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The Sunflower: On the Possibilities and Limits of Forgiveness Kindle Edition
You are a prisoner in a concentration camp. A dying Nazi soldier asks for your forgiveness. What would you do?
While imprisoned in a Nazi concentration camp, Simon Wiesenthal was taken one day from his work detail to the bedside of a dying member of the SS. Haunted by the crimes in which he had participated, the soldier wanted to confess to--and obtain absolution from--a Jew. Faced with the choice between compassion and justice, silence and truth, Wiesenthal said nothing. But even years after the way had ended, he wondered: Had he done the right thing? What would you have done in his place?
In this important book, fifty-three distinguished men and women respond to Wiesenthal's questions. They are theologians, political leaders, writers, jurists, psychiatrists, human rights activists, Holocaust survivors, and victims of attempted genocides in Bosnia, Cambodia, China and Tibet. Their responses, as varied as their experiences of the world, remind us that Wiesenthal's questions are not limited to events of the past.
- LanguageEnglish
- PublisherSchocken
- Publication dateDecember 18, 2008
- File size2729 KB
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From the Inside Flap
In this important book, fifty-three distinguished men and women respond to Wiesenthal's questions. They are theologians, political leaders, writers, jurists, psychiatrists, human rights activists, Holocaust survivors, and victims of attempted genocides in Bosnia, Cambodia, China and Tibet. Their responses, as varied as their experiences of the world, remind us that Wiesenthal's questions are not limited to events of the past. Often surprising and always thought provoking, The Sunflower will challenge you to define your beliefs about justice, compassion, and human responsibility.
From the Back Cover
In this important book, fifty-three distinguished men and women respond to Wiesenthal's questions. They are theologians, political leaders, writers, jurists, psychiatrists, human rights activists, Holocaust survivors, and victims of attempted genocides in Bosnia, Cambodia, China and Tibet. Their responses, as varied as their experiences of the world, remind us that Wiesenthal's questions are not limited to events of the past. Often surprising and always thought provoking, The Sunflower will challenge you to define your beliefs about justice, compassion, and human responsibility.
About the Author
Simon Wiesenthal is one of the founders of the Jewish Historical Documentation Center and the author of books including The Murderers Among Us, Justice Not Vengeance, and Every Day Remembrance Day
Robertson Dean has recorded hundreds of audiobooks in almost every genre. He's been nominated for several Audie Awards, won nine Earphones Awards, and was named one of AudioFile magazine's Best Voices of 2010. He lives in Los Angeles, where he records books and acts in film, TV, and (especially) on stage.
Product details
- ASIN : B000SEH8U8
- Publisher : Schocken; Revised, Expanded, Subsequent edition (December 18, 2008)
- Publication date : December 18, 2008
- Language : English
- File size : 2729 KB
- Text-to-Speech : Enabled
- Screen Reader : Supported
- Enhanced typesetting : Enabled
- X-Ray : Enabled
- Word Wise : Enabled
- Sticky notes : On Kindle Scribe
- Print length : 306 pages
- Best Sellers Rank: #180,582 in Kindle Store (See Top 100 in Kindle Store)
- #14 in Religious Studies - Ethics
- #39 in Dalai Lama
- #157 in Ethics & Morality
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The Lord loves justice Isaiah 6:18
All people who call themselves christians should read this book because christianity is under attack and for good reason many times. I grew up in the bible belt; you were extremely weird if you didn't go to church and there are churches on every corner practically in this part of the country. Christian Germans, continental europeans had their faiths tried by fire in this last century, it is not so obvious in America, but I believe we are standing at the edge of a cliff in so many ways and we have choices to make and those choices will save or condemn your soul; no matter how many apostles creeds you say, the choices you are making today will determine your salvation or not.
