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Date: Mon, 1 Jul 1996 14:18:46 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: liz vasile
Subject: Conquest review, N.Y.Review of Books / Meytahl
Ahron Meytahal writes "Garrad describes Ukrainians in Berdichev and
elsewhere as eager
participants in killing Jews. Conquest maintains that this is not so. .
.From the Holocaust research point of view it is important to analyze and
research participation of non-Germans in killings by Einsatzgruppen. It
seems that Lithuanian and Ukrainian police did take part, while others,
Poles for instance, did not."
Browning in Ordinary Men (p.52) reports that Germans recruited
"volunteers" [Hiwis] in Soviet POW camps on the basis of their
anti-Communisim. The Hiwis were promised they would not be used against the
Soviet army, and offered an escape from probable starvation. Poles
wouldn't of course be found in the Soviet POW camps and so couldnt be
recruited. Perhaps too in l941 the average Pole, who had already
experienced two years of German occupation policies, would be less easy to
recruit than the Nazi-innocent average Ukrainian. Goldhagen reports the
Hiwis being used to slaughter ethnic Poles (p.241).
Conquest in his review states (p.47,N Y R B, July ll) "Hitler said that
without ideology violence cannot be relied on." As Meytahl notes Conquest
is sparse with citations. Anyone know a source for this Hitler quote ?
Jon Petrie (at elizav@ . . .)
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 1 Jul 1996 14:19:48 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
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From: Robert Michael
Organization: University of Massachusetts Dartmouth, North Dartmouth, MA, USA
Subject: churches & holocaust
what startled me when i first learned of it was not only the anti-jewish
cast of christian ideology, from the church fathers (and perhaps the
christian scriptures) up to the holocaust, but also the continuing
anti-jewish aspects of church behaviors during the holocaust.
whereas thousands, if not hundreds of thousands,
of christians helped jews, for all sorts
of reasons, they were acting positively in the face of millions upon
millions of baptized christians who carried out the holocaust against the
jews or who collaborated with the murderers, who saw adolf hitler as the
hand of god sent against the already hell-bound jews.
years ago i read somewhere (i would love it if someone could identify who
wrote this and where) that martin luther would have gladly gone WITH the
jews to their deaths at the camps. as someone who has been studying
lutyher's attitudes toward the jews for 15 years, it seems instead that he
would have been writing more and more vituperative literature against the
jews. he set out a 7 ot 8 point program that, willy-nilly, the germans and
their collaborators followed--up to and including mass murder.
shalom,
bob michael
rmichael@umassd.edu
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 1 Jul 1996 14:20:45 CDT
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Comments: Converted from PROFS to RFC822 format by PUMP V2.2X
From: Peter Erspamer
Subject: Re: Mass for Hitler, Salvation, etc.
In-Reply-To: note of 06/30/96 12:34
Professor Prystowsky's comment reminded me of an exchange in Gotthold Ephraim
Lessing's great drama advocatingreligious tolerance, Nathan the Wise.
The simple-minded friar says to the Jewish merchant, "Nathan, you are a
Christian. There never was a better Christian." Nathan responds to the
Catholic friar, "And you are a Jew. What makes me a Christian to you, makes
you a Jew to me." The exchange is somewhat more humorous in the original
German, but makes a point which has some relevance to the present discussion.
Peter Erspamer e-mail: flpe@fhsuvm.fhsu.edu
Dept of Modern Languages - RH390 Phones: (913) 628-5382
Fort Hays State University (913) 625-9476
Hays, KS 67601
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 1 Jul 1996 14:23:30 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
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From: MISS MARIA R AVERY
Subject: Re: Jewish Saint
In my reply to Alexander Kimmel's inquiry about "The Jewish Saint", I
was simply relaying Catholic policy in regards to sainthood. My last
remark that Edith Stein "died for the faith," was not a personal
opinion but a statement of fact as to why the Catholic Church
beatified her. Edith Stein was at the moment of death a Carmelite
nun however I am fully aware of the fact that she was gassed for
being a Jew.
Sincerely,
Maria R. Avery
wnaq13a@prodigy.com
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 1 Jul 1996 14:24:37 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
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From: Robert Michael
Organization: University of Massachusetts Dartmouth, North Dartmouth, MA, USA
Subject: question on nazi-deutsch
the german words referring, and often disguising, holocaust activities has
been called nazi-deutsch. i am looking for a complete listing and
translation, a dictionary, glossary, something in that nature. the words i
am looking for are translations of aktion, einsatzgruppen, endloesung,
transport, appell, e.g.
thanking you in advance,
bob michael
rmichael@umassd.edu
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 2 Jul 1996 12:21:38 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
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From: Reinhard Zachau
Subject: Jakob Littner
Several colleagues of mine are involved in a translation of Wolfgang
Koeppen's holocaust book "Jakob Littner's Aufzeichnungen aus einem
Erdloch". The book has generally been treated as a novel - however, there
is a chance that Littner really existed and that the book is based on his
diary. Littner supposedly entered the US in 1947 or 1948 - any ideas on
how to verify the existence of this man?
Since Littner lived in the ghetto of Zbaraz near Tarnopol, I would be
grateful for any contributions or literature on Jewish life in the Western
Ukraine. Especially welcome would be ideas from colleagues who have worked
on the history of the Belzec concentration camp.
Thank you for your help,
Reinhard Zachau
University of the South
Reinhard K. Zachau
Department of German
University of the South
735 University Avenue
Sewanee, Tennessee 37383-1000
rzachau@seraph1.sewanee.edu
Office phone 615 598-1291
Home phone 615 598-0634
FAX 615 598-1145
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 2 Jul 1996 12:22:11 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: Mata Kimasitayo
Subject: Re: question on nazi-deutsch
In-Reply-To: <01I6K353E1UG8WWOTH@umassd.edu>
On Mon, 1 Jul 1996, Robert Michael wrote:
> the german words referring, and often disguising, holocaust activities has
> been called nazi-deutsch. i am looking for a complete listing and
> translation, a dictionary, glossary, something in that nature. the words i
> am looking for are translations of aktion, einsatzgruppen, endloesung,
> transport, appell, e.g.
>
> thanking you in advance,
>
> bob michael
> rmichael@umassd.edu
heinz paechter (also bertha hellman, hedwig paechter, and
karl o paetel), _nazi-deutsch: a glossary of contemporary
german usage, with appendices on government, military and
economic institutions_, (new york: frederick ungar publishing
co., 1944).
this is a revised and enlarged edition of _dictionary of
nazi terms_ compiled by the office of european economic
research to which has been integrated material from
a memorandum due to heinz paechter on _magic grammar in
totalitarian propaganda_ and from materials re nazi
propaganda at the new school for social research (this
from the acknowledgements). 125 pp.
mata kimasitayo
slreview@falstaff.ucs.indiana.edu
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 2 Jul 1996 12:22:45 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
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From: Mark Pollock
Subject: question on nazi-deutsch -Reply
Try Heinz Paetcher, Nazi-Deutsch: A Glossary of Contemproary Usage
(New York: Frederick Unger Publishing, 1944).
Mark A. Pollock, Asst. Prof.
Dept. of Communication, SC045
Loyola University Chicago
6525 N. Sheridan Rd.
Chicago, IL 60626
mpolloc@luc.edu
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 2 Jul 1996 12:23:25 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: Warren Thompson
Subject: "Silence as consent"?
The silence of the churches may have implied consent, but not necessarily. As
well, the silence of the churches ought not be construed as "intent" to commit
mass murder. It might be helpful to see the silence, not only of the churches
but also of the populace in general, as a kind of "moral indifference." And
this may be worse than actual intent to kill.
- Warren Thompson
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 2 Jul 1996 12:23:59 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
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From: Richard Libowitz Temple University
Subject: Re: churches & holocaust
Regarding Bob's query about Luther, I think we need to contrast the man's
perceptions with his vituperativeness. Luther attacked the Catholic Church
for its failure to convert the Jews. The reason, he said, was that Church
leaders had never approached Jews in the proper manner, had failed to treat
them honestly and fairly and that the Jews had therefore been repulsed by the
Good News.
However, when his own missionizing efforts met with similar rejections,
Luther turned upon Jewry as he turned upon any and all who had angered him;
his wrath produced the essay "On the Jews and Their Lies", which Hitler took
such delight in reprinting in full.
Would Luther have gone to his death with the Jews or written propaganda
for Goebbels? The question is not an unfair one to raise, but difficult to
answer. Surely, prior to "OtJaTL", he might have joined the Jews in their
plight. Even after, he might have seen Hitler as the Devil and rejected his
gang of cut throats as well.
Richard Libowitz
Saint Joseph's University
Philadelphia
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 2 Jul 1996 12:24:57 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
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From: "D.M. Henry"
Subject: Re: Resistance in camp
I am in contact with a survivor with whom I had some long visits recently to
go over his memoirs which I want to help him publish. He says that in his
camp, when they arrrived, the Ukrainians were checked out by a tall inmate
nicknamed Bimbo. He would ask them: who wants to join the SS? and those who
responded in the affirmative, would be hustled down to the infirmary for an
injection of air to the heart: "There was no pity". This was done also for an
eager beaver who showed up one day at the office where he was doing clerical
work following an operation on his leg. The man presented his credentials,
that he had been of great assistance to the Nazis and wanted to be
acknowledged and giving a position commensurate with his interests, and he
was "rewarded" accordingly by the inmates at the infirmary.
DMHenry@AOL.com
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 2 Jul 1996 12:25:46 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: Paul Lawrence Rose
Subject: Re: Littell on Goldhagen
In-Reply-To: LISTSERV AT UICVM.UIC.EDU -- Mon, 1 Jul 1996 00:01:41 -0500
LITTELL ON GOLDHAGEN: I agree with Franklin Littell on the complicity of
Christendom and Christianity in bringing about the Holocaust, but that
does not automatically exclude the far more immediate role of
German-Austrian culture and politics in engineering the Holocaust. The
fact is that the Holocaust originates IN SOME MANNER out of the matrix
of German/Austrian national cultures. Whether Goldhagen has been crude
in identifying the exact process is one matter, but the Holocaust
remains historically incomprehemsible outside the framework of
German-Austrian history. Paul Lawrence Rose, Penn State U
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 2 Jul 1996 16:23:28 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: Bjorn Krondorfer
Subject: Jakob Littner -Reply
To Reiharrd Zachau:
the book has just been reprinted/published in Germany, and the true
identity of the German author revealed. Littner indeed lived (maybe still
lives) but the book is not his, not even authorized by him as far as I
know. So, yes, it's based on a real person, but still a fiction.
I believe I saved a recent review from the German ZEIT, detailing all this
information of authorship and the question of fiction. If I find it, I would be
happy to send it to you, if you wish.
