“I am afraid, but I still pursue my quest. The further I go, the less I understand. Perhaps there is nothing to understand.”1
“Answers: I say there are none...Answers only intensify the question: ideas and words must finally come up against a wall higher than the sky, a wall of human bodies extending to infinity.”2
If He wanted me to be dust, why hasn’t He left me as dust? But I’m not dust. I’m standing up, I’m walking, thinking, wondering, shouting: I’m human!”3
“I want to know why human beings turn into beasts...I want to know how good family men can slaughter children and crush old people.”4
“Trapp asked the men not to talk about it, but they needed no encouragement in that direction. Those who had not been in the forest did not want to learn more. Those who had been there likewise had no desire to speak, either then or later...At Józefow a mere dozen men out of nearly 500 had responded instinctively to Major Trapp’s offer to step forward and excuse themselves from the impending mass murder. Why was the number of men who from the beginning declared themselves unwilling to shoot so small?...The battalion had orders to kill Jews, but each individual did not...To break ranks and step out, to adopt overtly nonconformist behavior, was simply beyond most of the men. It was easier to shoot...The reserve policemen faced choices, and most of them committed terrible deeds. But those who killed cannot be absolved by the notion that anyone in the same situation would have done as they did. For even among them, some refused to kill and other stopped killing. Human responsibility is ultimately an individual matter.”5
“I distrust miracles. They exist only in books. And books say anything.”6
“Any hope must be sober, and built on the sands of despair, free from illusions.”7
"Let us offer, then, as a working principle the following: No statement, theological or otherwise, should be made that would not be credible in the presence of the burning children.”8
“I stand in awe before the memory of the k’doshim who walked into the gas chambers with the Ani Ma’amin –– I believe! –– on their lips. How dare I question, if they did not question! I believe, because they believed.”9
“Tell me: Where is God in all this?”10
----------
1 Elie Wisel, “A Plea for the Dead.”
2 Ibid.
3 “Berish the Innkeeper,” Elie Wiesel, The Trail of God.
4 Ibid.
5 Christopher R. Browning, Ordinary Men: Reserve Police Battalion 101 and the Final Solution in Poland.
6 “Berish the Innkeeper,” Elie Wiesel, The Trial of God.
7 Irving Greenbeerg, “Cloud of Fire, Pillar of Smoke.”
8 Ibid.
9 Eliezer Berkovits, “Faith After the Holocaust.”
10 “Mendel,” Elie Wiesel, The Trial of God.
Showing posts with label Theology. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Theology. Show all posts
Thursday, February 22, 2007
Sunday, February 18, 2007
To Stop the Bleeding
Try as I may, I will never understand the selfishness of individuals.
It was night. I sat in a hot springs with friends and watched the stars travel across the night sky. For a moment, I closed my eyes and let myself slip from the consciousness of this world. Suddenly, a loud crack and the scream of a child jolted me from my mind’s wanderings. The noise made me awaken as if from a nightmare. I didn’t rub my eyes and yawn. Rather, as I awoke with a start and a gasp, I saw a young girl lying face down on the concrete at the opposite side of the pool.
I was halfway to standing up and rushing to the child’s side when I saw her parents come at a run. As an undergraduate, I promised myself that I would never sit idly by if I saw another person suffering before my eyes. I would do what was in my power at the moment to stop the bleeding, either literally or metaphorically. In this case, the bleeding appeared to be quite literal. The child must have slipped on the wet cement and taken a header flat onto her face. It was a simple childhood accident, one that I can remember experiencing at least once when I was very young. For a moment, I recalled how scared I was when I, myself, had fallen face-first into the pavement.
As I prepared to jump out of the pool, the child’s parents come to her side and I decided the wisest action would be to let them handle the incident. Nevertheless, I was concerned and deeply moved to compassion by this young child who I will likely never see again. Though my wilderness first-aide training made me cringe to see the mother immediately embrace her daughter and pull her off the concrete, I was relieved to see that both mother and father acted as responsible parents. And as mother carried her child away from the pool, father grabbed a towel and pressed it against the girl’s darkly colored mouth and nose. As the girl cried, the pair carried her into the warm and well-lighted pool house.
When the trio passed from earshot, a middle-aged woman across the pool from me and my friends spoke.
