What Would You Do?

Put yourself in the position of a prisoner in a concentration camp. A dying Nazi soldier asks for your forgiveness. What would you do? In The Sunflower: On the Possibilities and Limits of Forgiveness , Simon Wiesenthal raises that question for readers to wrestle with, and they have been passionately doing so ever since.

As a young man imprisoned in a Nazi concentration camp, Wiesenthal was taken one day from his labor brigade to a hospital at the request of Karl, a mortally wounded Nazi soldier. Tormented by the crimes in which he had participated, including the murder of a family with a small child, the SS man wanted to confess to–and if possible, receive absolution from–a Jew.

One day, while under the thumb of his Nazi captors, a nurse summoned him to follow her into a building converted into a hospital for German soldiers. He was brought into a semi-dark room where there laid a man whose entire head was bandaged, with openings only for his mouth, nose, and ears. In the early part of the conversation, the wounded 22 year-old SS soldier said to this Jewish prisoner, “I am resigned to dying soon, but before that I want to talk about an experience which is torturing me. Otherwise I cannot die in peace.”

“I know that what I have told you is terrible. In the long nights while I have been waiting for death, time and time again I have longed to talk about it to a Jew and beg forgiveness from him. Only I didn’t know whether there were any Jews left . . . I know that what I am asking is almost too much for you, but without your answer I cannot die in peace.”

Wiesenthal left the room in silence, but remained intrigued by the issues the man’s request raised about the limits and possibilities of forgiveness. Must we, can we, forgive the repentant criminal, no matter how heinous the crime? Can we forgive crimes committed against others? What do we owe the victims?

Twenty-five years after the Holocaust, Wiesenthal asked leading intellectuals what they would have done in his place. Collected into one volume, their responses became one of the most enduring documents of Holocaust literature and a touchstone of interfaith dialogue.

This new edition of The Sunflower, issued in honor of the twentieth anniversary of its publication in the United States, brings together the voices of a new generation of thinkers, including Robert Coles, Matthew Fox, Arthur Hertzberg, Harold Kushner, Dith Pran, the Dalai Lama, Dennis Prager, Tzvetan Todorov, and Harry Wu. Their answers reflect the teachings of their diverse beliefs, and remind us that Wiesenthal’s question is not limited only to events of the past.

Recommended to Read With High School Students

This would be an excellent book to read and discuss with your high school children. Random House provides an online free guide with 18 intriguing questions.

See Holocaust resources for other age levels here.

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