The Sunflower_ On the Possibilities and - Wiesenthal, Simon copy

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inconceivable to us. Still, with caveats galore, I proceed to tell of my mother's wish for my brother and me, that we learn how to understand, and too, that we learn how to forgive: understand the mistakes and errors of our ways, in the hope that we can do (can be) better; and forgive ourselves, lest we give our errant or evil side the continuing hold over us that such a refusal of forgiveness all too commonly, readily ensures. To sustain that moral conviction is not easy even in this comfortable, this privileged life that fate has given me— how often many of us who profess the Christian ethic of forgiveness succumb to smugness, arrogance, pretentiousness, a cocky self-importance that is utterly incompatible with the kind of absolution and reconciliation implied in the act of forgiveness: no exculpation for wrong, but an acknowledgment that a long, tenaciously critical look inward justifies a wholehearted response of merciful grace, for which one prays. I would, then, pray to God for the forgiveness of that Nazi, who claimed to be repentant— I, the present-day son of my parents, the one who inhabits this life. I say the above, though, with no conviction of righteousness, never mind (Lord, spare us) a temptation to selfrighteousness. Who am I (the rhetorical question must be asked!) to tell even myself, let alone this author who has generously taken public moral pause on behalf of all of us, what ought have been done under circumstances, let's face it, wherein the conscience in so many of us (the same conscience, with all its assumptions, that distinguishes us as the somewhat “civilized” people we at least sometimes are, or try to be) is no doubt maimed before the heart stops beating. Let us, who are lucky to have been given by fate the safety to read and ponder The Sunflower, to pose its haunting, provocative, thoroughly challenging moral questions to ourselves, not only struggle for (and with) our various responses, answers, but take to heart
what may be, finally, the author's real intent for us: that we never, ever forget what happened to him and millions of others; that their experiences become (through the movement of mind and heart that goes with reading, with writing) for now and for the future our very own—an introspective moral legacy we dare not relinquish for our own sakes, never mind out of respect for those whose suffering has enabled that legacy.
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CONTENTS Preface BOOK ONE The Sun
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Edward H. Flannery Eva Fleischner M
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Cardinal Franz König Harold S. Kus
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Matthieu Ricard Joshua Rubenstein S
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PREFACE When the first American edi
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Holocaust, repeat many of its horro
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What was it Arthur said last night?
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they splintered into small groups,
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If so, why were some murderers and
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order in which God has a definite p
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always led to dire punishment. If a
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Our gaze roamed the crowds on the p
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last look at the forest of sunflowe
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We turned left. I knew the way well
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designed as a prison gate. They had
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The other soldiers didn't seem to s
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work with Derdacki—a design for a
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I obeyed. His almost bloodless hand
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“I heard from one of the sisters
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All the atrocities and tortures tha
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closed the door behind me I heard m
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spirits. Oh, the jokes we used to p
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see symbols in everything. It was a
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He took a deep breath. Then a sip o
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“As we approached I could see the
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forget—least of all the child. It
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constantly warned Eli's parents to
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monotone. Sick people when they are
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“Our rest period did not last lon
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“In that moment I saw the burning
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the fact that he spoke to me was a
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“I was beginning to think you had
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At the end of Grodezka Street we tu
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Luckily the commandant was nowhere
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was better to keep my mouth shut ab
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career when the war broke out. Duri
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He now had me where he wanted me: I
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His father brought him to me in his
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though the Poles were now themselve
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to prove they were earning their sp
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swallowed it ravenously. Soldiers s
Page 87 and 88: failed. Then one day the extra labo
Page 89 and 90: whole stock of drugs consisted of i
Page 91 and 92: “Bolek,” I insisted, “you who
Page 93 and 94: “Maybe. But had he come to the ri
Page 95 and 96: At that time the world was seeking
Page 97 and 98: confronted the mother I did not kno
Page 99 and 100: move to my sister's, but I don't wa
Page 101 and 102: She could not tell me enough. I had
Page 103 and 104: Germans to find out who was guilty.