“Jeez,” she laughed, “Am I glad that I’m through with those days! Ugh, kids!”
In a moment, her words threw me from heart-felt compassion to visceral anger. Her words were a means to express the distance she desired to create between herself and the incident. She threw up a defense to separate herself from reality. With those words as a wall, she became one of the proverbial “faces in the window” that do no more than stare out at the suffering and injustice of the world before our eyes.
Instead of thinking about the child, the woman thought about herself. The same scene that had cried to me for action must have glued her to the bench of the pool. I wanted nothing more than to take the pain away and stop the child’s bleeding. The young girl’s screams were like a knife viscerally twisting through my guts. How could this woman say such a thing at the sight of obvious pain? I wondered what she would have done if the little girl had been her own creation? Eventually, as I sat and reflected on the incident, I found myself wondering about God in the mini-drama that unfolded before my eyes.
As a Lutheran, I believe that we are redeemed through the grace of God. As a member of the human race, I believed that we are saved when we stop the bleeding in our world. And as an historian, I’ve read Luther and the great debates of whether or not God saves individuals through works or grace. While doctrines and theories can be argued over for centuries with no answers (as they should be), I’ve found that they often fail to grasp the reality of the world in which we live. Though I believe in the grace of an unnamed creator-artist, such a notion will do little good for the child who lays bleeding on the pavement.
The only way we will survive as a species is if we deny the urge to throw up our selfish walls and idly watch when an incident as this unfolds. We must allow ourselves to be moved by compassion and to act at the sights of suffering and injustice. If we don’t, the human race will surely bleed to death as we watch from our own self-absorbed worlds.
Stop the bleeding. These were the most pertinent three words of moral advice I heard in college. Regardless of religious or moral dogmas, perhaps these words capture what it truly means to be a responsible member of humanity.
It was night. I sat in a hot springs with friends and watched the stars travel across the night sky. For a moment, I closed my eyes and let myself slip from the consciousness of this world. Suddenly, a loud crack and the scream of a child jolted me from my mind’s wanderings. The noise made me awaken as if from a nightmare. I didn’t rub my eyes and yawn. Rather, as I awoke with a start and a gasp, I saw a young girl lying face down on the concrete at the opposite side of the pool.
I was halfway to standing up and rushing to the child’s side when I saw her parents come at a run. As an undergraduate, I promised myself that I would never sit idly by if I saw another person suffering before my eyes. I would do what was in my power at the moment to stop the bleeding, either literally or metaphorically. In this case, the bleeding appeared to be quite literal. The child must have slipped on the wet cement and taken a header flat onto her face. It was a simple childhood accident, one that I can remember experiencing at least once when I was very young. For a moment, I recalled how scared I was when I, myself, had fallen face-first into the pavement.
As I prepared to jump out of the pool, the child’s parents come to her side and I decided the wisest action would be to let them handle the incident. Nevertheless, I was concerned and deeply moved to compassion by this young child who I will likely never see again. Though my wilderness first-aide training made me cringe to see the mother immediately embrace her daughter and pull her off the concrete, I was relieved to see that both mother and father acted as responsible parents. And as mother carried her child away from the pool, father grabbed a towel and pressed it against the girl’s darkly colored mouth and nose. As the girl cried, the pair carried her into the warm and well-lighted pool house.
When the trio passed from earshot, a middle-aged woman across the pool from me and my friends spoke.
“Jeez,” she laughed, “Am I glad that I’m through with those days! Ugh, kids!”
In a moment, her words threw me from heart-felt compassion to visceral anger. Her words were a means to express the distance she desired to create between herself and the incident. She threw up a defense to separate herself from reality. With those words as a wall, she became one of the proverbial “faces in the window” that do no more than stare out at the suffering and injustice of the world before our eyes.
Instead of thinking about the child, the woman thought about herself. The same scene that had cried to me for action must have glued her to the bench of the pool. I wanted nothing more than to take the pain away and stop the child’s bleeding. The young girl’s screams were like a knife viscerally twisting through my guts. How could this woman say such a thing at the sight of obvious pain? I wondered what she would have done if the little girl had been her own creation? Eventually, as I sat and reflected on the incident, I found myself wondering about God in the mini-drama that unfolded before my eyes.
