Night Essay The Dehumanizatio
Night Essay- The DehumanizatioIn the novel, Night, Elie Wiesel narrates his experience as a young Jewish boy during the holocaust. The captured Jews are enslaved in concentration camps, where they experience the absolute worst forms of torture, abuse, and inhumane treatment. Such torture has obvious physical effects, but it also induces psychological changes on those unfortunate enough to experience it. The Jews in the story had to overcome tremendous difficulties. The story begins with Eliezel, a young Jewish boy, describing his childhood and his religious upbringing. However, Hitler's anti-Semitic policies are just being introduced and the Jews are to be placed in concentration camps. The Jews are forced to abandon their homes, all their earthly possessions, and eventually their humanity. In the face of savage abuse and insolent treatment, the Jews stand tall and hold on to everything they can for as long as possible, but it is just not plausible for them to survive under such horrid conditions. However, these mutations of character and morality cannot be accredited to weakness of the Jews' spirit, but they can be attributed to the animal-like treatment they receive. They devolve into primitive essences, with savage, animal characteristics that are necessary for survival under such conditions. In Night, Wiesel effectively illustrates the drastic changes that the Jews go through; from average citizens with family, friends, and loved ones into savage, independent beasts who look out for no one else and must fight for their own well-being.
At the beginning of the novel, Elie describes his community, the Jewish community of Sighet, as a very caring and unified society. When the Hungarian police, and later the SS officers, force them to move into ghettoes and eventually institute the deportation of the Jews into concentration camps, the community comes together to support one another during this time of need. They receive news of the deportees working happily in Galicia and are soon able to forget such problems. They even doubt that Hitler will continue these practices and assume that they are safe. "Yes, we even doubted that he [Hitler] wanted to exterminate us" (6). At this point, the Jews are very comfortable and go so far as to recognize Hitler as being humane. Elie's father then holds a community meeting in his backyard, where he is called away, only to find out that they are all going to be deported the next morning. Upon discovering this information, they look to each other for support and comfort. "My father ran to the left and right, exhausted, comforting friends, running to the Jewish council to see if the edict had not been revoked in the meantime" (13). However, just as their physical and mental states deteriorate, so will this unified feeling of friendship and love.
It does not take long for the newly captured Jews to begin turning on each other; denying all that they have ever been taught about love and equality. However, this change of personality is induced by their savage treatment at the hands of the police. "They went by, fallen, dragging their packs, dragging their lives, deserting their homes, the years of their childhood, cringing like beaten dogs" (15). The Jews are already being treated like animals and it will not be long until their emotions devolve into animal-like, primitive savagery. The Jews then arrive at Birkenau, a reception center for Auschwitz, where they go through a selection process; a process that determines whether or not they are chosen to live or if they are to die in the crematory. They still have something of a sense of dignity, as they ponder whether or not to revolt against this atrocity. "We can't let ourselves be killed. We can't go like beasts to the slaughter" (29). The Jews still possess the strength to offer protest and they recognize that they are being treated like animals. However, they soon realize that a protest would be to no avail and that God shall save them if he intends for them to survive. The Jews are demonstrating a lot of good-spirit and hope, but in the end it serves no purpose. Elie is having his own doubts about God. He is searching for a reason as to why God would let this go on. "Why should I bless His name? The Eternal, Lord of the Universe, the All-Powerful and Terrible, was silent" (31). Elie, once a very religious and pious child, is being converted into a skeptic in the face of despair. "I too had become a completely different person. The student of the Talmud, the child that I was, had been consumed by the flames......A dark flame had entered into my soul and devoured it" (34). It is clear that Elie has changed at the hands of the German SS officers. He has become an unfeeling observing, watching out for only his own back. Not only has Elie changed, but the other Jews, including his father have changed as well. The story is narrated by Elie, so one can derive the most psychological change from his experiences, but he also describes the physical changes that he observes in his surroundings. "I glanced at my father. How he had changed! His eyes had grown dim. I would have liked to speak to him but I did not know what to say" (34). Elie's father has gone through some physical transformations during this episode as well. Once a man of vigor and vitality, he is now a gloomy, apathetic soul, wandering about aimlessly.
