Where is God?

“Where is God now?”
And I heard a voice within me answer him:
“Where is He? Here He is—He is hanging here on this gallows. . . .”


This passage is from the novel "Night" - written by the Holocaust survivor Elie Wiesel. A devout young Jewish boy, he studies the Talmud incessantly. When asked why he prays he answers, "Why do I pray? Why do I breathe?" God is in his blood. He never thinks to question why he prays because he feels God so strongly that he often cries during prayer. This is a true story.

When Elie first arrives at the camps he witnesses babies being thrown into the air and used as target practice. He witnesses old men and children being sent to crematoriums. He watches as his sisters and mother and separated from him forever. He continues to pray.

At one point, a young "pipel" is hanged - a child so light in weight that it takes him a half an hour to die. He overhears someone ask where God is and his only answer is that he must be dead - Hanging on the gallows with the young child. There is no other answer that makes sense anymore. None.




Amber Dubois is dead. She was fourteen years old on her way to school to buy a lamb.

Should I thank God that my family is safe? That we are all healthy and well-cared for? Should I thank God for my baby, warm and perfect growing inside of me? For the sunshine and my husband? Thank him for my lovely home and the flowers in my yard? Thank him that it wasn't MY family that was taken and killed?

I don't know. It just doesn't seem right.