The Inscription of Hope

His rugged back ached as he pressed his frail frame back against the wall. His hands - young and tender, trembled uncontrollaby as he tried to grip the dusty floor beneath him. His clothes - tattered, torn and dirty, couldn't provide any more solace than the thick smell of alcohol that saturated the air about him in that dark, damp and cold cellar.

His heart would skip a beat each time he heard a gunshot. They seemed to be getting ever closer; ever seeming to burst through the door any moment and down the stairs toward him. He wanted so so much to be in the arms of his father, to hold him just once more and know that he was secure, but as much as he wished, he knew it was impossible.

All he could recall was being violently awoken by his older brother who carried and thrust him into the basement before locking the door from the outside, leaving him dazed and confused as he tried to make sense of what was about him.

"We'll be back for you, I promise."

Those were the last words he ever heard his brother whisper.

He couldn't understand, he never was told much. As the days passed, the glow in his father's eyes ever seemed to fade. Even his mother gradually lost the exuberance and positiveness in her being, and though she told him everything was alright, he knew it wasn't. Thoughts flooded his mind as the tears poured down his thin, angular cheeks. He couldn't explain the tears, but somehow crying was all he wanted to do.

The entire house suddenly erupted with commotion as he was jolted back into reality. Shots rang out all over the place. Screaming unlike anything he had ever heard ensued. All to distinctly, he knew it was his mother.

Rage filled his body, he wanted so much to save his mother from the agony. She was old and weak, how could they do such cruel things to her?? But yet the fear of everything kept him frozen in the corner.

The shout that he had inside of him escaped as a bare whisper, even his vocal chords seemed to have broken as all that came out was a harsh burst of air.

"ma...ma...."

Tears afresh poured from his eyes, now red and bloodshot from crying. He was young, he couldn't do anything against the millions of German troops out there. He hated it. Why was he so small? Why was he so weak??

Why was he a jew?

The noise abruptly subsided after a few more gunshots. He waited for what seemed like an eternity before crawling his way to the cellar door.

"papa...?"

The eerie silence was all that answered him.

He knew it. He knew what had happened, as much as he refused to believe it. They were gone, all of them. All of them.

He slumped back against the wall in anguish but there were no more tears to be shed. His eyes were already dry and hurting like crazy. And in that moment of utter despair and pain, the teachings of his Sunday School teacher came to him.

"and never forget, God is with you, He will never leave you nor forsake you. He loves you."

There then in the deepest moments of his life, mustering what strength he had left, he took a chalk, drew the star of David, and below it wrote what today is known as the Inscription of Hope from the Holocaust.

These were the words that were found:

I believe in the sun,
Even when it is not shining.

I believe in love,
Even when there's no one there.

I believe in God,
Even when he is silent...


Do you believe?