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reinhardt's review
4.0
This book looks a 3 Theologians in Nazi Germany who were supporters of the regime. It reviews their thought leading up to and during the Nazi regime.
The first is Kittel of Kittel‘s Theological Wordbook fame and also a leading expert in ancient Judaism. He did not publicly support Hitler prior to 1933, but in 1933, after the Nazi‘s came to power, he became a party member, whether out of expedience or conviction is unclear. Although he was somewhat anti-Semitic prior to 1933, post 1933 he put some truly distasteful ideas into print. The most famous of which is that extermination is not a solution for the Jewish Question because it is impractical. In the second edition of that work, he added that it is also unchristian.
In 1934 he was selected to be a member of the National Institute for the History of the New Germany and in 1936 Institute for research into the Jewish Question. These prestigious position put him in contact with higher level Nazis. Kittel maintains he was only there to present the Christian point of view, specifically countering the pagan ideas of Alfred Rosenberg.
His antisemitism took on an increasingly racial tone to line up with the leading science of the day. Previously, his anti-Semitism was of the religious type, along the lines of Martin Luther. He was also opposed to Jewish secular culture. His proposed solution to the Jewish Question was guest status. He opposed assimilation. In this view, he had the support of Jews who did not want to assimilate into German culture. The existence of a `Jewish Question` went without saying at the time.
He also supported the Aryan paragraph as applied to the churches which required Jewish pastors to be removed from German churches. He wanted a moderate implementation of the policy, and supported baptized Jews as Christians, but to get in step with culture, they couldn’t be allowed to lead German congregations. It would be harmful for the Church’s mission in Germany.
The book spends a considerable amount of time reviewing the defence Kittle prepared for himself when he was arrested by the French after the war. The defence document Kittle prepared is almost entirely without corroboration so seem of little value in determining his true intentions.
The next theologian whose case is examined it Paul Althaus. A Luther expert and a moderate, if a Nazi support can be called moderate. He was a conservative, a nationalist, and an orthodox Lutheran. For the most part, he defended traditional interpretations of the Bible.
Althaus was not a supporter of the German Christian positions, which in his mind were (and are) heretical. He advocated a third way between the confessing Church and the German Christian movement. In fact, he was proposed as a candidate who would be acceptable to both the confession church and the German Christian movement.
Althaus became disillusioned with Hitler a few years before the war. He made no statements in support of the regime or its policies after 1937. He didn‘t speak out against the regime in any way for obvious reasons.
The final theologian is Edward Hirsch. Hirsch is without doubt the strongest supporter of Nazism among acclaimed theologian. Although Nazism doesn’t have a strong intellectual foundation, it swept through universities and was popular with most students and claimed a number of world renowned intellectuals as supporters, Hirsch among them. He was probably the world’s leading Kierkegaard expert of his day, so a scholar of some renown.
During the Weimar period, Hirsch was active in nationalistic politics. Like many Germans, he thought the Treaty of Versailles was a travesty and Germany should never have signed it. The signer betrayed Germany. He was against democracy as a weak form of government (cf. Plato). He didn‘t support the Nazi party until 1932, but in 1932 he endorsed Hitler for President.
Hirsch had a thoughtfully reasoned philosophy and theology based on a combination of Hegel‘s idealism and Kierkegaards existentialism. Theologically and philosophically he was nearly identical with Tillich, but politically they split into mirror images. Tillich split left to revolutionary socialism, Hirsch right to national socialism, both on similar grounds.
Hirsch was more theologically liberal than Althaus, supporting the idea of an Aryan Jesus. An idea that seems beyond preposterous now, but had serious intellectual support at the time. Consciously following in the footsteps of the liberal theologians who remade Jesus into their own image by dropping passages that didn‘t support the preferred picture and highlighting passages that reinforce the proposition. It is easy to remake Jesus, and for that matter Paul, into an anti-semite using select passages as representing the `historical` reality.
Hirsch was also a faculty dean and he used those powers to actively oppose the confessing church (The breakaway church supported by Barth, Bonhoeffer and Niemoller). He often turned in names to the state security apparatus.
All these theologians were supporters of the church and saw themselves as strong Christians who stood against the more pagan elements of the Nazi party. They all felt that If there weren‘t at the table to contribute to the discussions, the party, and hence Germany, would be paganized. They traded the traditions of the church for relevant and influence.
It is difficult to see how Christian theologians could support the Nazi party. But to be clear, none of them supported the policy of extermination and when they started to hear rumblings of what was happening in the east in 1942, they were horrified.
It is not unlike the liberation theologians attraction to Marxism long after it was clear what the real world implications were. It is always a temptation for Christians, Churches, and Theologians to bend the truth to make it more politically palatable, but when truth is sacrificed for political expediency, the outcome is hellish. This book presents a balanced look at how this happened in three case studies. The information is invaluable, but the organization and plan of the book could be improved.