Bjorn Krondorfer
Religious Studies
>>> Reinhard Zachau 07/02/96
01:21pm >>>
Several colleagues of mine are involved in a translation of Wolfgang
Koeppen's holocaust book "Jakob Littner's Aufzeichnungen aus einem
Erdloch". The book has generally been treated as a novel - however,
there is a chance that Littner really existed and that the book is based on
his diary. Littner supposedly entered the US in 1947 or 1948 - any ideas
on how to verify the existence of this man?
Since Littner lived in the ghetto of Zbaraz near Tarnopol, I would be
grateful for any contributions or literature on Jewish life in the Western
Ukraine. Especially welcome would be ideas from colleagues who have
worked on the history of the Belzec concentration camp.
Thank you for your help,
Reinhard Zachau
University of the South
Reinhard K. Zachau
Department of German
University of the South
735 University Avenue
Sewanee, Tennessee 37383-1000 rzachau@seraph1.sewanee.edu
Office phone 615 598-1291
Home phone 615 598-0634
FAX 615 598-1145
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 2 Jul 1996 16:24:28 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: "Larry Laufman, Ed.D."
Subject: trial and status of John Demjanjuk
I did not follow the John Demjanjuk trial in Israel, other than noting the
verdict of acquittal because the judges did not find the prosecution's
evidence, including eye-witness testimony, to be sufficiently compelling.
On his radio talk show last week, Jim Bohannon interviewed John Demjanjuk's
Israeli defense attorney (sorry, I don't remember his name). The attorney
has published a book which gives his version of the case and is called, I
believe, _Defending Ivan the Terrible_. He did not deny that Demjanjuk had
fought with a pro-Nazi military unit. However, he asserted that (1) the US
OSI (Office of Special Investigations?) had withheld exculpatory evidence
which would have demonstrated that Mr. Demjanjuk was not the camp guard in
question, and (2) consequently the US Supreme Court ruled that the OSI had
perpetrated fraud before the court. According to what he said, no one in
the OSI has been tried or punished for the fraud.
Does anyone on the list have more information about (1) this charge against
the OSI and (2) whether Demjanjuk's US citizenship has been restored?
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 3 Jul 1996 09:41:00 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: "Mott, Jim"
Subject: Auschwitz Reconstruction
From: John Lorinc[SMTP:75474.3401@CompuServe.COM]
I visited Auschwitz last fall, and the contrast between the older
camp
and Birkenau was strikingly profound. The day I visited, I decided to go
to
Birkenau first, and then wander through the museum display later. A
shuttle
took me and perhaps four other people over to Birkenau. It was a dreary,
damp fall day, and the weather seemed perfectly suited for the visit.
When I arrived, I found I had Birkenau almost completely to myself. The
railway tracks, the detraining platform, the collection of barracks --
all of it opened up before me as I walked in. As I walked around the vast
expanse of the camp, the silence was very much a presence, and I was
grateful for it, because it allowed me to think, and to consider the
enormity of this place.
There are, of course, many, many impressions and I won't dwell on
most of them, except those that seem relevant to this discussion.
(i) At one point, while walking in a quite deserted part of the
camp,
I noticed that I could hear dogs barking from the farm houses beyond the
camp's perimeter. That was a powerful moment, because it illustrated to
me that if you could hear, from within the camp, sounds from beyond the
camp, then the reverse is also true; i.e. there's no way anyone in this
region -- or, for that matter, anyone living near any concentration camp
-- could not know that something awful was happening inside. You could
just hear it.
(ii) Later on, I briefly got lost inside Birkenau; the roadways
at
the far end of the camp are overgrown, and don't always lead back to the
main section, which is fenced off. As I trekked through the tall grass,
looking
for a gap in the barbed-wire fence, I began to feel very trapped and
claustrophobic -- a sensation heightened by the solitude. Evidently, this
experience is not something that any museum curator could replicate, yet
I came away from my visit there feeling as if I had gotten just the
tiniest sense of what it must have been like to be inarcerated there.
(iii) Back at Auschwitz I, I found the barrack that contains the
mound of human hair. It is difficult to describe the feelings that such a
display arouses, but I do want to report one unintended impression: as I
moved through the barracks, I kept crossing paths with a family who'd
brought three young children. The children, of course, were running
around, laughing and shouting. Their father seemed singularly
uninterested and managed to look at the hair display with what I took to
be indifference. My point is this: the museum, while an important
informational component of Auschwitz-Birkenau, is necessarily disrupted
by the crowds that move through it. Serious visitors must jostle with
school kids and people who've been dragged along and just don't care.
There's nothing to be done about this fact; that's the nature of museums
and tourist attractions. But I would argue that Birkenau, in its present
condition, offers visitors a chance to both experience the camp, and
contemplate -- in appropriate solitude and quiet -- what transpired
there. To turn it into a full-fledged museum, as some have suggested,
would be to sacrifice the silence, and therefore the opportunity to
remember without distraction.
John Lorinc
271 Benson Ave., #3,
Toronto, Canada, M6G 2J9.
75474.3401@compuserve.com
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 3 Jul 1996 09:58:01 CDT
Reply-To: hicks@psych.ufl.edu
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: Suzanna Hicks
Subject: new book
Here is a new book that *might* be of interest to someone on this
forum. Listed in the July 5, 1996 issue of The Chronicle of Higher
Education.
MY OWN PRIVATE GERMANY: DANIEL PAUL SCHREBER'S SECRET HISTORY OF
MODERNITY, by Eric L. Santerner (Princeton U. Press; 2009 pp;
$22.95). Discusses a German judge who was one of Freud's most famous
case studies and the author of _Memoirs of My Secret Illness_
(1903), an autobiographical account of paranoia; links the crises
that led to Schreber's breakdown to the crises that precipitated the
rise of the Nazis.
-Suzanna Hicks
Dept. of Psychology
Univ. of Florida
hicks@psych.ufl.edu
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 3 Jul 1996 09:58:31 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: Bjorn Krondorfer
Subject: question on nazi-deutsch -Reply
To Robert Michael,
Martin Borman, son of the infamous Nazi leader, in his attempt to become
conscious of the Nazi cruelties, war crimes, genocidce, etc., has put
together a dictionary on German Nazi terms. I have not seen it yet, but as
far as I know it only exists on CD-rom for usage in schools. Maybe
worthwhile following up.
Bjorn Krondorfer
Religious Studies
>>> Robert Michael 07/01/96 03:24pm >>>
the german words referring, and often disguising, holocaust activities
has been called nazi-deutsch. i am looking for a complete listing and
translation, a dictionary, glossary, something in that nature. the words i
am looking for are translations of aktion, einsatzgruppen, endloesung,
transport, appell, e.g.
thanking you in advance,
bob michael rmichael@umassd.edu
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 3 Jul 1996 09:59:31 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: "Ben S. Austin"
Subject: Family in Rokiskis. (fwd)
Hello Friends,
I recently received the following request for help. While I plan
to look into the question, any help list members can give would be
appreciated -- either to the list or to me by private e-mail. Thanks
Ben Austin
baustin@frank.mtsu.edu
---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Tue, 2 Jul 1996 15:19:05 +-200
From: BRANDON OSSIP
To: "'baustin@frank.mtsu.edu'"
Subject: Family in Rokiskis.
dear sir/madam,
I am a pupil of a Jewish school in Johannesburg, South Africa. My late paternal
grandfather was from a place he once said (many years ago) was Popol in
Rokiskis. Please help me find more about my family which was then called
Osipowitz.
thanking you in anticipation
brandon e.ossip
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 3 Jul 1996 10:00:30 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: Peter Lavskis
Subject: Re: A mass for Hitler's soul.
On June 20 Alexander Kimel wrote:
"I read in the Times, that for years on Hitler's birthadys a mass for his
soul was said in Spain. Can someone confirm it? It ocurred to me, that
Hitler, being a baptised Catholic, is assured salvation, while millions of
unbaptised victims incinerated in Auschwitz, will be assigned to additional
burnig in hell. Can someone enlighten me on the Church doctrine in this
matter. This question burns me up."
Did he, or others who wrote on this subject, remember a posting on Feb 2 by
Robert Michael, saying that, by his unacceptable conduct, Hitler had been
excommunicated from the Catholic Church. Such masses would be invalid in
the the eyes of God.
For those who missed the Feb 2 posting, here it is again
>From: Robert Michael
>
>years ago in an article in a catholic weekly, i seem to remembver, was the
>comment that the church did not have to excommunicate hitler, he was
>automatically excommunicated even tho he continued to pay religious taxes.
>the reason, and here it sounds incredible, for his excommunication was that
>in the 30s he was best man at goering's wedding. so what was the sin? well,
>goering was a protestant, the article said, and so hitler's participation in
>the wedding ceremony automatically excommunicated him.
>hmmmmnnnn.
>cheers,
>bob michael
>
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 3 Jul 1996 10:11:00 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: "Mott, Jim"
Subject: Course on Representing the Holocaust in Literature and Film
From: phyllisl[SMTP:phyllisl@merle.acns.nwu.edu]
I am preparing an upper division undergraduate course on
"Representing the Holocaust in Literature
and Film" and would appreciate any suggestions and responses
to the following issues I've come across so far:
Uses and Abuses of the Holocaust:
Many hold the position that literature/fiction by non-survivors
is very often an abuse of the Holocaust because it cannot
authentically get inside any aspect of the experience and
therefore must misrepresent it. For a non-survivor
To fictionalize the Holocaust\
is to de-authenticate it.
Conversely, even when survivors' writing about the Holocaust is poor
aesthetically, its authenticity makes it more valuable than
a more aesthetically powerful fiction by a non-survivor.
On the same plane, many people feel that only non-fictional
documentaries or films authenticated by survivors, such as
WEAPONS OF THE SPIRIT are appropriate vehicles for teaching
the Holocaust, as opposed to such fictional works as Louis
Malle's AU REVOIR MES ENFANTS.
Since my purpose is to teach the problems of representation,
I am interested in related issues and teaching approaches.
Phyllis Lassner
Northwestern University
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 3 Jul 1996 11:52:12 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: Franklin Littell
Organization: TEMPLE UNIVERSITY
Subject: Re: uniqueness
In-Reply-To: Message of Sun, 30 Jun 1996 16:06:06 CDT from
Much too simple! The clerics, with few exceptions, did NOT "want the
Holocaust to occur." What they wanted was for the problem to go away.
Without understanding the subtleties of theological antisemitism, then
the cultural antisemitism that was built upon that level, and finally
modern political antisemitism (invented both theoretically and in
praxis in the 1870s), you cannot understand either the activists or the
bystanders. Most of the clergy, on this as on other major issues to
this day, were bystanders. Like most of the Jewish victims, they had
been trained in docility - "keep your head down!" "don't make waves!"
