Belzec, Sobibor, Treblinka, the Operation Reinhard Death Camps by Yitzhak Arad

Author:Yitzhak Arad [Arad, Yitzhak]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2015-09-25T16:00:00+00:00

27. Faith and Religion

In the hell of the death camps, there were people who still believed in God, recited prayers, and kept the Commandments as best they could. The face-to-face encounter with death, the trauma of the murder of loved ones and close friends and relatives, the feeling of impotence, the incomprehensibility of what was happening around them and to them, the feeling that in a matter of minutes or days they, too, would no longer be among the living, produced varying reactions; one of them was turning to God. Cries of the Shema could be heard from people who were being pushed into the gas chambers. After the doors had been closed, the cries weakened gradually and finally ceased completely. In their last moments of life, many of those who were taken directly from the transports to the gas chambers turned in faith and hope to their Father in Heaven.

In Treblinka, one of the prisoners from the "red" group, who worked in the area where the women undressed as they began their march to the gas chambers, writes:

There were women who, in the last moments of their lives, tried to find solace in God and died with the name Adonai on their lips. Others prayed for a miracle from heaven, for salvation at the last minute. I saw a tall woman with a wig on her head standing with arms upraised to heaven, like a cantor before the Ark, and behind her a group of women-they, too, with their arms raised-reciting after her word for word: "Hear, 0 Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is One. We sacrifice our lives for Kiddush HaShem. Avenge us on our enemies for their crimes, avenge our blood and the blood of our children, and let us say: Amen.s1

Richard Rashke writes of an old man who was brought to Sobibor and on the way to the gas chambers said out loud: "Hear, 0 Israel...." As he completed the verse, the old man slapped the face of Oberscharfuhrer Frenzel. The commander of the camp, Reichleitner, who happened to be nearby, pulled the old man over to the side and killed him.2

Abraham Kszepicki, a prisoner in Treblinka, writes about the feelings of uncertainty, of absolute astonishment, as to the tragedy that had befallen them, but also of some expressions of the justice of the verdict:

Was this our last night or last hour? No one knew, but it was clear that the end was near. Different people reacted in different ways. Young people who had not been religious before joined the young Hasidim and together with them said the Kaddish. There was no shortage of moral people who were of the opinion that the tragedy was our punishment from heaven on the sins of the Jewish people. As a result of this kind of talk, there were people who felt guilty like sinners. They confessed, prayed, bowed, and expressed their fear with crying and chanting psalms .... 3

Religious expressions and what might even be taken

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