Preview

Eliezer's Relationship with His Father

Good Essays
Open Document
Open Document
752 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Eliezer's Relationship with His Father
Eliezer’s Relationship with his Father

In his book, Night, Elie Wiesel spoke about his experience as a young Jewish boy in the Nazi concentration camps. During this turbulent time period, Elie described the horrifying events that he lived through and how that affected the relationship with his father. Throughout the book, Elie and his father’s relationship faced many obstacles. In the beginning, Elie and his father have much respect for one another and at the end of the book, that relationship became a burden and a feeling of guilt. Their relationship took a great toll on them throughout their journey in the concentration camps.
As the story begins, Wiesel said, “My father was a cultured man, rather unsentimental. He rarely displayed his feelings, not even with his family, and was more involved with the welfare of others than with that of his own kind”. Chlomo, Elie’s father, was well respected in the Jewish community of Sighet. In Sighet, numerous members of the community came to meet with him for many unknown reasons. Wiesel felt that his father devoted too much time to make others happy and not enough to time with his own family. When Elie decided to take his studies of religion into greater exploration, his father dismissed his idea and claimed that he was too young. This is proof that the two did not have a strong bond but many different views of how to do things in life.
Their lives took a turn for the worst when the Wiesel family were forcefully taken and placed into cattle cars to Auschwitz, a concentration camp. Elie’s view began to change and he started to see his father as someone who he admires and did not want to lose. As the family arrived at Birkenau they are given the order "Women and children to the left. Men to the right." Elie was young and could have gone with either his mother and sister or father, but instead he decided to stay with his father who would have stayed all by himself if Elie had not joined him. At this moment,



Cited: Wiesel, Elie. Night. 1st ed. New York: Hill & Wang, 2006.

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Satisfactory Essays

    The author Elie Wiesel's relationship with his father was really strong. He was close to his dad than his mother or his sisters. If he would have choose between his father, mother, or his sisters. He definitely will choose his father rather than his mom or sisters. In the quote, "I glanced over at my father. How changed he looked! His eyes were veiled. I wanted to tell him something. But I didn't know what." It tells how Elizer had fear of losing his father that's why he choose to go where his father was going each and everytime. No one can see their father in much pain. So may be because of that he glances at his fathers d says nothing. This tells us that Elie can do anything for his father and he loves him so…

    • 139 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    In the beginning of his memoir, Elie Wiesel had a distant relationship with his father. Wiesel mentions that “he rarely displayed his feelings, not even with his family” his father kept to himself and didn't open up to anybody, causing an unhealthy relationship with his son, Eliezer Wiesel. He later goes on and says, “he was always more involved with the welfare of others than with that of his own kin” Wiesel’s…

    • 301 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Elie clings to his father, and his father to him. Elie did not believe his surroundings, he could not bare to consider that idea that the Nazi’s were really slaughtering the Jews, until he saw live babies being thrown into fiery graves. That is when Elie realized that not everything is good, and that there are bad things in the world. During this time Elie’s father cried- this was the first time Elie had ever seen his father cry. Elie’s father begins to soften and break under the pressures of camps. Elie and his father are forced to work and get little to eat, and grow weaker and weaker by the days, however they still keep going. Elie saw and experienced many things each time he lost more and more faith until one day he saw a young boy on hung, and he said that God died with that young boy on the gallows that day. Elie was becoming colder as he experienced the harsh reality of concentration camps, and Elie’s father was becoming weaker and more dependent on Elie as he experience…

    • 543 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    His father was a busy community leader and he did not have much time for his family. In the beginning of the memoir, Elie noted his father was more concerned with others than with his family. As the atrocities of the camps escalated, it was a major goal of Elie’s to stay with his father. In the camps, their relationship changed drastically to one of protection. Elie’s outlook on family was very different inside the camps. His father went from barely caring for him to being a protective father and depending on each other for survival. After seeing the rest of his family disappear, he knew his father was his last relative so he clung to him. However, as life in the camps continued, there were times Elie resented having to take care of his father and began to blame him for their troubles. An example of this was while his father was being beaten. Elie thought “... if I felt anger at that moment, it was not directed at the Kapo but at my father. Why couldn’t he have avoided Idek’s wrath? That was what life in a concentration camp had made of me …” (54). The camps were filling Elie with anger and blame; he was upset because his father was getting hurt and his innocence was stripped from him. This is what the camps were trying to accomplish - break people down so they could not rebel successfully and in this case they succeeded. Another example of a time when Elie disliked having to take care of his father was…