- while the real movers and shakers wrought their will in the body
politic.
The doctrine, when someone stopped to look it up, was antisemitic in
word and intent. The culture of "Christendom" was antisemitic, which
swept up masses of people who had no intentional malice but when push
came to shove were hostile to "the Jews" (even if they'd never seen one).
The modern political articulation of antisemitism as a weapon or tool
was viewed with horror by people who were both theologically and
culturally antisemitic - but didn't know it. This is a very common thing
even among American Christians today, most of whom certainly think of
themselves as tolerant and broad-minded, etc.
Unless they get power, as they did in 1933 in Germany, the intentionally
antisemitic activists aren't the problem: the problem is the "good
people," who don't want ANYTHING to happen. They become the bystanders,
who - as Elie Wiesel often says - are a worse problem than the
perpetrators. - FHL
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
| |
| FRANKLIN LITTELL FHL@VM.TEMPLE.EDU |
| DEPARTMENT OF RELIGION |
| TEMPLE UNIVERSITY 610-667-5437 |
| |
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 3 Jul 1996 11:52:44 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: Stephen Feinstein
Subject: Re: uniqueness
In-Reply-To: <199606302048.QAA119576@r05n01.cac.psu.edu>
For a more comprehsnive and less deterministic view, see Zygmunt Bauman,
MODERNITY AND THE HOLOCAUST (Cornell UP). I would not use Leon uris as a
scholarly source, especially since EXODUS helps maintain the fiction that
the King of Denmark wore a yellow star.We historians have enough trouble
already with Hollywood and authors of fiction manipulating the History to
fit their own needs.
Stephen feinstein
On Sun, 30 Jun 1996, Jack Rabin wrote:
> As I had aluded earlier, I agree with your conclusions---specifically,
> since "silence means consent", the virtual lack of protest among clerics
> throughout Europe, especially in the Vatican, can only be interpreted that
> the various churchs approvedc of the Holocaust. Even after the war, the
> silence was outrageous, although accompanied by active efforts by many
> clerics to help escaping Nazis out of Europe.
>
> Leon Uris stated in his book, "Exodus,"---"Christianiny died at
> Auschwitz." I thinkl a strong case can be made that, as the German
> persecution of the Jews picked up in the late-1930s, that if the churches of
> each denomination had come out in strong, clear terms against what was
> happening, the persecution would have moderated or died. This would have
> been especially important as word of the massacres pored into Germany and
> into our countries early in the war.
>
> It didn't happened. Why? One thesis has to be confronted---clerics
> wanted the Holocaust the occur.
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> >The uniqueness of the Holocaust escapes any normal abstract or proposi-
> >tional category and can only be conceived in the language of historical
> >process. That is, the UNIQUENESS is precisely the moral, ethical, and
> >religious crisis set in place by the truth that 6,000,000 Jews were
> >murdered in the midst of "Christendom," by baptized Eastern Orthodox,
> >Roman Catholic and Protestant Christians. They were never rebuked by the
> >church leaders. The credibility crisis thereby downloaded upon Christian
> >belief and practice is without parallel in history. As a clergyman and
> >an academic (American) I feel strongly this central point must be made,
> >for we are again being inundated by an essentially racist interpretation
> >of the uniqueness of the Holocaust which provides precisely the escape
> >hatch for which my co-religionists are eagerly looking. - FHL
> >
> >+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
> >| |
> >| FRANKLIN LITTELL FHL@VM.TEMPLE.EDU |
> >| DEPARTMENT OF RELIGION |
> >| TEMPLE UNIVERSITY 610-667-5437 |
> >| |
> >+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
> >
> >
>
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 3 Jul 1996 11:53:22 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: Jack Rabin
Subject: Re: Littell on Goldhagen
German-Austrian culture might have played a small part in the Holocaust IF
there had not been other, and larger, instances of mass murders elsewhere.
It appears that two necessary conditions were required for the Holocaust:the
precense of Jews and the teachings and complicity of the Church. Europeans
had been taught for centuries that the Jews had killed Christ and that
present-day "sinners" should be punished for that deed. By being a "sinner"
and by inevitably going to hell, Jews weree, therefore, dehumanized long
before Hitler's big lie of the 1930s. What is particularly troubling in
clerical behavior after the war is (a) the assistance which clerics gave
fleeing Nazis and (b) the lack of a general feeling of contrition. These
acts give rise to the feeling that the only regret that clerics today have
is that the Nazis did not finish the job world-wide.
>LITTELL ON GOLDHAGEN: I agree with Franklin Littell on the complicity of
>Christendom and Christianity in bringing about the Holocaust, but that
>does not automatically exclude the far more immediate role of
>German-Austrian culture and politics in engineering the Holocaust. The
>fact is that the Holocaust originates IN SOME MANNER out of the matrix
>of German/Austrian national cultures. Whether Goldhagen has been crude
>in identifying the exact process is one matter, but the Holocaust
>remains historically incomprehemsible outside the framework of
>German-Austrian history. Paul Lawrence Rose, Penn State U
>
>
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 3 Jul 1996 11:53:44 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: Franklin Littell
Organization: TEMPLE UNIVERSITY
Subject: Re: churches & holocaust
In-Reply-To: Message of Mon, 1 Jul 1996 14:19:48 CDT from
1. In his last days Luther became embittered by many things, of which the
failure of much of Christendom to convert to the Reformation and the
failure of the Jews to convert (signing the end of this history) were but
two of the most intense. To understand Luther's Christian antisemitism,
read Heiko Obermann's WURZELN DES ANTISEMITISMUS.
2. In fifty years of study I have yet to run across a Christian writer
we said straight out that the genocide of the Jews was God's punishment
of them, although I bought a book on the corner of Ben Yehudah and King
George a couple years ago in which an ultra-Orthodox rabbi did argue
that line. Usually the Christian writers, even the collaborators, simply
repeat the traditional doctrines and tamp down any tendencies to empathize
with the victims.
3. To understand the failure of "Christendom," which I call "apostasy,"
you must see how the proletariat and the Intellectuellen were lost to the
churches with the Enlightenment and the Ersatzreligionen, ideologies and
apocalyptic political movements that grew stronger from the 1840s on. It
is true that there was an ancient theological antisemitism at the founda-
tion of "Christendom," and that upon it were mounted centuries of Kultur-
antisemitismus. But modern political antisemitism, used as a tool or
weapon by populist movements and adventurers, appeared in the 1870s -
ideologically in the West, with Wm Marr et al., and in practice in Tsarist
Russia.
The affirmative energy that built the cathedrals and founded the universi-
ties was flagging seriously by the time of the Encyclopedistes and certainly
long gone by the time of Pius IX, but there remained in the bottom of the
barrel the negative definition of Christianity: the hostility of the
baptized pagans to the Jews. - FHL
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
| |
| FRANKLIN LITTELL FHL@VM.TEMPLE.EDU |
| DEPARTMENT OF RELIGION |
| TEMPLE UNIVERSITY 610-667-5437 |
| |
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 4 Jul 1996 13:19:21 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: Jim Mott
Subject: Re: Littell on Goldhagen
From: George M Kren
I would take issue with the second of the two necessary conditions required
for the Holocaust by Jack Rabin (For the first obviously the victims had
to be available)
I would suggest that the only necessary condition was the decision by the
leadership of a totalitarian state that a group, whose membership it
defined should be killed. Indeed the first killings were of Germans who
were defined because of physical or mental illness as posessing a life
not worth living. The killers, whether SS or police batallions had no
problm killing gypsies and though anti-gypsy sentiment did ineed exist
this was in no way comporable the the long anti-Semitism. Nor did any
(including the regular army) find it difficult to kill millions of
Russian prisoners of war.(See the book, KEINE KAMERADEN). The Stalin
mass killings are also relevant here. Can the proposition that a
modern totalitarian (authoritarian?) state may select ANY group, define
it as harmful and kill it be refuted? In every case where such a policy
was adopted many individuals who were willing to participate. No evidence
appears to exist that such policies will evoke significant opposition.
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 4 Jul 1996 13:23:57 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: Jim Mott
Subject: Re: Representing the Holocaust in Literature and Film
From: Rene Ash
I do not completely agree with Phyllis Lassner. The Poles, Czechs,
Germans after WWII up through the early 70's produced excellent
fictional films regarding the holocaust. One should take under
consideration that these countries experienced WWII with the holocaust
part of the 12 year hell:
Here are some suggestions for your course - KAPO, LAST TRAIN TO
TERESIAN STADT, EHE IM SCHATTEN (MARRIAGE IN THE SHADOWS), which are just
some examples. There are many more. A course such as this will be a great
asset to the understanding of the holocaust.
Rene L. Ash
A survivor
=======================================
From: "Darren O'Brien"
Dear Phyllis,
One of the major essay topics in our course 'The Politics of Genocide' is
on this very theme. We show a variety of films as adjuncts to the lectures
and tutorials. Three quarters of them focus on the Holocaust specificly,
e.g. BBC Genocide production from the World at War Series, Segments of
Shoah- Bomba, Srebnik, Muller, Suchomel, etc, the remainder look at other
Genocides- Cambodia, the Australian Aborigines, Rwanda, the Armenians etc.
A limited bibliography includes the following: S. Totten, 'The Literature,
Art and Film of the Holocaust' in Israel Charny (ed), Genocide: A Critical
Bibliogrpahic Review, New York, 1991. Annette Insdorf, Indelible Shadows:
Film and the Holocaust, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1989. Frank
Manchel, 'A Reel Witness: Steven Spielberg's Representation of the
Holocaust in Schindler's List', The Journal of Modern History, Vol. 67,
No.1, March 1995. Geoffrey Hartman, 'The Fortunoff Video Archive for
Holocaust Testimonies', Teaching About Genocide, Vol.55, No. 2, February,
1991. David Gitten, 'Beyond Belief - The Shooting of Schindler's List',
Empire magazine, 1995. A. Cykiert, 'The Ghost of Betrayal', Generation,
1991. I. Avisar, Screening the Holocaust, Bloomington and Indianapolis:
Indiana University Press, 1988. Very Important: S Friedlander (ed),
Probing the Limits of Representation, Massachusetts and England: Harvard
University Press, 1992. S. Felman, 'Film as Witness: Claude Lanzmann's
Shoah' in G. Hartmann (ed) Holocaust Remembrance: The Shape of Memory,
Cambridge: Blackwell Publishers, 1994). R. Madsen, The Impact of Film,
Macmillan Publishing Co., New York, 1973. S. Kracauer, Theory of Film: The
Redemption of Physical Reality, Oxford University Press, London, 1960. J.
