They needed no reason. They came simply because he was of Jewish descent. The Nazis stormed into his home, arresting him and his entire family. Soon they were herded like cattle, packed into a train, and then sent to a death camp n Krakow. His most disturbing nightmares could never have prepared him for seeing his family shot before his very eyes. How could he live through the horror of seeing his child's clothing on another because his son was now dead as the result of a "shower"?
Somehow he continued. One day he looked at the nightmare around him and confronted an inescapable truth: if he stayed there even one more day, he would surely die. He made a decision that he must escape and that escape must happen immediately! He knew not how, he simply knew he must. For weeks he'd asked the other prisoners, "How can we escape this horrible place?" The answers he received seemed always to be the same. "Don't be a fool," they said, "there is no escape! Asking such questions will only torture your soul. Just work hard and pray you survive." But he couldn't accept this - he wouldn't accept it. He became obsessed with escape, and even when his answers didn't make any sense, he kept asking over and over again, "How can I do it? There must be a way. How can I do it? There must be a way. How can I get out of here healthy, alive, today?"
It is said that if you ask, you shall receive. And for some reason, on this day he got his answer. Perhaps it was the intensity with which he asked his question, or maybe it was his sense of uncertainty that "now is the time." Or possibly it was just the impact of continually focusing on the answer to one burning question. For whatever reason the giant power of the human mind and spirit awakened in this man. .................
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