Forgiveness, for Dr. Edith Eger, is not a word you throw around lightly.
It’s not something you hand out to absolve someone else.
It’s a declaration, a battle cry, a promise you make to yourself to no longer be bound to the pain someone else caused.
Edith, a Holocaust survivor who lived through horrors that most of us can’t even imagine, tells us that forgiveness is not about forgetting.
It’s about surviving—and thriving.
She was just 16 when her life as she knew it ended.
Auschwitz.
Her parents were taken from her the moment they arrived.
For Edith, who stayed alive alongside her sister Magda, survival was an act of defiance.
She danced for Josef Mengele, the man who decided who would live and who would die, a performance forced on her not for applause but for his cruel amusement.
In a place designed to destroy not just bodies but spirits, Edith held tight to her will to live.
That will would carry her through the war, through the loss of her family, and into a new life in America, where she would rebuild herself piece by piece.
But it wasn’t easy.
Survival, she discovered, wasn’t the same as freedom.
Freedom, real freedom, came decades later when she stood on a mountaintop in the Bavarian Alps, where Hitler’s retreat had once loomed over the world.
There, Edith let go.
Not of the memories—they would always remain.
Not of the injustice—it was too great to ever dismiss.
But of the hatred, the resentment, the bitterness that had tied her to the atrocities she endured.
She forgave. Not for them, but for herself.
What Forgiveness Meant for Edith
Edith writes that forgiveness is not an act of weakness but a declaration of strength.
It’s a refusal to let the past dictate your future.
And in forgiving, Edith didn’t lose her history—she reclaimed her humanity.
Forgiveness as Freedom:
For Edith, forgiveness was liberation. It was saying, I will not be imprisoned by what you did to me anymore.
A Gift to Herself:
Forgiveness wasn’t something Edith gave to her tormentors. It was a gift she gave herself—a chance to live fully in the present.
Empathy Without Excuses:
Edith doesn’t justify the actions of her captors, but she looks deeper.
She sees their pain, their brainwashing, their fear.
She doesn’t excuse them, but she refuses to let their hate define her.
The Process of Forgiveness
Edith often reminds us that forgiveness isn’t a light switch.
It’s a journey.
It doesn’t happen all at once, and it doesn’t mean the hurt vanishes.
It means you’re willing to work toward release, even if it takes a lifetime.
She also teaches that forgiveness isn’t for the offender. It’s for you.
For your ability to move forward, to be more than what happened to you.
Edith’s Lesson to Us
Edith Eger’s story is bigger than her. It’s about what we do with our pain.
How we can turn anger into understanding, grief into growth, and suffering into strength.
Whether it’s the unthinkable horror of the Holocaust or a betrayal closer to home, Edith’s story reminds us that forgiveness is a choice.
A choice to be free. A choice to live. A choice to hope.
And perhaps that’s the greatest act of defiance of all.
This post was inspired by Daily Stoic's video, Holocaust Survivor Dr. Edith Eger on the Gift of Forgiveness.