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Watersheds of human history are often given symbolic recognition through radical breaks in the way we date things. Thus in Christendom reference is made to B.C. and A.D.; some Jews and Christians have agreed on a mutual resort to BCE and C.E.; while in Islam H.A. stands for the alldecisive year of Mohammed's Hijra (Migration). Perhaps 1941 is to be identified as Year One of the Holocaust (basing it upon the "killing phase" of the program against the Jews). On this reckoning the present analysis is offered in the year 34 of the Holocaust. But the symbology A.H. would mean confusion with Muslim usage. An alternative, for English usage, is BFS, before the Final Solution, and F.S., in the year of the Final Solution. (Any symbology faces the criticism of being either arbitrary or contrived. A still further alternative is B.A. and A.A., before and after Auschwitz. There are substantive objections to singling out Auschwitz, and yet there is no doubt that this name has become the single most powerful symbol of the Holocaust.)

Long Night's Journey Into Day is a stimulating and provocative attempt to deal with the impact and meaning of the Holocaust within contemporary Christian and Jewish thought. To Jews, the Holocaust is the most terrible happening in their history, but it must also be seen as a Christian event. The Eckardts call for a radical rethinking of the Christian faith in the light of the Holocaust, examining such issues as the relation between human and demonic culpability, the charge of God's guilt, and the reality of forgiveness. They clarify the theological meaning of the Holocaust and the responsibili