Professional Documents
Culture Documents
by
Robert A. Michael
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Epigraph
Preface
Introduction
1933
1934
1935
1936
1937
1938
1939
1940
1941
1942
1943
1944
1945
1946
Footnotes
References
Epigraph
their disorderly English garden. She wonders aloud why all the mice
are gone. He tells her that snakes have eaten them all. With the
innocence of childhood, she looks into his face and asks, "Daddy, why
do living things kill each other?" The father looks down into his
daughter's face, reflecting on an answer. After a while his eyes fill with
many other complicated questions about life and death. But even he,
ignorance.
the horror of the Holocaust? How does the historian explain why the
Western world has chosen Jews as the metaphor for suffering and the
belief that the Jews are radical enemies of the state and of humanity,
inherently evil beings who must be eradicated from the face of the
earth? How does the historian explain the silence of the world to the
Nazi atrocities? How does the historian face the murder of two million
Jewish children? There are no easy answers for these questions. Eugon
piles of bodies, pause for a short moment and imagine that this
poor residue of flesh and bones is your father, your child, your
wife, is the one you love. See yourself and those nearest to you,
to whom you are devoted heart and soul, thrown naked into the
the Holocaust (also called by the Hebrew Shoah, the Yiddish Hrbn, and
Jewish Problem), traces the events of the years 1933 through 1946.
The intentional focus on the Jews victimized during the Holocaust is not
goal was the killing of millions of non-Jews. But the other, less
the timetable for the decision on the Final Solution of the Jewish
Problem.
only dislike or hate Jews, but who foment political action against Jews.1
But history has repeatedly shown that anti-Jewish action results from
Certainly, not in the common usage of the word. Admittedly, there are
distinctions to be made between St. Jerome, who claimed that all Jews
were Judases who betrayed God for money; St. John Chrysostom, who
argued that Jews “grew fit for slaughter"; Martin Luther, who described
exile them, and kill them; and Adolf Hitler, who articulated the
to solve the "Jewish problem," and saw to it that it was carried out.
Jewish adults and children, sick and elderly? Certainly not simply the
hatred and anger that the audience already feels toward the Jews and
Neither Sts. Jerome and Chrysostom nor Luther could have been
Nazis; they lived centuries earlier. But what is so appalling is that their
ideas parallel those of the Nazis. There is a "seamless web" among all
Jews for their alleged evil. As when a pebble is thrown into a pool, the
resulting ripples are not equally powerful. At the heart of the horrors of
the Holocaust were the Nazis and Germans, followed closely by their
that stirred hostility; it was instead aspects of the Jews' character (for
an anti-Jewish manner.
“sacrilegious assemblies”
“monstrous heretics”
“blindly senseless”
The emperors referred to Judaism as
“a brothel”
Long before Hitler and the Nazis declared the Jews socially dead,
Christians had proclaimed them evil. St. Ambrose, who saw any
its crimes, the Jewish people soiled its pretended bodily purity by the
the hatred and anger that the audience already feels. St. Augustine
called them Cains. St. John Chrysostom called for their deaths: like
useless animals, Jews “grew fit for slaughter. This is why Christ said:
‘As for these enemies of mine, who did not want me to reign over
century until after the Holocaust felt that the Jews were alienated,
before the Christians of the Third Reich did. As Aldous Huxley observed
that “If you call a man a bug, it means you propose to treat him as a
bug.”
but also among the Allied peoples and writers. That many of the
greatest American and British writers, the creators and caretakers of
“There sat the very Jew of Jews; the distilled essence of all the
Jews that have . . . been born since Jacob's time; he was Judas
Iscariot; he was the Wandering Jew; he was the worst, and at the
Mein Kampf: “If you cut even cautiously into [the Jewish] abscess, you
light—a kike!”