This book is probably the best book I've ever read. I love Simon Wiesenthal not just for his books' content but because Simon understood G-d's demands for justice; he then tracked down the Nazi killers who took millions of lives and not only jews. Forgiveness is a hard thing to do but Christ commands christians that if they don't forgive others their sins that G-d can't forgive them. Christ told his followers to pray more than 70 x 7 times until they could truly forgive those who persecuted them. However, in the case Mr. Wiesenthal places before us, the crimes possibly committed by the dying Nazi soldier are much more than what he mentions, but we simply don't know all the details. Simon of course has seen this scene of slaughter so many times, jews rounded up, jews crowded into kerosene laced buildings and set on fire. And then the dying Nazi soldier begs him to stay and hear his confession instead of from a priest. Simon stayed there for hours and though Karl wanted to hear Simon forgive him and though Simon really sensed that Karl was sincere, he simply could not utter the words, but rendered what little comfort he could muster by holding his hand, by swatting away flies from Karl's infected, rotting face, the whole time though wanting to flee. The whole story affected Simon so much for days afterwards he had nightmares and would wake screaming back in the death camp; it greatly alarmed his friends because the Nazis would usually respond to such disturbances by shooting or hanging them. His friends finally silenced his screams by having talks with him about this strange encounter: "it was not your place to forgive him because you were not his immediate victim" and "how could you forgive on the part of the whole jewish nation", "we all will probably not survive this death camp".... All of those friends later died within the camp, from malnutrition, infectious disease, gun shots. Somehow Simon was miraculously spared and he dedicated the rest of his life to bringing to justice the Nazi murderers from some of the remotest, wild corners of the world.
What can I say but I place this book on the same pedestal as my bible. Clearly putting away criminals who take the lives of innocent millions and not only jews is just and understood by most cultures. It was stipulated in the books of Moses: for blood pollutes the land and NO atonement can be made for the land except by the blood of him who shed it. Is it not significant that one of the first stories in the bible, in christian, jewish, and even muslim bibles is the story of the killing of Able by Cain and G-d hearing the voice of Able crying from the ground?
There are two versions of this book, but I recommend this last version over Wiesenthal's first; the additional perspectives from 53 persons that Wiesenthal posed his question to adds more insight to the problem of forgiveness. All of their answers are slightly different, all equally thought provoking. Most believed Simon behaved rightly in his response to Karl, it was not his place to offer forgiveness because he was not the injured party and Simon acted UBER princely given the circumstances by what little he did and mostly by what he didn't do. "He could have smothered him with a pillow to put Karl out of his misery," one of the respondents noted. He could have choked him if he was consumed by a rage for vengeance, but true to G-d's word left the vengeance part to G-d. 'Vengeance is mine says the Lord, I will repay.' What does G-d promise? Vengeance is mine, I WILL REPAY. G-d is just and cannot tolerate evildoers. Evildoers will be punished if not in this lifetime, surely in the world hereafter.
So, herein, you will find responses from the most unlikely of characters, the Dalai Lama, various christian theologians, of course, other jews, some concentration camp survivors, teachers and most surprisingly an answer from Albert Speer, who was the only Nazi to declare his guilt at the Nuremberg trials. My favorite responses were from the Dalai Lama, Harry Wu, Dith Pran and a jewish teacher. The Dalai Lama asked a buddhist monk what did he fear most after years of brutal torture by the chinese; the monk told him that his biggest fear was that he would lose compassion for the Chinese. Dith Pran, a survivor of Pol Pot's murderous rampages saw and understood how the soldiers were duped and deceived by these murderous despots as Hitler youths were manipulated by the Nazis. He wrote: "We need to learn to separate the true culprits from the pawns, the evil masterminds from the brainwashed." The jewish teacher posed Simon's predicament and question to her students who were studying The Sunflower. Nearly all christians said they'd forgive Karl, nearly all jews said that they wouldn't. I think her observation is significant. And as someone who's been raised as a christian and trained in the bible, I think that the jews' thinking/logic on this issue is incredibly wise and worth examining.
Harry Wu's experience of nearly 20 years in chinese prison gave him a slightly different perspective: "In regard to Mr. Wisenthal's story and in comparing his story to my own, I must first state that it is inconceivable for me to believe that anyone in the People's Republic of China would ask for such forgiveness as the Nazi soldier did to the jewish prisoner. In China, there was no understanding that what the communists did to their own people was in any way morally wrong....They had no regard for an individual's well-being. There was no value put on a human's life because, quite simply, the leaders of the country placed no value on human life. In order to survive in China during these times, one had to give up one's own conscience and humanity....Instead, the society that the communists founded was designed to drain any remnants of humanity out of a person. Like Mr. Wiesenthal, I would not have forgiven the Nazi soldier, but I would have been able to say to him: "I understand why you were a part of a horrible and vicious society. You are responsible for your own actions but everyone else in this society shares that same responsibility with you.""
