Return to Life?

The subject of “returning to life“, may seem to some, to be peripheral or less important than the subject of the Holocaust. However an in-depth study of the Holocaust cannot focus solely on the years during which the Holocaust took place. The Holocaust left an indelible mark on the survivors. The trauma experienced by those who were subjected to the Nazi regime was so great that it remained with them and continues to accompany them in one form or another throughout their lives. In a certain sense, it has also been passed on to the second and third generations. Antek Zukerman, one of the leaders of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, spoke in a testimony given in the 1990s of the “psychological chasm” yawning between Holocaust survivors and those who were not there. He says bluntly to the people of Israel that they will never be able to fully understand Holocaust survivors. It is important that we remember this point in our educational discussion with our students: There are things which, even if we study them in greater and greater depth, we will never understand; at best, we will discover empathy towards the people who were part of the holocaust.