man is truly greater than God, “And I, the former mystic, was thinking: Yes, man is stronger, greater than God.
As stated by Wiesel, at a desperate point Jewish prisoners needed help from God. Elle believed God chose to be silent in a time when people needed him. This drove Elie to thoughts of committing suicide because if God wasn’t helping the prisoners there is no point of living. Elle thought there was no point in thanking God because he believed didn’t do anything to help the prisoners that were praying to him and asking for help. He questioned the reason why people even try to have hope that The Almighty would help them if he wouldn’t even answer their Kaddish to him.(33) Wiesel believed, Elie came close to giving up on hope when a son killed his own father for food on a train to another camp.
Belief and Faith is a “double-edged sword” to the jews, it cuts both ways. It keeps them alive, and at the same time makes them oblivious, and leads to their suffering. Over time, Elie’s belief in god, diminishes and eventually he questions God’s existence extensively and at point, Elie is infuriated that even though they are being tormented and enslaved, the Jews will still pray to god, and thank him, “If god did exist, why would he let u go through all the pain and suffering (33). This is a major point in the ongoing theme of faith and belief, because for once he is infuriated with the thought of religion in a time of suffering. Throughout the book, with the nazis ultimate goal is to break the jews and make dehumanize them and if anything, their goal is take and diminish their belief.
Losing faith one train ride at a time Many began to lose faith in their god when going through a hardship. It is difficult to have faith in a god who has permitted harm on innocent people. They began to lose hope in survival and began to believe that god may be unjust. In Night by Elie Wiesel, Eliezer starts off as a very religious Jew.
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.
Imagine believing so strongly in something and then being let down, or thinking that you were wrong to believe. In Night by Elie Wiesel, Elie felt as though he had lost his religion and beliefs. “I believed profoundly. During the day I studied the Talmud, and at night I ran to the synagogue to weep of the destruction of the Temple,” (Wiesel, 14). This quote shows how strongly he believed before experiencing the hardships of the Holocaust
To highlight the downfall, “Never shall I forget those moments that murdered my God and my soul and turned my dreams to ashes. Never shall I forget those things, even were I condemned to live as long as God Himself” (34). It’s important to remember for readers that with all faith, he has no security with himself to say God is helpful and all- powerful. Now, his mindset shifted to question more the reality of what was happening trying to find a meaning. Nevertheless, Elie felt pain, and loss.
Elie, once so faithful, is one of the first to lose faith in God due to the horrific sights he sees. After witnessing the bodies of Jewish children being burned, Wiesel writes, “Never shall I forget those flames that consumed my faith forever” (34). He quite understandably has begun to doubt that his God is with him following the sight of the supposedly chosen people’s bodies being unceremoniously burned. Elie, though, was perhaps not a member of the masses with this belief; in fact, some men were able to hold on to their beliefs despite these horrendous sights. Also near the middle of the book, Wiesel reflects on the faith of other Jews in the face of these events, saying that “some of the men spoke of God: His mysterious ways, the sins of the Jewish people, and the redemption to come.
When these people were being treated in such malicious ways, they started to believe that God wasn’t really there for them. They felt as if He wasn 't there to protect them. Sometimes, they started to rebel against their own religion and turn to their worst enemies for faith. Throughout Elie’s memoir, Night, Elie shows that many people, including himself, lost faith during their stay at the concentration camps. Many other victims of the concentration camps lived to see such tragedies that they began to lose hope in God, as well as he did.
And so he remained for more than half an hour, lingering between life and death, writing before our eyes. And we were forced to look at him at close range. He was still alive when I passed him. His tongue was still red, his eyes not yet extinguished.” This had reinforced Elie’s growing conviction that God was dead, that there was no purpose in praying to God or calling up God’s promises to His people because He had abandoned them.
But then he experiences the hardships of the Holocaust and it abruptly changed him. In the book Night, the main theme is religious belief, shown when Elie talks about the his strong religion and belief as a boy, his disconnection from religion, and the inhumane actions the Nazis caused. Having a strong belief in something so important to who we are and then being confronted with horrors which cause us to cease to believe, is a significant life changing event. During this time, many people questioned where God truly was. Even Elie was questioning where God was.
Elie Wiesel is not only a talented author but a survivor of the holocaust who documented his horrific experiences in his memoir “Night”. In the beginning of the book Elie Wiesel was one of the most religious people in his town of Saghet who had a dream of living a monastic life. However, as a result of the harrowing injustices he endured he continuously lost faith in his religion. Within the book the reader is reminded again and again that when extreme adversity is experienced, faith is often lost.