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Voyagers - Etty Hillesum - An Interrupted Life

And if God does not help me to go on, then I shall have to help God - Etty Hillesum - 11 July 1942, Saturday morning, eleven o'clock

Index

Etty Hillesum's background

What makes Etty Hillesum such a great example?

Etty Hillesum's background

Etty Hillesum was a fairly ordinary Dutch woman, who also happened to be a Jew at a time and a place when people like her were being murdered on an industrial scale. The consequence was that Etty too was incarcerated at Westerbork, and then sent to Auschwitz, where she was killed on 30 November 1943.

What makes Etty different is that she kept a diary from March 1941, so we know something of her life and personal experience, and even more remarkably, during this time she seems to have undergone a spiritual awakening that has majorly impressed those who have read her diaries and letters.

Etty was born on 15 January 1914 in Middelburg, and although she could have gone into hiding, she chose instead to volunteer for a post with the Jewish Council at Westerbork transit camp, wanting to share the fate of her people rather than escape it. She and her family were deported from Westerbork to Auschwitz on 7 September 1943, and she was killed there on 30 November 1943, aged 29.

What makes Etty Hillesum such a great example?

19140115 Birth of Etty Hillesum and the day of her deportation to Auschwitz

What is particularly notable is that Etty went to her death not in despair but, as her diaries and letters record, in a state of remarkable spiritual acceptance, having written that she did not want to be simply a passive victim of what was happening to her and her people.

The transits at the time of Etty Hillesum's deportation from Westerbork to Auschwitz, on 7 September 1943, were

Transiting Sun trine Etty Hillesum's Venus

Transiting Venus conjunct Etty Hillesum's Chiron

Transiting Chiron conjunct Etty Hillesum's Saturn

Transiting Chiron square Etty Hillesum's Chiron

Transiting Chiron square Etty Hillesum's Uranus

Transiting Uranus square Etty Hillesum's Jupiter

The chart shown is Etty Hillesum's birthchart, together with transits for the day of her deportation from Westerbork around the outside. Aspect lines [traditional] are between the transits and her birthchart.