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The Holocaust: Who or What Was to ‘Blame’?
Whenever the topic of the Holocaust is brought up, you can feel the tension rise in the room. The small Jewish group I facilitate was no exception. In pursuing the topic recently, I learned a great deal, not only about others’ thinking, but about the issues I had been struggling with for years.
To be clear, I’m not talking about the Germans and the war and atrocities they committed; I’m referring specifically to whether G-d was to “blame” for letting the Holocaust take place, or whether the Jews were responsible, at least in part, for their own deaths. As you can imagine, it can be a pretty dicey topic to tackle, but I believe that it was worthwhile.
Almost everyone in our group believed that G-d should have interceded before 6 million Jews and a total of 12 million people died. I was prepared to present a more complex point of view, and I proceeded to lay out my own thinking.
When venturing to discuss the nature of G-d, the discussion can get very complicated. And when you add in the component of the dominance of secularism over religion in our times, the conclusions we draw may be all over the map. For that reason, I’ve chosen to discuss briefly many of the expectations that people have of G-d, but I believe there are a few key ones that have driven the secular Left to reject G-d and embrace nihilism. If we are going to have any chance of breaking the hold that secularism has on our society, we have to address not just religion, but the nature of our relationship with God. And we must deal with the deep disillusionment that many on the Left are experiencing, and encourage them to expand their understanding and awareness of G-d.
When I woke up on Shabbat, I was hesitant to open my eyes fully, dreading the malaise that had been dogging me for days. But I’d already slept in longer than I wanted, and so I pulled myself out of bed and stood up. And I felt, well—almost normal.
pass by.’ Then a great and powerful wind tore the mountains apart and shattered the rocks before the Lord. But the Lord was not in the wind. After the wind was an earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake. After the earthquake came a fire. But the Lord was not in the fire. And after the fire – a still, small voice. (I Kings 19:9-12)
Jewish communities and their practices. I wrote this letter to her yesterday to support her on her journey.
