From the Kingdom of Memory (20 page)

It was the same even in the death camps. Defeated and downcast, overcome by fatigue and anguish, tormented and tortured day after day, hour after hour, even in their sleep, condemned to a slow but certain death, the prisoners nevertheless managed to carve out a patch of freedom for themselves. Every memory became a protest; every smile was a call to resist; every human act turned into a struggle against the torturer’s philosophy.

Do not misunderstand me: I am in no way trying to minimize the Nazis’ evil power. I am not saying that all prisoners succeeded in opposing them by their will to be free. On the contrary—locked in a suffering and solitude unlike any other, the prisoners generally could only adapt to their condition—and
either be submerged by it or swept along by time. The apparatus of murder was too perfect not to crush people weakened by hunger, forced labor, and punishment. But I
am
saying that the executioner did not always triumph. Some victims managed to escape and alert the public in the free world. Others organized a solidarity movement within the inferno itself. One companion of mine in the camps gave the man next to him a spoonful of soup every day at work. Another would try to amuse us with stories. Yet another would urge us not to forget our names—one way, among many others, of saying No to the enemy, of showing that we
were
free, freer than the enemy.

Are We Afraid of Peace?

F
ROM TIME IMMEMORIAL
, people have talked about peace without achieving it. Do we simply lack enough experience? Though we talk peace, we wage war. Sometimes we even wage war in the name of peace. Does that seem paradoxical? Well, war is not afraid of paradoxes.

Though temporary in nature, war seems to last forever. In the service of death, it mocks the living. It allows men to do things that in normal times they have no right to do: to indulge in cruelty. A collective as well as individual gratification of unconscious impulses, war may be too much a part of human behavior to be eliminated—ever.

Life on our planet would be so much easier if only men and nations could live in peace. But apparently
they cannot. Is this because they are unaccustomed to it? Or perhaps because they need to simplify things? For war simplifies everything by reducing the options. The gulf separating good and evil widens. On one side, everything seems just; on the other, unjust. There is no need to think too hard about it—no one worries about subtleties in time of war. Time itself becomes subordinated to war.

If only we could celebrate peace as our various ancestors celebrated war; if only we could glorify peace as those before us, thirsting for adventure, glorified war; if only our sages and scholars together could resolve to infuse peace with the same energy and inspiration that others have put into war.

Why is war such an easy option? Why does peace remain such an elusive goal? We know statesmen skilled at waging war, but where are those dedicated enough to humanity to find a way to avoid war? Every nation has its prestigious military academies. Why are there no academies—or so few of them—that teach not only the virtues of peace but also the art of attaining it? I mean attaining and protecting it by means other than weapons, the tools of war. Why are we surprised whenever war recedes and yields to peace?

Unfortunately, we are forced to acknowledge that war seems inherent in the human condition—and in fact preceded it, according to an old Talmudic legend. Before God created man, says the Talmud, He was given contradictory advice by His angels. The Angel of
Love was in favor of creating man because he felt that in order to survive, men would have to love one another. But the Angel of Truth opposed this suggestion, because he knew that in order to exist in society, men would inevitably invent lies. As all the angels joined in the argument, it degenerated into a quarrel and then into open warfare. All but two—Michael and Gabriel, heavenly defenders of Israel—were destroyed by the fire that they themselves had lit.

Human beings turned out to be no better. Adam had scarcely been created before he quarreled with his wife and even with God. His two sons, Cain and Abel—the only children then on earth—became enemies and ultimately murderer and victim.

What lessons can be learned from this? Two men can be brothers and yet wish to kill each other; and also, whoever kills, kills his brother. But we only learn these lessons too late. In time of war, whoever is not our brother is our enemy; we are forbidden to be compassionate or give in to our imagination. If the soldier were to imagine the suffering he is about to inflict, he would be less eager to wage war. If he were to consider the enemy a potential victim—and therefore capable of weeping, of despairing, of dying—the relationship between them would change. Every effort is made, therefore, to limit, even stifle, his imagination, his humanitarian impulses, and his capacity to experience a feeling of brotherhood toward his fellow man.

Is this why people often appear so ill prepared for peace? As soon as peace knocks on the door, they seem paralyzed by distrust: what if it is but an illusion, a mirage, a trap? It is as though peace makes them uneasy—which is not unnatural, since we are so accustomed to living in fear of war that peace becomes a sort of elevated, remote ideal, something associated with the absolute, the transcendent. Peace has been so eagerly anticipated that its reality can only disconcert.

We are afraid to let ourselves go, to allow ourselves to be carried away by an enthusiasm born of wishful thinking. It is as though we cannot forget certain images and words which, only yesterday, characterized the other side as our adversary. How can we erase the collective memory of the Gulag atrocities, the occupation of Prague, the attack on Korea? How can we reconcile the terror of the KGB with
perestroika
and
glasnost
, Stalin’s Kremlin with Gorbachev’s?

Still, no matter how great the reward, we must not forget. There is no justification for forgetting. If we had to forget the past in order to obtain peace, I would say that I would want nothing to do with such a peace. It could only be a lie. It could only foster a costly and dangerous passivity.