As a Lutheran, I believe that we are redeemed through the grace of God. As a member of the human race, I believed that we are saved when we stop the bleeding in our world. And as an historian, I’ve read Luther and the great debates of whether or not God saves individuals through works or grace. While doctrines and theories can be argued over for centuries with no answers (as they should be), I’ve found that they often fail to grasp the reality of the world in which we live. Though I believe in the grace of an unnamed creator-artist, such a notion will do little good for the child who lays bleeding on the pavement.
The only way we will survive as a species is if we deny the urge to throw up our selfish walls and idly watch when an incident as this unfolds. We must allow ourselves to be moved by compassion and to act at the sights of suffering and injustice. If we don’t, the human race will surely bleed to death as we watch from our own self-absorbed worlds.
Stop the bleeding. These were the most pertinent three words of moral advice I heard in college. Regardless of religious or moral dogmas, perhaps these words capture what it truly means to be a responsible member of humanity.
Monday, February 5, 2007
The Balance of History
What is the opposite of history? Everyone knows (or at least should know) what history is. This field is more than the simple study of the past. Ultimately, history is the creation of meaning where there is only the raw and lived existence of the present. We can look back on the past, tell our stories, and give meaning to events. Among animals, this uncanny ability makes humans unique. Without the ability to remember and create meaning, we are nothing more than Nietzsche’s belly-oriented herd of goats grazing on a mountainside.
But what force stands in opposition to the historical records and interpretations? If history is meaning given to events that have already happened, then its opposite force cannot also be located in the past. The moment we live in –– the present –– has no meaning until it is over and we begin to tell stories and analyze our experiences. History can only come in retrospect. Therefore, whatever stands opposed to history must be neither in the past nor in the present. History’s opposition must be in the future. This conclusion seems the most logical.
The opposite of what happened in the past must invariably look to the future. History has already taken place and we mine its events and biographies to give meaning to the present world in which we live. But the future has not yet happened. The future offers untold variables and courses of action. It should be understood that the opposite of past is future. The former world of history is littered with skepticism and negative critique. Therefore the opposite must offer a different alternative and vision of the world in which we live.
This opposition of history must be positive. The chroniclers and critics of historical events speak of wars, politics gone astray, and the darker side of human nature. Simply stated, history is the record of the world in which we live. That world is most often recorded as harsh and brutal. It is littered with scores of names that evoke strong emotions: Caesars, The Terror, Waterloo, Solferino, Verdun, Auschwitz. Even our own individual experiences and stories tell us that life is hard and will eventually end. What, then, can be the opposite of such a bloody, raped, and cratered landscape?
Perhaps Hope is the single human force which stands in opposition to the events of the past. Hope is a world of the future tense. The events of the future have not yet transpired, and hope allows us to believe that anything is possible. There are two kinds of hopes that humans experience. The first is simple and fleeting. This is the hope that asks for puppies at Christmas and cakes on birthdays. It’s the second type of hope that counter-balances the historical experience. These are the hopes that are too big to fit into this world, the impossible hopes that may or (more likely) may not be realized in our lives. These are the Hopes which keep us looking to a future where the ever upsidedown world is turned on its head.
But why do we do it? Why do we hope when there is ample historical evidence which speaks to the failure of such hopes? Countless times throughout history the hopes of nations, peoples, and individuals have been utterly dashed against the stones of human reality. Perhaps hope is the necessary balance to the craziness of our world.
Let’s ponder these questions and thoughts until we’re old and wise grandmothers and grandfathers. Perhaps then we will have a better understanding of the mysteries of life, and we will be more qualified to offer answers to such questions.
But what force stands in opposition to the historical records and interpretations? If history is meaning given to events that have already happened, then its opposite force cannot also be located in the past. The moment we live in –– the present –– has no meaning until it is over and we begin to tell stories and analyze our experiences. History can only come in retrospect. Therefore, whatever stands opposed to history must be neither in the past nor in the present. History’s opposition must be in the future. This conclusion seems the most logical.
The opposite of what happened in the past must invariably look to the future. History has already taken place and we mine its events and biographies to give meaning to the present world in which we live. But the future has not yet happened. The future offers untold variables and courses of action. It should be understood that the opposite of past is future. The former world of history is littered with skepticism and negative critique. Therefore the opposite must offer a different alternative and vision of the world in which we live.
