He who came to save the world entire

 

    During the Second World War, most of the factories related to the countries that had a role in the conflict tried to make a profit by changing their production. There are numerous records of factories that created extensions of its facilities to meet the demand of those years. What was most required was military products, such as guns, tanks, and different kinds of weapons. That was a lucrative time for those who assembled the new products, numerous factories made money and increased their gain. However, what most people did not know was that, in one city inside the occupied Poland, a German industrialist also tried to adapt his production to make a profit. His name was Oskar Schindler, but his gains were not money, status, or prestige. His profit was 1,200 lives that he saved.
    Oskar Schindler is a symbol of the history of humankind. He preserved several generations of Jewish families by protecting them from the Nazi Party in the Second War. His stratagem was employing all those Jews in his factory. The people who were contracted to work composed a list that got the famous title “Schindler’s List”. Because of all of these acts, Oskar Schindler could be summarized in a single word: Hero. This summary is true because a hero, in the basic sense, is a person who cares about other person’s decency. Moreover, a heroic person is defined as someone who cared about the importance of life, and above all, respectes the human life. “The hero profoundly believes in the value and dignity of human life”; Miriam Polster says in her article (2001) Eve’s Daughters . If the fact of believing in a single life, numerically saying, already characterizes a heroic act, Schindler is definitely a hero by saving hundreds of lives.
    It is known that courage is one of the hero’s characteristics. No matter what it can cost to the heroes, they just take the risk on behalf of a greater cause. Indeed, as Polster (2001) argues, “Heroism requires courage, both physical and mental; personal cost takes a backseat to getting the job done”. A close look at Schindler’s acts reveals that this concept of courage fits completely with his qualities. Although Schindler was an executive constantly trying to make money with his factories, he did not always do so successfully. However, losing money was not enough to stop his desire to save lives. In fact, he continued to increase the number of Jews in his factory even though he risked bringing prejudice upon himself. In another words, he did not care about the price he had to pay for each life; he was just dedicated to save the life of those innocent people. The atmosphere of the war made him undergo a moral transformation; that is why he risked all his money.
    Oskar Schindler did not start his plans to save lives at the initial sight of the war. He first had to see the results that the war brought to his country, and had to analyze them. As a hero, after realizing and analyzing the consequences that the war brought to the world, he underwent a transformation in his mind that made him think about a way to change the reality of that suffering population. The notorious list that he created as a means to save lives was not created overnight; it was a result of serious, conscious decisions to make the list grow.  Thus, Schindler worked together with his mind, but also had to fight against it. He struggled with his morality, but his faith was stronger, allowing him to constantly find a way to save people from oppression. “He came more and more to associate himself with his Jews than with other Germans”, notes Crowe in his book (as was cited in Stuart Anderson’s article, Oskar Schindler: The Untold Story, 2014).
Besides all his good acts, Schindler was also a fallable human being, such a human that also commit some errors, but all of those failures just make him more heroic than he already is, because a true hero, not the fantastic heroes, are completely reachable. They are people that you can find in the daily life. Polster (2001) shows the idea of a "close hero", “They are family, co-workers, neighbors, and their heroism takes place in commonplace settings and in response to everyday challenges." In simple words, the real heroes get the job done by people’s side in common places. Sometimes you do not even notice them just because they are simple humans.
    “The Unforgettable Lifesaver of 1,200 Persecuted Jews." This is what is inscribed on Schindler’s grave in Jerusalem. After knowing his history, it is clear that Oskar is without doubt a hero. With his acts, he changed the lives of thousands of people and wrote a different page in the history of humankind. He risked his life and interests to be a lifesaver. And as the Talmud, the central text of Judaism, teaches, “He who saves a single life, saves the world entire." In fact, he saved the world.





References
Anderson, S. (2014). Oskar Schindler: The Untold Story. Retrieved     from http://www.forbes.com/sites/stuartanderson/2014/03/19/oskar-schindler-the-untold-story-3/
Oskar Schindler. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oskar_Schindler
Oskar Schindler Biography (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.notablebiographies.com/Ro-Sc/Schindler-Oskar.html
Polster, M. (2001). Eve’s Daughters. Gestalt Journal Press.