so few tried to intercede. The answer is that the same principles that
Jewishness--on the Jewish spirit--drive the attack on the Jews during the
non-German) were not good Christians, yet almost all of them were
born and raised in Christian homes; they and their children were
Jews, had friendly relations with Jews, even married Jews. But anti-
purity of blood laws. Near the end of his life, Hitler concludes that
“Jewish spirit,” that he hates. The only way to rid the world of this
Jewish spirit, he determines, is to destroy the Jewish bodies that house
it. The Jews are “an abstract race of the mind [that] has its origins,
more solid, more durable than just a [biological] race, pure and
anti-Jewishness and helps answer the question as to why Hitler and his
collaborators chose the Jews to die in the first place. These ideas
nor on others who hated Jews, because they were already convinced
that Jews were evil, and that is why Hitler and Nazi propaganda were
throes of social or personal crisis. Third, although Jews have often been
and guilt.
are:
policies in his attempt first to exile and then to murder the Jews of
coincided with his own ideas that Ribbentrop served him so willingly to
the end"--so it can be said that many, if not most, Europeans, not just
Germans, followed Hitler's directives not because they had to, but
influenced them, but Hitler pointed the way to "solving" the Jewish
the bonds of human community between Christians and the Jews, most
Europeans may not have wanted the Jews dead, but they certainly
were willing to have them put out of the way. So pervasive were anti-
stock of Abraham who dwell in this land continue to merit and enjoy
fighting a war for democracy and human rights, the attitudes of many
and refugees paralleled those of the Nazis and their collaborators. The
Allied governments' antipathy toward Jews was far removed from the
Nazi death factories, but even the indirect nature of this prejudice
became murderous when it shut off all avenues of hope and relief for
Final Solution.
indicated, even when they realized that the Nazis were murdering
millions of Jews, that they lacked the sense that Jews were human
beings.
Europe treated the Jews with respect and the Holocaust with the
overcame their fear of the Nazis and their collaborators and chose to
risk their lives to save the innocent. These Christians passed the moral
American Jews fled from the attempt to put political pressure on their
realities of the Final Solution, but most Jews fell into a spectrum that
by Robert Michael
Epigraph
their disorderly English garden. She wonders aloud why all the mice
are gone. He tells her that snakes have eaten them all. With the
innocence of childhood, she looks into his face and asks, "Daddy, why
do living things kill each other?" The father looks down into his
daughter's face, reflecting on an answer. After a while his eyes fill with
many other complicated questions about life and death. But even he,
ignorance.
the horror of the Holocaust? How does the historian explain why the
Western world has chosen Jews as the metaphor for suffering and the
belief that the Jews are radical enemies of the state and of humanity,
inherently evil beings who must be eradicated from the face of the
earth? How does the historian explain the silence of the world to the
Nazi atrocities? How does the historian face the murder of two million
As you view the history of our time, turn and look at the
piles of bodies, pause for a short moment and imagine that this
poor residue of flesh and bones is your father, your child, your
wife, is th one you love. See yourself and those nearest to you, to
whom you are devoted heart and soul, thrown naked into the
2Eugon Kogon citation is in Schoenberner, yellow star
Preface:
the Holocaust, traces the events of the years 1933 through 1946. The
goal was the killing of millions of non-Jews. But the other, less
Introduction:
The word antisemitism, anti-Jewishness, the essential cause of
Holocaust takes place, religious antipathy toward Jews and toward the
frequent the anti-Jewish rhetoric of Roman law became. The Jews were
3See Moshe Zimmermann, Wilhelm Marr: The
Patriarch of Antisemitism (Oxford 1986), 113. The
Great Brockhaus dictionary of 1882 clearly defined
antisemite as a “Hater of Jews. Opponent of
Judaism.” See also Ben Halpern, “What Is
Antisemitism?” Modern Judaism 1(1981), 25162.
“enemies of Roman law” (438),
“a brothel” (329),
(409),
4C.T. 3:1:5, 15:5:5, 16:5:44, 16:7:3, 16:8:7, 16:8:19,
16:8:22, 16:9:4 and Codex Justinianus 1:9:3, 1:7:5,
and 1:5:7. See also Novella 3 to the law of Theodosius
II of 31 January 438, in Linder, The Jews in Roman
Imperial Legislation, doc. 54. See also Clyde Pharr,
tr., The Theodosian Code and Novels and the
Sirmondian Constitutions (Princeton 1952), 489.