    • 705 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Elie had to make a lot of changes to his lifestyle. When they first got to the camp him and his father got separated from his mother and sister. Elie says “Never shall I forget that night, the first night in camp, which turned my life into one long night.” (43) Elie went with his dad because he was more like his dad than he was his mom. There was one major change and it was with his dad. In the beginning he would do almost anything to keep his dad with him and make sure his dad was okay. When his dad started to get beat, he would not move or say anything even when his dad cried out to him for help because he was scared for his own life. Elie cared for his dad to a great extent but when it came to his own life he would not help his…

    • 1143 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The concentration camps and death camps ruled by the Nazis during WWII were littered with people who could live no longer, who had no strength to go on. These people would commit suicide by electric fence, or find a reason to get shot. Just so they could end their suffering. These victims are the ones who had nothing, the people whose dearest belongings were inanimate and abandoned at home. However, Elie Wiesel had something not many had; a father in the camps with him. Together they lived for each other. Simply having one other person who one could rely on kept the pair alive, almost out of the camps. The father-son pair stayed alive longer because together they suffered to try to stay together, they kept loyal to each other, and they stayed alive so that the other could live.…

    • 868 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    During the holocaust, many people suffered due to the loss of their loved ones. The memoir Night by Elie Wiesel tells the story of what those who did not meet Hitler’s expectations while creating a superior race had to endure at the concentration camps. Thesis By using symbolism and setting, Wiesel creates the message that love is sacrificed in order to survive.…

    • 365 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Night by Elie Wiesel, allows readers to find themselves trapped within the life of Elie himself. In both the 1954 and 1958 versions, we find many devices such as tone, syntax, diction, and personal references being used. As the twists and turns of the Holocaust unfold from the Jewish perspective, the true meaning of remembrance is tested. The purpose of the 1954 ending is to inform the reader of his perspective and his reason for writing this infectious novel. The purpose of the 1958 ending was to portray a sense of deep infliction that the Holocaust left upon Elie. The novel’s endings differ in the uses of their rhetorical devices, but are quite similar, in that they use almost the same rhetorical devices.…

    • 1010 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    Elie Wiesel's Night

    • 708 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Elie Wiesel in the novel, Night, illustrates how his life went during, arguably, the worst time in recorded history, the Holocaust. Elie Wiesel was born in Hungary, 1928, and was the age of 15 when he first was sent to auschwitz. He went thru many devastations during his time in the Holocaust and with him being one of not so many people to survive this period of time he’s able to tell his story now. Elie’s father, Shlomo, was another huge character in this book. He was a Jewish leader and had to go threw the Holocaust knowing everything he worked for is being destroyed and ripped from his hands and there's nothing he could do about it. Although Elie tries his best to keep his father's hope alive. Due to the Holocaust Elie had to go threw changes such as His whole family, religion and Race be destroyed and taken from him in a short period of time, and he went thru terrible living conditions and a overall bad way to live.…

    • 708 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    After Elie Wiesel and his family neglect to flee the Jewish town of Sighet, Transylvania back in 1944, they start to experience the very brutality of what is today known as the “Holocaust.” They were taken from their homes, stripped of their valuables, and severely tortured beyond human limits. In this dark story, the reader can experience pain and suffering like they have never experienced it before by looking through the eyes of the young Elie Wiesel. For a person to endure as much suffering as Elie did, they would have to be very strong. They would have to have very strong morals, and have something very important to fight for. People suffer everyday, whether it be lightly or heavily. However, it all is the same. In the story “Night” by Elie Wiesel, he utilizes the concepts of comradeship, love,…

