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One advantage of being in North America is that it doesn’t cost inordinate sums of money to bring famous intellectuals to speak to an audience. So while the Jewish community finds itself with one esteemed guest after another here, and I heard from Adin Steinsaltz a couple of weeks ago (he came to Sydney last year but I missed him), tonight I had the opportunity to hear Elie Wiesel speak. The holocaust survivor, acclaimed author, social activist, Boston University professor and Nobel Peace Prize laureate lectured and took questions on the topic of “Building a moral society: the urgency of hope”.

The event was hosted by Hillel UQAM’s committee for Étudiants pour la Compréhension de la Tolérance, and supported by numerous organisations. I received a free ticket yesterday from Allison when she realised she couldn’t go (a rehearsal, I presume) and so landed up tonight at Spectrum—a large entertainment hall made for concerts and not so appropriate—waiting in a line for headsets that would provide a concurrent English translation.

While the novelty was to see Elie Wiesel and hear him speak, the translation was bound to detract: it was stinted and often hard to understand; it didn’t convey all of the speaker’s emotion or passion; it didn’t follow his lips, or synchronise with the laughter of half the audience; and I have a habit of falling asleep when I have earphones in.

Still, the ideas were the main point. Despite the title of the organisation that brought him out, Wiesel spoke out against tolerance. He said that in order to tolerate someone else, you have to think pretty highly of yourself. Tolerance says “the other is inferior to me, but I’m cool with that”. Instead, one needs to find respect for others. (This in the end is just semantics and words are only what you and others mean them to be.)

He points out that one should love others, not because they are the same as you but because they are different. Each culture and each individual is unique, and that is precisely what we need to appreciate. Wiesel seemed to argue that totalitarian regimes did not understand this and they saw that one person’s role could be filled by someone else. This is precisely their fault, in not realising that each person is irreplacable.

This idea of loving people for their difference is in contrast with much of the human rights movement of the 20th century which focussed on what people have in common, as the UN’s Universal Declaration of Human Rights begins: “All Human beings are free and equal in dignity and rights”. I had also understood Leviticus 19:18’s command to “love your neighbour like yourself” to focus on the commonalities: later in the chapter (v34) is a command to “love the stranger like yourself because you were a stranger in Egypt”. I like to take an interpretation where “like yourself” in the second case, and therefore the first means “because he is like yourself”. For a long time, too, I have tried to appreciate and cherish the differences between people and peoples. There is a blessing in Judaism that one is meant to say upon encountering an exceptionally different person “blessed are You … who distinguishes the creations (משנה הבריות)”. Similarly, one who sees a multitude of Israel should say “‘Blessed is He who understands mysteries’ for their opinions are different one from another and their faces are different one from another.” (Berakhot 58a) We see a contrast here between loving because of similarity and loving because of difference. The point may be that at the most basic level it is important to understand that all are the same, but at another level it is important to love, and to respect people, for their differences (and not just in spite of them).

And while on the topic of difference, Wiesel multiple times protested against indifference as possibly the worst quality a person can have. He encouraged people to act; to create petitions simply written “Save Darfur”, signed and sent to Prime Minister, President, Secretary General, from each university campus, and surely something will come from it. He filled his talk with anecdotes, like when he first was alerted to the situation in Sudan in 2000, his reaction and his influence in pushing politicians to action. Also in 2000, Wiesel had visited Germany and spoke there in parliament. There he spoke with the president: Germany has been very supportive in aiding the victims of the holocaust, and in aiding Israel—but still it has not asked Israel for forgiveness. Two weeks later, the president spoke in German before the Knesset, apologised and asked for forgiveness from the Jewish state. This reminded me of the Sorry movement in Australia, which aims for governmental apology for a “stolen generation” of Aboriginal children. The first thing I thought is the likely meaninglessness of governments acting on behalf of earlier incarnations of themselves. But asking for forgiveness is also a much more meaningful act than saying sorry. “Sorry” is thrown around all the time, said when you want to make your way through a crowd, or when you step on someone’s toe. Asking for forgiveness has to be a much more sincere and personal act—it necessarily involves two partners and has some sense of mutuality.

In Judaism, asking for forgiveness is something one is meant to do at the start of the year to each person they may have wronged. But to what extent do I have the responsibility to ask the forgiveness of a person who I only wronged through my indifference, or my inaction? A common reaction to such a person would be pity; Kathryn, a class mate, with whom I walked back from the talk, suggested love is appropriate. I think love can be too fluffy, too meaningless (sort of like “sorry”). What does it mean to love such a person you do not yet know personally? Maybe the appropriate reaction is to ask for forgiveness on the inside, in your heart, and give respect on the outside, in action.