Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #636710 in Books
• Published on: 2002-11
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 384 pages

Customer Reviews

Anti-Semitism, the Catholic Church & the Holocaust...
The issue studied here is not new to me, but I must admit that upon picking up the book and viewing some of the photographs filled me with horror and revulsion. Seeing photographs of ranks of Roman Catholic nuns marching in unison on parade together with Nazi troops and lines of Roman Catholic priests giving the Nazi salute was a sobering experience.

Here we have a penetrating investigation by Daniel Jonah Goldhagen (author of "Hitler's Willing Executioners"), into the full extent of the Catholic Church's involvement in the Nazi Holocaust which resulted in the murder of some six million innocent Jews.

Goldhagen's book reveals that, despite recent professions and declarations to the contrary, the complicity of Pope Pius XII and the Roman Catholic Church was much deeper and more widespread than originally thought.

The author delves into the archives and reveals how deceitful and distorted that the defence of the Catholic Church with reference to the Jews has been. Demonstrated articulately is their tainted endeavour to transmit and portray a deluded & meaningful difference between the blatant, traditional religious contempt for the Jews and the modern racial hatred for them that is used as the surrogate justification for the wholesale slaughter now part of history.

The basic denigration of the Jews, a process taught, accepted & practiced by the Catholic Church, is shown to have prepared the way and indeed created a climate that facilitated the operation of the Nazi plan for Jewish genocide.

The complicity of individuals and groups within the Church is examined together with the unfulfilled duty of reparation and reconciliation which is part and parcel of the Catholic Church's own doctrine.

This is a very disturbing, yet necessary book on this subject. Unless the Catholic Church, indeed the whole Christian faith itself, comes to terms with it's inherent, historic anti-Semitism and utterly renounces, condemns and repents of this outrage, then the Jewish people will continue to hold suspicions and fears about the real and true agendas of the Church in these latter days. The repugnant doctrine of replacement theology needs to be cast aside for the lie that it is and the Jewish roots of Christianity need to be embraced firmly and passionately. It has been too easily forgotten that Jesus Christ Himself was a Jew and that the very founders of the Christian faith, indeed all the members of the early Church, were themselves Jews.

Might I respectfully suggest some further reading those with an interest in this subject, in highlighting three other books;-
"The Popes Against The Jews" by David Kertzer,
"The Anguish Of The Jews" by Edward H. Flannery &
"Hitler's Cross: The Revealing Story of How the Cross of Christ Was Used As a Symbol of the Nazi Agenda" by Erwin Lutzer.

Drunk with the blood of the martyrs
Hitler's Willing Executioners by Goldhagen caused an uproar. In Hitler and the Holocaust, Robert Wistrich does not entirely agree with him but reveals the extent to which all ordinary continental Europeans were involved, with the noble exception of particularly Bulgarians, Danes, Finns and Swedes. To an admirable degree, Italians also sabotaged the Nazi effort. Here the author addresses culpability & morality and their political & social implications through an empirical focus on the Catholic Church & clergy, not lay Catholics. Much of this analysis could be applied to Protestant churches, clergy & lay members too but this study intends to be exemplary rather than comprehensive. It also serves as a general framework on how to conduct a moral reckoning. Moral investigation is carried out in Parts 1 & 2 whilst Part 3 considers moral repair & restitution.

The introduction includes critiques of Hannah Arendt's and Sartre's opinions. Starting at the source, the foundational documents of Christianity, Goldhagen mentions the absurdity of the accusation that all Jews of that time, some millions spread throughout the Mediterranean area, could be held responsible for killing Christ. Even more ludicrous is the notion that all of them, in unison, assumed such guilt, simultaneously declaring all their descendants culpable. These New Testament books contain further outrageous slanders as explored in more detail by Jules Isaac in The Teaching of Contempt & Lillian C Freudmann in Antisemitism in the New Testament.

Goldhagen explores the suicidal pathology of antisemitism in Europe with its legacy of oppression, expulsion and murder. The 1st recorded instance of mass murder occurred in Alexandria in 414 whilst the First Crusade of 1096 established a pattern of periodic massacres that culminated in the Shoah/Holocaust and continued even after the end of World War II. The Reformation made little difference as Martin Luther was amongst the worst of antisemites. This record of horror was mostly absent from the history books until last century when James Carroll, Edward Flannery, David Kertzer, Franklin Littell and others started revealing the nasty secret.

The attitudes & actions of Pius XI & XII are scrutinized, followed by a dissection of the defenders of Pius XII's strategies of exculpation. The evidence is plentiful & painful to read. For example, in 1937 the Vatican journal 'Civiltá Cattolica' openly discussed the annihilation of Jews. Part 2 deals with culpability, outlining the matrix of the Church's failures compared to the exemplary conduct of the Danish Lutheran Church. It proceeds with the moral reckoning predicated upon the notions that individuals are responsible for their actions, that it is proper to do so, that clear & fair criteria must be applied and that judgments must be transparent in their reasoning. The author covers various types of culpability, affirmative offenses, offenses of omission & postwar offenses. It emerges that the distinction between antisemitism and "anti-Judaism" is nonsense.

Part 3 opens with examples of the fury that these revelations evoke in the defenders of the Church. Goldhagen condemns anti-Catholicism, especially the habit of criticizing Catholics based only on their religious identification. Yet the Church, a political & social institution is subject to the same evaluative standards applied to other institutions and individuals. It has failed to admit its specific offenses or punish the perpetrators, neglected making amends with the victims and never properly identified the source of its offenses or gone far enough to correct them. Decades later, Pope John Paul II and some national churches officially acknowledged guilt and took steps towards reconciliation.

No encyclical has appeared, only the brief statements in Nostra Aetate (1965) and We Remember: A Reflection on the Shoah (1998). Issues like restitution, telling the truth and repentance are discussed against the actions of the Carmelite nuns at Auschwitz in the 1980s and the statements of Cardinal Glemp. And John Paul II in 2001 by the side of Bashar Assad, passively listening to the Syrian dictator's venomous antisemitic libels and incitement to violence broadcast to a TV audience of millions. The pope continued his visit without protest. A determined & sustained program to combat antisemitism would have contributed much to prevent or counteract its current recrudescence.

Goldhagen's argument for the separation of church & state is of course correct but his suggestions that the Church give up its political ambitions & Vatican State will never happen. Nor will it renounce its claims of offering the only way to salvation or papal infallibility. Neither will it sincerely repudiate the doctrine of supersessionism. Referring also to political Islam and secular salvationist movements like Communism, the author puts it so well: "... the road to earthly hell has been paved by a claimed monopoly on the road to heaven."

The reactions to the 1st edition of this book are found in the afterword. The attacks began even before publication, following an article in The New Republic. In both Europe & the USA, church apologists distorted the contents & defamed the messenger. There were some welcome exceptions amongst Catholic & Protestant theologians and laity. It's no surprise that the author's bold stance on the antisemitism of the New Testament & this false witness that saddled an entire people with collective, intergenerational guilt proved the most sensitive issues. Myth is powerful & the full truth about Christianity's treatment of Jews is devastating. Yet, no matter how harrowing, it would be better for Christians to get to know the truth; it sets one free.

Seventy-one pages of notes with detailed bibliographical references and further information bear witness to meticulous research. Italicized entries in the index refer to pages with illustrations; the book concludes with a list of illustration credits. A Moral Reckoning is a magisterial work of admirable scholarship and an absorbing read. Although Goldhagen presents measured arguments with restraint, the book's content will shock Christians while its directness and honesty will offend fanatics.