In the memoir, Night by Elie Wiesel (September, 1960), the protagonist discovers that, even though he is in a rough situation and everyone around him is beginning to give up on themselves, he still maintains his faith and goal in mind and continues to endure what he does and tries to overcome the situation. Told in 1st person point of view, the author supports his theme by describing the setting of a young boy in the Holocaust, in one of the most dangerous concentration camps in Germany, Auschwitz, establishing a major conflict of him losing his father and potentially his life. Even though people are struggling to keep their lives, after seeing multiple people die right in front of their eyes, people still maintain their faith and hopes after such hardships.
A reason why faith is so important, is because faith gives the motivation to advance and continue forward toward the goal, Without it, one would give up on what they are going for and not bother to do anything else about it. In the memoir, Elie is separated from his father and does not see him anywhere in the camp, right after they announced inspection (a check-in with every person to see if they are fit enough to live or not). After his frantic panic to find him, he recounts, “There was no longer any reason to live.” (97). The moment he realizes what could potentially happen to his father, he gives up very easily. His father is like his final string to sanity and hope to him. Without it, he would not even try to live anymore and he would just accept it and die.
A second reason as to why faith is so important, is because it helps you reach your goals, and overcome your fears. A good example of this would be from a passage from the book. When Elie is in a shack, crowded with people around him scared to sleep for what they think will happen to them, “The sound of a violin,” (94) Even though they are on the brink of death and everyone is scared for themselves because anything could happen at any given moment; he held onto his faith until the very moment and got over his fears, so he could play the violin one last time, in the middle of a hellhole.
A final reason why faith can get so valuable is because it keeps everyone together and it runs hope through their veins. Everyone in the beginning are worrying, not only for themselves but for their peers and “brothers” that are with them in the hardship of the camp. A passage from the book, is when Elie gets messed up and is bleeding from a beating from one of the guards. As he retreats to rest, a French girl, who was also within the camp, comes up to him and begins to treat some of his wounds. “Bite your lips, little brother… don’t cry. Keep your anger and hatred for another day, for later on” (51). She doesn’t want him to revolt and to have gone through everything to just lose it and not go for the final goal. Freedom.
Faith over all means everything within the context of the text. The moment Elie give up, everything is lost for him. This theme can highlight other themes because it can give out motivation and hope to continue going for the final goal. Some of the connections that we can make to the experience is how often we, as a society give up on faith because it doesn’t really affect us as much as it would back then, and if we were to give up how we do now, back in the holocaust, we would be done for. Where we can go from here is to try to give in a little more effort in life as we live right now and try to accomplish more things, because we actually can accomplish most of the things we give up on.
