Courage

It’s people like that firefighter who define the word courage and make it have meaning.  Courage is taking an active and responsible role when trying to overcome an obstacle.  Even if it is something small like making a public speech, or even battling a disease, courage can come from anybody in many ways.  Courage cannot be around, though, if fear is not with it.  The two are similar to Yin and Yang in Chinese beliefs, they are opposites that need the other, or else it won’t exist at all.

    One of the most horrific events in human history was the Holocaust.  During World War II, the Nazis rounded up all of the Jews and either killed them, or sent them to concentration camps to be killed.  One survivor of this terrifying event was Elie Wiesel.  In his book, Night, he explains what happened before and during his time at the concentration camp.  Moshe the Beadle, his former teacher, was one of the people supposed to be massacred before the others were sent off.  Instead, he was only shot in the leg, and had the courage to walk from Hungary back to Germany to tell his story.  After being asked why he came back, he said, “I wanted to come back to Sighet to tell you of my death, so that you could prepare yourselves while there was still time.  I don’t attach any importance to my life anymore.” (Wiesel 5).

    Even though Moshe was taken far away and supposedly killed, he had the courage to come back.  He faced the danger of dying or being taken away, and committed a very courageous act, even with an injured leg. It’s acts like his that define courage perfectly.  Many people would not have had the courage to go back that far under those circumstances, instead they would die or go to the nearest town or city.

    Another terrible tragedy in history was the genocide in Rwanda.  The country was split into two, caught in a civil war filled with mass murders, destroyed villages, and families torn apart.  The political leaders in Rwanda were hiding in fear of getting assassinated, although some of them were the ones conducting the genocide.  The UN sent a small unit to help the citizens and negotiate a peace agreement between the two sides.  The unit was there for over a year, and their fearless leader for most of their time there was Lt. Gen. Romeo Dallaire.  He is probably one of the most courageous people in history, being face to face with death and the genocidaires, too many times for him to remember.  Even though he was faced with all of these dangers to his life, he still commanded the UN unit until he suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder.  The many dead bodies, mutilated children, and barbarianism of the citizens of Rwanda was too overwhelming for him.

    He returned home in 1994, just two months before the whole ordeal was over.  He was urged by friends, family, and colleagues to write a book about his experiences to share with the world the horrible events that had just happened.  In Shake Hands With the Devil, Dallaire relived the traumatic experience with many horrifying details.  He stated, “It took me seven years to finally have the desire, the willpower, and the stamina to begin to describe in detail the events of that year in Rwanda.” (5).  This shows that courage can not only come on the battlefield or in a deathly experience, but how it can also take courage to write a book. One of the most fearful situations anybody can be in is being face to face with the devil
himself.

 In The Thieves of Heaven by Richard Doestch, Michael St.Pierre was a former thief, until his future wife persuaded him to stop his thieving ways.  Ten years later, when life seemed to be going absolutely perfect for Michael, his wife develops a serious case of cancer in her ovaries.  His insurance does not cover the treatment, and he cannot afford to pay for it either.  He gets a letter from a wealthy German man named Finster, who said he would pay for his wife’s medical fees.  The letter included  a plane ticket and money to take a cab to Finster’s home.  Michael arrived, and Finster gave his proposition. 

He wanted two keys from the Vatican that apparently held the secret to getting into heaven.  Michael agreed, and stole the keys without having much trouble.  Michael soon got a call from his best friend, Paul Busch, saying that it was too late for his wife to survive.  Michael went back to Finster’s home and told him, and Finster said he already knew.  After a long argument between the two, Michael found out that Finster was actually the Devil in human form.

Most people, when so close to the Devil, would either run as fast as they can go, praise him, or pray to God for help.  Instead, Michael didn’t even move an inch when he found out, but still argued with him over his job.  Michael ended up trapping Finster in a cell in an old town, and made the hill it was built in cover it by setting explosives in the right areas.  Even though he knew the Devil was not dead, he felt accomplished. 

Michael is also another hero who defines what courage means.  He overcame his fear of losing his wife after he knew it was too late, and still went on to defeat the Devil and bring the keys back.  It takes a lot of courage to do even one of those things separately, but both takes an unimaginable amount of courage.