Others sought to heal themselves in the weeks and months after liberation by nursing the flickering embers of faith, and clutching at symbols of Jewish life that represented their shattered past. Some abandoned their beliefs, lashing out at the Creator in their rage and despair.

Others were crushed by their bitter suffering. Some Jews had clung to faith until the very end-until death or liberation, he testified. Rav Aronson also penned profound essays on the process of recovery and awakening that brought survivors back to the land of the living, and the world of Torah and mitzvos. His diary, originally titled Megilas Beis Hoavodim, Scroll of the House of Bondage, chronicles the brutal camp conditions, relentless abuse, prospects for resistance, questions of suicide, the observance of yomim tovim, and a number of gut-wrenching halachic decisions he made pertaining to life and death situations in the camp. During this period, he compiled meticulous records of events he witnessed and experienced during almost three years of captivity, at great risk to his life. Rav Aronson was deported with his community in 1942 and went through a long agonizing odyssey in various Nazi camps. “Can these dry bones come back to life?” we wondered. “When the few survivors were liberated, one from a city and two from a family…without the breath of life or any desire to live, there was no natural means visible on their horizon by which these people could recover,” Rav Yehoshua Moshe Aronson, one of the few Polish rabbonim to survive the Holocaust, wrote in his sefer “Alei Merorot. Haunted by their memories, sick and prematurely aged, trapped in the camps even after liberation, many survivors hovered on the edge of an emotional and spiritual abyss, questioning whether there was anything worth living for. Nazi brutality and dehumanization had wiped away many facets of their identity. They seemed to belong nowhere, perhaps not even fully to themselves. But Jewish survivors did not belong to that world. Footage taken in many camps at the hour of liberation captures the joyful sobbing of ravaged inmates, as the yearned for moment of freedom finally arrived.īut for many survivors, the initial burst of jubilation fizzled out as the magnitude of the devastation sank in, and traumatized victims realized they had no homes or community to return to, no family to embrace them.Īcross the world, wild celebrations filled the streets.

“ –Rav Yehoshua Moshe Aronson, Alei Merorotįor most Holocaust survivors, liberation and the opening of the camps triggered an outpouring of exultation. “From Heaven came the answer: These bones shall live! We saw with certainty Hashem’s kindness dripping the dew of techiyas hameisim upon us. Can these dry bones come back to life?” we wondered.

Slingshot of Hell by Yechezkel Harfenes