Night Questions

Questions for Consideration: Elie Wiesel's Night


1) Where is Wiesel's childhood home? Locate the country on a map.

Wiesel's childhood home is in the tiny town of Sighet in Transylvania. On the map
Transylvania is located in the country of Romania.

2) Wiesel opens Night by relating his youthful desire to study the cabala. What is the cabala?

The cabala are secret doctrines that the Jews study having to do with mysticism.

3) Wiesel says that when he was young, he wanted to study the cabala in order to know the truths of this world. What kinds of truths is he referring to? After you complete Night, return to this question: what kinds of truth was the young Elie ignorant of?

By studying the cabala Wiesel thought that he would learn certain truths like ways to get closer to God, as well as what to expect would happen in the future, or even ways he could strengthen his faith in God. Elie was ignorant of the truths that their would come a time when his faith that he had towards God would be tested.

4) Why is Moshe the Beadle a significant character? What does he tell Elie about answers, questions, and the truth? After you complete Night, return to this question: why was Moshe prescient in his admonition to Elie?

Moshe is a significant character because he questions certain things Elie does and by questioning Elie he begins to question also. He told Elie that not every question has an answer. Moshe also says that men as God questions and God answers but they don't understand them. The only place to find the true answers is within one self.

5) Why do the people of Sighet ignore Moshe after he returns from his escape? Why don't they listen to him?

After Moshe returns and he tell his stories of the way foreign Jews were being torchered he was ignored by the people they believed he had become crazy. Although perhaps the true reason the didn't listen to him was because of fear, yet they still doubted that what Moshe told them was true because this reassured them that Hitler wouldn't be able to do anything to the Jews even if he wanted to.

6) Who is Madame Schachter? In what ways is she similar to Moshe the Beadle? (Think about prophetic figures and how people often ignore them.)

Madame Schachter was a woman, who traveled in the same train as Elie and his family as well as other Jews. Days before they had go to their destination she would have nightmares and wake up in the middle of the night crying and screaming that their was a fire and flames. At the beginning all the Jews in the train really thought their was a fire but they didn't see anything. Night after night she would wake up screaming saying their was a fire and it smelled like the burning flesh. Jews in the same train became frightened so they beat her in order to keep her quite. The day they reached the camp all the Jews seen was fire and flames they were from chimneys were they were burning people. Madame Schachter is similar to Moshe because he too tried to tell everyone something terrible was going to happen except none of the Jews listened until it was to late.

7) Consider this passage on pg. 32:Never shall I forget that nocturnal silence which deprived me, for all eternity, of the desires to live. Never shall I forget those moments which murdered my God and my soul and turned my dreams to dust. Never shall I forget these things, even if I am condemned to live as long as God himself. Never.

Even though it was Elie's first day in camp Auschwitz for him it seemed like weeks. After seeing the ditches were people and children were burned alive those images had never left his memory. The things he seen are memories that are perminent and as of that day he had lost all faith in God.

8) What is the context of this passage? How has the young Elie's theology changed? As you continue reading, ask yourself how this passage speaks to the rest of Night.

By seeing the forms of torture the Germans came up with made him change his thinking about life and God because he seen all these injustices and was waiting for God to intervine. As a result his tone changed about God and faith which affected the rest of the book Night.

9) How does Elie's understanding of God and God's presence—or absence— continue to change throughout Night? When is he most angry with God? When is not angry at all? Mark passages throughout Night that illustrate his changing attitudes toward God.

After seeing camp Auschwitz and breathing in the flames is when he becomes upset with God for allowing this to happen and not do anything about it. He isn't angry anymore after with God when he decides to eat instead of fast.


10) What literal and figurative (symbolic or metaphorical) meanings does night have in Night?

The figurative meaning night has in the novel Night is night means darkness. Yes it can be said when the holocaust occured it was a time of darkness in history. It was during the middle of the twentieth century and other humans were being treated worse then animals.

11) Why do you think Night is such a slim book? Surely Wiesel could have included much more detail.

Night is such a slim book because the emphasis was to illustrate the horror that Jews went through in concentration camps and how was it that humanity didn't do anything about it they were jus silent. His point being that such events like this shouldn't repeat themselves and if they do their should be something done about it.


12) Is Night a memoir of tragedy or triumph? Can it be both? If so, why? If not, why not?

Night is a memoir of tragedy because it seemed like not much was done to try to stop Hitler and help free the prisoners that were in the concentration camps. A period of about four years had passed until the Nazi reign was over. As a result families were split lives were destroyed to say the least, and other backgrounds or religons that weren't German were tried to be gotten rid of, so it is truely a tragedy because this happened and is remembered in history to this day.