The educational philosophy of Yad Vashem

Abstract

The Holocaust is usually presented by the traditional way of historical research, analyzing different kinds of written documents, testimonies and pictures, to have a better understanding of the historical process of the “Final Solution”. This kind of presentation gives a comprehensible picture of the political decisions, that were made by the perpetrators, but the image of the Jewish victim remains unclear in the shadow of the ashes of the gas chambers. The Jew has no face, no past, no family, he is no more than a helpless subject of the Nazi policy, part of a huge mountain of burned skeletons, a mathematical sum up of 6 million losses. This way of presentation strengthens the Nazis' perception of the Jews, which smashes not only his body but his memory too since nobody can feel a real empathy for numbers. The immediate reaction to those traumatic horrible pictures is rejection or denial. This point of view leads to a claim of inability to understand the Holocaust as part of the historical phenomena, and to describe Hitler as an insane, sick one! This approach is especially dangerous since it liberates the perpetrators from responsibility. For this reason, we have to distinguish between the role of historians and the role of educators. History narrates the tale, while education gives it meaning. The topic of the Holocaust is part of the curriculum we teach in High School and it is an important part of final examines for History. But learning the facts by heart doesn't mean a real understanding of the moral importance and consequence of this issue.

Holokaust se obično predstavlja tradicionalnim načinom istorijskog istraživanja, analizom različitih vrsta pisanih dokumenata, svedočanstava i slika, kako bi se bolje razumeo istorijski proces „Konačnog rešenja“. Ovakva prezentacija daje razumljivu sliku političkih odluka koje su počinioci doneli, ali slika jevrejske žrtve ostaje nejasna u senci pepela gasnih komora. Jevrejin nema lice, prošlost, porodicu, on je ništa više od bespomoćnog subjekta nacističke politike, deo ogromne planine spaljenih skeleta, matematički zbir 6 miliona gubitaka. Ovakav način predstavljanja jača percepciju nacista o Jevrejima, što razbija ne samo njegovo telo već i pamćenje, jer niko ne može da oseti pravu empatiju prema brojevima. Neposredna reakcija na te traumatične užasne slike je odbacivanje ili poricanje. Ovakvo gledište vodi ka tvrdnji o nemogućnosti da se Holokaust shvati kao deo istorijskog fenomena, a da se Hitler opiše kao lud, bolestan! Ovaj pristup je posebno opasan jer oslobađa počinioce odgovornosti. Iz tog razloga moramo razlikovati ulogu istoričara i ulogu prosvetnih radnika. Istorija pripoveda priču, a obrazovanje joj daje smisao. Tema Holokausta je deo nastavnog plana i programa koji predajemo u srednjoj školi i važan je deo završnih ispita iz istorije. Ali učenje činjenica napamet ne znači stvarno razumevanje moralnog značaja i posledice ovog pitanja.