Hereafter, the Codex Justinianus will be referred to as
C.J.
The most notorious racist of the twentieth century, Adolf Hitler,
life that biological racism is a sham. It is the Jewish mind and values,
the “Jewish spirit,” that he hates. The only way to rid the world of this
it. Hitler tells his last private secretary, close associate, and second-in-
reality and from the genetic point of view there is no such thing
Hitler describes the Jews as “an abstract race of the mind [that] has its
5Poliakov.
6First published in French by Fayard as Le Testament
politique de Hitler: Notes Recueillies par Martin
Bormann (Paris 1959), it contains an important
monologue of 13 February 1945. Republished in
English as The Testament of Adolf Hitler: The Hitler
Bormann Documents, FebruaryApril 1945 (London
1961).
origins, admittedly, in the Hebrew religion . . .. A race of the mind is
something more solid, more durable that just a [biological] race, pure
Hitler and his collaborators chose the Jews to die in the first place.
7Hitler, The Testament of Adolf Hitler, 556.
8See Marcel Simon, Verus Israel (Eng.) 395.
9See Robert Wistrich, Antisemitism: The Longest
Hatred (London 1991), xvixvii.
10“As historical horizons shifted [antisemitism] could
maintain its power and still accommodate all sorts of
variations on the basic pattern.” Alter, “From Myth to
Murder,” 41. See also Uriel Tal, Christians and Jews in
personal crisis. Third, although Jews have often been compared to
guilt.
chronology are:
his attempt first to exile and then to murder the Jews of Europe. Just
Minister--"It is because Hitler's policy and plans coincided with his own
said that many, if not most, Europeans felt a strong antipathy toward
non-Jews of Europe. But Hitler also expressed the same feelings about
the way to "solving" the Jewish "problem," and many Europeans, not
just Germans, followed Hitler not because they had to, but because
the Jews saw them punished but not perished. Christians were
Germany (Ithaca 1975), 276.
11Snyder,Encyclopedia of the Third Reich, 296.
murderous (six million Jews may have already been murdered within
the Jews out of the way. Centuries of antisemitism had severed the
Europe treat the Jews with respect and the Holocaust with the urgency
their fear of the Nazis and their collaborators and choose to risk their
stock of Abraham who dwell in this land continue to merit and enjoy
12George Washington, “A Reply to the Hebrew
Congregation of Newport,” Paul MendesFlohr and
Jehuda Reinharz, The Jew in the Modern World: A
Documentary History (New York 1980), Ch. 9,
Document 8. A century later, Russian Jews were
appealing to their American brothers to “come to our
fighting a war for democracy and human rights, the attitudes of many
and refugees parallel those of the Nazis and their collaborators. The
Nazi death factories, but even the indirect nature of this prejudice
becomes murderous when it shuts off all avenues of hope and relief for
historically the best destination for Jewish refugees. The British War
even when they realize that the Nazis are murdering millions of Jews,
that they lack the sense that Jews are human beings.
help . . . let us touch the sacred soil of Washington.”
Feingold, Zion in America, 118.
society, if not fully exterminated. The position of the Church
the words of the 4th century St. Ambrose, who sees any
government officials but also among the Allied peoples and writers.
That many if not most of the greatest American and British writers, the
should suffice here: Nathanael Hawthorne wrote this of a Jew who sat
“There sat the very Jew of Jews; the distilled essence of all the
Jews that have . . . been born since Jacob's time; he was Judas
Iscariot; he was the Wandering Jew; he was the worst, and at the
their control. Once the Third Reich's forces occupy these nations, they
American Jews fled from the attempt to put political pressure on their
realities of the Final Solution, but most Jews fell into a spectrum that
13Hawthorne, The English Notebooks (New York 1941), p. 321.