Why?

I will surely consume them, says the Lord; there are no grapes on the vine, nor figs on the fig tree, and the leaf will fade; and what I gave them will pass away from them. (Yirmiyahu - 8:13)

Eicha? How could it happen? That’s the ultimate question about the tragedy of losing the Beis HaMikdash. It is asked every year on this day of Tisha B’Av. I ask it about the Holocaust. Not just on Tisha B’Av but every time I see Holocaust era images. 

Images like Kristallnacht - where Jewish business were vandalized and all manner of antisemitic behavior was the norm. Where Jews were blamed for all the troubles in  Germany - and even the world. 

Images of Jews being forced into cramped ghettos where disease was rampant, and people were starving and dying in the streets. 

Images of slave labor where Jews were worked and starved to death.  

Images of groups of Jews being forced to dig their own graves, stripped and shot into them – their naked bodies left to rot. 

Images of Jews herded into ‘showers’ en masse day after day; stripped naked as they entered; doors locked; and then gassed to death. After which their bodies were cremated. 

Images where Jew turned against Jew just to survive. 

Images of little babies smothered to death in an effort to keep them quiet so the Jews in hiding would not be discovered.

Images of Jews selected for torturous and often deadly  medical experiments. 

What exactly was it that motivated the barbarism of so many of the German people? ...where the majority who saw it happening just shrugged it off?  ...or actually  believed that the Jews had it coming? True there were some heroes that helped some Jews escape the deadly fate of their brethren. Some even risking not only their own lives but those of their families. But they were exceedingly rare compared to the vast number of people all over Europe that just stood by and watched it happen. 

The entire world was closed off to Jews that tried to escape Europe during the Holocaust. Jews got slaughtered while good men did nothing. There was no way out.

If there was a manner of torture that existed, it was used against Jews by Nazis and their collaborators and sympathizing Eurpeoan antisemites during the Holocaust.

What evil could anyone possibly see with German Jewry? Religious leaders and lay people. Jews with beards and Peyos. Observant Jews that were well integrated into the culture and even non observant Jews who lived their lives no differently then their gentile neighbors. Jews that were as patriotic as their next door neighbors; Jews that fought gallantly for Germany in previous wars. Jews with medals for bravery; Jews that gave so much to Germany in every facet of life becoming doctors, lawyers, accountants, bankers, builders, and all manner of successful business people. Jews who were prouder of being German than they were of being Jewish! Not a single Jew was spared! 

Why did both of my parents and my brothers have to suffer? Why did my father have to experience the loss of his first wife, two of his sons, and 2 twins baby daughters? (Which my two surviving brothers experienced with him.) Why did they have to suffer the indignities of running and hiding in underground bunkers - fearing for their lives if they were caught - until they were liberated by the Russians? 

Why did my mother have to hide in a forest, hunting down food at night, usually scraps of food discarded by Poles. Why did she have to see her mother step on a land mine while running from Nazi soldiers chasing her down? And then telling my mother to keep running.That was the last time my mother saw her mother. I know of no gentler soul than my mother. Why was she subjected to this horrible fate along with the rest of European Jewry?

Jews were a despized ‘race’ in Germany despite their high level of integration. For some reason Jews were blamed for everything. So despised were they that Germany’s leadership thought they should be eradicated from the face of the earth. So strong was that belief that even when they knew they were going to lose the war, they accelerated their ‘death machine’ to kill as many Jews as they could before being totally defeated. As though it was a religious mission!

How could it be that the Chosen people of God were subjected to this in ways that were for the most part inescapable? I ask this question all the time.

Survivors were traumatized for life. Some were mentally impaired beyond help. But most readjusted quiclkly to their freedom and made new lives for themselves in new countries. Especially Israel where – after declaring its independence - opened it’s borders to all Jewish refugees from the holocaust who were no longer welcome in their former homes in Europe.  Many surviving in Displaced Persons (DP) camps until a country was found that would take them. But even as they readjusted to their new lives, the horrors of what they lived through never fully left them.

This was the utlmate Tzadik V’Ra Lo. The ultimate question of why bad things happen to good people. Many survivors lost their faith because of this experience. It’s not too difficult to understand why. The Satmar Rebbe is puported to have said that any Jew that lived through the Holocaust had paid his dues and would be granted Olalm Habah even if they stopped being observant because of it.

But many survivors retained their faith and returned to a fully observant life. This was the case with my parents. But that doesn’t answer the question. Clearly the hand of God was in this. It could not have happened if God did not will it so. The question is, why?

Some people have tried to provide answers to that question. But I believe they are all foolish for trying. It is impossible to know the mind of God under the conditions of Hester Panim. God’s face is hidden from us now. For His own reasons. We no longer have Nevi’im - prophets with whom God directly communicates. Speculating about His motives only causes pain to the survivors and their families. There is no rational explanation for the Jewish people having experienced the virtual Tochecha the Torah describes. But experience it our people did.

If not for the Holocaust, I would not be here today.  The fact that my father lost his first wife caused him to marry my mother.  Had it not been for the Holocaust, all of my children, my grandchildren and I would not exist.

I am perplexed by this whole situation and remain with those questions as I ask the ultimate why? Why am I spared anything remotely like this? Why do I get to live in complete freedom and great comfort? Never having suffered a tiny fraction of what my parents and brothers suffered? Why do I even exist? Why do my children exist? By what sense of Divine Justice does any of this make sense?

I have no answers. Only questions even as I remain a believing Jew.