Pre-Ap English 10 - Night Essay

Yumna Salih

Pre-Ap English 10

Ms.Ruland

Night Essay

Albert Einstein once said, “Two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity; and I'm not sure about the universe”.  Human stupidity is a flaw in human nature that can cause drastic atrocities like the holocaust. Human stupidity also influences human behaviors like cruelty and selfishness. In Elie Wiesel’s Night, Elie’s opinion of human nature is that some humans are inherently evil, however Elie learns that everyone is inherently evil when they are pushed to their limits.

In Night, the Nazi’s were the most evil of mankind that there was. They Nazi’s threatened the Jews with death as soon as they walked through the doors of the concentration camps. Elie questions the humanity of the Nazi’s as well as the humanity of the world when he sees Jewish families being burned in the crematoriums. “How was it possible that men, women, and children were being burned and that the world kept silent?” (Wiesel 59). This was the first major event in the story that made Elie wonder if there was any humanity left in the world at all after the cruelty he experienced during his first night at the camp. In another instance, the Nazi’s tattooed number on the arms of the prisoners: they completely stripped the identities of the people being imprisoned in the camp. Elie recalled, “I became A-7713. After that I had no other name” (Wiesel 42).  This showed the lack of identity the prisoners had and how they were treated as subhuman under the imprisonment of the Nazi’s.  Elie’s opinion on human nature did not change throughout the entirety of the book. It only increased as the Nazi abuse became more cruel and frequent. Idek, an SS soldier was one particularly inhumane Nazi soldier. One day, Idek lost control of himself and began to beat Elie’s father. “And he began to beat him with an iron bar. At first my father crouched under the blows, then he broke into two, like a dry tree struck by lightning” (Wiesel 54).  With every passing day, Elie’s perspective on human nature became progressively worse because of the abuse and suffering caused by the Nazi soldiers; and, the abuse many prisoners received from other prisoners was just as harsh.

Under harsh conditions, the prisoners in concentration camps turn on themselves causing more death and pain for the Jewish people and other victims of the holocaust. An example of this is when Elie and his father first get assigned to a bunker under a Gypsy and his father asked where he could find a bathroom. Elie recalled, “The Gypsy stared at him for a long time…then, as if waking from a deep sleep, he slapped my father with such force…”. The Gypsy had become like a second SS soldier, one that tortured the prisoners inside the barracks. Prisoners hurt each other out of pure survival instinct; but, the incident on the train showed that it was quite deadly for the prisoners. The prisoners had been travelling for days with little to no food. The SS soldiers began moving them to avoid capture by the allied forces. While in the train wagon a piece of bread fell that caused panic amongst the prisoners. During the struggle over the piece of bread, Elie remembers, “The old man mumbled something, groaned, and died. Nobody Cared.” (Wiesel 101) During that moment, it became evident to Elie that human nature was in fact inherently evil. The last example of humanity’s evil was during the march between the towns. An old rabbi and his son that Elie knew were part of the march. The son seemed to run faster than his father, almost like he was trying to leave him behind and Elie couldn’t understand why. Later on, Elie lies to his father about if he received food or not. In that moment Elie realized,” Just like Rabbi Eliahu’s son, I had not passed the test”. (Wiesel 107). Just like Rabbi’s son had left his father to die, Elie had left his father to die as well. The selfishness of human nature not only lived in others, it lived within Elie himself.