Young, Writing and Rewriting the Holocaust, Indiana University Press,
Bloomington, 1990. Most Recently, S. Dresden, Persecution, Extermination,
Literature, University of Toronto Press, Toronto, Buffalo, London, 1995.
Originally published in 1991 as Vervolgung, Vernietiging, Literatuur, S.
Dresden and J.M. Meulenhoff.
I hope this helps out.
************************************************
Darren O'Brien
Assistant Director
Centre for Comparative Genocide Studies
School of History, Philosophy and Politics
Macquarie University
NSW 2109
Australia
Ph: (612) 850 8822
Fax: (612) 850 8892
************************************************
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 4 Jul 1996 13:25:40 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: "Alexander Soifer,Prof,University of
Colorado"
Subject: Re: Littell on Goldhagen
In-Reply-To: <199607021842.OAA83856@r05n01.cac.psu.edu>
>From Alexander Soifer, U. of Colorado
On Wed, 3 Jul 1996, Jack Rabin wrote:
> German-Austrian culture might have played a small part in the Holocaust IF
> there had not been other, and larger, instances of mass murders elsewhere.
In addition to too many ifs: "might have", "a small Part", 'IF", the
"argument" appears utterly illogical to me.
Perhaps, one needs so many ifs precisely because the German origin of the
Holocaust is so obvious.
Sinverely,
Alexander Soifer
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 4 Jul 1996 13:26:33 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: mlpereboom@sae.ssu.edu
Subject: Re: Course on Representing the Holocaust in Literature and Film
I think that to suggest that a non-survivor "de-authenticates" the
Holocaust by fictionalizing it is to judge too harshly. I'm not sure
that we gain much by ranking the works of survivors and non-survivors
relative to one another.
A survivor dealing with his or her experience through the creative process
is also creating a document which can broaden our understanding of the
Holocaust, regardless of the work's aesthetic "merits" (subjective in
any case).
But non-survivors also play a vital role in preserving the memory of the
Holocaust and helping us to understand its significance for all of humanity.
Theo Richmond's KONIN: A QUEST is an attempt by a man with no personal
experience of the Holocaust to recreate life in the shtetl before the
Nazis destroyed it forever. The book was recommended to me by a woman who
had grown up in Poland and survived Lodz and Auschwitz; she said it was one
of the best books she had ever read. We wouldn't call this fiction, though
the author no doubt had to use his imagination to some degree to fill in gaps.
But the point is that human beings are capable of the intelligence,
empathy and sensitivity essential to the task of examining experiences
other than their own in an artistic medium as well.
I think that Louis Malle's "Au revoir, les enfants" is a good example, in
fact. To label this work fictional is somewhat misleading, since it does
correspond to Malle's own childhood experience. But it is narrative film,
not documentary, and the experience was "fictionalized" somehat in its
adaptation for the screen. It's about the Holocaust as experienced by
a young French boy from a well-to-do family in a Catholic school in
rural France: that is to say, rather far removed from the ghettoes and
camps, but nonetheless a rather powerful portrayal of a child gradually
becoming aware of the brutality that surrounds him. And that little
glance at the end leaves you wondering whether he in fact betrayed
his Jewish classmate, wittingly or unwittingly, to the Germans. Quite a
metaphor, I think, for the ambiguous role of "bystanders" across Europe.
Maarten L. Pereboom
Salisbury State University
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 4 Jul 1996 13:27:16 CDT
Reply-To: david@iowalaw.com
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: David A Hirsch
Subject: address request
This may be an inappropriate request:
I need to send a photograph to Elie Weisel. If anyone knows his surface
mail address, I would appreciate your sending it to me privately (not to the
list).
David A. Hirsch; Beckman & Hirsch < david@iowalaw.com>
314 North Fourth; Burlington, IA 52601
Telephone: 319-754-8404; Facsimile: 319-754-6302
PGP key, email mailback@iowalaw.com WITH SUBJECT: dah public key
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 4 Jul 1996 13:28:23 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: Sidney Bolkosky
Subject: Re: new book
In-Reply-To: <49719.hicks@webb.psych.ufl.edu>
Suzanna, I haven't seen the book, but Schreber, perhaps one of the most
infamous of Freud's patients, was the son of Europe's Dr. Spock whose
book on child-rearing included incredibly grotesque, infernal machines
into which children should be placed to discipline them and teach them
about being seen but not heard, etc. Remarkably, Freud never mentioned this.
Sid Bolkosky
UM-Dearborn
On Wed, 3 Jul 1996, Suzanna Hicks wrote:
> Here is a new book that *might* be of interest to someone on this
> forum. Listed in the July 5, 1996 issue of The Chronicle of Higher
> Education.
>
> MY OWN PRIVATE GERMANY: DANIEL PAUL SCHREBER'S SECRET HISTORY OF
> MODERNITY, by Eric L. Santerner (Princeton U. Press; 2009 pp;
> $22.95). Discusses a German judge who was one of Freud's most famous
> case studies and the author of _Memoirs of My Secret Illness_
> (1903), an autobiographical account of paranoia; links the crises
> that led to Schreber's breakdown to the crises that precipitated the
> rise of the Nazis.
>
> -Suzanna Hicks
> Dept. of Psychology
> Univ. of Florida
> hicks@psych.ufl.edu
>
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 4 Jul 1996 13:33:53 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: Jim Mott
Subject: Re: Auschwitz Reconstruction
From: Sid and Judy Cohen
Dear Suzanna Hicks,
We Jews (male and female, the word Jewess is obsolete) have, what is
nowadays called, "a common historical memory", which probably orginates with
the beginning of antisemitism from time immemorial. The history of the ebb
and flow of the: hatred-tolerance-acceptance-persecution-tolerance-again
etc. of the Jews in any given time of history/place/country/regime/.
And this could be the reason why a Jewish and non-Jewish person would have,
emotionally at least, a different reaction visiting a former death camp. Or
reading about pogroms or any other mode of persection of the Jews. Somehow,
one cannot help but put oneself in the picture. (*But for the grace of God
go I* kind of reaction.)
And I'd go further. There is a different reaction even between Jews who
were or those weren't incarcerated in camps. Especially death camps. No
matter how vividly and accurately we can transmit the historical facts, no
matter how many artifacts and other displays one views, no matter how
sensitive the imagination of the viewer, nothing but nothing can transmit
the experience how it *felt* being there. Being there day in and day out.
The psychological beatings we all took aside from the physical ones. And
those *feelings* usually come rushing back. For others it is only an
intellectual endevour.
Perhaps therein lies the differene in reaction, in my humble opinion.
Judy (Weissenberg) Cohen.
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 4 Jul 1996 13:35:09 CDT
Reply-To: Michael Thaler
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: Michael Thaler
Subject: Re: Resistance in camp
In-Reply-To: <960702105019_147411326@emout19.mail.aol.com>
Jews were never incarcerated together with Ukrainians,nor were
Ukrainians interned in slave labor camps. Ukrainians overwhelmingly
supported the Germans against the Russians (the few Ukrainian communists
having retreated east with the Red Army in 1941) in the hope of
regaining their independence. Volunteer Ukrainian Wehrmacht units fought
alongside the Germans on the Eastern front. As the Wehrmacht retreated
from the Ukraine, heavily armed Ukrainian resistance groups under the
command of General Bandera (the so-called banderovtsy) waged open warfare
against the Red Army for months after the Germans had been pushed
westward.
There were two Ukrainian SS divisions, recruitment for which was highly
competitive, except in the last few months of the fighting on
Ukrainian soil in the spring and summer of 1944. By then, the Ukraine had
long been declared Judenrein and no Jews
were left alive "officially" even in the Zwangsarbeitslager (forced labor
camps) which were guarded by Ukrainian police under German SS
officers.
In the light of the above history, is the 'survivor' in the story Jewish
and what was the name of the camp in which he (she?) was incarcerated?
Michael Thaler
University of California
San Francisco, CA 94143-0136
Voice:415-664-9316
Fax:415-476-1343
email: mmt@itsa.ucsf.edu
On Tue, 2 Jul 1996, D.M. Henry wrote:
> I am in contact with a survivor with whom I had some long visits recently to
> go over his memoirs which I want to help him publish. He says that in his
> camp, when they arrrived, the Ukrainians were checked out by a tall inmate
> nicknamed Bimbo. He would ask them: who wants to join the SS? and those who
> responded in the affirmative, would be hustled down to the infirmary for an
> injection of air to the heart: "There was no pity". This was done also for an
> eager beaver who showed up one day at the office where he was doing clerical
> work following an operation on his leg. The man presented his credentials,
> that he had been of great assistance to the Nazis and wanted to be
> acknowledged and giving a position commensurate with his interests, and he
> was "rewarded" accordingly by the inmates at the infirmary.
> DMHenry@AOL.com
>
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 5 Jul 1996 13:45:49 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: Jack Rabin
Subject: Re: uniqueness
What I am suggesting is that a socialization process existed in Europe for
centuries. This process, with the Church as a major teacher, created the
necessary conditions for thedehumanization of the Jews. Once Jews were not
better than rats---the subject of one of the more virulent Nazi motion
pictures---then the extermination process could begin.
The intensity of the socialization process was such that the German war
effort actually was hindered by the priority given to the death trains.
Furthermore, this socialization process's success also can be seen by
cosndiering the sheer numbers of Germans involved in the killings. How many
of the actors were unwilling participants? It appears from the literature
that few were for as long as you are in the verman-control business, you
have few conscience-pains.
Certainly, these arguments may seem uni-causal, or "simple." Yet, what
is offered is an alternate hypothesis, concentrating on the role of the
Church as teacher, as a major socializing influence.
>Much too simple! The clerics, with few exceptions, did NOT "want the
>Holocaust to occur." What they wanted was for the problem to go away.
>Without understanding the subtleties of theological antisemitism, then
>the cultural antisemitism that was built upon that level, and finally
>modern political antisemitism (invented both theoretically and in
>praxis in the 1870s), you cannot understand either the activists or the
>bystanders. Most of the clergy, on this as on other major issues to
>this day, were bystanders. Like most of the Jewish victims, they had
>been trained in docility - "keep your head down!" "don't make waves!"
>- while the real movers and shakers wrought their will in the body
>politic.
>
>The doctrine, when someone stopped to look it up, was antisemitic in
>word and intent. The culture of "Christendom" was antisemitic, which
>swept up masses of people who had no intentional malice but when push
>came to shove were hostile to "the Jews" (even if they'd never seen one).
>The modern political articulation of antisemitism as a weapon or tool
>was viewed with horror by people who were both theologically and
>culturally antisemitic - but didn't know it. This is a very common thing
>even among American Christians today, most of whom certainly think of
>themselves as tolerant and broad-minded, etc.
