Ethical Challenge of Auschwitz and Hiroshima: Apocalypse, The

THE ETHICAL CHALLENGE OF AUSCHWITZ AND HIROSHIMA: APOCALYPSE. By Darrell J., Fasching, State University Press of New York, $19.95.

This book, which examines the meaning of what happened at Auschwitz and Hiroshima, is written firm a theological perspective, but it is a theology that accuses the traditional churches of serving gods who are too small. The author makes it clear that he is speaking to Christians, Jews, Buddhists, as well as to "secular" humanist atheists. He feels that the only kind of theology that can speak to our multi-cultural world must be an "alienated" theology that is willing to be critical of its own traditions through the eyes of the "other."

Fasching says that "The link between Auschwitz and Hiroshima turns out to be an inner link demanded by the analysis of those who were, directly or indirectly, victims of the Shoah. It is as if those who know something of the `desolation' of Auschwitz recognize that in some sense they have a kinship with those who know the `desolation' of Hiroshima." As no particular religion possessed sufficient moral strength to prevent the holocausts of the past, the author is calling for the development of a cross-cultural ethic that will free us from the tyranny of the technical order that created the bombs and the death camps and at the same time would make the total destruction of "the other" unthinkable. This new cross-cultural ethic will lead to the discovery of the human dignity of the cultural strangers that we are now encountering in greater numbers.

RAYMOND. K. DeHAINAUT

Copyright The Human Quest May/Jun 1998
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