In the extract from “Maestro” by Peter Goldsworthy, the author discusses the protagonist, Paul, and how he and his family moved from the South to Darwin. They stay in a motel room the first night and the next day they visit their new house. It shows the relationship between the family and their environment, expressing their feelings about the situation. In the prose extract, the author illustrates a rough atmosphere which the protagonist immediately loves, unlike his family, in order to create characterisation through the family’s first impression of the new town. The text conveys Nancy as a strong-willed person by her initial rejection of her new circumstances and then she improves them by quickly moving forward with the situation, showing
Elie has just heard a tale of a son betraying his father and prays to God to help him never cross his father after not believing in God for a long time. The author tells the reader, “And in spite of myself, a prayer formed inside me, a prayer to this God in whom I no longer believed” (Wiesel 91). This reveals that despite Elie losing all his faith in God, he recognizes he’s at his weakest and prays to God to help him. He turns to God at the moment he believes he needs him most. Elie’s decision to pray is a significant turning point in Elie’s identity.
Because in His great might, He had created Auschwitz, Birkenau, Buna, and so many other factories of death?” (Wiesel 67). Eliezer tries to find out what this new God he discovered is all about. In the face of what Elie sees as God’s indifference to suffering, Elie seems to determine that God is not a someone that he can praise
Why did I breathe?” In the beginning of the memoir, Elie portrays himself as very religious and dedicated to his religious beliefs. He thought of praying as something with the same importance as living and breathing. (Wisel) “ For God’s sake, Where is God?”
As for me, I had ceased to pray... I was not denying His existence, but I doubted His absolute justice” (45). It is apparent here that the effect of the Holocaust on the Jewish people’s faith was delayed on some level. Elie refuses to pray to the God that apparently abandoned him. This is personified when he says he doubts that God has absolute justice.
Elie became independent from God and refused to view him as omnipotent, and therefore, Elie and the other inmates believed that“ [they] were masters of nature, masters of the world” (87). With the daunting experience that Elie had undergone, he felt that the camps had utterly devoured his identity and his soul, but because he suffered blisteringly and managed to abide, even if “ [he] was nothing but ashes now, [he] felt [himself] to be stronger than this Almighty to whom [his] life had been bound for so long” (68). Although Elie was at last, liberated from the concentration camp, the rigorous conditions and brutal treatments from the camps has weakened him physically, mentally, and spiritually. Elie, bereft of his faith and soul, looked into mirror for the first time after his liberation, and “from the depths of the mirror, a corpse was contemplating him” (115). Through tormenting sufferings and witnessing the mortifying decimation in the Holocaust, Elie’s faith is eventually dismantled
Elie’s faith and relationship with God is one of his top priorities. Elie believes he will find answers and strength in God. After this morning, Elie, along with many others, took a long, tiring, and grueling journey to the concentration camps. When they arrive at the camps, Elie can already see the awful things going on. He sees malnourished people, guards yelling, and people being carelessly beaten.
Oftentimes, the effects of traumatic experiences can transcend the importance or the gravity of original beliefs. With every passing day, Elie is seeing more and more innocent infants, children, men, and women dying all around him, simultaneously. However, as the survivors around him congregate and continue to pray to God on their own volition he is thoroughly confused. With the amount of deaths around him, he questions everything, and thinks aloud.
Elie is losing faith in God because he has been able to create Auschwitz, Birkenau, and Buna, which kills many. He says, “But now, I no longer pleaded for anything. I was no longer able to lament,” (68) demonstrating Elie’s full move-away from God. Elie’s identity is left insecure and he is now alone. Elie was not “terrible alone in a world without God, without men.”
Eliezer even asked his father to find him a master to guide him in his studies of Kabbalah which is an esoteric method of discipline which is a tradition in Judaism. This is illustrated when Eliezer states that, “One day I asked my father to find me a master to guide me in my studies of Kabbalah. ”(Pg.4) Eliezer was a observant and curious kid that had a huge interest in his religion. He even wanted to learn more about his religion
And in spite of myself, a prayer formed inside me, a prayer to this God in whom I no longer believed.” (Wiesel 91). This quote demonstrates the internal struggle between Elie and his faith. He is slowly losing his belief in God, who was once the meaning and center of his life. This quote shows how the extreme circumstances of the Holocaust can lead to the questioning and loss of once-strong bonds of faith, ultimately changing one's life forever.
During the events at Auschwitz, the Jews of the camp would often pray, but the justifiability of their prayers were questioned by Elie. He describes his confliction with an extreme amount of emotion, “Blessed be God's name? Why, but why would I bless him? Every fiber in me rebelled… He caused thousands of children to burn in his mass graves” (Wiesel 67).
Even though Elie is a young boy, he feels that his religion is the most crucial thing in his life. His faith was strong here, he had no doubts about it, he believed that praying was one of the most essential things in his life, like breathing. “Oh God, Master of the universe, in your infinite compassion have mercy on us. ”(Wiesel 20). When Elie and his family are first taken by the police and forced to run, he prays to God that he will have mercy on the Jewish people.
Elie’s spiritual and emotional journey during his transformation throughout the Holocaust made him a stronger person. During his time at the concentration camp, Elie started losing faith in God, family, and humanity which gave him challenges on his spiritual and emotional journey. On page 34, Elie was thinking, “Why should I sanctify His name? The Almighty, the eternal and terrible Master of the Universe, chose to be silent.
When Elie and his family are in Sighet, Elie has a passion for seeking out and learning more about his God and Kabbalah. At the beginning of the book, Eliezer is a deeply religious boy who studies the Torah and longs to know more about God. However, as he and his family are taken to contraction camps he begins to question his faith and the fairness of God. Throughout the whole time he constantly prays to god asking him to help in these horrible conditions. As things only go further downhill he still prays asking for help.
