1. Night By Elie Wiesel “to remain silent and indifferent is the greatest sin of all…”

2. Eliezer Wiesel  Born on September 30, 1928  Born in Sighet, Transylvania

3. Eliezer Wiesel  Parents owned and operated a grocery store  Mother was also a teacher  Had two older sisters, Hilda and Bea  Had one younger sister, Tsiporah  Credits his maternal grandfather with his love of storytelling

4. Education  At 3 years old, he began attending a Jewish school where he learned Hebrew, Bible, and Talmud  Thought it was a waste of time to read novels  Spent time talking with Moshe, a caretaker in his synagogue

5. War Begins  1940 – the Nazis turn Sighet over to Hungary  1942 – Hungarian governmnet ruled that all Jews who could NOT prove Hungarian citizenship would be transferred to Nazi-held Poland and murdered. The only person from Sighet who was sent to Poland and escaped was Moshe. He returned to Sighet to tell his story. No one believed him. 

6. War Begins  1942 – Elie celelbrated his bar mitzvah.  He continued studying and became particularly interested in Kabbalah, Jewish mysticism.  He began studying astrology, parapsychology, hypnotism, and magic.

7. War Begins  1944 – German soldiers occupy Sighet  Forced the Jews to wear yellow stars  Closed Jewish stores, raided their houses and created ghettos  In May, deportations began  The Wiesel’s Christian maid, Maria, invited them to hide in her hut in the mountains, but they refused, preferring to stay with the jewish community.

8. Deportation  June 1944 – Wiesels were among the last of the Jews to be loaded into cattle cars  80 people to each cattle car  Wiesel later wrote, “Life in the cattle cars was the death of my adolescence.”  After four days, the train stopped at Auschwitz.

9. Auschwitz  Elie was only 15 years old, but took the advice of a fellow prisoner and told the SS officer he was 18 and in good health  He and his father were assigned to slave labor  His mother and younger sister were taken to the gas chamber

10. Auschwitz  Elie and his father survived Auschwitz and then Buna for eight months  They survived beatings, hunger, roll calls and other torture  Elie witnessed hangings, but continued to pray everyday  Stripped of his name and became A-7713

11. Buna  January 1945 – SS forced inmates on a death march  For 10 days, they were forced to run, and at the end, were crammed into freight cars and sent to Buchenwald, another camp  Of the 20,000 inmates who began the march, only 6,000 reached Buchenwald.  Upon arrival, Elie’s father died of dysentery, starvation and exhaustion.

12. Buchenwald  Elie was sent to join 600 other children in Block 66 of Buchenwald  April 6, 1945 – guards told prisoners they would no longer be fed  Began killing 10,000 inmates each day  April 11 – underground movement began against the SS guards  That evening American troops arrived and liberated the camp

13. Reunited  War ended and he was released when he was 16  Elie traveled to France and was eventually reunited with his two older sisters

14. Eliezer Wiesel  Studied at the Sorbonne from 1948 to 1951 (the Sorbonne is a university in Paris)  Elie learned the French language and took courses in literature, psychology, and philosophy  Tutored other students, directed church choir, and worked as a translator to support himself

15. Eliezer Wiesel  Realized he had a duty to share his story  First book, And the World Has Remained Silent, was published in Yiddish in 1956  Abridged, autobiographical version, Night, was published in Paris in 1958  Since then, it has been translated into 18 languages and is his best-known work

16. Eliezer Wiesel  Traveled to the United States in 1955 to write about the United Nations  Was hit by a taxi cab in Times Square  Because of the accident, he was unable to return to France to renew his residency papers, so he applied for U.S. citizenship  He married another Holocaust survivor in New York in 1969-Marion Erster Rose

17. Eliezer Wiesel  Has won many awards and honors  1986 alone: –Nobel Peace Prize –the Freedom Cup Award –the Jacob Javits Humanitarian Award of the UJA Young Leadership –the Medal of Liberty

18. Night  Begins in the town of Sighet, Transylvania  1941, Europe is in the midst of WWII  1944, Elie and family are deported to Auschwitz in Poland  After three weeks, Elie and his father are moved to the Buna camp, where most of the story takes place

19. Themes  Strength  Courage  Compassion  Fear  Faith

20. Main Characters  Elie Wiesel –A devout Jewish boy who arrives at Auschwitz before his fifteenth birthday and who devotedly takes care of his father after losing his faith in a just God.  Elie’s father –A community leader in Sighet who often seems to give more to the community than to his own family, until the concentration camp experience forges a deep bond between him and his son.

21. Main Characters  Moshe the Beadle –A poor resident of Sighet who studies the cabbala with Elie and who everyone loves until he returns from deportation with stories of German atrocities.

22. Background Information  Talmud – large collection of authoritative writings in the Jewish tradition. These ancient books show how the Jewish faith has evolved and grown.  Cabbala – a Jewish mystical tradition based on interpreting the revelations of the Hebrew Bible. A mystical experience is one in which a person comes into direct contact with the divine.

23. Background Information  Anti-Semitism – prejudice against Jews. –Roman Empire – Jews were often persecuted b/c they refused to worship the emperors as deities. –Medieval Times – when Christians ruled Europe, Jews were forced to live in ghettos, apart from faithful Christians on whom they might exert an “evil influence.” They were also made to wear the Star of David –Nazi Germany – Nazis later revived the practice as a means to identify and persecute European Jews.

24. Background Information  Nazis put some prisoners into positions of power (very limited power) as a way to “divide and conquer” and to have help running the camps.  These prisoners were responsible for whole camps, for barracks, or for work squads.  Called Kapos

25. Key Definitions  Cabbala - a Jewish mystical tradition based on interpreting the revelations of the Hebrew Bible. A mystical experience is one in which a person comes into direct contact with the divine.  Fascism – a political system founded in Italy after WWI that emphasized nationalism and an authoritarian government.

26. Key Definitions  Gestapo – Hitler’s “secret state police” that suppressed opposition to his government and organized the concentration camps.  Ghetto – an area of a city where members of a minority are forced to live.  Mysticism – direct contact with the divine, often accompanied by prayer or meditation.  Nazism – a set of political and economic doctrines, which included the belief that Germans were of a superior “Aryan” race and that Jews were evil and dangerous.

27. Key Definitions  Revelation – something that is revealed, such as a religious truth.  SS – the “staff guard” or “black shirts,” an elite police force that served as Hitler’s bodyguard  Talmud - large collection of authoritative writings in the Jewish tradition. These ancient books show how the Jewish faith has evolved and grown.

28. Key Definitions  Zionism – the movement to establish a Jewish national state (Israel).