Night-Section 3 Summary by Adrian Aguilar and Alexis Cordova- Period 4

Section 3 starts in Birkenau where the women and men are separated. Elie goes with his father, while his mother and sisters go to the women's side. Little did Elie know, this would be the last time he saw them. I think this shows how strong Elie is because the minute I am separated from my family, I would have broken down into tears. It must have been also difficult to wonder how they dealt with being cremated alive. I would be asking myself, did they suffer? Or was it quick? After being separated, another prisoner demands Elie and his father to lie about their age because this would allow them to survive. Other prisoners angrily inform Elie that the reason they are sent to Auschwitz was to be cremated. When asked by the doctor, Elie lies about his age and says he is a farmer, instead of a student. He is sent to the left with his father. At this point, Elie is still unsure about his safety because no one knows which direction leads to death or work. As they move throughout Birkenau Elie witnesses babies and adults being burned in pits and realizes the horrors Auschwitz is full of. Elie begins to challenge God and is angered that he would allow all the deaths of the innocent Jewish people. This gave me a sense of irony because Elie was very religious at first, but we begin to see the cracks in his faith from this scene. At first, it seems the group of men are moving toward the pit, which causes Elie to consider suicide with the electric fence. However, two steps from the pit, the group is redirected to barracks. Soon after arriving, the men are shaved, stripped, and dressed in prison uniforms. When days pass, Elie realizes how much he's changed when he fails to protect his father from a Kapo. They then move over to Auschwitz for three weeks, here prison numbers are tatooed on their arms. Elie's number is A-7713. At Auschwitz, Elie and his father meet a relative named Stein, who Elie lies to about his family's whereabouts to give him hope. When Stein discovers the truth about his family, he never returns to Elie again. At the end of the section, the group of workers embark on a four hour walk to their new work place, Buna.