How Can One Thank A Nazi Doctor

Eva Kor and her sister Miriam were the subjects of horrific experiments at Auschwitz-Birkenau. They were among 1,500 sets of twins exposed to disease, disfigurement and torture at the hands of the Nazi regime’s Angel of Death, the infamous Dr Josef Mengele.

In 1995, Eva returned to Auschwitz for the 50th anniversary of their liberation. She reached out to Dr. Hans Munch (the physician responsible for signing the death certificates at the camp). Eva requested that he join them at the Auschwitz and sign an affidavit acknowledging what he had seen and what he had done. Dr. Munch agreed. Eva explains what happened after:

So I returned from Germany, and I was so glad that I would have an original document witnessed and signed by a Nazi—a participator, not a survivor and not a liberator—to add to the historical collection of information we were preserving for ourselves and for future generations. I was so grateful that Dr. Münch was willing to come with me to Auschwitz and sign that document about the operation of the gas chambers, and I wanted to thank him. But what does one give a Nazi doctor? How can one thank a Nazi doctor?

For ten months I pondered this question. All kinds of ideas popped into my head until I finally thought: “How about a simple letter of forgiveness from me to him? Forgiving him for all that he has done?” I knew immediately that he would appreciate it, but what I discovered once I made the decision was that forgiveness is not so much for the perpetrator, but for the victim. I had the power to forgive. No one could give me this power, and no one could take it away. That made me feel powerful. It made me feel good to have any power over my life as a survivor.

In an interview before her death just last year, she summarized the impact of forgiveness this way: “Immediately I felt that a burden of pain had been lifted from my shoulders, a pain I had lived with for fifty years: I was no longer a victim of Auschwitz, no longer a victim of my tragic past. I was free. . . If I had discovered forgiveness sooner, I would have had that 50 years of my life. Forgive. See the miracle that can happen.”