The first is Kittel of Kittel‘s Theological Wordbook fame and also a leading expert in ancient Judaism. He did not publicly support Hitler prior to 1933, but in 1933, after the Nazi‘s came to power, he became a party member, whether out of expedience or conviction is unclear. Although he was somewhat anti-Semitic prior to 1933, post 1933 he put some truly distasteful ideas into print. The most famous of which is that extermination is not a solution for the Jewish Question because it is impractical. In the second edition of that work, he added that it is also unchristian.
In 1934 he was selected to be a member of the National Institute for the History of the New Germany and in 1936 Institute for research into the Jewish Question. These prestigious position put him in contact with higher level Nazis. Kittel maintains he was only there to present the Christian point of view, specifically countering the pagan ideas of Alfred Rosenberg.
His antisemitism took on an increasingly racial tone to line up with the leading science of the day. Previously, his anti-Semitism was of the religious type, along the lines of Martin Luther. He was also opposed to Jewish secular culture. His proposed solution to the Jewish Question was guest status. He opposed assimilation. In this view, he had the support of Jews who did not want to assimilate into German culture. The existence of a `Jewish Question` went without saying at the time.
He also supported the Aryan paragraph as applied to the churches which required Jewish pastors to be removed from German churches. He wanted a moderate implementation of the policy, and supported baptized Jews as Christians, but to get in step with culture, they couldn’t be allowed to lead German congregations. It would be harmful for the Church’s mission in Germany.
The book spends a considerable amount of time reviewing the defence Kittle prepared for himself when he was arrested by the French after the war. The defence document Kittle prepared is almost entirely without corroboration so seem of little value in determining his true intentions.
The next theologian whose case is examined it Paul Althaus. A Luther expert and a moderate, if a Nazi support can be called moderate. He was a conservative, a nationalist, and an orthodox Lutheran. For the most part, he defended traditional interpretations of the Bible.
Althaus was not a supporter of the German Christian positions, which in his mind were (and are) heretical. He advocated a third way between the confessing Church and the German Christian movement. In fact, he was proposed as a candidate who would be acceptable to both the confession church and the German Christian movement.
Althaus became disillusioned with Hitler a few years before the war. He made no statements in support of the regime or its policies after 1937. He didn‘t speak out against the regime in any way for obvious reasons.
The final theologian is Edward Hirsch. Hirsch is without doubt the strongest supporter of Nazism among acclaimed theologian. Although Nazism doesn’t have a strong intellectual foundation, it swept through universities and was popular with most students and claimed a number of world renowned intellectuals as supporters, Hirsch among them. He was probably the world’s leading Kierkegaard expert of his day, so a scholar of some renown.
During the Weimar period, Hirsch was active in nationalistic politics. Like many Germans, he thought the Treaty of Versailles was a travesty and Germany should never have signed it. The signer betrayed Germany. He was against democracy as a weak form of government (cf. Plato). He didn‘t support the Nazi party until 1932, but in 1932 he endorsed Hitler for President.
Hirsch had a thoughtfully reasoned philosophy and theology based on a combination of Hegel‘s idealism and Kierkegaards existentialism. Theologically and philosophically he was nearly identical with Tillich, but politically they split into mirror images. Tillich split left to revolutionary socialism, Hirsch right to national socialism, both on similar grounds.
Hirsch was more theologically liberal than Althaus, supporting the idea of an Aryan Jesus. An idea that seems beyond preposterous now, but had serious intellectual support at the time. Consciously following in the footsteps of the liberal theologians who remade Jesus into their own image by dropping passages that didn‘t support the preferred picture and highlighting passages that reinforce the proposition. It is easy to remake Jesus, and for that matter Paul, into an anti-semite using select passages as representing the `historical` reality.
Hirsch was also a faculty dean and he used those powers to actively oppose the confessing church (The breakaway church supported by Barth, Bonhoeffer and Niemoller). He often turned in names to the state security apparatus.
All these theologians were supporters of the church and saw themselves as strong Christians who stood against the more pagan elements of the Nazi party. They all felt that If there weren‘t at the table to contribute to the discussions, the party, and hence Germany, would be paganized. They traded the traditions of the church for relevant and influence.
It is difficult to see how Christian theologians could support the Nazi party. But to be clear, none of them supported the policy of extermination and when they started to hear rumblings of what was happening in the east in 1942, they were horrified.
It is not unlike the liberation theologians attraction to Marxism long after it was clear what the real world implications were. It is always a temptation for Christians, Churches, and Theologians to bend the truth to make it more politically palatable, but when truth is sacrificed for political expediency, the outcome is hellish. This book presents a balanced look at how this happened in three case studies. The information is invaluable, but the organization and plan of the book could be improved.
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