Faith In Elie Wiesel's Night

Faith, as a theme in the novel Night, is very important in the development of characters as well as the plot as a whole. The theme is touched on again, and again by multiple different characters throughout the book. Faith gives the reader a look inside the mind of a character as how they view the world and the different things around them changes. A character’s faith allows the audience to see their outlook on their situation and how their hopes go up and down as events occur. The many different conflicts occurring in the story often revolve around a character’s faith either in themselves, other people, or a higher power.

Throughout the story, Elie’s faith in God is often in question. At different points, he often wonders if his God is as kind as he is made out to be or if he is even real. One such time when Elie doubts his God’s benevolence is when he says, “You have betrayed them, allowing them to be tortured, slaughtered, gassed, and burned.”. When Elie says this, it is clear his faith in God has wavered to the point that it is almost nonexistent. He is angry that this could be allowed to happen and seems almost confused as this contradicts his original vision of God. Elie was not the only person to reference his faith however. A prisoner in the Buna camp brought up his faith in Hitler, of all people. The prisoner said to Elie, “I have more faith in Hitler than in anyone else. …show more content…
Now, what the man means by this is that of all people it is, ironically, Hitler, their worst enemy, whom he has the most faith in simply because all the evil things he promised, have come true. This highlights the man’s lack of hope and optimism towards the future as he seems to have given up to whatever Hitler has in store for