Page 105 and 106: My picture of Karl was almost compl
Page 107: And later when I met his mother I a
Page 110 and 111: tool of war. Over 10,000 individual
Page 112 and 113: I explicitly and emphatically rejec
Page 114 and 115: JEAN AMÉRY My high regard for your
Page 116 and 117: part in the extermination, he knew
Page 118 and 119: SMAIL BALI Now that nearly thirty y
Page 120 and 121: shape the views of the masses. One
Page 122 and 123: epresentative of German Nazism, or
Page 124 and 125: Even if Wiesenthal believed that he
Page 126 and 127: except when the state declares an a
Page 128 and 129: forgiveness is forbidden. Judaism t
Page 130 and 131: ROBERT MCAFEE BROWN Warsaw, 1979. W
Page 132 and 133: after twenty-seven years in jail, p
Page 134 and 135: HARRY JAMES CARGAS I am afraid not
Page 136 and 137: ROBERT COLES We are told at the end
Page 140 and 141: THE DALAI LAMA I believe one should
Page 142 and 143: EUGENE J. FISHER Simon Wiesenthal's
Page 144 and 145: Secondly, I believe it is the heigh
Page 146 and 147: a prayer or two that the efforts in
Page 148 and 149: Simon's sleep was not to remain so
Page 150 and 151: unanimity on such issues is rarely,
Page 152 and 153: course; it has invariably led to an
Page 154 and 155: elates to the concept of atonement,
Page 156 and 157: MATTHEW FOX Simon Wiesenthal is a t
Page 158 and 159: the dying but guilt-ridden soldier.
Page 160 and 161: allows these sins to take root and
Page 162 and 163: all-to-hell type, the Nazi beast. D
Page 164 and 165: increments in his humanity add up,
Page 166 and 167: the community that gives him that r
Page 168 and 169: Did the Germans actually feed into
Page 170 and 171: even saw one, and whatever atrociti
Page 172 and 173: HANS HABE On reading The Sunflower
Page 174 and 175: the question of punishment. If Karl
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Page 178 and 179: those Jews who tried to isolate Ger
Page 180 and 181: ARTHUR HERTZBERG This personal hist
Page 182 and 183: had carried out the murders. On the
Page 184 and 185: ABRAHAM JOSHUA HESCHEL Over fifty y
Page 186 and 187: SUSANNAH HESCHEL I would have done
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JOSÉ HOBDAY The question, “What
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CHRISTOPHER HOLLIS The Sunflower, w
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these are explanations. They are no
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confessing to an unknown Jew? The J
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had also reached the same point, th
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Archbishop of Vienna Reading about
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HAROLD S. KUSHNER I am not sure the
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while he's living it up with his ne
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Although many have hailed the since
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the sinner to eternal damnation bef
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in absolving your man, and you woul
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level: from within themselves, they
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forgiveness. Citizens of Germany, A
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deathbed moment of crystal clarity.
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outsiders, cynicism and atheism hav
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e sure, the conviction that we gain
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ERICH H. LOEWY Anyone who has never
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Of course, Wiesenthal could not for
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HERBERT MARCUSE I think I would hav
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“What would I have done?” becom
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the cheapening of grace. A second f
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CYNTHIA OZICK
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2. THE SOURCES OF PITY Pity is not
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But that is a misunderstanding. Ven
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4. MORAL TENDERNESS, MORAL RESPONSI
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greatest moral philosopher of the a
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more complex process, especially in
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interventionist possibilities can n
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DENNIS PRAGER I am a religious Jew
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murderer, not his punishment (let a
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has been taken to mean “pray for
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Pulling away from the Khmer Rouge l
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TERENCE PRITTIE Men who are dying e
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MATTHIEU RICARD For a Buddhist, for
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JOSHUA RUBENSTEIN As we near the cl
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We know today, if Simon did not at
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SIDNEY SHACHNOW Having spent most o
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from communism. I was prepared to g
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extraordinary happened, something I
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human beings. And yet, those eyes a
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themselves into a collective and un
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mission. But if that young man had
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he have the right to ask for forgiv
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treat the man as a monster who had
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nasty lie. As a child survivor of t
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give up prosecuting those who have
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seems to be denying to the Jews the
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Forgiveness is not a simple, discre
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JOSEPH TELUSHKIN Was this young Naz
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that if a murderer accepts his puni
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specifically human activity which c
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What would I have done? Our preside
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left the Jewish people still strugg
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HARRY WU Reading Simon Wiesenthal's
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out of the barracks and braced ours
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CONTRIBUTORS SVEN ALKALAJ is the am
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volumes); The Moral Life of Childre
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ecipient of the Herzl Prize, his wo
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He has taught at the Jewish Theolog
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at the Catholic Theological Union i
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died in 1981. MANÈS SPERBER, Frenc
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A NOTE ABOUT THE AUTHOR SIMON WIESE
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Other SCHOCKEN BOOKS of Related Int
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Available at your local bookstore,
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-P
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