“The dark night of the soul”, is interpreted to suggest the darkness and terror of the nights that were experienced by many during the Holocaust. “Never shall I forget the nocturnal silence that deprived me for all eternity of the desire to live. Never shall I forget those moments that murdered my God and my soul and turned my dreams to ashes.” Elie’s quote about the horrors of his first night in the concentration camps expresses Elie’s thoughts of the nights in the holocaust and the darkness and hopelessness they possessed for him. Night to Elie represents the unknown and known horrors that were to be experienced by him and the many other Jews in the Holocaust. The night to Elie reflects the horrible experiences that await him at the ending of the night, and the unknown horrors of the Holocaust.

“No human race is superior, no religious faith is inferior. All collective judgments are wrong. Only racists make them.” This quote was made by Elie Wiesel in reference to faith and race, it is understood by this quote to mean that judging a person by a collective group is unjust and only a racist person would make a judgment about the personality of another by their race or faith. In the context of Night faith is considered to be the religion that you devote yourself to and follow and what you believe as an individual. Elie’s faith as a child was the Kabbalistic works, the secrets of Jewish mysticism. Elie devoted himself to the studies of Judaism in order to learn more about the Jewish faith and learn more of what he so devoutly followed. Although as components in Elie’s life became altered with the holocaust his faith also altered, becoming questioned and leaving Elie unsure of what he believed. Night expresses ideas about faith through Elie’s altering thoughts about his religion and the faith of others in the camps as Hitler attempts to destroy the religious faith of the Jewish entirely, showing the different ideas individual people have about faith and race.

“From the depths of the mirror, a corpse was contemplating me.” When Elie Wiesel looks in the mirror at the end of the novel this is what he sees himself as; a corpse contemplating the small insignificant gap between life and death. This small quote from Elie ends the novel, showing the dehumanization the Jews had experienced throughout these years. This image shows the starvation, the excruciating pain and torture that was experienced by Jews during the holocaust in an attempt to eliminate their race. Elie Wiesel has so amazingly captured the closeness the people in the concentration camps were to death and how they became to be in this situation, so far away from feeling like a actual human being.

Elie Wiesel as a young boy in Sighet is an innocent child with out a worry in the world except that of his studies in the Kabbalistic works, the secrets of Jewish mysticism. As Hitler begins to take power in Germany, Elie becomes more and more involved with the Kabbalistic works but his worries increase as the beginnings of Hitler’s “final solution” start. Elie now has to look out for more than just his education, he now has the worries of the world upon his shoulders. Death is now so close and God feels so far away to Elie as the dehumanization and the darkness takes over his mind, body and soul. “Blessed be God’s name? Why, but why would I bless Him? Every fiber in me rebelled. Because He caused thousands of children to burn in His mass graves?...” Elie as a child of the holocaust now questioned his belief in God and his relationship with himself. Throughout Elie’s experiences in the novel his relationship with himself and his faith changes, “For the first time, I felt anger rising within me. Why should I sanctify His name?...”. Elie became more aware of himself and the others around him as he was intoxicated by the darkness and inhuman experiences he experienced in the holocaust. As Elie travels between life and death he realizes a lot about himself and grows into a different person leaving behind the young boy and his firm beliefs in God. As Elie grows his beliefs in God become altered and he no longer knows what he believes, but he becomes more aware of who he is himself and what is important to him. Elie Wiesel (center) as a young boy in Sighet.