Isabel - Blog Post #2

A common theme that appears throughout Night is the Jewish people slowly losing their faith and trust in God. For example, at the beginning Moishe the Beadle was very religious and practiced it regularly. However, after he came back from the camp he acted very differently: “Moishe was not the same. The joy in his eyes was gone. He no longer sang. He no longer mentioned either God or Kabbalah. He spoke only of what he had seen.” (7). You can understand how what Moishe saw affected him, he had been traumatized and was no longer enthusiastic about religion.

Later on in the book, Eliezer begins to distrust God.

Why, but why would I bless Him? Every fiber in me rebelled. Because He caused thousands of children to burn in His mass graves? Because He kept six crematoria working day and night, including Sabbath and the Holy Days? Because in His great might, He had created Auschwitz, Birkenau, Buna, and so many other factories of death? How could I say to Him: Blessed be Thou, Almighty, Master of the Universe, who chose us among all nations to be tortured day and night, to watch as our fathers, our mothers, our brothers end up in the furnaces? Praised be Thy Holy Name, for having chosen us to be slaughtered on Thine altar? (67)

This is significant because at the start Eliezer had full faith in God, but now he sees no reason to trust or even like Him. In his eyes, God is at fault for the Holocaust. Another example of someone losing faith in God is this: "I have more faith in Hitler than in anyone else. He alone has kept his promises, all his promises, to the Jewish people." (81). To me, this can be taken as kind of a jab at God. Normally, when you ask a religious person who they have the most in faith in they would say God, but to have someone say Hitler tells a lot about what’s happened to their faith.