{"id":82884,"date":"2020-02-14T09:59:56","date_gmt":"2020-02-14T16:59:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/?p=82884"},"modified":"2020-02-18T21:34:14","modified_gmt":"2020-02-19T04:34:14","slug":"the-holocaust-and-the-problem-of-goodness","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/2020\/02\/the-holocaust-and-the-problem-of-goodness.html","title":{"rendered":"The Holocaust and the Problem of Goodness"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"The<\/a>
The liberation of the Nazi concentration camp at Mauthausen, near Linz, Austria, on 6 May 1945, by elements of the Eleventh Armored Division of General George Patton\u2019s Third Army. My father was there that day, though I don\u2019t believe that he\u2019s in this photograph. He raised me with the moral obligation that he himself felt, that the crimes committed at Mauthausen and other such camps must never be forgotten. And I HAVEN\u2019T forgotten.
(Photo from Wikimedia Commons public domain)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

I wrote this column for the Provo Daily Herald<\/em> in October 1998:<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cA single death is a tragedy,\u201d said Josef Stalin.\u00a0 \u201cA million deaths is a statistic.\u201d\u00a0 But a visit to the Holocaust Museum in Washington, DC, gives the lie to the Soviet dictator.\u00a0 A million deaths is a million tragedies.<\/span><\/p>\n

And the losses continue.\u00a0 Given the intellectual leadership of the Jews in Europe and, now, in the United States, we must ask ourselves what great art we are missing, that Hitler\u2019s millions of victims might have created. \u00a0 Who can know what literature they or the children they were denied might have written?\u00a0 Would we have had a cure for cancer?\u00a0 And Jews were by no means the only victims of Hitler\u2019s grisly \u201cFinal Solution\u201d and of the war into which he plunged much of Europe and the world beyond.\u00a0 The ramifications of the Holocaust are literally incalculable.<\/span><\/p>\n

The Holocaust raises the problem of evil \u2014 what theologians and philosophers call the question of \u201ctheodicy\u201d \u2014\u00a0 in its most acute imaginable form:\u00a0 Appalling evils suggest that, if God is all-powerful, he is not good, and that if he is good, he is not all-powerful.\u00a0 Many solutions have been offered to this problem, but in the face of the actual details of the Holocaust \u2014 and the Soviet \u201cgulag\u201d and the Armenian genocide and the Cambodian killing fields and the Ukrainian \u201cfamine\u201d and the purges of Mao and the massacres in Rwanda and, now, the \u201cethnic cleansing\u201d in the former Yugoslavia \u2014 they can seem merely shallow and glib.\u00a0 One thinks of Voltaire\u2019s Candide, and of Dr. Pangloss, assuring us despite horrifying injustices and seemingly pointless suffering that this really is \u201cthe best of all possible worlds.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cNever shall I forget that night,\u201d writes the Nobel laureate Elie Wiesel, a survivor of the Nazi death camp at Auschwitz, \u201cthe first night in camp, which has turned my life into one long night, seven times cursed and seven times sealed.\u00a0 Never shall I forget that smoke.\u00a0 Never shall I forget the little faces of the children, whose bodies I saw turned into wreaths of smoke beneath a silent blue sky.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cNever shall I forget those flames which consumed my faith forever.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cNever shall I forget that nocturnal silence which deprived me, for all eternity, of the desire to live.\u00a0 Never shall I forget those moments which murdered my God and my soul and turned my dreams to dust.\u00a0 Never shall I forget these things, even if I am condemned to live as long as God Himself.\u00a0 Never.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

But is evil really the end of the story?\u00a0 Did Hitler win?\u00a0 Some Jews have seen in the \u201cFinal Solution,\u201d which ended violently in 1945, and the rise of the Jewish state of Israel in 1948, a symbol of the triumph of good (and of God) over evil and death much like the death and resurrection of Jesus himself for Christians.\u00a0 They may not be entirely wrong.<\/span><\/p>\n

The scores of biographies of Hitler that have appeared since his Wagnerian death amidst the flaming ruins of Berlin clearly demonstrate that we crave an explanation for such stunning evil \u2014 and that we are not yet satisfied that we have one.\u00a0 But doesn\u2019t stunning goodness also demand explanation?\u00a0 Albert Schweitzer, the Buddhist<\/a> emperor Asoka of India, and Mother Teresa of Calcutta (who sought only to do \u201csomething beautiful for God\u201d) are clues, no less than Stalin and Pol Pot, to the nature of humanity and the universe.<\/span><\/p>\n

