Variations in Religious Thought During the Holocaust: Consideration of God in the Kovno Ghetto Through the Writings of an Elite Orthodox leader, Rabbi Oshry, and the Oral Testimonies of Ordinary Jews, Judith Meisel and Sidney Shachnow

Abstract

The role of Jewish religion during the Holocaust is complex in its ambiguity. To address the topic, this article will provide a limited analysis of the faith in the power of God from the contrasting perspectives of an elite Orthodox leader, Rabbi Ephraim Oshry, and two non-elite, ordinary Jews, Judith Meisel and Sidney Shachnow. All three were imprisoned in the Kovno ghetto from 1941 to 1944. Rabbi Oshry’s purpose in his rabbinical writings, as Orthodox historigraphy, was to portray the observant as heroic to maintain the post-war faith of the Orthodox. He glorified religious observance of Jews during the Holocaust, in the seeming-absence of God, to reaffirm faith in the power of God. In contrast, the oral testimonies of Meisel and Shachnow reveal their personal anguish as they describe their individual doubt in the power of God. They explain that they questioned why God did not act to stop the destruction and slaughter. The post-war oral testimonies of Meisel and Shachnow were not created for an identified audience per se, as their testimonies were unrehearsed. In contrast, Rabbi Oshry edited and revised his published work over several decades after the war for an Orthodox audience. David Deutsch and Michal Shaul argue that in the historiography the religious perspectives of elites that glorify the observant during the Holocaust, such as those of Rabbi Oshry, have been embraced in by researchers. In contrast, they identify a near absence of academic inquiry into the religious questioning of ordinary Jews, such as Meisel and Shachnow, as revealed in oral testimonies. While this article is necessarily restricted in its scope due to its focus on the perspectives of three subjects, its purpose is to identify variation in religious thought as affected by the Holocaust.