History has many messages as well as secrets in store for people to learn from. Through knowing one’s history well, one may avoid passed mistakes too; it is according to one’s history that one can take a better path for living and be aware of previous misdeeds and folly. Along with this, one may even have an idea of things that s/he was not aware of before. Through understanding history, many secrets and facts can be revealed. In short, by knowing one’s history well, one can argue about facts with conviction and refute those who taint historical events.
In view of history being on one’s side,
it can be said that events in history such as
the Holocaust can help one not to forget the millions
that suffered under the cruelty of the German
Nazis. Indeed, the forms of cruelty that the Germans
used were of different kinds, leaving scars in
the minds of those who miraculously survived.
Starvation was one of the means they used to break
their prisoners spiritually, psychologically and
physically. In this way they ultimately accomplished
their goal of exterminating the Jews (Levi, 1994).
Those that survived, thankfully, did not abandon people today, as they recorded their experiences and their thoughts in graphic detail. Some of these writers wrote explicitly on their experiences while others were more cryptic. The latter wrote few words that carry hundreds of interpretations, but yet all these interpretations come down to their experiences of unbelievable suffering (Levi, 1994).
Examples of literature that relate the immense cruelty inflicted on the Jews to people of today are Paul Celan's ‘Death Fugue’, and Primo Levi's ‘Survival in Auschwitz’. Celan’s ‘Death Fugue’ are verses describing suffering at the time of the Holocaust while Levi’s ‘Survival in Auschwitz’ is a novel with detailed descriptions of the event. Though both these forms of literature contrast considerably regarding their lengths and the forms they use, the core similarity between them is that they both use a common baseline, and this refers to the denial of ‘food’ for holocaust prisoners. It also refers to the type of ‘eating’ that is manifested in both the literary accounts. ‘Eating’ and ‘hunger’ are two vital elements in both texts, and they both describe the plight of the Jews in concentration camps. In describing the depressing and unbelievable experience of these people, there are literal as well as symbolic significance that surface (Levi, 1994).
‘Eating’ in both Celan's ‘Death
Fugue’, and Levi's ‘Survival in Auschwitz’
refers to the process of individuals working the
camps have to consume food in order to keep on
working. This is the literal meaning, and was
a real situation in which they were. Aside from
this real situation, it might be said that the
symbolic meaning of ‘eating’ refers
to the need to keep on going; they all needed
a spirit to keep themselves going. In a sense
food and eating for families would mean that there
is an element of sharing. However, in times of
greatest despair food may not have been shared.
Particularly among strangers all put together
in one camp would not want to share whatever they
had. In fact, times were so hard for these people
that they would trade their food. The extent to
which food was treated as a commodity is simply
unbelievable. One cannot bring him or herself
to think what a condition the Nazi’s compelled
the Jews to live in. Even the tiniest of food
quantity were being traded in camps (Levi, 1994).
One prisoner would manage to attain a bit of bread in exchange for a few pieces of potato from the bottom of his soup. These minute quantities of trade that took place with concentration camps magnify the value of food and eating in order to live. In a spiritual sense, it is worth saying that even the tiniest piece of food kept individuals going in their daily drudgery. However, in a round about way, it is this very food they salvaged that kept them working for the Nazis until they dropped dead (Levi, 1994). This is why it is worth quoting Celan’s Death Refugue:
“Black milk of daybreak we drink you at night
we drink you at midday and morning we drink you at evening
we drink and we drink” (Death Fugue, 2004)
It is evident from these lines that the captives were not only deprived of food, they were also denied proper living, which is to say that they did not have a life of their own. They did not know what was to become of them. They had no access to the outside world, and they did not have anything on their side that even men today in prisons have. Denial of information from the outside world dulls ones mind, and this is precisely what happened to these people in the concentration camps (Death Fugue, 2004).
In addition to this, there was hardly any communication
between the captives; they wee dulled in their
heads from starvation. Another reason for them
being dulled in their heads was because of the
starvation of knowledge; being cut off from access
to information, they were dulled. Hence, they
did not know what was to become of them. Hence,
these poor people had been turned into non-humans
(Death Fugue, 2004).
Just as advised by philosophical thought of his time, Hitler knew that he had to dominate, he also was aware of the fact that if he did not dominate there would be others who would do it. It is because of this thought that he felt that if I he did not accomplish what he so easily could there would be other nations that would dominate the Germans. His response to these views was to capture and starve those that he thought were degenerate (Hillesum, 1991).
Since the Germans were in fact dominated by the richer classes (mainly the Jews) Hitler was aware of his people’s economic sufferings. It is on the basis of this that he decided to cleanse the land of the ‘degenerate’. The ‘degenerate’ however included gays and lesbians and anything that stood in the way of the Nazi cause. This explains why he treated them as though they were not human, and this also coincides with the notion that human beings need their rights to information, food, and every kind of freedom that others have.
It is considered a sin to cut one off from information in contemporary times. It is everyone’s right to have knowledge and know what is going on. An example of this is the freedom of the people and the freedom of the press; this demonstrates the need for human beings to know and to find out what they do not know. If human beings are denied these rights, then it can be said that they are not living human lives (Hillesum, 1991).