>
>Unless they get power, as they did in 1933 in Germany, the intentionally
>antisemitic activists aren't the problem: the problem is the "good
>people," who don't want ANYTHING to happen. They become the bystanders,
>who - as Elie Wiesel often says - are a worse problem than the
>perpetrators. - FHL
>
>+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
>| |
>| FRANKLIN LITTELL FHL@VM.TEMPLE.EDU |
>| DEPARTMENT OF RELIGION |
>| TEMPLE UNIVERSITY 610-667-5437 |
>| |
>+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
>
>
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 5 Jul 1996 13:46:27 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: James Costello
Subject: Re: churches & holocaust
Franklin Littell recently wrote:
> In fifty years of study I have yet to run across a Christian writer we
> said straight out that the genocide of the Jews was God's punishment of
> them, although I bought a book on the corner of Ben Yehudah and King
> George a couple years ago in which an ultra-Orthodox rabbi did argue
> that line. Usually the Christian writers, even the collaborators,
> simply repeat the traditional doctrines and tamp down any tendencies to
> empathize with the victims.
Richard Rubenstein in his book, *After Auschwitz*,has an interesting
interview with a Christian pastor in Germany which addresses this very point.
Rubenstein writes: *In the apocalyptic atmosphere of Berlin at the
moment of the initiation of the Berlin Wall, the Dean dramatized the
consequences of accepting the normative Judeo-Christian theology of
covenant and election in the light of the Holocaust. The interview
pushed me to a theological point of no return: If I truly believed in
God as the omnipoptent author of the historical drama and in Israel as
His Chosen People, I had no choice but to accept Dean Grubers
conclusion that Hitler unwittingly acted as Gods agent in committing
six million Jews to the slaughter. I could not believe in such a God,
nor could I beliveve in Israel as the Chosen People of God after Auschwitz.*
(note: the lack of the possessive apostrophes in the above are due to
my text-based communication program and are not grammatical errors made
by the author)
Jim Costello (jcostello@igc.apc.org)
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 5 Jul 1996 13:47:12 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: Robert Michael
Organization: University of Massachusetts Dartmouth, North Dartmouth, MA, USA
Subject: hitler's excomunication
in discussion recently someone brought up the issue that hitler was
automatically excommunicated not just because he was best man at the
Protestant Goering's wedding, but that it was goering's SECOND marriage,
having already been DIVORCED!
cheers,
bob michael
rmichael@umassd.edu
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 5 Jul 1996 13:48:11 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: Ben Saltman
Subject: Re: Auschwitz Reconstruction
In-Reply-To:
I am concerned about the question of who may or may not write about the
Holocaust. The issue is in need of clarification. As a white teacher I
was confronted by the claim that I could not speak or write authentically
about African-American literature because I am not an African-American.
On the contrary, what I could not write about was the personal experience
of being an African-American, but I reserved to myself the right to study
and describe African-American literature with as much legitimacy as
anyone, white or black. Similarly, though I did not personally suffer
the Holocaust, neither did anyone else suffer it as a whole. An
individual survivor can only testify to his personal experience.
Together we may study the literature of the Holocaust, may interview
survivors, and come to equally legitimate conclusions. The cumulative
effect of testimonies and research can be evaluated by anyone, and stands
or falls by the strictness of the research and the mass of survivor accounts.
One person's experience of the Holocaust is not the Holocaust.
Ben Saltman
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 5 Jul 1996 13:48:52 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: Andrew Jakubowicz
Subject: Re: Course on Representing the Holocaust in Literature and Film
In Australia we are in the midst of a major controversy on exactly this
issue - in 1995 a book titled "The Hand that Signed the Paper" by a person
calling herself Helen Demidenko was published. It was a fictionalised
account of the experiences of a Ukrainian family which had experienced the
Stalin famine, identified the communists with the Jews, and were then
implicated as guards at Treblinka. The "authorial voice" was of one of
their descendants trying to understand what had happened, in the context of
the War Crimes trial of the early 1990s.
The book, by a woman in her early twenties, was hailed as a major
accomplishment and awarded a raft of prizes - after which it was discovered
that she was not herself Ukrainian but English, and her public persona was
totally faked. The book was also attacked as both anti-semitic and anti-
Ukrainian, historically false, badly written, and simplistic. It was
defended as important, deep, sensitive and neither anti-semitic nor
anti-Ukrainian but rather an extraordinary exploration of the relationship
between "normal people" and horrofic events.Then there were the fights
between critics and supporters, which involved discussion of the role of
the author, the audience, postmodern theories of the death of the author,
the role of the text, the relation between "reality" and fiction or
faction, the context etc etc. There have been at least four books about
the book and the cause celebre it represents, and it has triggered a huge
argument about authenticity, multiculturalism, historical memory and the
contemporary meaning of the Holocaust. More recently people have begun to
suggest that the real author, whom is called Helen Darville, may in fact
be a performance artist, who created Demidenko, who then wrote the novel,
and the beginnings of a perfomance script (Darville as Demidenko would only
appear in public dressed in Ukrainian costume, she created a fictious
personal history, she claimed to be herself Ukrainian) which took off
beyond her wildest dreams, involving participants from Sydney university's
Chancellor (one of the judges on a prize panel) through to academics,
politicians, writers, publishers, right wingers, left wingers, community
organisations etc in an ever extending ripple of confusion and
consternation.
This is all to suggest that l'affaire Demidenko is an extremely usefuyl
case study for any course on the Holocaust and its current representation.
Andrew Jakubowicz
Professor of Sociology
Department of Social Political and Historical Studies
University of Technology Sydney
PO Box 123 Broadway 2007 NSW Australia
Ph: 61+2+330 2298 Fax: 61+2+330 2332
Mob: 041 980 1102
Email: A.Jakubowicz@uts.edu.au
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 5 Jul 1996 13:49:40 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: Tom Blancato
Subject: Re: new book
In-Reply-To:
Referring to Schreber's father as "Europe's Dr. Spock", without further
explanation vis a vis Spock, seems a terrible mistake. Dr. Spock's advice
on childrearing could not be compared to torturous practices of Schreber's
father. Perhaps you meant simply that Screber Sr. had a popularity like
that of Dr. Spock. Could you explain this?
Tom Blancato
On Thu, 4 Jul 1996, Sidney Bolkosky wrote:
> Suzanna, I haven't seen the book, but Schreber, perhaps one of the most
> infamous of Freud's patients, was the son of Europe's Dr. Spock whose
> book on child-rearing included incredibly grotesque, infernal machines
> into which children should be placed to discipline them and teach them
> about being seen but not heard, etc. Remarkably, Freud never mentioned this.
> Sid Bolkosky
> UM-Dearborn
>
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 5 Jul 1996 13:50:38 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: liz vasile
Subject: "Moral Indifference"
It might be helpful to see the silence, not only of the churches
but also of the populace in general, as a kind of "moral indifference." And
this may be worse than actual intent to kill.
- Warren Thompson
Seems to me that we should be thinking of our own silences and "moral
indifference."
Readers of the list are aware that I find the misrepresentation of Polish
and Soviet death at the Holocaust Museum in Washington extraordinary, the
failure of any established Holocaust scholar to comment publically on this
misrepresentation morally unhealthy. While arguments can be made that the
"Holocaust" is simply what happened to Jews -- leaving no general word to
describe German killing of millions of "untermenshen", an event then
difficult to bring into conciousness -- once the killing of Poles and
Soviets is represented, it needs to be represented fairly.
Part of the message of Holocaust Studies is a warning about the dangers of
"bystander" behavior. Scholars of the Holocaust period have an obligation
to speak out when any killing by Germans is minimized or excused. (Again,
Goldhagen denies a German genocidal killing of ethnic Poles (p. 471) and
no one in the Holocaust community appears to be bothered by this denial.)
Jon Petrie (at elizav@ . . .)
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 5 Jul 1996 13:51:14 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: Richard Libowitz Temple University
Subject: Re: Jakob Littner
One possibility would be to seek information from INS under the Freedom of
Information Act. There should be a record of his legal entry into the U.S. if
it took place in 47-48.
Richard Libowitz
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 5 Jul 1996 13:52:13 CDT
Reply-To: Mark Ira Kaufman
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: Mark Ira Kaufman
Subject: Re: trial and status of John Demjanjuk
llaufman@bcm.tmc.edu (Larry Laufman, Ed.D.) writes...
> I did not follow the John Demjanjuk trial in Israel, other than noting the
> verdict of acquittal because the judges did not find the prosecution's
> evidence, including eye-witness testimony, to be sufficiently compelling.
> On his radio talk show last week, Jim Bohannon interviewed John Demjanjuk's
> Israeli defense attorney (sorry, I don't remember his name). The attorney
> has published a book which gives his version of the case and is called, I
> believe, _Defending Ivan the Terrible_. He did not deny that Demjanjuk had
> fought with a pro-Nazi military unit. However, he asserted that (1) the US
> OSI (Office of Special Investigations?) had withheld exculpatory evidence
> which would have demonstrated that Mr. Demjanjuk was not the camp guard in
> question, and (2) consequently the US Supreme Court ruled that the OSI had
> perpetrated fraud before the court. According to what he said, no one in
> the OSI has been tried or punished for the fraud.
>
> Does anyone on the list have more information about (1) this charge against
> the OSI and (2) whether Demjanjuk's US citizenship has been restored?
The 'exculpatory evidence' the OSI was accused of withholding consisted of
testimonies from 38 Ukrainian POW's who had worked for the SS at Treblinka.
The testimonies were taken in the Soviet Union in the 1950's and 1960's.
They testifies that they knew of a fellow Ukrainian who the inmates called
'Ivan Grozny' (Ivan the Terrible). His name was Ivan Marchenko.
As it turns out, there was an Ivan Marchenko who worked as a guard at the
Treblinka mass murder facility. The OSI knew of these avidavits. But they
did not introduce them during the denaturalization proceedings. And for
some very good reasons.
The most obvious reason is that from the standpoint of American law, they
were worthless. All 38 Ukrainians were dead and, as such, could not be
cross-examined.
Another reason they were not introduced has to do with both the questions
asked (and not asked) of these former camp guards, the size and scope of
the Treblinka facility, and the name Ivan.
The name 'Ivan' is more common in the Ukraine than the name 'John' is here.
('John' is the English equivalant of 'Ivan.')
The Treblinka facility was massive. Hundreds of Ukrainian POW's volunteered
to work there. As such, there were probably several 'Ivans.' And it seems
likely that, considering the nature of their work, there could have been a
number of 'Ivans the Terreible.'
