Abstract

This contribution explores the question: how could it be possible to go on trying to see the Nazis as human beings created in the Image of God? It begins with Etty Hillesum gazing at the brutal faces of the guards loading the train destined for the death camps, and explores her reaction to what she sees and how her reaction is a statement of what she has become. The essay then traces how, in the midst of a world collapsing all around her, Etty Hillesum learns to inhabit another inner world which saves her, and which shares characteristics common to the contemplative traditions of all the great faiths. The contribution is a reminder that her story is a story not of one, but of two worlds.

Keywords: description of Nazism by Etty Hillesum, inner world of Etty Hillesum, contemplative practices, metaphors used by Etty Hillesum, silence, prayer, kneeling.

When I think of the faces of that squad of armed, green-uniformed guards – my God, those faces! I looked at them, each in turn, from behind the safety of a window, and I have never been so frightened of anything in my life. I sank to my knees with the words that preside over human life: “And God made man after His likeness.” That passage spent a difficult morning with me.