About a week ago, Barnard College received another big name on campus. This iconic man, through his novels, philosophic teachings and civil activism, has not only become the voice of the Shoa (Hebrew for “voice of the people’s rememberance”) but also of all people being unjustly ignored and forgotten. Professor Elie Wiesel, a Hungarian Holocaust Jewish survivor, walked into a packed Diana Oval accompanied by our amazing President Spar, and the room went silent. As President Spar introduced Prof. Wiesel, we started comprehend how influential he really is.
Not only the writer of his personal account of the Holocaust, he is also a recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize along with 100 other honors, all culminating in his being considered as the “messenger of mankind.” The format of the event was 38 minutes of talk, “no more, no less”, as Prof. Wiesel assured the audience, followed by Q&A session. So, with his strong but poetic German accent, Prof. Wiesel began with a story about a man who voices the question of humanity—“Where am I?” This led us to one of his bigger teachings; we are all interconnected, all living through the same plight, so we must take care of each other, we need to keep an open heart and mind, or the world will never move forward. The key to a functional and healthy society, which he shared with us later on, is sensitivity and empathy; we need to be able to care and feel for others. “The worst thing to happen to a person,” Prof. Wiesel said “is to die thinking no one cares about you.” Prof. Wiesel gradually went into the topic of the Holocaust. He asked us: “Since we are we are all interconnected, is it even possible to believe that so many Jews were left in the dark about Hitler and Auschwitz?” When Prof. Wiesel was sent to the camps, not once did he know where he was going or what was going to happen to him. After being liberated from the camps and saw how little was being attributed to the voice of the Shoa, Prof. Wiesel vowed to be that voice, to be the voice of the survivors, to be the voice that will destroy injustice and, more importantly, indifference.
The connection between humans proved itself to be as strong as ever after the war as, in the light of such injustices, such indifference, such hatred, we did not stray from each other, but built back up our love, empathy and commitment to each other. Prof. Wiesel points out that he belongs to a generation betrayed by mankind and by God, left to be humiliated and dehumanized by Hitler. This generation can never stray away from each other, and in order to do that “we need to decided every day between hatred, humiliation and solitary, and love…” During the Q&A session, the question that were thinking was asked of Prof. Wiesel: “After so much hatred and humiliation, how can you move on to solidarity and love?” The professor’s answer was quick and simple: “It’s not our style to be bitter! What good would it do to hate those who hate?”
This article is written by a student writer from the Her Campus at Columbia Barnard chapter.