This opposition of history must be positive. The chroniclers and critics of historical events speak of wars, politics gone astray, and the darker side of human nature. Simply stated, history is the record of the world in which we live. That world is most often recorded as harsh and brutal. It is littered with scores of names that evoke strong emotions: Caesars, The Terror, Waterloo, Solferino, Verdun, Auschwitz. Even our own individual experiences and stories tell us that life is hard and will eventually end. What, then, can be the opposite of such a bloody, raped, and cratered landscape?
Perhaps Hope is the single human force which stands in opposition to the events of the past. Hope is a world of the future tense. The events of the future have not yet transpired, and hope allows us to believe that anything is possible. There are two kinds of hopes that humans experience. The first is simple and fleeting. This is the hope that asks for puppies at Christmas and cakes on birthdays. It’s the second type of hope that counter-balances the historical experience. These are the hopes that are too big to fit into this world, the impossible hopes that may or (more likely) may not be realized in our lives. These are the Hopes which keep us looking to a future where the ever upsidedown world is turned on its head.
But why do we do it? Why do we hope when there is ample historical evidence which speaks to the failure of such hopes? Countless times throughout history the hopes of nations, peoples, and individuals have been utterly dashed against the stones of human reality. Perhaps hope is the necessary balance to the craziness of our world.
Let’s ponder these questions and thoughts until we’re old and wise grandmothers and grandfathers. Perhaps then we will have a better understanding of the mysteries of life, and we will be more qualified to offer answers to such questions.
Thursday, February 1, 2007
Notes from a Night on a Bald Mountain
Recorded Sept. 4, 2005
From the eastern summit of the ridge line west of Sheep Mountain, Missoula County, Montana. Elevation approximately 7600 feet. Distance covered about 10 horizontal miles and about 4000 vertical feet in elevation.
The sun went down. To one side I saw the encroaching darkness of night, to the other was the last ray of light falling behind the Bitterroot Mountains. Night’s hand cradled the valley below. I stood at 7600 feet above sea level. The night’s grip grew tighter as daylight vanished. I was alone, without another person for at least ten miles. Soon the world would be clenched in a dark, cold fist.
I made camp on the eastern summit of a barren ridge line. There were only a few shabby trees for shelter, and the ground was covered in shale. I anchored my tent with a stone tent ring. I put on my long sleeve shirt, sweatshirt, and wool beanie. The temperature had already dropped several degrees since my arrival that afternoon. And the wind speed had increased dramatically. This would be a cold, windy, and solitary night.
I watched the world as the sun set. Blackness covered the land behind me. To my left, the barely visible lights of Missoula were beginning to flicker as if in battle against the coming dark. To my right, the sun still reflected off of glacial capped peaks on the northern horizon. In front of me, the sun inched its way over the Bitterroots.
In this harsh altitude, I was overcome with thoughts. I recalled something I recently read. From the epilogue of Elie Wiesel’s play The Trial of God:
“So great is humanity’s capacity for evil that the God of justice is indeed silenced by humanity’s evil deeds––but the God of the sun and moon and stars, of time and space and the fifteen billion years that brought humanity into being, the God of life itself, of the horses and lions and mountain goats that caught Job’s attention––that God is not silenced. The God of cosmos is not silenced.”
Suddenly, I felt captured by the physical and visual wonders that surrounded me. Beautiful and malevolent forces that never cease. And it was for me alone. I had no one with whom I could share this spectacle. It was all mine, just as if this moment was created solely that I might witness these things.
I suddenly had words rushing through my mind. I needed to write. I grabbed pencil and the only paper available to me, my copy of Wiesel’s Night which I brought for reading material. I opened to the last page and began scratching the paper with lead. Prompted by the wonder before me, and by the above passage that had been on my mind for over a month, I wrote the following words.
“HaShem Elohim: Blessed is your name. The sun rises every morning and falls every night. The moon and stars are in their courses and never fail. The wind blows across my face and the aurora dances in the north. It is twilight, a chance to begin again. Blessed is your name for these constants engulfed in a world of chaos, madness, insanity. Because the constants never fail, I will know that you are haShem. Blessed is your name.”
