The extraordinary and wise Ellie Wiesel has died at the age of 87. He was often cited as an icon of a

reasonable loss of faith. There's a terrible moment in his memoir of the Holocaust, night,

when he watches a young boy die slowly by hanging and repeats the question posed by someone

in the crowd. Where is God now? Vizel writes,

I heard a voice within me answer him. Where is he? He is hanging here on this gallows.

In 2006, I sat across from Elie Wiesel in a hotel room that my producers had turned into a makeshift

studio, and I asked him to tell

me what happened after he lost his faith forever, as he wrote at Auschwitz. He answered,

What happened afterwards is in the book. I went on praying. Elie Wiesel ever after enriched my

understanding of prayer and forgiveness and the problem of evil,

which was nowhere more embodied in the 20th century than in Germany,

where I first encountered him as a young journalist in Divided Berlin.

This is Becoming Wise, an inquiry into the mystery and art of living.

I'm Krista Tippett.

Germany, you were there when I was there once visiting.

Yes.

I'm asked occasionally, you know, do you forgive?

And who am I to forgive? I'm not God.

I don't believe in collective guilt.

I met you there. We talked about it. It was January 20th, 1985.

Now, I have a recollection. It was one of the first...

First time you've been in Berlin.

...