ipl-logo

Eliezer's Loss Of Faith Essay

548 Words3 Pages

Faith is a word to some and an entire meaning of life to others. For Elie it was his entire life. He was cruising along through his journey, becoming closer and closer with God until the Holocaust abruptly intervened. A boy who once devoted himself to his faith will begin to question God, become angry with God, and loose all faith in God.

At the beginning of the book, Elie 's spiritual bond with God was unbreakable. He practiced and studied the religion of Judaism routinely. In the quote "by day I would study Talmud, and by night I would run to the synagogue and weep over the destruction of the temple," shows the day to day devotion Elie had to God. At the young age of thirteen Elie wanted to further push his knowledge of Judaism by hiring …show more content…

Growing up so religiously has permanently forced Elie to look at life through a Jewish perspective. God has never truly left his consciousness. He says the prayer "Oh God, Master of the Universe, give me the strength never to do what Rabbi Eliahu’s son has done" even though he says "God in whom I no longer believed." Elie is constantly contradicting himself whens he claims he doesn 't believe but he still says prayers and thinks about God.

By the end of the book Elie 's faith in God or in anything for that matter is dead. The metaphor "from the depths of the mirror, a corpse was contemplating me" used in the last few sentences of the book supports the claim that Elie 's faith has ceased to exist. The corpse that Elie is seeing is himself because he was so severely starved, but it also can symbolically represent his faith. The holocaust did not physically kill Elie but it took with it his reasons to live.

Elie 's spiritual journey is a terribly great example of how nothing is permanent not even our devotion to our own religions. People live and die for their religions. Religion has built kingdoms and empires. Considered one of the strongest things on Earth and the holocaust took it by it 's throat and threw it to the ground. Crushing millions of peoples faiths and beliefs. Elie just happened to be one of the unlucky millions that got caught in the

Show More
Related
300 Words | 2 Pages

In this book Elie speaks of his hardships and how he survived the concentration camps. Elie quickly changed into a sorrowful person, but despite that he was determined to stay alive no matter the cost. For instance, during the death

Read More
801 Words | 4 Pages

The holocaust makes physical and mental alterations to Elie’s life, and this tells the reader that the people who did this are effective and impacting, also it shows that Elie’s mind is controlled by what he was experiencing. Way back at the start of the book the readers see an adolescent boy who is studying Kabbalah, but when suddenly German officers come to ship the Jewish citizens out of his town, Elie wants to run away. By

Read More
1146 Words | 5 Pages

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.

Read More
1331 Words | 6 Pages

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.

Read More
1074 Words | 5 Pages

When Adam and Eve deceived You, You chased them from paradise… But look at these men whom You have betrayed, what do they do? They pray before You! They praise Your name!,” (pg.68) because of all the horrors and mistreatment Elie has endured, like witnessing infants being thrown into the trenches, “... Children thrown into the flames,” (pg.32), and watching his father being slapped, “... he slapped my father with such force that he fell down and then crawled back to his place on all fours,” (pg.39), his faith is distinguished. This contrasts to the beginning of the book where Eliezer says he cannot imagine a world without God, “Why do I pray?

Read More
1120 Words | 5 Pages

“Identity can change for a person over the course of their life. Certain events can change a person a person for the better or the worse,” This cause to happen from a boy name Elie Wiesel from the book called Night by Elie Wiesel, Memoir. It cause from Elie changing his life to him being a religious and studios boy to him stop believing in god. Over the course of Night, Elie’s identity has changed tremendously. Elie went from being a studios boy who was very religious to a kid who started to die from the inside and thinking about nothing.

Read More
867 Words | 4 Pages

Elie survives the Holocaust through a battle of conscience – first believing in God, then resisting his faith in God, and ultimately replacing his faith with obligation to his father. Elie begins his journey through the Holocaust as a firm believer of Judaism and of his God, using his faith as a motivation to carry on during his ordeal. The last of the Jews

Read More
684 Words | 3 Pages

One that is already believing cannot simply stop believing in something like that. But one can change is opinion on and view on Elie’s faith was tested many times in Night. There was many a time where he questioned god and his belief in him. After going through so much he eventually lost his faith. Elie has gone through so much that his faith or even his will to live and survive after his father died are all gone.

Read More
478 Words | 2 Pages

At the beginning of Night, Elie was someone who believed fervently in his religion. His experiences at Auschwitz and other camps, such as Birkenau and Buna have affected his faith immensely. Elie started to lose his faith when he and his father arrived at Birkenau. They saw the enormous flames rising from a ditch, with people being thrown in.

Read More
760 Words | 4 Pages

and it changed him. In the book, Night, the main theme, is religion and belief which is shown when Elie talks about the his strong religion and belief as a boy, his disconnection from religion, and the inhumane actions the Nazi 's caused. Having such a strong belief in something and then dramatically changing how you think, is a very significant event. During this time, many people questioned where God truly was. Even Elie was questioning where God was.

Read More
451 Words | 2 Pages

I concurred with a job. I was not denying his existence, but I doubted his absolute justice.” Elie is not denying the fact that God doesn’t exist, but little by little he’s getting separated farther from him. In conclusion Elie’s faith towards God does shift around throughout the story.

Read More
767 Words | 4 Pages

Religion is something that many people have consistently believed in and turned to in times of need and support. Some of these people rely on their faith more than their own family and friends. Their religion is their entire life and they can’t imagine their lives without it. Imagine a scenario that’s so terrible that God won’t take you out of it. These people will wonder where God is and pray for Him to come.

Read More
779 Words | 4 Pages

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.

Read More
712 Words | 3 Pages

The cruelty of the German officers at the concentration camps change Elie’s personality throughout the novel. At the beginning of the novel, Elie is deeply religious and spends most of his time studying Judaism. However, by the end of the novel, Elie believes that God has been unjust to him and all the other Jews, and has lost most of his faith. The cruelty of the German officers also changed the other Jews as well. The events of the Holocaust forces the prisoners to fend for themselves, and not help others.

Read More
938 Words | 4 Pages

“Why do you cry when you pray? He asked, as thought he knew me well. “I don’t know”, I answered, troubled”. This moment shows that at the start of the book he believes in god because he is praying to god for a miracle to someone else that might really need it. The reader can infer that at this point he trust god and believes, which supports the argument that Elie changes from a person who believes in god to a person who only thinks about

Read More

More about Eliezer's Loss Of Faith Essay

Related Topics

Open Document