But why must we remember the Shoah?
AVRIL ALBA
WHILE the Holocaust has possibly become the most documented event in history, concerns remain as to the longevity of its memory. How do we explain such an apparent paradox?
With Kristallnacht just passed and the director of Auschwitz-Birkenau speaking at the Sydney commemoration and at the Jewish Holocaust Centre in Melbourne, reflection on this rather contradictory state of affairs seems in order. Auschwitz-Birkenau is one of the most visited “sites” in Europe, with 1.3 million visitors pouring through its gates in 2009. Given the hundreds of Holocaust memorials and museums that now dot the globe — from the death camps to the purpose-built institutions situated far from the sites of mass murder — the worry that the Holocaust will be forgotten seems counter intuitive.
And yet such concerns are real, indeed palpable. They demand further ­consideration.
As evidenced in recent issues of The AJN, much of this concern centres on the ability of survivors to “pass the legacy” and the readiness of succeeding generations to receive such an inheritance. When asked by The AJN for my own “take” on this question, I responded that my worry was not that we had failed to receive “what” survivors wanted to tell us — such information we have gleaned in abundance. Rather, my concern lay in the fact that we seldom, if ever, asked “why?” Why do survivors wish us to remember and why should we take up this cause?
“Self evident!” I hear my critics respond. “Never Again, that’s why.”
Yes, this is an important answer, but it cannot be the only reason to continue commemoration. Do we really need Holocaust commemoration to know that mass murder is wrong and that one should take all possible steps to avoid it recurring? Western civilisation knew of this moral certainty well before the Holocaust and other atrocities were enacted upon millions of innocent civilians in the course of the 20th century. The events of the Holocaust reinforce such moral knowledge, but they certainly do not predate it. So why do we need to remember?
This is a question not easily answered, let alone within the restrictions of an 800-word op-ed. But I would suggest that it is the key question with regard to Holocaust commemoration. For it is the discussion and debate that this question will engender that will ensure the longevity of the memory it seeks to confront. All the more so as we pass from the survivor generation to the next, when the more immediate concerns of personal mourning and loss no longer govern commemorative agendas.
The “why” that eludes us ¬≠generates both the anxiety that accompanies the passing of the survivor generation, but also provides a powerful conduit to bestow meaning to the memory they bequeath. Without it, we are left with a traumatic history of pain, cruelty and a despairingly detailed account of the brutalities that human beings can inflict upon each other. With it, we can probe deeper into that experience, asking questions that are not simply about “facts”, but also about truth — the truth of human experience when faced with the worst that humanity has to offer.
Asking the “why”was forbidden in the “grey zone” of the camps — Primo Levi taught us that. From this point on, the ethics of asking this question at all has been under constant debate. Those who would refrain from asking contend that Auschwitz lies beyond our comprehension and this may well be true. The horror of Auschwitz may never be transmissible as “ordinary knowledge”. Yet the demands of memory leave us no other option but to try. Confronting the “why” requires humility but it cannot, must not, relinquish effort in the face of incomprehensibility.
Those individuals, communities and institutions that take the “why” seriously are the ones, I believe, that will succeed in passing the legacy of the Holocaust onto the next generation. Their answers will, by necessity, be different, as each individual or group reflects on the multiplicity of experiences that comprise what we now refer to ubiquitously as “The Holocaust” and draw from it their own conclusions. Some will sit well with us, while others will provoke anger and outrage, but hopefully all will provide food for thought and, moreover, cause for reflection.
The paradox with which we began now seems to slacken. For it is one task to “know” one’s history — a task whose difficulty and importance should not be underestimated. Yet, to understand this history’s significance and therefore relay its “memory” is another undertaking altogether.
It is to the latter duty that our energies must turn if commemoration is to continue with meaning and purpose; if we are to continue to truly “pass the legacy” and not simply “recount the facts”.
Avril Alba is the director of education at the Sydney Jewish Museum.
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