From "Answering Jewish Objections to Jesus" by Messianic Jewish author Michael L Brown:

1. Question:

Why did God allow six million Jews to die in the Holocaust? Before I could even think about believing in Jesus, I need an answer to this question.

Answer:

This is an agonizing question that has been asked countless times by both Jews and Christians, but in many ways, it is more a question about man's sin against man than about God's silence during that sin.

In other words, the Holocaust is something people did to other people. Why didn't God intervene? Some Orthodox rabbis would say it was because we, the Jewish people, had sinned against the Almighty and were therefore under his disfavor.

The Holcaust, then, was a massive, overwhelming example of divine discipline, devastating for the moment but leading to health and healing in the end. To the extent that there is truth to this view, we must then ask what sins we had committed to merit such a fate (or to rob us of divine protection).

Other Jewish leaders strongly disagree with this view, claiming that even godless Jews who died in the Holocaust were martyrs in some sense of the word, innocent victims of murderous injustice solely because they were Jews. Which view is correct from a biblical perspective? That is something we will consider, but let me suggest something you may never have entertained: The ultimate image of an innocent Jew suffering atrocities at the hands of godless murderers is not so much the image of a Jew dying in the Holocaust as it is teh imgage of our Messiah, the best-known Jew of all time, beaten, flogged, humiliated, and nailed to a cross. He is a Messiah with whom we can identify-- and who can identify with us.

Over the last thirty years, an almost endless stream of literature has been published delving into every imaginable aspect of the Holocaust, including detailed, meticulously documented studies that leave no stone unturned. Still, it is one thing to analyze the natural side of the Holocaust, tracing the political, economic, sociological, psychological, and ethnic factors that contributed to this time of unparalled suffering. It is another thing to analyze the spiritual (and unseen) side, attempting to understand what God was or was not doing, what Satan was or was not doing, and what the religious dimensions of the Holocaust really were. Closely related to all this is the most fundamental of all questoins: Why?

Do we even have a right to ask such questions? LImited as we are, can we really gain true insight into such deep, mysterious matters? Don't they belong to the realm of hidden things (see Deut. 29:29) that lie beyond the grasp of mortal, finite humans and are known only to God?

Perhaps there are dimensions of the Holocaust that will remain a mystery, and perhaps the motivation behind some of our questions is a wrong motivation. But it is impossible to think that people of faith--both Jews and Christians-- would simply put their heads in the sand and not seek spiritual answers, no matter how painful the process may be. In fact, it can easily be argued that it is imperative that we ask some questions, either to learn whatever lessons must be learned from the Holocaust or to provide some assurance of the goodness of God in a time of such spiritual darkness.

So much has been written and said. There have been countless books and articles devoted to the questions, Why did this happen? and Where was God? Is it possible to gain clarity in the midst of so many competing voices and conflicting ideas?

In order to make any headway, we need to step back and get as broad a perspective as possible. To help us do this, let me give you an overview of the more important religious Jewish responses to the Holocaust. Then I'll offer some biblical reflections on these responses. Finally, I'll present something that could radically affect your outlook concerning the Messiah.

The noted Jewish historian Steven Katz provided a useful summary reflecting major Jewish reflections on the Holocaust current as of 1975. He enumerated them as follows:

1. The Holocaust is like all other tragedies and merely raises again the question of theodicy and "the problem of evil," but it does not significantly alter the problem or contribute anything new to it.

2. The classical Jewish theological doctrine of mi-penei hata'einu, ("because of our sins we were punished") which was evolved in the face of earlier national calamities can also be applied to teh Holocaust. According to this account, Israel was sinful and Auschwitz is her just retribution.

3. The Holocaust is the ultimate vicarious atonement. Israel is the "suffering servant" of Isaiah (ch. 53ff.) -- she suffers and atones for the sins of others. Some die so that others might be cleansed and live.

4. The Holcaust is a modern Akedah (sacrifice of Isaac) -- it is a test of our faith.

5. The Holcaust is an instance of the temporary "Eclipse of God" -- there are times when God is inexplicably absent from history or unaccountably chooses to turn His face away.

6. The Holcaust is proof that "God is dead" --if there were a God He would surely have prevented Auschwitz; if He did not then He does not exist.

7. The Holcaust is the maximization of human evil, the price mankind has to pay for human freedom. The Nazis were men, not gods; Auschwitz reflects ignominiously on man; it does not touch God's existence or perfection.

8. The Holcaust is revelation: it issues a call for Jewish affirmation. From Auschwitz comes the command: Jews survive!

9. The Holcaust is an inscrutable mystery; like all of God's ways it transcends human understanding and demands faith and silence.

Let me encourage you to reread this brief summary and reflect on each of heh responses. Do you find yourself in agreement with any of them? Do you find any of the views above abhorrent? Perhaps you have a totally different view of your own.

Let's sharpen our focus and look at some related perspectives in a little more detail. In a compendium of Orthodox Jewish reflections on the Holocaust prepared by rabbis and students in Israeli yeshivas, Yosef Roth discussed five principal responses, paraphrased below, some of which overlap with the positions presented by Steven Katz:

1. Hester Panim (Hebrew for "hiding of the face"; see 5 and 7 in Katz's list). According to this view, in order for God to allow real freedom of choice, he restrains himself from intervening in human affairs. Thus, to a point, he will allow evil to go on unchecked, even if it results in tragedy and loss of life. Otherwise, there would be no true freedom of choice and no real consequences for evil or good behavior.

2. Holocaust and redemption Roth states, "According to this approach, the lack of proportion between the sin and its punishment is explained by the end of the Exile and the establishment of the State of Israel." Therefore, the Holocaust is not seen as a punishment "but rather as a Divine 'treatment,' for lack of an alternative, intended to extricate the Jewish people from the Exile."

3. The birth pangs of the Messiah. This view, too, does not see the Holocaust as a punishment. Rather, it is part of the final complex of events dubbed "the birth pangs of the Messiah" by the Talmudic rabbis, a period marked by unprecedented suffering and upheaval. (Cf. Matthew 24:4-13, where Yeshua [Jesus] also speaks of a period of time marked by calamity and upheaval called [v. 8] "the beginning of birth pains.")