[ajarmst]

I always liked the way he responded when asked (many years later) why he did it. Paraphrased, it was along the lines of "It was so obviously the right thing to do, but it would have been nearly impossible to push through the bureaucracy, so I just went ahead and did it myself." He did something so profoundly good that we are compelled to wish we could live up to such an example, and the reason he did it? He didn't really have one. It just never occurred to him not to do it. Which is as good a definition of "hero" as you're likely to run across. "Righteous among nations" indeed.

[DicIfTEx]

Anton Schmid [0] said something similar: ‘We all must die. But if I can choose whether to die as a murderer or a helper, I choose death as a helper.’

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anton_Schmid

[duxup]

And it was as simple as just doing it and not being limited to just what someone would or wouldn't allow.