In view of denying human beings their right to
the food for the mind (knowledge and information)
and denying them of real food for biological consumption,
it can be asserted that those who were responsible
for the Holocaust are well encompassed in Dante’s
Inferno. This is because they fit into several
categories of the Inferno. The following are few
points of Dante’s Inferno that are underlined,
and it is these categories into which the Nazis
fit:
- Circle One - Those in limbo
- Circle Two - The lustful (because they are
greedy and want to take over Europe.
- Circle Three - The gluttonous (because they
take it all for themselves and take more than
what they need or deserve)
- Circle Four - The hoarders (because they
keep away information, and have it themselves)
- Circle Five - The wrathful (because they
are hateful)
- Circle Six - The heretics
- Circle Seven - The violent (because of the
brutality they unleashed on innocent people)
- Circle Eight - The Fraudulent
- Circle Nine – Traitors (because they
have been traitors to humanity by denying human
beings of their very basic needs) (Dante’s
Inferno, 2004)
These being the Nine Circles of Sin according to Dante’s Inferno, one can see how the Nazi’s fit into it. The sinners in the nine circles of hell are guilty of one of three types of sin:
- Incontinence: Evil action arises from losing control of natural appetites and desires
- Brutishness: Evil action arises from attraction to things which repulse the healthy soul
- Malice / Vice: Evil action arises from abuse of reason, a human's most god-like quality (Dante’s Inferno, 2004)
The Circles of Sin listed above along with the
three main categories of sin would in most cases
lead to individuals being aware of their actions
and therefore avoiding these sins and winding
up in the fires of hell (Dante’s Inferno,
2004).
In view of this, it hardly seems possible how
an individual could have thought of punishing
so many people for the sake of their race or sex.
This entire behavior is against reasonable human
thought. Beyond doubt, it is true that Hitler
had attempted this kind of action and indeed succeeded
to a great extent. However, his actions were not
enough to wipe out particular races of groups
from Germany. His wrath for Jews was insufficient
to extinguish the hunger of human beings in camps
(From Survival in Auschwitz, 2004). At least those
who lived would go on to survive even if there
were several that still perished after they were
freed because of malnutrition. This is worth considering
in spite of the fact that Nazi sentiments prevailed
even after the Second World War, Jews still lived,
and they could once again have food, both in a
literal form as well as a symbolic form. It is
even surprising how the people who suffered these
atrocities still managed to survive so long to
tell their stories.
While considering the manner in which the Nazis treated the Jews, it must be noted that the cruel actions of Hitler can hardly be digested. However, one may assert that the views that Celane’s and Levi’s literature provide their readers significant understanding of what was the case with Hitler and his racial and other sentiments. In addition to Hitler’s anti-Jew sentiments that he largely denied of food, his hatred for gays and determination to transform gays and lesbians into regular men and women certainly defines his beliefs or fears as well.
The difference between his sentiments for Jews
and gays was that he though he could change gays
while he wanted to exterminate Jews. It seems
that Hitler was not actually afraid but believed
in what he did. His belief in a round about way
had caused him and his followers to sin against
humanity. Having starved so many people and ill-treated
them, he starved his own people of free thought
and open mindedness. It is evident through Levi’s
and Celan’s literature that there is irony
as well; not only did Hitler starve his prisoners
of food literally and metaphorically, but he also
blinded his own people (Insdorf, 1990).
Even if Hitler was really afraid of the ‘degenerate’
he was well aware of what had to be done in order
to establish a pure race. He probably was also
aware that homosexuality would not be so easily
erased from German society. So, perhaps he had
to make use of the ethnic cleansing that he was
conducting in the form of overworking and starving
his prisoners (Langer, 1978).
It can be observed from the above discussion that starvation does not only refer to the physical type of starvation that Hitler intended. Of course he did try to starve the Jews in camps in every way possible to break them mentally as well as physically, but it is spiritual and psychological starvation that can bring humanity to its knees. This is indeed what Celan and Levi attempt telling their readers, as starvation takes place in a number of ways, and though one may even consume food to stay physically alive, a person can be mentally and spiritually dead.
Keeping in mind the cruelty that went on against the Jews during the Second World War, there have been attempts to reconcile the reality of evil with belief in the sacred. If this were not done then there would probably be a distinct line drawn between those that are good and those that are bad, and in this process there would be many races in the world that would even be termed good or bad (Ezrahi, 1982).
Though Celan and Levi explicitly do relate their accounts of the Holocaust to the Nazis, it must also be mentioned that they do not hold any other Germans responsible for the starvation of the Jews. They have simply related accounts of what starvation enforced by the Nazis did to the prisoners. It is clear enough finally that the writers have intended to make clear how starvation can take place in other forms as well, which include the literal one, starvation of spirituality, and starvation of the mind as well. It is all these forms of starvation that dull a person to such a degree that s/he forgets how much humanity is left within. |