    • 670 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Nothing in human history can compare to the barbarity and the atrocities that were committed in the Nazi concentration/death camps. In the book Night by Elie Wiesel, he describes in detail the horrific events and tragedies that he experienced during the concentration camps. He talks about how he lost his family and how his relationship with his father transitions throughout the story. Elie describes how his relationship with his father evolves from them being distant, to them getting closer, to Elie helping his dad, to his dad becoming his burden.…

    • 729 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    In the beginning of “Night” Elie is very interested in religion: he wants to study the Kabbalah. When he tells his father about this on page 4, his father does not encourage him to study. Instead he says, a bit condescendingly it seems, “You are too young for that. Maimonides tells us that one must be thirty before venturing into the world of mysticism, a world fraught with peril. First you must study the basic subjects, those you are able to comprehend.” Elie proceeds to say that his father “wanted to driver the idea of studying Kabbalah from my mind,” showing that he wasn’t supportive of Elie’s decisions and future. Afterwards, Elie states “My father was a cultured man, rather unsentimental. He rarely displayed his own feelings, not even within his family, and was more involved in the welfare of others than with that of his own kin. On page 18, Elie tells that when they were first sent away, before anything terrible happened, his mother was the one to send him and his siblings to bed early in order to conserve their strength. She tucks them in and comforts them, while his father just tells them…

    • 788 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    Elie Wiesel Biography

    • 2204 Words
    • 9 Pages

    Elie was born on September 30,1928 in Sighet, Transylvania (which would later become present day Romania). Wiesel says “I wanted to come back to Sighet to tell you the story of my death” (page: 5). This was Wiesel not believing he was going to be able to survive the torture of the concentration camps he was experiencing. His name given to him at birth was Eliezer Wiesel. His parents, Sarah and Shlomo had four children. Elie was the 3rd child and the only boy out of all four children. Elie had an interest in learning about Hebrew Literature, he acquired his liking for this from his father. Shlomo was the owner of a grocery store and Sarah was the son of a farmer. The Wiesel Family grew up in a very small village. They used Yiddish as there language they use around the house. Elie learned how to speak Hungarian, Romanian and Germany. Elie as a young boy enjoyed folk tales and mystical storys about Hassidic sect of Judaism. Elie had to experience people on the train that were starving, including him and would literally kill for food. The Wiesel family was on the train to Auschwitz-Birkenau for about three days at the beginning of June in the year 1944. The prisoners traveling to the death camps including the Wiesel’s would eat the snow because it was just about all they could eat because they were not provided anything to eat, besides bread. The amount of bread the German guards would throw into…

    • 2204 Words
    • 9 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    Elie Wiesel Journey

    • 744 Words
    • 3 Pages

    While the Jews praised God during the Jewish New Year, Wiesel realizes that to believe in the faith that had previously taken priority in his life is foolish and states "My eyes had opened and I was alone, terribly alone in a world without God, without man. Without love or mercy. I was nothing but ashes now, but I felt myself to be stronger than this Almighty to whom my life had been for so long. In the midst of these men assembled for prayer, I felt like an observer, a stranger." (Page 68) Wiesel had come to the conclusion that if God would allow these horrendous events to take place, then he no longer wanted to place his faith in God or in his fellow man. Later when Elie and his father had arrived in Buchenwald, Elie's father pleads for him to leave so that he can "sleep" because he is so exhausted. They then have to go inside the block until the next morning and Elie realizes he had left his father and states "When I woke up it was daylight. that is when I remembered that I had a father. During the alert, I had followed the mob, not taking care of him. I knew he was running out of strength, close to death and yet I had abandoned him." (Page 106) During the alert, Wiesel focuses solely on his own survival, despite his weakening father being right next to him. Wiesel's experiences in the camp caused him to abandon not only his beliefs, but for a brief period of time he also abandoned his father to ensure his…

    • 744 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Life Is Beautiful

    • 712 Words
    • 3 Pages

    In Night, Elie’s father Shlomo was his only reason for living, Throughout the book they were put through many hard obstacles in their time there but always came to each other for a will to live. “My hand tightened its grip on my father. All I could think of was not to lose him. Not to remain alone.” Terrified of separating they continued together no matter what the cost was. Elie struggles with…

    • 712 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays