this world is not this world.

So this week, I picked up a book that was essentially about the psychology of genocide. Well, not only is the book itself heavy in weight, but so is the topic. The writer explores the psychology behind the Nazi doctors -- venturing into the deep darkness of the men who systematically killed their neighbors and fellow citizens. 

The first lines of the book were quotes taken from a man that survived Auschwitz, a concentration camp. He said that "this world is not this world." Woah. That is some deep stuff. I mean obviously, this man has pretty much gazed into Death's eye and is still alive to tell the tale. I was so shocked that the author did not take the time to analyze this important phrase, because to me, it was so powerful. I took his line to mean that after Auschwitz, the ordinary rhythms and appearances of life, however innocuous or pleasant, are far from the truth of human existence. Essentially, underneath those rhythms and appearances lay darkness and menace. 

To permit one's imagination to enter into the Nazi killing machine is to alter one's relationship to the entire human project. No one wants to learn about such things. But psychologically speaking, nothing is darker or more menacing, or harder to accept, than the participation of physicians in mass murder. When we think of Nazi doctors, what comes to mind are their cruel and sometimes fatal human experiments. Those experiments in their precise and absolute violation of the Hippocratic oath, mock and subvert the very idea of the ethical physician, of the physician dedicated to the well-being of patients. The medicalization of killing -- the imagery of killing in the name of healing -- was crucial. At the heart of the Nazi enterprise is the destruction of the boundary between healing and killing. 

I'll give you some time to digest that.