The 38 Ukrainians interrogated in the Soviet Union were never asked about
Ivan Demjanjuk. (He changed his name to John the same day he was granted
his American citizenship.)
As for having worked as a death camp guard, even his attorney Yoram Sheftel
acknowledged this during the trial.
Demjanjuk worked for the SS in at least one death camp, and probably more
than one, a fact conceded by the defense during the trial in Israel. In a
surprising move, Demjanjuk s attorneys introduced evidence of his Nazi past
during the trial.
Yoram Sheftel, Demjanjuk s Israeli defense attorney, introduced testimony by
Ignat T. Danielchenko, a guard at the Sobibor death camp. (Unlike Auschwitz,
which was both a slave labor camp and an extermination factory, Sobibor and
Treblinka, camps attached to Operation Reinhard, had no wrk facilities: They
were designed and operated exclusively to exterminate the largest number of
human beings in the shortest possible time.) Danielchenko stated, "I saw Mr.
Demjanjuk escorting prisoners in all phases, from the unloading of the trains
to the entrance to the gas chamber."
While such testimony would seem to put Demjanjuk in harm's way, its was to
protect him. Sheftel s goal was to place Demjanjuk somewhere other than
Treblinka during the time in question. Harvard Law Professor Alan Dershowitz
noted, "Demjanjuk was charged with having committed crimes against humanity
at Treblinka. He could only be tried in Israel for crimes committed at
Treblinka. A principle of law known as the doctrine of speciality prevented
Israel from trying Demjanjuk for any crime other than the specific crime for
which he or she was extradited.
For this reason, proving Demjanjuk participated in the murder of innocent
men, women, and children at another death camp during the time in question
would not necessarily hurt the defense."
Sheftel, sensing potential drawbacks, reversed this strategy and abandoned
the Sobibor alibi during his closing arguments. Instead, he reaffirmed one
of Demjanjuk s earlier alibis - his claim of having been a POW at Chelm.
One month before Demjanjuk's acquittal in Israel, the U. S. 6th Circuit
Court of Appeals appointed U.S. District Judge Thomas Wiseman to investigate
charges of misconduct by the OSI. Wiseman ruled the OSI had improperly
withheld evidence. The judge also noted that because of Demjanjuk s Nazi SS
service at Sobibor and alibis concocted to conceal all of his Nazi service,
Demjanjuk s behavior contributed to his extradition. Wiseman wrote, "Mr.
Demjanjuk s alibi was so incredible as to legitimately raise the suspicions
of his prosecutors that he lied about everything."
After Israel reversed the conviction, the 6th Circuit Appeals Court ordered
Demjanjuk temporarily readmitted to the country. The court declared that
his presence was necessary to assist his attorneys prepare for a hearing on
the OSI. matter. (For reasons still unknown, the court began and concluded
the hearing a week before Demjanjuk returned to America.)
The Justice Department then claimed Demjanjuk's extradition was now moot,
and the KGB documents have no bearing on Demjanjuk s denaturalization. The
Justice Department also claimed an order to deport Demjanjuk to the Ukraine
was still in effect and, because of Demjanjuk s service at Sobibor, still
justified. (After Federal Judge Frank Battistti stripped Demjanjuk of his
citizenship, he appeared in immigration court in 1984, where he was ordered
deported. When asked where he would prefer to be deported, Demjanjuk refused
to answer. Immigration Judge Robert Angellelli then ordered him deported to
the Ukraine. The order was signed by Secretary of State George Schultz.
Before the order could be carried out, Israel's request for his extradition
was granted.)
The Justice Department has filed a motion to have the federal court reaffirm
the original denaturalization order, so they can at last deport Demjanjuk to
the Ukraine. Demjanjuk has filed a motion to have his citizenship case
reopened. He is currently represented by a federal public defender.
Most legal experts insist Demjanjuk cannot regain his American citizenship
and will eventually be deported. One historian noted that because of the
collapse of the Soviet Union, deporting Demjanjuk to the Ukraine today does
not represent the certain death it did a dozen years ago. "Demjanjuk will
fare better in an independent Ukraine than if the deportation order had been
carried out when originally ordered. In 1984 Demjanjuk would have been
thrust into a legal system that took a dim view of captured Soviet soldiers
going to work for the Nazis."
Demjanjuk, now 76, is rarely seen in public. He does not venture from his
house, except to attend church. The Seven Hills Police Department have
posted several no trespassing signs in his front yard. The blinds on the
front windows are drawn closed day and night.
Until the government deports him, public perception of Demjanjuk is likely
to remain unfettered by the facts of his past.
Many who acknowledge Demjanjuk s history believe he has been punished enough.
Others who believe in his innocence view the loss of seventeen years from
his life as a tragedy.
Professor Dershowitz sees it differently.
"The tragedy is not that John Demjanjuk has lost 16 or 17 years of his life.
The tragedy is that he had 20 to 25 good years of life with his family after
the Second World War. His victims didn t have those years."
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 5 Jul 1996 13:52:44 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Comments: Converted from PROFS to RFC822 format by PUMP V2.2X
From: Peter Erspamer
Subject: John Demjanuk
*** Resending note of 07/03/96 15:26
To: SCHOAH --CMSNAMES
From: Peter Erspamer
I may be mistaken but I don't believe Demjanuk's citizenship was restored
because he had incontrovertibly lied about his Nazi past when seeking U.S.
citizenship: a fact that was true regardless of whether or not he was Ivan
the Terrible. Last I heard, he was considering either returning to the
Ukraine or moving to Switzerland. Possibly you could scan The New York
Times Index to get some information more reliable than my memory can
provide at this time.
Peter Erspamer e-mail: flpe@fhsuvm.fhsu.edu
Dept of Modern Languages - RH390 Phones: (913) 628-5382
Fort Hays State University (913) 625-9476
Hays, KS 67601
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 5 Jul 1996 13:53:55 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: Jack Rabin
Subject: Re: churches & holocaust
Though there may not be a Christian writer who has said that the Holocaust
was God's punishment, this relationship has been achieved in Christian
writings since the Apostles. Specifically, the idea that the Jews killed
Christ sets the stage for all the blood shed throughout the last 2,000
years. Thus, the label "Christ-killer" was appended to the Jew consequently
dehumanizing him. Salvation could not come to the Jews because of the
deicide.
What about the post-World War II era? Though Pope John XXIII was able to
get the Church to go on record that present-day(!) Jews are not responsible
for the deicde. where is the Vatican's condemnation of the Holocaust?
>1. In his last days Luther became embittered by many things, of which the
>failure of much of Christendom to convert to the Reformation and the
>failure of the Jews to convert (signing the end of this history) were but
>two of the most intense. To understand Luther's Christian antisemitism,
>read Heiko Obermann's WURZELN DES ANTISEMITISMUS.
>
>2. In fifty years of study I have yet to run across a Christian writer
>we said straight out that the genocide of the Jews was God's punishment
>of them, although I bought a book on the corner of Ben Yehudah and King
>George a couple years ago in which an ultra-Orthodox rabbi did argue
>that line. Usually the Christian writers, even the collaborators, simply
>repeat the traditional doctrines and tamp down any tendencies to empathize
>with the victims.
>
>3. To understand the failure of "Christendom," which I call "apostasy,"
>you must see how the proletariat and the Intellectuellen were lost to the
>churches with the Enlightenment and the Ersatzreligionen, ideologies and
>apocalyptic political movements that grew stronger from the 1840s on. It
>is true that there was an ancient theological antisemitism at the founda-
>tion of "Christendom," and that upon it were mounted centuries of Kultur-
>antisemitismus. But modern political antisemitism, used as a tool or
>weapon by populist movements and adventurers, appeared in the 1870s -
>ideologically in the West, with Wm Marr et al., and in practice in Tsarist
>Russia.
>
>The affirmative energy that built the cathedrals and founded the universi-
>ties was flagging seriously by the time of the Encyclopedistes and certainly
>long gone by the time of Pius IX, but there remained in the bottom of the
>barrel the negative definition of Christianity: the hostility of the
>baptized pagans to the Jews. - FHL
>
>+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
>| |
>| FRANKLIN LITTELL FHL@VM.TEMPLE.EDU |
>| DEPARTMENT OF RELIGION |
>| TEMPLE UNIVERSITY 610-667-5437 |
>| |
>+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
>
>
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 5 Jul 1996 13:54:43 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: Jack Rabin
Subject: Re: uniqueness
I ceretainly was not using Uris as an historical source but rather as
someone with an opinion.
I find in reading the coimmunications in this listserv that often
apologies have been made for clerical behavior. What if clerics in each
Christian faith had protested? Germany was not Russia---there had not been
an anti-religious bias in Germany. Hitler was a Catholic---what if the Pope
had threatened him with excommunication?
Overall, the stage had been set in Europe for the mass murder of the Jews
centuries before Hitler. Dehumanization of the Jews was accomplished
through the vehicles of (a) the New Testament, (b) Luther's writings, (c)
the Crusades, (d) and propaganda, such as The Protocols of the Learned
Elders of Zion. Is there cause and effect shown here? No. However, a
culture of both religious and political anti-Semitism built up over the
centuries is hard to deny as a possible virus which led to the Dreyfus
affair, ritual blood murder charges in pre-World War I Russia, and, finally,
the Holocaust.
By the way, my point about the effect which a wide-spread protest by
clerics might have averted the Holocaust draws as a precedent the enormous
outburst of negative sentiment brought about by the ritual blood murder
charge in Russia. Did not the Pope join in that protest?
I close by suggesting a scenario for the US: 1. a massive economic
crash; 2. the rise of demagogues, many of whom identify the "cause" of the
economic disaster as the Jews of America; 3. the middle class embraces
fascism as a way of restoring order; 4. the fascist leaders of the US,
already convinced that the Jews created the economic disaster, propose
incremental changes in the law which would deny Jews of certain civil
rights; 5. the dehumanization process of American Jews picks up leading
inevitably to death camps. Impossible in America? Just consider the Frank
lynching in Georgia or the 1922 accusation brought by police in Messina, New
York against a rabbi for ritual blood murder. Furthermore, consider Pat
Robertson's recent statements. It can "happen here."
>For a more comprehsnive and less deterministic view, see Zygmunt Bauman,
>MODERNITY AND THE HOLOCAUST (Cornell UP). I would not use Leon uris as a
>scholarly source, especially since EXODUS helps maintain the fiction that
>the King of Denmark wore a yellow star.We historians have enough trouble
>already with Hollywood and authors of fiction manipulating the History to
>fit their own needs.
