Lessons from Dachau

Lessons from Dachau


Our visit to the Dachau concentration camp left me contemplating what I learned and how I would allow this experience to affect my life. As I noted in my previous post, Dachau 2012, it was a somber and reverent experience being in the place where so many people suffered horribly and died at the hands of other people. Most people recognize the Holocaust as one of the great tragedies of history and an event we never want to repeat, but how much have we really learned from it and what does it mean for me, specifically in my life?

One of the things I recognized while on the grounds was that the people who died there and most, if not all, of those who suffered are now at peace in a place free from pain and suffering. They no longer need our help or our prayers. Appreciating the weight of what happened there is an exercise for ourselves, not for them. We need to fully grasp what happened so that we can take responsibility, as human beings, to ensure it doesn't happen again.

Unfortunately, it is happening again, right now in different parts of the world; atrocities just as gruesome and cruel as the Holocaust. And, until this point, I have neither known or cared much about them. At the Salzburg Seminar, I learned a little about what's happening in Syria. Men, women and children are being killed by the thousands and not much is being done about it. Just last week another village was invaded and 78 people were massacred. There are other atrocities happening all over the world and I know nothing about them.

From my Dachau visit, I have learned that I need to be more informed and active in whatever ways I can to speak out, vote, get involved or otherwise fight against these atrocities. I need to learn more about the UN, Amnesty International and other organizations to see if I should support them or speak out to them in some way. Part of me thinks that as I do this research, I will find that there is little that I can do to help these people around the world. But, if that happens, at least I can pray for them and find more opportunities in my own local community to help and to serve in some way. As a Christian, I believe that every person around the world is a child of God and loved by Him. Each one is a valuable soul and I cannot ignore their suffering.

From my visit and reading from Viktor Frankl's book, "Man's Search for Meaning", I also learned that my personal trials and struggles are what I make of them. In his book, Frankl wrote that:

"Everything can be taken from a man or a woman but one thing: the last of human freedoms to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one's own way."

and "When we are no longer able to change a situation - we are challenged to change ourselves."

So, no matter what is happening in my life, I have a choice of attitude and how I will allow the circumstance to change me. The people in concentration camps had this choice, too. Most became defeated, sullen and despondent, and they would not be blamed in the least in their situation. But, some few made a choice to rise above their plight, make right choices to help those around them, even at their own risk, and hold on to hope and faith in the future. Often times this saved them from others and from themselves. Frankl also referred to these struggles as "tasks" to be worked through as opposed to crises that are somehow defeating us. As long as I keep these things in mind, and remind myself of the things I've conquered in the past and that others have lived through, I know I can meet any challenge that the Lord sees fit to give me. I know that they are all for my own growth and perfection.

Finally, I am reminded of what I felt as I walked down the path, beyond the gravesites where were buried the ashes of thousands of unknown people and past the firing range where countless were executed. Seeing the beautiful overgrown plant-life and hearing the birds singing all around, one phrase went through my mind: "The Lord will reclaim His Earth". It was a testament to me that God is in charge. He would not remove the perpetrators' free agency and stop the Holocaust, but He is making that place His own and beautiful again - He is making it right. That reminds me that we are the same way. We may make a mess of our lives but through Him, we can be reclaimed as well and made right. He is reclaiming the souls that were lost in that place decades ago, He is reclaiming the grounds on which those souls suffered, He is dealing with those that perpetrated those evils and He can reclaim us, as well, if we let Him.

I am so grateful for the opportunity I had to visit Dachau and learn these lessons. I hope that I can really learn them by becoming a better person: finding a way to help those who are struggling now, recognizing trials in my life as opportunities to grow, and allowing myself to be reclaimed through God and His work. If you have an opportunity to visit one of these special and, in my opinion, sacred sites, I hope you take it and find some new understanding for yourself. And if you can, read Frankl's book. It will give you a unique perspective on the Holocaust and your own life.

Viktor Frankl, "Man's Search for Meaning"

Wiki article on Dahau

Dachau 2012

Yesterday the Salzburg Seminar group went to the Dachau Concentration Camp. I knew it would be a moving and spiritual experience for me and it was. Words cannot describe the horror that occurred there and nothing I can write will be nearly as moving as being there or even that others have written about the holocaust but I wanted to get down my thoughts before they escape me.

I prepared for the trip by reading most of "Man's Search for Meaning" by Victor Frankl, which describes daily life in a concentration camp and looks at the psychological affects and choices that men have when they are imprisoned there. The book describes details quite well and gives you a good idea of the struggles prisoners have in the camps, while also explaining the choices one has to either give up and wallow in despair or view the experience as your "task" in life to get through with dignity and doing right. Besides being an excellent introduction to what I would see, today, it provides a valuable perspective for anyone who is going through a crisis about how to make the best of it.

I said a prayer before I left that I would be able to feel the Spirit helping me to understand whatever my Father in Heaven wanted me to know or feel from my visit today. He did not let me down. Many people talk of an "aura" about the place. I could definitely feel that but it felt like the Spirit to me - a spirit of respect, grimness and great reverence for the things that happened there. I learned a lot about what led up to the camp and the history of the Nazi regime. Dachau was the first concentration camp and was used as a model for most of the others. Being the first, it housed many prisoners in the early 1930's, before WWII even started. These were mostly political prisoners, people who were against the National Socialist party that was coming into power. It wasn't mostly Jews at first and most people didn't die there - some were actually released after a period of training to be real Germans and worthy of citizenship. Of course they were carefully watched after they left. It wasn't until later that the camps became primarily for Jews and primarily to torture, humiliate and generally make them miserable. It was then that Victor Frankl's account is more applicable.