St. Maximilian Kolbe voluntarily went to his death at Auschwitz in place of a fellow prisoner.\u00a0 Oskar Schindler, not a good man by traditional standards, rose to indisputable moral heroism under the Nazis and rescued hundreds of Jews.\u00a0 During the four years of the German occupation of France, the little southern Protestant village of Le Chambon, with an impoverished population of three thousand, saved about five thousand refugees (mostly children).<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThere is none that doeth good,\u201d says the Psalmist, \u201cno, not one.\u201d\u00a0 \u201cAll we like sheep have gone astray,\u201d agrees Isaiah.\u00a0 Yet, as another Psalm declares, God has made humankind \u201ca little lower than the angels\u201d \u2014 or, as the Hebrew says, \u201ca little lower than the gods.\u201d\u00a0 A balanced perspective on humanity and the universe will keep both facts in view.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Posted from Phoenix, Arizona<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u00a0 \u00a0 I wrote this column for the Provo Daily Herald in October 1998: \u00a0 \u201cA single death is a tragedy,\u201d said Josef Stalin.\u00a0 \u201cA million deaths is a statistic.\u201d\u00a0 But a visit to the Holocaust Museum in Washington, DC, gives the lie to the Soviet dictator.\u00a0 A million deaths is a million tragedies. And […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1019,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[7272,8652,8649,8625,8643,8628,8622,8634,3691,1670,8658,8655,8640,2271,8637,2292,8646,1724,8631],"class_list":["post-82884","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-albert","tag-ashoka","tag-asoka","tag-auschwitz","tag-calcutta","tag-elie","tag-evil","tag-goodness","tag-hitler","tag-holocaust","tag-kolbe","tag-maximilian","tag-mother-teresa","tag-problem-of-evil","tag-schweitzer","tag-stalin","tag-teresa","tag-theodicy","tag-wiesel"],"yoast_head":"\nThe Holocaust and the Problem of Goodness<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"    I wrote this column for the Provo Daily Herald in October 1998:   \u201cA single death is a tragedy,\u201d said Josef Stalin.\u00a0 \u201cA million deaths\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/2020\/02\/the-holocaust-and-the-problem-of-goodness.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The Holocaust and the Problem of Goodness\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"    I wrote this column for the Provo Daily Herald in October 1998:   \u201cA single death is a tragedy,\u201d said Josef Stalin.\u00a0 \u201cA million deaths\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/2020\/02\/the-holocaust-and-the-problem-of-goodness.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Sic et Non\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2020-02-14T16:59:56+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2020-02-19T04:34:14+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/186\/2016\/11\/800px-KZ_Mauthausen.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Dan Peterson\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Dan Peterson\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"4 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/2020\/02\/the-holocaust-and-the-problem-of-goodness.html\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/2020\/02\/the-holocaust-and-the-problem-of-goodness.html\",\"name\":\"The Holocaust and the Problem of Goodness\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2020-02-14T16:59:56+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2020-02-19T04:34:14+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/#\/schema\/person\/77113e9b09701bd1599fa272c4f65045\"},\"description\":\"    I wrote this column for the Provo Daily Herald in October 1998:   \u201cA single death is a tragedy,\u201d said Josef Stalin.\u00a0 \u201cA million deaths\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/2020\/02\/the-holocaust-and-the-problem-of-goodness.html#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/2020\/02\/the-holocaust-and-the-problem-of-goodness.html\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/2020\/02\/the-holocaust-and-the-problem-of-goodness.html#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"The Holocaust and the Problem of Goodness\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/\",\"name\":\"Sic et Non\",\"description\":\"\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/#\/schema\/person\/77113e9b09701bd1599fa272c4f65045\",\"name\":\"Dan Peterson\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/5ed1a72d26805e35a503e3167599df7c?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/5ed1a72d26805e35a503e3167599df7c?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"Dan Peterson\"},\"description\":\"\\\"Life was very unsatisfying until I discovered Dan's blog, which gave me a reason to live.\\\" (gemli, 7 November 2019)\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/author\/danpeterson\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"The Holocaust and the Problem of Goodness","description":"    I wrote this column for the Provo Daily Herald in October 1998:   \u201cA single death is a tragedy,\u201d said Josef Stalin.\u00a0 \u201cA million deaths","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/2020\/02\/the-holocaust-and-the-problem-of-goodness.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"The Holocaust and the Problem of Goodness","og_description":"    I wrote this column for the Provo Daily Herald in October 1998:   \u201cA single death is a tragedy,\u201d said Josef Stalin.\u00a0 \u201cA million deaths","og_url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/2020\/02\/the-holocaust-and-the-problem-of-goodness.html","og_site_name":"Sic et Non","article_published_time":"2020-02-14T16:59:56+00:00","article_modified_time":"2020-02-19T04:34:14+00:00","og_image":[{"url":"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/186\/2016\/11\/800px-KZ_Mauthausen.jpg"}],"author":"Dan Peterson","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Dan Peterson","Est. reading time":"4 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/2020\/02\/the-holocaust-and-the-problem-of-goodness.html","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/2020\/02\/the-holocaust-and-the-problem-of-goodness.html","name":"The Holocaust and the Problem of Goodness","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/#website"},"datePublished":"2020-02-14T16:59:56+00:00","dateModified":"2020-02-19T04:34:14+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/#\/schema\/person\/77113e9b09701bd1599fa272c4f65045"},"description":"    I wrote this column for the Provo Daily Herald in October 1998:   \u201cA single death is a tragedy,\u201d said Josef Stalin.\u00a0 \u201cA million deaths","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/2020\/02\/the-holocaust-and-the-problem-of-goodness.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/2020\/02\/the-holocaust-and-the-problem-of-goodness.html"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/2020\/02\/the-holocaust-and-the-problem-of-goodness.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"The Holocaust and the Problem of Goodness"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/","name":"Sic et Non","description":"","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/#\/schema\/person\/77113e9b09701bd1599fa272c4f65045","name":"Dan Peterson","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/5ed1a72d26805e35a503e3167599df7c?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/5ed1a72d26805e35a503e3167599df7c?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"Dan Peterson"},"description":"\"Life was very unsatisfying until I discovered Dan's blog, which gave me a reason to live.\" (gemli, 7 November 2019)","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/author\/danpeterson"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/82884","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1019"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=82884"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/82884\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=82884"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=82884"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=82884"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}