Reflections on Yom HaShoah 2008

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By Rabbi Michael Samuel | Tuesday, May 06, 2008 |

Martin Gilbert in his book “The Holocaust” tells the story about a 16-year-old named Zvi Michalowski. On Sept. 27, 1941, Zvi was supposed to be executed with 3,000 other Lithuanian Jews. He had fallen into the pit a fraction of a second before the Nazis shot their guns.

That night, he crept out of the pit and fled to the closest village. He knocked on a door of a peasant, who saw this naked man, covered with blood. He begged the elderly widow and said, “I am Lord Jesus Christ. I came down from the cross. Look at me — the blood, the pain, the suffering of the innocent. Let me in.” The widow threw herself at his feet and begged for forgiveness and she hid him for three days. The young man managed to survive as a partisan.

One cannot help but compare this anecdote to Jesus’ words in Matthew 25:35-40:

“You may remember, I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, I was naked and you gave me clothing, I was sick and you took care of me, I was in prison and you visited me. ... Truly I tell you, just as you did it to one of the least of these who are members of my family, you did it to me.”

What does the human face say to me when no words are ever said? The human face says, “Look at me; treat me with humanity; I am like you.” In the parable of Jesus, the First Century rabbi gently reminds his disciples that kindness and compassion must find tangible expression in the language of good deeds.

According to the French philosopher and Holocaust survivor Emmanuel Levinas, the human face always challenges us to respond ethically toward others. No commandment even need be given. When I see the human face looking back at me, I cannot deny its humanity without destroying my own in the process. In the age of push-button warfare, it is so easy to kill millions without ever having to look at the human face that commands us to be aware of our mutual humanity.

Remembering the victims of the Holocaust must be more than a brief recollection. How we remember the death of the 6 million is important, for as the philosopher George Santayana said, “He who forgets the past is condemned to repeat it.”

The ghost of Adolf Hitler is alive and well in Iran’s Mahmud Ahmadinejad, whose Holocaust denial has made him a cult-hero to many of his fellow religious fanatics, even as he develops the nuclear weapons to someday create a new Holocaust in Israel. The world cannot afford to take a passive or indifferent attitude toward the one country that has done more to export international terror than any other terrorist organization in the last several decades.

Yes, the human face demands a response. But how we ultimately respond to the bellicose threats of this demented regime will determine the fate of millions in the world today.

As always, the choice is in our hands.

Rabbi Michael Samuel is with the Tri-City Jewish Center, Rock Island.