Walking around the camp, I first saw the area for roll-call, where each morning and night men lined up by the thousands to be counted. They had to stand there for more than an hour at a time, in any weather and no matter what their physical health was, and it was normally at least malnourished and weak. I remember that as I stood there and looked out over that vast area, I could see the image of all those men in ragged uniforms standing row by row.




Looking down Camp Road toward the Maintenance Building with barracks plots on the side



We went through the museum which is in the building where new prisoners were brought to be processed. We took the path that the prisoners took. They were stripped of their clothes and relieved of all of their possessions, recorded carefully in large registries that reminded me of those you'd see when you check into a hotel, categorized and labeled with numbers, by which they would be known (no names were ever used, according to Frankl), and color-coded patches to show why they were there - political dissidence, moral deviancy/criminal behavior, homosexuality and whether they were Jewish, Polish, Russian or whatever and finally cleaned and disinfected before being given prison uniforms - sometimes used by those who had died - and sent to their designated place in the barracks. In each of these rooms I could envision crowds of prisoners being processed into the dreary life they faced ahead.

Right in front of this "Maintenance Building", where the new prisoners were processed, there is now a sculpture memorial. It clearly represents the repulsiveness of the place. Made of iron, it depicts scrawny bodies piled on one another and gives you an uneasy feeling.



Monument in front of the Maintenance Building





There were 30-something barracks, each which should have housed about 50 people but ended up housing hundreds each by the end of the war. By then they slept in bunk boxes (rather than bunk-beds) with so many head to foot in each box that they would all have to roll over at the same time, when a whistle blew. I could clearly see these people in their bunks, wearing the dismal uniforms and looking malnourished. I saw the bathrooms which were just about 9 or so toilets/urinals lined up in one room and two round wash basins in the adjoining room. I could see the men as they washed up at these basins. Early in the history of the camp there was also a room for lockers for each prisoner. These were later removed to put more beds in.





Bunk Beds



There are only two barracks there, now and they have been reconstructed - so nothing original in them. The rest of the barracks are gone, leaving only the obvious plots of where they stood in two long rows on either side of a wide corridor called "Camp Road". I heard somewhere that the prisoners dreamed of walking to their freedom along this road. I could again envision these men crowded in the road each day with guards around them.

The Barracks plots with a reconstructed barracks in the distance.



Behind the barracks, are the memorials by different religions. The only one I really cared to see was the Jewish one which depicted an ugly building with a ramp going down into it with railings that looked like the barbed wire that surrounded the original camp. This memorial was supposed to make you feel like you were going down into a gas chamber and it did its job. In the very bottom, as you are within the dark, brick chamber, there was a hole in the ceiling that looks up to a Menorah on the roof and allows the sunlight to come in. It was here that I started to cry. But, it wasn't just from the incredible sadness I felt for the many people who died there, but also a sense of gratitude in knowing that their souls were taken up and given all the peace and freedom they had longed for. The Spirit was strong there and the veil thin.

Inside the Jewish Memorial

From here we went to the Crematorium section. This was the most emotional place for me. As I looked into the ovens, it was hard not to imagine a human body inside. There really are no words to describe the emotion here. The tears flowed, though. Two rooms away was the gas chamber. This one, it is said, was never actually used. But even if it wasn't, 30,000-40,000 people died in this camp. Many others were shipped to the Auschwitz chamber. You could see, in the chamber, the fake shower holes in the ceiling, drains in the floors and the box in the wall where the pellet would be dropped. This room was completely heart-breaking. There was also another crematorium near this building - the older one where most of the cremations happened.




Ovens in the crematorium

When the liberators came in and began to clean up the place, they found the containers with all the human ashes in them. Ashes of thousands of people who were killed or died of sickness. These ashes were buried in two graves behind the larger building and now have memorial plaques that say "Grave of thousands of unknowns". A small path leading away from these graves, goes into a beautiful garden area, overgrown with trees, flowers and other plants. As I walked down this path, I could hear the birds chirping. Halfway down is a firing range where executions were carried out. Some of the students reported finding bullet holes in the back wall and even one hole with a bullet still in it. I did not go close enough to this wall to see it, but passed it by walking along the loveliness and feeling very emotional. Again there really are no words to describe these emotions but there were so many all combined together within me. As I walked the path, one phrase went through my mind "The Lord will reclaim His Earth".

Path overgrown and beautiful

I felt that no matter what horror these poor people had to endure, it is now over and they are in the comforting arms of the Lord. He will overcome all the terrible things that we do on this Earth and will one day restore beauty and perfection. That is the biggest message that I got from my visit. It brought me such peace to know this but also a lot of inspiration to find more ways in my life to try to end such atrocities or prevent them from happening. I plan to write another piece about the lessons from Dachau but for now, I am happy to end here.

Andy, the students and faculty and I left Dachau a little different, a little better than when we arrived. I think I was prepared for what I saw and experienced there, but I will still never forget it and hope to use what I gained for good in my life.