The only comment I took offense to was one by a christian speaking of Christ and His disciples welcoming Judas Iscariot back into their midst. In the account of John, son of Zebedee, Jesus says about Judas after he left to betray Him for 30 pieces of silver, "it would have been better if he had never been born." In John also, Christ said that His father gave all judgement to Him and so Christ's words to a christian should be more true than other apocryphal writings as "The Judas Gospel". It's so easy for false truths to be believed and lies disseminated.
Theologians don't have a clear handle on what the blasphemy of the holy spirit is, what the only sin is that G-d will never forgive, but I have no doubt that it would surely be found in the many evil acts against humanity, against the sanctity of human life that was to be unveiled from these true stories of the holocaust. (Jews prefer the word Shoah rather than the holocaust. Shoah in English means calamity. Holocaust has twisted christian connotations of whole burnt offering as if there was something holy in the jews' sacrifice which I totally agree is extremely abhorrent.) But the world knows of these tribulations as the holocaust so I use that term here.
This book is one of the most important books I've ever read. It is so thought provoking and there are really no easy answers to Simon's question. I found myself as I am here, thinking of so many arguments. It is a subject of universal appeal because forgiveness is truely hard when one has been subjected to such uncomparable persecution and suffering. And even christians should grasp that G-d understands our difficulty with this issue, to truely forgive 100% may not even be achieved in one's lifetime and doesn't negate one's salvation (my thoughts). But after the 490 or 4900 time of trying to forgive a heinous crime all one may be able to do is say, I CANNOT DO IT, BUT I HAND IT OVER TO YOU TO ADJUDICATE. And I think G-d probably wouldn't have a problem with it.
I have so many pages marked; my hope and prayer is that whoever reads this review will want to read the book themselves. I couldn't find this edition anywhere in the greater Atlanta area, universities included. You can get it through interlibrary loan, but better to have the book on hand as I do.
I must temper my criticism of christianity with these thoughts from Dennis Prager: "I am a religious Jew who has come to admire many christians and to appreciate Christianity....I deeply fear the consequences of a de-Christianized America."
The Sunflower is a philosophical narrative about moral responsibility and the possibility—and limits--of forgiveness of genocide. In this parable, the narrator describes his hellish daily existence in the Lemberg concentration camp. The story reflects, in some respects, Wiesenthal’s own experience in several Nazi concentration camps during WWII: including Janowska, Plaszow and Mauthausen. Although the narrative shies away from vivid descriptions of violence, it alludes to the sadistic mistreatment of Jewish inmates by SS officers as well as to the starvation, disease and constant threat of being shot or selected for the crematorium that were part and parcel of the daily horrors experienced by inmates. The book, originally published by Schocken Books in 1976, has been taught for decades in schools as an introduction to the Holocaust. Written in a simple yet elegant prose, The Sunflower has been especially popular because it raises the important questions about moral responsibility for national crimes and explores the victims’ capacity for forgiveness. The latter point was particularly relevant to Wiesenthal, who spent years of his life tracking down Nazi fugitives and bringing them to trial for their crimes against humanity.
In a moment of rare beauty in his somber existence in the concentration camp, the narrator, a Jewish prisoner on his way to forced labor, sees a row of sunflowers planted on Christian soldiers’ graves. In a poetic scene, the narrator describes how he’s initially enthralled by the flowers’ beauty, only to be later struck by its implications: “I stared spellbound. The flower heads seemed to absorb the sun’s rays like mirrors and draw them down into the darkness of the ground as my gaze wandered from the sunflower to the grave… It was gaily colored and butterflies fluttered from flower to flower. … Were they whispering something to each flower to pass on to the soldier below? Yes, this was just what they were doing; the dead were receiving light and messages” (The Sunflower, Simon Wiesenthal, New York: Schocken Books, 1998, 14). As he overcomes his awe, he realizes that, as a Jewish prisoner, he’ll be deprived of dignity not only in life, but also in death. He’ll be shot and tossed into a mass grave or gassed and incinerated. For him, as for millions of other Jewish prisoners, “No sunflower would ever bring light into my darkness, and no butterflies would dance above my dreadful tomb” (15).