Once the Jews realize that they are powerless at the hands of the SS, they accept that position, numbing their morale and giving in to a sense of apathy. Elie witnesses his father being struck to the ground for no legitimate reason and upon observing this, does absolutely nothing. He is later eaten by remorse, but his lack of action demonstrates how he is changing. Later, when his father is beaten up again, he gets angry at him for not knowing how to avoid Idek's outbreak. Elie knows he is changing for the worse. When he realizes that he is getting angry at his father for getting beat, he admits "That is what concentration camp life had made of me" (52). The other Jews were changing too. They were so malnourished that they would risk their lives to get hold of some extra food. When the air-raid sirens went off, the prisoners were forced to evacuate all activities and take position. Upon doing so, a cauldron of soup was left in the middle of the eatery. Hundreds of Jews glared at the food with passionate desire, but no one dared try to get some. One man fell victim to his hunger and, denying his sanity, deciding to retrieve some. "Poor hero, committing suicide for a ration of soup!" (57). The Jews were so poorly treated that the man was in such a state of insanity that he was willing to risk his life for a few moments of glory. The act did ultimately cost him his life. Another Jewish boy was found beating his father for not making the bed properly. It is clear that these once loving and caring Jewish people have undergone extreme changes on a psychological level as well as a mental level as a result of their treatment by the Germans.
Being that Elie and his father were imprisoned for several years, the regular Jewish holidays came and went, including Yom Kippur. Yom Kippur calls for the Jews to fast, but Elie and his father deny this practice, as God has not helped them out as of yet. "I no longer accepted God's silence. As I swallowed my bowl of soup, I saw in the gesture an act of rebellion and protest against Him" (66). Elie has now lost just about all his faith in God. Once a devout follower, Elie feels that it is all useless anyway. God has remained unjust and silent with regard to the Jews' time in the concentration camp, so Elie will not honor his traditions. Other Jews had chosen to deny God's divine Mercy as well. Even a rabbi lost faith in the Almighty. Once a man of God, he told Elie, "It's the end. God is no longer with us" (73).
As their strength is no longer derived from God, the prisoners must look to themselves to survive. Of course, in doing so, concentration life becomes much more cutthroat. Elie's friend Zalman is trampled to death by fellow Jews during their march and Elie shows no emotion toward his friend's death. "I quickly forgot him. I began to think of myself again" (82). The prisoners are now so malnourished and so beat up that they didn't even bother to ask anyone else for help. They had only enough energy and will-power to keep themselves alive. "No one asked anyone else for help. You died because you had to die. There was no fuss" (85). Elie tells us of sons wanting to lose their father in order to free themselves of that dead weight; a thought that even Elie often has himself. Conditions had got to the point where as the Jews would battle to the death for a few pieces of bread crumbs, necessary for survival. The struggle to live was no longer a community effort, but rather a contest where only the fittest survive because they only look out for themselves. Retrieving a cup of coffee has turned into an animalistic savage contest. "Like a wild beast, I cleared my way to the coffee cauldron" (101). The once civilized Jewish community has been reduced to primitive savagery. The ultimate example of the degree of change in Jewish mentality comes when Elie's father sums up the way of life in the concentration camps. "Here every man has to fight for himself and not think of anyone else" (105). This once Godly man, a figure of honor and admiration in the Jewish community, is reduced to a parsimonious savage.
The Jews in Elie Wiesel's Night go through many changes and mutations of personality. Faced with the ultimate test, death, the Jews, instead of demonstrating humane dedication to the God that instituted this perilous situation upon them, they deny everything that are and were ever taught in a vain attempt to survive. They deny the existence of the Almighty, they are callous to the death of their peers, and they will even go so far as to murder fellow Jews to maintain their own survival. This once peaceful and civilized society devolved into primitive animals upon being treated as such, offering the notion that we as humans must not lose touch with everything that makes us what we are, even in the face of death and disaster.