ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses Religion and the Uniqueness of the Holocaust. Few events of the twentieth century have been the object of as much persistent popular interest as the Holocaust. When the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum opened its doors in April 1993, museum officials estimated that 1 million people would visit the museum during its first year. They vastly underestimated the actual number that first year, hosting approximately 2 million visitors, two-thirds of whom were non-Jews. Given the enormous weight Judaism and Christianity place on the interpretation of Jewish disaster as an expression of God's justice and providence, it was inevitable that both Jews and Christians would respond to the Holocaust in accordance with their respective traditions. The Holocaust almost inevitably elicits some form of religious interpretation at every level of intellectual sophistication, as is evident in the popular response to the Holocaust museum.
