Yad Vashem

Israeli soldiers in front of the
museum's entrance

Today we went to the Holocaust Museum in Jerusalem.  I haven't really thought about it but I've visited a lot of memorials and museums that have to do with the holocaust.  When I lived in Germany I visited some concentration camps turned exhibits. One I remember that we went to was Dachau.  Last fall I went to the Holocaust Museum in Washington D.C.  But this visit was very different from the other times.

Being in the country where the Jewish people came to after WWII was all too real and it hit home.  The re-population of Israel and the people in this country is a testimony of God's faithfulness to the promises he made to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.  The amount of suffering and persecution the Jewish people endured was unimaginable.  The pictures and stories of survivors were so heartbreaking.

The fire burns in memory of all who
perished in the Holocaust

One of the things I remember was that the Jews living in Germany had assimilated to German culture and then the people in the country turned on them leaving the people with an identity crisis.  I wonder what would happen if America one day just turned on Korean-Americans or Asian-Americans.  What kind of position would the second generation be put in?  Where would we place our identity?  If we say we are Americans, our own country is persecuting us and if we say Korea or Asian, we are labeled to be persecuted.  But this was a reality for Jewish-Germans and as time went on for the Jews in the surrounding nations.

The stone structure quotes
Ezekiel 37:14

The museum was very intense with Israeli students and soldiers also going through the exhibit to learn about their history and learning again about where the world fell short.  It was hard to swallow the fact that the church had started antisemitic behavior because they wouldn't convert to "Christianity".  Hitler would later use this as not just a religious position but a racial one.  The surrounding nations failed to let the Jewish people in their nations as refugees for many, many years.  Then following the refusal, certain groups joined in the persecution.  Even the USA refused refugees at the beginning of the Holocaust.

But there was redemption for the nations.  Finally, starting with Denmark I believe, the nations started turning to aide the Jews to hide them and protect them from being taken to concentration camps.  And there will be redemption for the church as we walk together as one new man.

At the end of the exhibit they have a room of names.  It is a circular room with volumes of books.  These books are filled with the names of the people who died in the Holocaust.  This is not a small room and the books are not thin, its purpose is to not forget what happened so that it will not happen again.