When Wiesel was loaded on to a cattle car, carrying seventy-nine other people to the German concentration camp of Auschwitz, he had very little knowledge of what he was to encounter. Along with the fear of the unknown, he was about to experience the lowest standard of living that anyone could undergo. During his time at the concentration camps, Wiesel was starved to the point where they would eat the snow off of a man’s shoulder and where they would marvel at the sight of a piece of bread. In the novel he retells the sight of “dozens of starving men fought each other to the death for a few crumbs” (Wiesel 95). Along with starvation, the people in the concentration camps were required to work in deathly conditions such as the frigid weather with nothing but rags of clothing to warm their bodies. Wiesel suffers from the cold weather when he describes the pain he felt, “Toward the middle of January, my right foot began to swell because of the cold. I was unable to put it on the ground” (Wiesel 74). During his time in the concentration camps he was forced to make quick decisions that would determine whether he would be killed or if he would have another to live and suffer. He decides to endure the pain of his infected foot, and push through his decreasing health. Towards the beginning of his life, before he was sent to the concentration camps, Wiesel had undeniable faith in God and he wanted to further his studies of the cabbala. He read the Talmud during the day, spent his nights in the synagogue, and learned from the teachings of Moshe the Beadle. As Wiesel experiences life in the concentration camps, his faith in God slowly diminishes as he describes, “I did not deny God’s existence, but I doubted his absolute justice” (Wiesel 42). He cannot fathom why the God that he had worshiped and prayed to, could let an event such as the Holocaust happen to innocent people including himself and his family. Many of the Jews that were persecuted struggled in their faith and questioned where God was during their time at the concentration camps. Throughout the novel, Wiesel loses his emotions and his desire to believe in God when he says, “My eyes were open and I was alone—terribly alone in a world without God and without man. Without love or mercy. I had ceased to be anything but ashes, yet I felt myself stronger than the Almighty, to whom my life had been tied for so long” (Wiesel 65). Wiesel faces a profound struggle to keep his trust in God and to believe in the strength of his religion throughout the novel. The people who were sent to the German concentration camps faced death with every step they took. Every day, thousands of innocent people were brutally murdered, and thousands of people died from exhaustion. In the novel, Wiesel …show more content…
Although millions of innocent people died in these camps, Wiesel was able to survive due to his undeniable resilience. Numerous times, he looked death straight in the face and there was never a time where he was sure that he was going to survive this horrible genocide. With his strength and his will to overcome significant obstacles, Wiesel was able to survive the Holocaust and reveal to everyone what life was like for those who were captured. Resilience is a characteristic that only certain individuals obtain. There are those who are unable to face adversity and show weakness in difficult situations, however people who show undying strength to push through hard situations are the ones who will overcome almost any obstacle that is presented to