>Stephen feinstein
>
>On Sun, 30 Jun 1996, Jack Rabin wrote:
>
>> As I had aluded earlier, I agree with your conclusions---specifically,
>> since "silence means consent", the virtual lack of protest among clerics
>> throughout Europe, especially in the Vatican, can only be interpreted that
>> the various churchs approvedc of the Holocaust. Even after the war, the
>> silence was outrageous, although accompanied by active efforts by many
>> clerics to help escaping Nazis out of Europe.
>>
>> Leon Uris stated in his book, "Exodus,"---"Christianiny died at
>> Auschwitz." I thinkl a strong case can be made that, as the German
>> persecution of the Jews picked up in the late-1930s, that if the churches of
>> each denomination had come out in strong, clear terms against what was
>> happening, the persecution would have moderated or died. This would have
>> been especially important as word of the massacres pored into Germany and
>> into our countries early in the war.
>>
>> It didn't happened. Why? One thesis has to be confronted---clerics
>> wanted the Holocaust the occur.
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> >The uniqueness of the Holocaust escapes any normal abstract or proposi-
>> >tional category and can only be conceived in the language of historical
>> >process. That is, the UNIQUENESS is precisely the moral, ethical, and
>> >religious crisis set in place by the truth that 6,000,000 Jews were
>> >murdered in the midst of "Christendom," by baptized Eastern Orthodox,
>> >Roman Catholic and Protestant Christians. They were never rebuked by the
>> >church leaders. The credibility crisis thereby downloaded upon Christian
>> >belief and practice is without parallel in history. As a clergyman and
>> >an academic (American) I feel strongly this central point must be made,
>> >for we are again being inundated by an essentially racist interpretation
>> >of the uniqueness of the Holocaust which provides precisely the escape
>> >hatch for which my co-religionists are eagerly looking. - FHL
>> >
>> >+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
>> >| |
>> >| FRANKLIN LITTELL FHL@VM.TEMPLE.EDU |
>> >| DEPARTMENT OF RELIGION |
>> >| TEMPLE UNIVERSITY 610-667-5437 |
>> >| |
>> >+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
>> >
>> >
>>
>
>
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 5 Jul 1996 13:55:29 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: Richard Libowitz Temple University
Subject: Re: trial and status of John Demjanjuk
The facts that Demjanjuk 1) had fought in a pro-Nazi unit and 2) concealed
that fact upon his entry to the U.S., are sufficient grounds for removal of
his U.S. citizenship and deportation, whether he was "Ivan the Terrible" or
not.
Richard Libowitz
Saint Joseph's University
Philadelphia
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 5 Jul 1996 13:56:17 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: Phyllis Lassner
Subject: Re: Representing the Holocaust in Literature and Film
In-Reply-To: from "Jim Mott" at Jul 4,
96 01:23:57 pm
I want to thank people for their suggestions for teaching a course
on "Representing the Holocaust in Literature and Film," and
also want to say that the views i presented in my request
message were not mine but rather those I am hearing in
discussion of the subject.
Phyllis Lassner
Northwestern U.
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 5 Jul 1996 13:57:10 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: David Dickerson
Subject: Vinnitsa Region Jewish Community (VRJC)
Greetings!
For about a month, I have been corresponding with Igor Desner, head of
the Vinnitsa Region Jewish Community (VRJC) in Ukraine; I thought that
subscribers to the HOLOCAUS list would like to know about the VRJC.
In particular, the VRJC's archives contain documents pertaining to the
Holocaust; these materials are primarily in Russian and Ukrainian, but
there are also some documents in German.
The VRJC has several functions, including the following:
- supporting the elderly and sick Jews of the region.
- creating and implementing educational programs.
- revitalizing Yiddish language and culture.
- preserving the region's Jewish historical artifacts,
sites, and monuments.
- celebrating the traditional Jewish holidays.
In an effort to help the VRJC and let researchers know about the VRJC
archives, I created a small Web presentation at the following URL:
http://www.igc.apc.org/ddickerson/podolia-vrjc.html
(Incidentally, I am expecting materials from the VRJC this month, and
will be adding more information to the VRJC's WWW presentation in the
near future.)
The VRJC has several ongoing projects -- which include restoring the
town's synagogue. The community has eight Jewish schools, a lecture
center, and musical groups which perform Yiddish music and dance.
The VRJC's postal and e-mail addresses are as follows:
Mr. Igor Desner
VINNITSA REGION JEWISH COMMUNITY
Post Office Box 1993
Vinnitsa-21 286021
Ukraine
--
E-MAIL: vinni@jew.vinnica.ua
I hope this information is of interest. Thank you very much.
Cordially,
David Dickerson
http://www.igc.apc.org/ddickerson/
___________________________________________________________
David Dickerson / / / ddickerson@igc.apc.org
"In a world of absurdity, we must invent reason; we
must create beauty out of nothingness." - Elie Wiesel
From holoweb@h-net.msu.edu Thu Aug 29 12:21:15 1996
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=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 7 Jul 1996 12:14:55 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: David Dickerson
Subject: Re: Vinnitsa Region Jewish Community (VRJC)
At 1:57 PM 07/05/96, I wrote to HOLOCAUS:
> ...the VRJC's archives contain documents pertaining to the Holocaust;
> these materials are primarily in Russian and Ukrainian, but there are
> also some documents in German....
I just wanted to clarify that the archives of the Vinnitsa Region Jewish
Community (VRJC) are actually in Vinnitsa (and aren't accessible on-line).
I apologize for any confusion which my original message may have caused
about the location -- and accessibility -- of the VRJC archives.
Thank you for your time, consideration, and understanding.
Cordially,
David Dickerson
http://www.igc.apc.org/ddickerson/
___________________________________________________________
David Dickerson / / / ddickerson@igc.apc.org
"In a world of absurdity, we must invent reason; we
must create beauty out of nothingness." - Elie Wiesel
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 7 Jul 1996 12:15:38 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: Franklin Littell
Organization: TEMPLE UNIVERSITY
Subject: Re: Littell on Goldhagen
In-Reply-To: Message of Thu, 4 Jul 1996 13:19:21 CDT from
George, you're absolutely right in connecting absolute power (dictator-
ship) with mass murder (genocide, of which the Nazi genocide of the Jews
is Exhibit A). Resistance to this rather obvious connection seems to
come - like resistance to the term "totalitarianism" 40 years ago - from
those desiring to insulate Soviet Communism from conceptual parallelism
with Third Reich Nazism. Resistance also comes from those confusing
the UNIQUENESS of the Holocaust with PRECIOUSNESS, the latter a mark of
Jewish sectarianism - a dishonor to the dead and an albatross to efforts
to make a better relationship between the Jewish people and the Christian
communities. - Franklin
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
| |
| FRANKLIN LITTELL FHL@VM.TEMPLE.EDU |
| DEPARTMENT OF RELIGION |
| TEMPLE UNIVERSITY 610-667-5437 |
| |
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 7 Jul 1996 12:16:25 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: Franklin Littell
Organization: TEMPLE UNIVERSITY
Subject: Re: churches & holocaust
In-Reply-To: Message of Fri, 5 Jul 1996 13:46:27 CDT from
I return to my statement whether a Christian preached "straight out" that
the genocide of the Jews was a result of God's will for them. (I could
have said in the original communication that there is a story circulating
that the Nietra rabbi or Dov Weissmandel received such an answer upon
appealing to the papal legate to intervene for Jewish children. But that
story requires more solid documentation, and in any case he was not
preaching.) This is a point where precision is called for: Who preached
what, in what sermon or on what occasion? Who said so and when?
I knew Probst Grueber personally. He is memorialized by a tree at Yad
Vashem for the work of his team in Berlin which rescued c1100 Jews.
He is a perfect illustration of the point I was making, as is the
frequent reference to Dietrich Bonhoeffer's conventional reference to
the punishment of the Jews in history in his 1934 writing. By 1938
Bonhoeffer had learned better use of the language. Grueber also was,
as so often the case with Christian teachers who have memorized their
doctrinal lessons (a vanishing phenomenon, by the way!), repeating
propositions that float in the air above Christian discussions for
centuries - but in Grueber's case were CONTRADICTORY TO HIS OWN
ACTIONS. So was Bonhoeffer's effort to get the Confessing Church to
intervene for the persecuted Jews (not only the baptized Jews, as often
wrongly asserted), and continuing criticism of his church and the
brethren for failing to act for those who had no voice of their own.
Richard Rubenstein, in the first important religious discussion of the
Holocaust (AFTER AUSCHWITZ, now in a 25th anniversary edition), drew his
own conclusions from what Grueber said while looking out the window and
meditating on the tanks of the occupation rolling by. Grueber was right
on target when he said those tanks were a penalty for Germany's sins;
he was a conventional Christian preacher when he then moved from the
existential to the propositional and repeated the old generalization
about the woes and wanderings of the Jews.
You can hear those propositions rumbling in the background in almost any
church discussion of doctrine today. Churches tumble over each other
to repudiate open and overt antisemitism - the language of assault at
street-fighting level, but the reformation and reconstruction of our
preaching and teaching still has a long way to go. An imaginative and
creative effort such as that of the Protestant Church of the Rhineland
(synodical declaration of January, 1980), which is the best any church
has produced thus far, is still far ahead of most official church
judicatories.
To understand Christian antisemitism (which opprobrium some ecclesiastics
try to escape by claiming they aren't "antisemitic" because they're ONLY
"anti-Judaic"!) it is imperative to understand the three levels of the
malaise that have developed across centuries: theological, cultural,
ideological/political. Grueber, like EVERY Christian who hasn't drawn
the knife on the prejudices he drew in with his mother's milk and
learned to articulate in Sunday School, was still fixed in the first and
second levels even while he was risking his life and the lives of his
staff to fight the Evil Thing at the third level. - FHL
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
| |
| FRANKLIN LITTELL FHL@VM.TEMPLE.EDU |
| DEPARTMENT OF RELIGION |
| TEMPLE UNIVERSITY 610-667-5437 |
| |
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 7 Jul 1996 12:17:10 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: Franklin Littell
Organization: TEMPLE UNIVERSITY
Subject: Re: hitler's excomunication
In-Reply-To: Message of Fri, 5 Jul 1996 13:47:12 CDT from
Someone may have "thought about" Hitler's purported automatic excommunica-
tion lately, but where was that "someone" when Cardinal Bertram - chairman
of the German Catholic Bishops' Conference - instructed the priests to say
a memorial mass for Hitler on May 5, 1945? or when, until Franco was
taken to the lower regions, a memorial mass was annually said at the time
of Hitler's birthday, in Madrid? - FHL
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
| |
| FRANKLIN LITTELL FHL@VM.TEMPLE.EDU |
| DEPARTMENT OF RELIGION |
| TEMPLE UNIVERSITY 610-667-5437 |
| |
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 7 Jul 1996 12:22:04 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: Jim Mott
Subject: Re: Uniqueness
From: Franklin Littell
Preachers and moralists often tell the truth in metaphors that should be
distinguished from pedestrian fact. Leon Uris spoke a great Truth when
he said "Christianity died at Auschwitz." Elie Wiesel says the same.