I said these words as the last rays of sun fell behind the Bitterroots. The temperature dropped to freezing. The wind blew across the bare peak like a freight train. After watching a show of the aurora borealis, I returned to my tent in the darkness both happy and content to weather the frigid and cloudless wind storm.
In the morning, I watched the sun rise over the valley. For the first time in many months, the world looked beautiful. What had changed? I spent a night in the frigid wind. Yet I knew the sun would return in the morning. Night is only a season. The sun will always rise in the morning. Yet those who lived through the night have an obligation to tell their story. Those who didn’t experience a night such as this (or any other metaphorical night) will never understand what the minutes and moments were like. Yet those who are willing to listen to the stories will, hopefully, become better individuals having heard and reflected on them. The stories of such nights provide countless others a chance to learn. Perhaps the greater gift in life is to listen to the stories.
From the eastern summit of the ridge line west of Sheep Mountain, Missoula County, Montana. Elevation approximately 7600 feet. Distance covered about 10 horizontal miles and about 4000 vertical feet in elevation.
The sun went down. To one side I saw the encroaching darkness of night, to the other was the last ray of light falling behind the Bitterroot Mountains. Night’s hand cradled the valley below. I stood at 7600 feet above sea level. The night’s grip grew tighter as daylight vanished. I was alone, without another person for at least ten miles. Soon the world would be clenched in a dark, cold fist.
I made camp on the eastern summit of a barren ridge line. There were only a few shabby trees for shelter, and the ground was covered in shale. I anchored my tent with a stone tent ring. I put on my long sleeve shirt, sweatshirt, and wool beanie. The temperature had already dropped several degrees since my arrival that afternoon. And the wind speed had increased dramatically. This would be a cold, windy, and solitary night.
I watched the world as the sun set. Blackness covered the land behind me. To my left, the barely visible lights of Missoula were beginning to flicker as if in battle against the coming dark. To my right, the sun still reflected off of glacial capped peaks on the northern horizon. In front of me, the sun inched its way over the Bitterroots.
In this harsh altitude, I was overcome with thoughts. I recalled something I recently read. From the epilogue of Elie Wiesel’s play The Trial of God:
“So great is humanity’s capacity for evil that the God of justice is indeed silenced by humanity’s evil deeds––but the God of the sun and moon and stars, of time and space and the fifteen billion years that brought humanity into being, the God of life itself, of the horses and lions and mountain goats that caught Job’s attention––that God is not silenced. The God of cosmos is not silenced.”
Suddenly, I felt captured by the physical and visual wonders that surrounded me. Beautiful and malevolent forces that never cease. And it was for me alone. I had no one with whom I could share this spectacle. It was all mine, just as if this moment was created solely that I might witness these things.
I suddenly had words rushing through my mind. I needed to write. I grabbed pencil and the only paper available to me, my copy of Wiesel’s Night which I brought for reading material. I opened to the last page and began scratching the paper with lead. Prompted by the wonder before me, and by the above passage that had been on my mind for over a month, I wrote the following words.
“HaShem Elohim: Blessed is your name. The sun rises every morning and falls every night. The moon and stars are in their courses and never fail. The wind blows across my face and the aurora dances in the north. It is twilight, a chance to begin again. Blessed is your name for these constants engulfed in a world of chaos, madness, insanity. Because the constants never fail, I will know that you are haShem. Blessed is your name.”
I said these words as the last rays of sun fell behind the Bitterroots. The temperature dropped to freezing. The wind blew across the bare peak like a freight train. After watching a show of the aurora borealis, I returned to my tent in the darkness both happy and content to weather the frigid and cloudless wind storm.
In the morning, I watched the sun rise over the valley. For the first time in many months, the world looked beautiful. What had changed? I spent a night in the frigid wind. Yet I knew the sun would return in the morning. Night is only a season. The sun will always rise in the morning. Yet those who lived through the night have an obligation to tell their story. Those who didn’t experience a night such as this (or any other metaphorical night) will never understand what the minutes and moments were like. Yet those who are willing to listen to the stories will, hopefully, become better individuals having heard and reflected on them. The stories of such nights provide countless others a chance to learn. Perhaps the greater gift in life is to listen to the stories.
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