Journal #12: Chapter 12

In class discussion, my group talked about how life in Auschwitz was not true “living” and how the workers were no longer “men.” I also think that living in Auschwitz was not actually “living” as a human being. Rather than that, the workers were more like slaves or robots that obeyed their masters and followed every direction. They neither had joy nor excitement in Auschwitz. They almost had no emotions. They took everything passively and did not show desire to live. It was mostly the SS men’s fault that the workers did not have life because even their existence made the workers exhausted. However, I think it was also the workers’ fault to some extent that they let themselves lose their identity. If they tried very hard, they might not have been turned into wild beasts. If they concentrated on living as a man, then they might have been able to maintain their dignity. They were overwhelmed by the depressing atmosphere and allowed themselves to be nobody. But I believe that they should have tried harder.

Even though I questioned why God allowed this tragedy to happen, I still believe that the workers should have relied on God. According to the book, faith was not a part of the workers’ life. Many Christians blamed God and turned against Him; they stopped praying, talking to God, and believing in Him. Instead of relying on God, they denied their faith. As I wrote in another journal, there is always purpose in every event. God must have had plans for the people in Auschwitz. But the people did not allow intimate relationship with God. It always comes back to the very basic idea: that we [people] are impatient and all sinners.

Memorable Quotes:
“At bottom, we all had a certain read of changes: ‘When things change, they change for the worse’ was one of the proverbs of the camp. More generally, experience had shown us many times the vanity of every conjecture: why worry oneself trying to read into the future when no action, no word of ours could have the minimum influence?” (116).

“For living men, the units of time always have a value, which increases in ratio to the strength of the internal resources of the person living through them; but for us, hours, days, months spilled out sluggishly from the future into the past, always too slowly, a valueless and superfluous material, of which we sought to rid ourselves as soon as possible … For us, history had stopped” (117).

“… that there still existed a just world our side our own, something and someone still pure and hole, not corrupt, not savage, extraneous to hatred and terror; something difficult to define, a remote possibility of good, but for which it was worth surviving” (121).

“But Lorenzo was a man; his humanity was pure and uncontaminated, he was outside this world of negation. Thanks to Lorenzo, I managed not to forget that I myself was a man” (122).