Oscar Schindler: A Profiteer-turned-hero
Throughout the history of mankind, certain great men have stepped up to the
challenges of leading a nation to independence, guiding a nation through
turmoil. Moreover, they consistently defended their religious beliefs no matter
what, and even put their lives on the line every day to protect and secure the
safety of others. These men are traditionally regarded as heroes in the grand
human society. As a matter of fact, it is not extraordinary that these heroes
reached such achievements. Because most of them had stayed on the same
track all the way through, the track which they always believed as the orthodox
one. In comparison, Oscar Schindler was certainly a particular hero who chose
another route and turned himself completely around, against his own country,
culture and the inherited belief system, as a result he saved the lives of 1,200
Jewish people during the crucial holocaust period—we can definitely accept him
as a hero and he was no more and no less a hero then everyone else who
resisted Nazism during World War II.
Schindler’s attitude toward the pitiful Jewish people changed, while the other
Germans were persecuting them. His compassion and respect for them had
gained as he gradually came into contact with them. At first he was a cynical and
greedy exploiter of slave workers in Krakow, who was entirely driven by the
luring profit like every other usurping German industrialist. In view of the fact
that the original reason he employed Jews in his factory was because Jewish
labours were a lot cheaper than the “Poles”, he did not intend to save them at
all in the first place. But somewhere along the line, his attitude had begun to
change slowly. In a stark contrast to the beginning, he began to talk to them and
try to know them; as a result he became compassionate for them. For instance,
once he actually provided the Jews with water when he saw they were thirsty to
death in the train on a blazing day. He said in short pants, “More water, come on
more water on the roof. I’ve got some 200-mter hoses back in Emalia. We can
reach the cars at the end.” He grabbed the hoses and in fact did the heavy work
personally; moreover he seemed more anxious than the people inside the train.
Besides sprinkling water to the Jews with his own hands, he even insisted on
bringing longer hoses, which made him suspicious in front of Goeth.
Moreover Schindler’s perspectives on the Nazi changed dramatically after he
witnessed a German raid on the Jewish ghetto. He was aware that the brutality
of the Nazis accelerated with murder, violence and terror when he saw innocent
people were killed and packed in the trucks. He was almost shocked as he
oversees the liquidation from the mountain. He firmly stated that, "Beyond this
day, no thinking person could fail to see what would happen. I was now resolved
to do everything in my power to defeat the system." He was awakening, and his
sheer humanity forced him to take extremely great personal risks to save the
Schindler Jews. Comparing with the member of the Nazi party eternally on the
lookout for profit, he took his first faltering steps from the darkness of Nazism
towards the light of heroism.
Additionally, Schindler’s sense of worth also changed ultimately, and he had
found the significance in his life. After he realized the situation of war, he could
have comfortably taken the money and gone to Switzerland. But instead, he
gambled his life and all of his money to save Jews. Instead of wealth and woman,
he valued people’s lives the most. He spent all his fortune to bribe to S.S officials,
in order to save the Jews from deporting to the death camps. According to the
statics, He spend 4 million keeping his Jews out of the death camps, an
enormous sum of money for those times He eventually got bankrupt after the
war ended, from an ordinary salesman to an extremely wealthy profiteer, and
after all became an escapee without a penny. But he still murmured before he
fled, “This pin. Two people. This is gold. Two more people. He would have given
me two for it, at least one. One more person. A person, Stern. For this.” Even
though he was in such horrible situation, in which he had to flee away, he still
wanted to save more Jewish people.
Today there are over 6,000 offspring of Schindler Jews live in Europe and the
U.S.A. The name Schindler is now well known to billions of people as a household
word for courage in a world of brutality. He was indeed a hero who was able to
stop on the brink of a precipice and turn back from the wrong path. It is more
surprising and takes more energy for someone to defy their own beliefs and to
turn themselves around than to stay true to what they always believed.