Answering Wiesenthal's Question

Throughout the second half of part one of The Sunflower, Wiesenthal contemplates if he made the right decision in regards to the dying soldier's request. In the last sentence of The Sunflower Wiesenthal tells the reader to ask, “What would I have done?” if I were placed in this situation. For me, the answer is simple. I would not have forgiven the soldier, and I would not be hard on myself for not forgiving him. How could Wiesenthal even consider forgiving a man who has killed so many innocent people, and who probably would have killed him if he was told to? The people that the Nazi really should be asking for forgiveness from is the people he killed. Wiesenthal should never forgive the SS soldier, especially after everything he had been through in his life at the Nazi camps. I found this link about Wiesenthal's life to be very interesting, and I recommend it to anyone interested in reading about his life.

What probably surprised me the most about the book was the fact that the Nazi soldier asked for forgiveness. If I had just killed a bunch of innocent Jews, and was on my death bed, I would not have had the audacity to even face a Jew. The soldier, being the Christian that he was, should have talked to a priest before he died. The priest would have been more likely to have helped him die in peace.

There are many reasons why I believe Weisanthal should not forgive the Nazi. I do not understand why he felt somewhat bad for the Nazi, or why he visited the Nazi’s mother. Maybe with time, he thought that the soldier was just following orders and really didn’t have a choice. Maybe he thought that the soldier knew he was doing the wrong thing, and asked for forgiveness because he was trapped into doing a horribly wrong deed. However, I still think that everyone has a choice about their actions, and the soldier was wrong to kill those innocent people even if he was doing it under orders.