What we must do is use our memory as an opening rather than a prison. What does our memory tell us? It tells us about the absurdity of territorial conquests today. Imperialism, whether political or ideological, is outmoded. Nothing is left of the empires
of Napoleon or the czars. What remains of Stalin’s global ambition? Communism is retreating everywhere. As for the Third Reich, which was to last a thousand years, today its name arouses horror and shame rather than admiration and envy.

In general, nationalism is less tied to geography than it used to be. Western Europe—for hundreds of years so fragmented and divided—is about to abolish its internal frontiers. Hereditary enemies such as France and England, France and Germany, will unite. Despite the past? Because of the past. Memory is a source of anguish, but it can also become a source of faith. And memory also reminds us that from now on war will be without glory. It will leave no conquerors, only victims.

J. Robert Oppenheimer expressed this aptly in his testimony before a Congressional committee in Washington. Asked what we had to do to avoid a nuclear war, he answered concisely: “Make peace.”

The Nobel Address
^*

Y
OUR
M
AJESTY
, Your Royal Highnesses, Your Excellencies, Chairman Aarvik, members of the Nobel Committee, ladies and gentlemen:

Words of gratitude. First to our common Creator. This is what the Jewish tradition commands us to do. On special occasions, one is duty bound to recite the following prayer:
Barukh shehekhyanu vekiymanu vehigianu lazman haze
—“Blessed be Thou for having sustained us until this day.”

Then—thank you, Chairman Aarvik, for the depth of your eloquence. And for the generosity of your gesture. Thank you for building bridges between people and generations. Thank you, above all, for helping humankind make peace its most urgent and noble aspiration.

I am moved, deeply moved by your words, Chairman Aarvik. And it is with a profound sense of humility that I accept the honor—the highest there is—that
you have chosen to bestow upon me. I know: your choice transcends my person.

Do I have the right to represent the multitudes who have perished? Do I have the right to accept this great honor on their behalf? I do not. No one may speak for the dead, no one may interpret their mutilated dreams and visions. And yet, I sense their presence. I always do—and at this moment more than ever. The presence of my parents, that of my little sister. The presence of my teachers, my friends, my companions.…

This honor belongs to all the survivors and their children and, through us, to the Jewish people with whose destiny I have always identified.

I remember: it happened yesterday or eternities ago. A young Jewish boy discovered the Kingdom of Night. I remember his bewilderment, I remember his anguish. It all happened so fast. The ghetto. The deportation. The sealed cattle car. The fiery altar upon which the history of our people and the future of mankind were meant to be sacrificed.

I remember he asked his father, “Can this be true? This is the twentieth century, not the Middle Ages. Who would allow such crimes to be committed? How could the world remain silent?”

And now the boy is turning to me. “Tell me,” he asks, “what have you done with my future? What have you done with your life?” And I tell him that I have tried. That I have tried to keep memory alive, that I
have tried to fight those who would forget. Because if we forget, we are guilty, we are accomplices.

And then I explain to him how naive we were—that the world did know and remained silent. And that is why I swore never to be silent whenever and wherever human beings endure suffering and humiliation. We must always take sides. Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented. Sometimes we must interfere. When human lives are endangered, when human dignity is in jeopardy, national borders and sensitivities become irrelevant. Wherever men or women are persecuted because of their race, religion, or political views, that place must—at that moment—become the center of the universe.

Of course, since I am a Jew profoundly rooted in my people’s memory and tradition, my first response is to Jewish fears, Jewish needs, Jewish crises. For I belong to a traumatized generation, one that experienced the abandonment and solitude of our people. It would be unnatural for me not to make Jewish priorities my own: Israel, Soviet Jewry, Jews in Arab lands.… But others are important to me. Apartheid is, in my view, as abhorrent as anti-Semitism. To me, Andrei Sakharov’s isolation is as much a disgrace as Josef Begun’s imprisonment and Ida Nudel’s exile. As is the denial of Solidarity and its leader Lech Walesa’s right to dissent. And Nelson Mandela’s interminable imprisonment.

There is so much injustice and suffering crying out for our attention: victims of hunger, of racism and political persecution—in Chile, for instance, or in Ethiopia—writers and poets, prisoners in so many lands governed by the Left and by the Right.

Human rights are being violated on every continent. More people are oppressed than free. How can one not be sensitive to their plight? Human suffering anywhere concerns men and women everywhere. That applies also to the Palestinians, to whose plight I am sensitive, but whose methods I deplore when they lead to violence. Violence is not the answer. Terrorism is the most dangerous of answers. They are frustrated, that is understandable; something must be done. The refugees and their misery; the children and their fears; the uprooted and their hopelessness: something must be done about their situation. Both the Jewish people and the Palestinian people have lost too many sons and daughters and have shed too much blood. This must stop, and all attempts to stop it must be encouraged. Israel will cooperate, I am sure of that. I trust Israel, for I have faith in the Jewish people. Let Israel be given a chance, let hatred and danger be removed from her horizons, and there will be peace in and around the Holy Land. Please understand my deep and total commitment to Israel: if you could remember what I remember, you
would
understand. Israel is the only nation in the world whose very existence is
threatened. Should Israel lose but one war, it would mean her end and ours as well. But I have faith. Faith in the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and even in His creation. Without it no action would be possible. And action is the only remedy to indifference, the most insidious danger of all. Isn’t this the meaning of Alfred Nobel’s legacy? Wasn’t his fear of war a shield against war?