Lynn Yarborough, age 12, of Florence, South Carolina, for her question:

What exactly is a holocaust?

Sometimes we need a heavy duty word to fire the imagination. For example, think of the volcano that burned and buried the ancient city of Pompeii. Our usual everyday words are too tame to describe it. But the word "holocaust" can convey the dramatic event because it stuns the mind. It compels us to imagine the fiery fury and devastating destruction that wiped out a thriving city and its people in a day.

The word "holocaust" is borrowed from languages spoken when Pompeii was destroyed. At that time it referred to burnt offerings made to the gods and goddesses of the day. It was a special ceremony in which a whole sacrificial animal was completely consumed by fire. Later the ancient word was somewhat modified and exaggerated to mean a devastating fiery event in which uncountable human bodies are burned and buried. Holocaust maintains its dramatic impact only when we reserve it for such a mind boggling event. If for example, we use it to describe a blaze in a waste basket, it loses its force.

In modern times the holocaust is the word used to describe the atrocities and persecution thousands of  Jewish people suffered until the government lead by German Adolph Hitler.