Forgiveness - Simon Wiesenthal

            Simon Wiesenthal lost 89 relatives in Hitler’s death camps. One day he was yanked out of a work detail and taken up a back stairway to a dark hospital room. A nurse led him into the room, then left him alone with a figure wrapped in white, lying on a bed. The figure was a badly wounded German soldier, whose entire face was covered with bandages. His name was Karl.

            With a trembling voice, the German made a kind of confession to Wiesenthal. He told how he had been brought up in a Nazi family, the fighting he had experienced on the Russian front, and the brutal measures his S.S. unit had taken against Jews. And then he told of a terrible atrocity. All the Jews in a town were herded into a wooden building that was then set on fire. Karl had taken an active part in the crime. Several times Wiesenthal tried to leave the room, but each time the ghost-like figure would reach out and beg him to stay.

            Finally, after 2 hours, Karl told Wiesenthal why he had been summoned. The soldier had asked a nurse if any Jews still existed. If so, he wanted one brought to his room so he could clear his conscience. He then said to Wiesenthal -”I am left here with my guilt. “I do not know who you are, I know only that you are a Jew and that is enough. “I know that what I am asking is almost too much for you. “But without your answer I cannot die in peace.” Karl asked for forgiveness for all the Jews he had killed. He asked for forgiveness, from a man who might soon die. Wiesenthal sat in silence for some time. He stared at the man’s bandaged face. At last, without saying a word, he stood up and left the room. He left the soldier in torment, unforgiven.

            Had Simon Wiesenthal done the best he could? He himself seemed dissatisfied with his action. He went over it with his companions. He visited the dead soldier’s mother. In a book in which he reported this incident, he asked 32 rabbis, Christian theologians, and secular philosophers to comment on it. “What would YOU have done?” is the question he posed.

            Out of 32 people he asked the majority said he had done right in leaving the soldier unforgiven. Only 6 said he had done wrong. Yet Bible says we have the privilege of granting forgiveness to those who have wronged us.”