When the narrator arrives at work, where he’s charged with throwing away medical waste, a nurse signals him to follow her to a hospital bed. There the narrator sees a man enveloped in bandages, pale and rail thin. As this man addresses him with great difficulty, the narrator realizes that the dying man is a young German SS officer: a mortal enemy. Astonishingly enough, the officer begs for his forgiveness for what he’s done to other Jewish people. He doesn’t excuse his behavior, but he describes some of its causes. He tells him about the Nazi indoctrination when he was in Hitler Youth. He speaks of the manuscripts and speeches that depicted Jews as a “subhuman race” and called for their annihilation, which he later encountered in his training as an SS officer. He also speaks of being subjected to tremendous peer pressure from fellow soldiers as well yielding to the pressure of following orders from his superiors.
And yet, now that he’s about to die, he feels a sense of responsibility and guilt for his murderous acts against defenseless civilians. He confesses that he was part of an SS brigade that hunted Jews down, forced dozens of them—defenseless men, women and children--into a house, then tossed hand grenades into the windows to kill all of them. Some people jumped, while on fire, from the broken windows. Still haunted by this vivid memory, the SS soldier can’t expire in peace without some kind of atonement from a Jew: from a member of the group he and other soldiers victimized. The narrator is surprised by the request and paralyzed by indecision. He doesn’t know how to respond.
When he returns to the camp that evening, he tells his friends about this strange encounter. Adam, an architect, finds the SS soldier’s request preposterous—and trivial—given that the Nazis were murdering millions of Jews. One less Nazi, he states cynically. Josek, a deeply religious Jew, maintains that he’d have refused the pardon with a clear conscience. How could his friend have forgiven atrocities of such a magnitude? And who was he to speak for millions of other victims? Both friends remain suspicious: Why would the “Aryan Superman” need the forgiveness of an “inferior” Jew? The narrator, however, sees the dying SS soldier as a fellow human being. “The SS man’s attitude toward me was not that of an arrogant superman. Probably I hadn’t successfully conveyed all my feelings: a subhuman condemned to death at the bedside of an SS man condemned to death…” (67). Of course, their circumstances were far from symmetrical. In fact, they were diametrically opposed. Still unsure of his own ethical stance, the narrator asks each of us, readers, to ask ourselves: If faced with the Nazi soldier’s dying request for forgiveness, “What would I have done?” (98)
If we read the transcripts of the Nazi leaders put on trial, we see that this question of forgiveness doesn’t come up often for the perpetrators: at least not in the public trials. Adolf Eichmann or Rudolf Hoss, for instance, express no regret or compunction for their crimes. They deny all sense of personal responsibility and blame only the Nazi system and their superiors for their murderous deeds. Yet for the victims, the question is extremely relevant because it asks them to consider at least some of the perpetrators as human: as men capable of guilt and regret for their crimes.
Wiesenthal’s simple moral parable shows the Nazis as a diverse group who nevertheless behaved the same way. Not every SS soldier hated Jews. Not every SS soldier was a ruthless sadist. Not every SS soldier gladly followed orders to butcher innocent people. Yet almost every SS soldier chose, like the man in The Sunflower, to follow such orders, to commit such crimes. Almost every SS soldier killed countless innocent Jews. How could this happen? Understanding what forces were at play to make genocide possible doesn’t mean forgiving perpetrators or exonerating them of blame. But without a sociological, and historical, understanding of how tens of thousands of German citizens—some of whom were ordinary men, like the soldier in this story--were capable of such atrocities, we are likely to overlook the vulnerability of our own times.
Claudia Moscovici, Literature Salon
It is a reminder that we can neither forget the Holocaust and other spaces and places of inhumanity. It is also a call to work toward a future that holds less space for such inhumanity. We must find ways to avoid these crises.
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O livro é muito bom!!!