Introduction
Traditional Jewish theology prior to Holocaust comprised a broad and fluid body of thought that defined the framework of Jewish religious life. This framework faced challenges when confronted with modernity, which exposed its strengths and weaknesses. Holocaust intensified these challenges to an unprecedented degree. It is not merely a historical event or an internal religious crisis but a phenomenon with extensive civilizational dimensions, leaving deep and lasting impacts across diverse spheres of human life. Therefore, this research will also examine the reflections of Holocaust in areas such as politics, culture and art, society, education, and media.
Materials & Methods
The authors do not regard themselves as historians of Holocaust, and their discussion is not aimed at affirming or refuting the event. Rather, they have sought to narrate it through the lens of its impact on the minds and language of Jewish thinkers. Consequently, their research is phenomenological, not historical. Consistent with the study's nature, the research materials are primarily based on library documents and media archives.
Discussion & Result
Consistent with this phenomenological analysis, Holocaust engendered a profound crisis in Jewish theology, demonstrating that traditional theological responses were no longer adequate to explain or endure such an experience. This inadequacy was not merely an abstract issue but an existential and faith-based crisis that compelled Jewish thinkers and theologians to undertake a difficult endeavor of rethinking the most fundamental concepts. Martin Buber (1878–1965) argued that God's silence during the dark events of history does not signify His absence or non-existence, but rather an eclipse rooted in the wicked deeds of human beings and the destruction of what he termed the sphere of between. Abraham Joshua Heschel (1907–1972) placed the responsibility for this evil not on God but on humanity and its misuse of God-given freedom, arguing that God's apparent silence at Auschwitz was not a sign of His absence or indifference, but a manifestation of His boundless sorrow and deep empathy for the victims. Eliezer Berkovits (1908–1992) contended that God has opened a space for genuine human freedom and choice through the voluntary self-limitation of His power. Mordecai Menahem Kaplan (1881–1983) redefined Jewish theology by categorically rejecting a supernatural, intervening God of history and proposing the concept of God-Process.
Holocaust tragically demonstrated that modern states may not only fail to preserve the dignity and lives of their citizens but are also capable of becoming the primary, organized agent of their destruction. Furthermore, the legacy of the Holocaust and the deep sensitivities arising from it have become a powerful tool in current political and media discourses. One of its most serious and controversial manifestations is the definition, interpretation, and use of the concept of antisemitism, especially when the critique of the policies of Israel's regime is involved. This situation raises fundamental questions concerning the boundaries of freedom of speech, legitimate political criticism, and instrumentalization of historical suffering for political objectives. There is increasing evidence suggesting that the accusation of antisemitism has become a tool to suppress political critiques of Israel's regime.
On a social level, the Holocaust was not only a genocide but also the experience of a type of social death and a profound collapse of interpersonal trust and human solidarity. Moreover, Holocaust demonstrated that science and education, when lacking a moral orientation and social responsibility, can be transformed into tools for legitimizing deadly ideologies and justifying atrocities. If culture and art had previously often served to represent beauty, wisdom, transcendence, and progress, after Auschwitz they could no longer easily overlook suffering, destruction, and the questioning of history's purpose. The duality in artistic approaches indicates that post-Holocaust culture has been constantly grappling with the fundamental question of how such an experience can be depicted, and the delicate line between ethical testimony, artistic creativity, educational necessity, and avoiding commercial or political trivialization and abuse.
Media also played a vital and dual role during and after Holocaust. On the one hand, many Nazi German publications, radio stations, and cinema became powerful instruments of the regime's official propaganda. On the other hand, after the war, journalists, photographers, and documentary filmmakers played a decisive role in shaping global public memory by recording and exposing the horrific images from camps like Auschwitz and Dachau. These contradictory experiences highlighted the media's crucial role in either reinforcing discourses of hatred or the normalization of evil, or conversely, in exposing truth, fostering critical awareness, and strengthening collective responsibility, demonstrating that the representation of events in the media has a direct impact on the formation of historical memory and society's moral judgment.
Conclusion
Holocaust challenged the foundations of traditional Jewish theology, prompting fundamental questions about God's presence or absence, divine justice, the meaning of the Covenant and the Chosen People, and the possibility of faith after Auschwitz. In response to this crisis, prominent thinkers sought to resolve this fragility of belief and find a path for the continuation of intellectual and spiritual life by offering novel answers. In the political sphere, the event led to a crisis of confidence in states and a reappraisal of the moral legitimacy of laws, setting the stage for geopolitical shifts, such as the strengthening and acceleration of the Zionist movement. This research specifically emphasized the crucial distinction between antisemitism and legitimate critique of the policies of the State of Israel and the Zionist movement. It showed how the concept of antisemitism is sometimes instrumentalized to suppress any critique of Zionism and block academic and critical discourse, a phenomenon that threatens freedom of expression and poisons the space for healthy dialogue. In the sphere of culture and art, Holocaust created a great challenge for its representation, leading to the formation of a collective memory based on the necessity of bearing witness or recounting the experience. In the social context, it exposed the collapse of trust, the deterioration of solidarity, and the complexities of the gray zone. It implicated educational and cultural institutions in the issue of the politicization of knowledge, and it placed the media in a dual role in shaping public memory and representation. All this evidence confirms that Holocaust became a point of rupture in modern Western civilization, a rupture that challenged the optimistic faith in linear progress, instrumental rationality, the rule of law, the neutrality of science, social solidarity, and the possibility of fully representing reality, thereby posing fundamental epistemological questions about the nature of historical knowledge and collective memory.