So have I said it many times, and I have the leverage of being a Christian
minister. The meaning of the utterance is to shake the baptized loose
from their continuing complacency, not to make another footnote for an
historical essay. - FHL
==========================================
From: Franklin Littell
I find Jack Rabin's moral earnestness thoroughly sympatisch. The church
leaders of Europe (and America) who did not use the weapons of the
spirit to fight antisemitism and a genocidal dictatorship are to be
sharply criticized. The pope's spiritual rehabilitation of Dean
Lichtenberg is an encouraging sign. Perhaps in visiting Austria he will
remember Friedrich Jaegerstaetter (?)... The Protestant martyr Dietrich
Bonhoeffer is still on the German court books as a "traitor." But then
the Concordat between Pacelli and Hitler that broke the back of the
Zentrum's opposition to Hitler's assumption of dictatorial powers is
also still in force, too.
There are Christian theologians and churchmen - both in Germany and in
the USA - who have made the correction of Christian doctrine and preach-
ing in the shadow of Auschwitz their major work for years. It is most
unfortunate that the Jewish weeklies NEVER report on their meetings and
pronouncement and publications, while the rantings of a demagogue like
Farrakhan or the pretentious proclamation of the hierarchy of the
Southern Baptist Convention gets extensive coverage. This may strengthen
the dogma that the gentiles are always either beating up on the Jews or
getting ready to do so, but it is counter-productive and disfunctional
if we have any interest in bettering the situation for the future. -FHL
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
| |
| FRANKLIN LITTELL FHL@VM.TEMPLE.EDU |
| DEPARTMENT OF RELIGION |
| TEMPLE UNIVERSITY 610-667-5437 |
| |
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 7 Jul 1996 12:22:58 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: Louis Maier
Subject: Re: Course on Representing the Holocaust in Literature and Film
In-Reply-To: <31DA8DBB@msmailgw.spss.com>
I feel that major contributions to holocaust literature were made by many
fine writers ranging from Hersey (The Wall) to Ozyk (The Shawl). The
fiction writers presented their works when many of us were not ready to
write about our painful experiences.
However, I sense a lack of interest in books about the life experiences
of survivors. Our books need greater support, even if we are not
established writers.
I hope that you will consider including my recently published book in your
curriculum. My web page (listed below) contains excerpts from the book
for your perusal.
____________________
Dr. Louis Maier, DSW
Author of "In Lieu of Flowers (In Memory of the Jews of Malsch...)"
http://www.wam.umd.edu/~drmaier/inlieu.html
On Wed, 3 Jul 1996, Mott, Jim wrote:
> From: phyllisl[SMTP:phyllisl@merle.acns.nwu.edu]
>
> I am preparing an upper division undergraduate course on
> "Representing the Holocaust in Literature
> and Film" and would appreciate any suggestions and responses
> to the following issues I've come across so far:
> Uses and Abuses of the Holocaust:
> Many hold the position that literature/fiction by non-survivors
> is very often an abuse of the Holocaust because it cannot
> authentically get inside any aspect of the experience and
> therefore must misrepresent it. For a non-survivor
> To fictionalize the Holocaust\
> is to de-authenticate it.
> Conversely, even when survivors' writing about the Holocaust is poor
> aesthetically, its authenticity makes it more valuable than
> a more aesthetically powerful fiction by a non-survivor.
> On the same plane, many people feel that only non-fictional
> documentaries or films authenticated by survivors, such as
> WEAPONS OF THE SPIRIT are appropriate vehicles for teaching
> the Holocaust, as opposed to such fictional works as Louis
> Malle's AU REVOIR MES ENFANTS.
> Since my purpose is to teach the problems of representation,
> I am interested in related issues and teaching approaches.
> Phyllis Lassner
> Northwestern University
>
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 7 Jul 1996 12:24:11 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: Sidney Bolkosky
Subject: Re: new book
In-Reply-To:
The popularity of Schreber's book was exactly my point. Sorry for the
confusion. No two children's commentators could be more different than
Spock and Schreber. The book, however, had the kind of broad readership,
primarily of middle class Austrians, that Spock's achieved in this country.
Sid Bolkosky
On Fri, 5 Jul 1996, Tom Blancato wrote:
>
> Referring to Schreber's father as "Europe's Dr. Spock", without further
> explanation vis a vis Spock, seems a terrible mistake. Dr. Spock's advice
> on childrearing could not be compared to torturous practices of Schreber's
> father. Perhaps you meant simply that Screber Sr. had a popularity like
> that of Dr. Spock. Could you explain this?
>
> Tom Blancato
>
>
> On Thu, 4 Jul 1996, Sidney Bolkosky wrote:
>
> > Suzanna, I haven't seen the book, but Schreber, perhaps one of the most
> > infamous of Freud's patients, was the son of Europe's Dr. Spock whose
> > book on child-rearing included incredibly grotesque, infernal machines
> > into which children should be placed to discipline them and teach them
> > about being seen but not heard, etc. Remarkably, Freud never mentioned
this.
> > Sid Bolkosky
> > UM-Dearborn
> >
>
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 7 Jul 1996 12:24:40 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: Richard Libowitz Temple University
Subject: Re: Auschwitz Reconstruction
Your comment as to Holocaust writers and authorities should attract little
disagreement. Consider: today, the bulk of Holocaust publications are being
authored by women and men born after V-E Day. If only the original generation
was "entitled" to write about events, our research would be nearly completed.
Richard Libowitz
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 7 Jul 1996 12:27:20 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: Jim Mott
Subject: Re: Moral Indifference
From: Franklin Littell
The problem of reaching agreement seems tied to the fact that "genocide"
is not yet a fixed term of reference. The fundamentalist Muslim govern-
ment of northern Sudan has for ten years been campaigning to root out
Christianity in the southern half of the country. c800,000 have died
and large numbers of children have been kidnapped by the authorities and
are sold as slaves in Khartum. Is this genocide?
If so, why are the inter-tribal and inter-clannish atrocities in "Bosnia,"
no where near as massive, condemned as "genocide" and allowed to become
a serious threat to European/American international relations while both
Europeans and Americans virtually ignore the crimes in Sudan?
Atrocious as the Third Reich oppression of the Poles was, like the Soviet
oppression of subject peoples or like the oppression of subject peoples
by the present Indonesian dictatorship, where is the evidence the Germans
intended their murder rather than their enslavement? The Third Reich
intention toward the Jews is indisputable: murder and the eradication of
their culture and civilization.
Or are there degrees of genocide, as there are - in court - degrees of
murder? - FHL
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
| |
| FRANKLIN LITTELL FHL@VM.TEMPLE.EDU |
| DEPARTMENT OF RELIGION |
| TEMPLE UNIVERSITY 610-667-5437 |
| |
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
==========================================
From: Aharon Meytahl
The intent of remembering the crimes of Germans against Poles and Russians
is certainly commendable, in particular when "the 'courage of not knowing'
is in fashion" - if I may use an expression of Miroslav Holub written in
different context.
The suggestion as how to do it is not. History of Poland and of Soviet Union
during Second World War is of paramount importance on its own ground and
should be commemorated by its people and historians, after their own
fashion. Such history should not be degraded to second class resident in
history of others. It has its own justification and interest.
Again and again, various individuals and groups are complaining why the
Jewish Holocaust does not encompass other atrocities, those of Armenians,
Cambodians, of Rwanda and Biafra. Those events deserve better. They should
be studied and researched, on their own merit, which does not derive its
importance from the Holocaust.
Aharon Meytahl
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 8 Jul 1996 14:00:23 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: Jim Mott
Subject: Re: [do not post][problem here???? rj]
Comments: To: "Richard Jensen, H-Net Director" ,
h-france@vm.cc.purdue.edu
In-Reply-To: Message of Mon, 08 Jul 1996 12:45:53 -0600 (CST) from
My subscription list is REVIEW=OWNER. No one but myself and Richard
Levy have access to the list of subscribers.
Jim Mott
Holocaus Editor
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 8 Jul 1996 14:03:57 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: "Alexander Soifer,Prof,University of
Colorado"
Subject: Have an enjoyable and succesful Summer!
Dear Friends (which inculdes everyone, but one "Prof" critic :-):
I thank you for the great company during past year, and wish you a
nice Summer. I wish a nice Summer to my critic as well.
I am unsubscribing just for 4 months of my European sabbatical, and will
be on again in late November. In fact, any suggestions would be greatly
appreciated for viewing Jewish museums and great art
along my way (Seville, Madrid, Barcelona, Burgundy, Netherlands, Moscow,
Prague and the rest of Czech Rep., Germany, Switzerland, Italy, France).
Please, send suggestions directly to me before Saurday.
Thank you the moderators, thank you everyone!
"See you" in November!
Yours faithfully,
Alexander Soifer
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 8 Jul 1996 14:05:24 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: David Dickerson
Subject: FWD: Remnants of Jewish History (Regensburg, Germany)
Comments: cc: smheyl@AOL.COM, heyl@erzicip.erzwiss.uni-hamburg.de
Greetings!
I am forwarding the attached message, submitted recently by Matthias
Heyl of the Universitaet Hamburg, to the Usenet group
, since I thought it would be of interest
to HOLOCAUS subscribers.
Also, I would very much appreciate any more information which HOLOCAUS
subscribers in Germany might be able to add to Mr. Heyl's message.
Thank you very much for your time and consideration.
Cordially,
David Dickerson
http://www.igc.apc.org/ddickerson/
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Source: Written 9:06 AM / Jul 1, 1996 / by smheyl@aol.com
Conference:
Subject: Remnants of Jewish History in Regensburg, Germany,
in Danger, Again!
> According to the last edition of German weekly newspaper DIE
> ZEIT (June 28, 1996, page 39, "Wie die Stadt Regensburg ihre
> Vergangenheit bewaeltigt - Zuschuetten!) they have found some
> fundaments of houses and synagogues during excavations for
> rebuilding a market place around the "Neupfarrkirche" (which is
> a church) in the center of the Bavarian city of Regensburg.
>
> Now the city of Regensburg is planning to close the wholes they
> have digged into the ground, leaving only ten days for the
> archeologists to make an inventory of what they have found there.
> They are in a hurry, because they fear that someone might protest
> against their way of dealing with very unique remnanst of
> German-Jewish history. One of the fundaments they found is that
> of a synagogue in a gothic style and the remnants of its
> predecessor in a romanic style - Andreas Angersdoerfer, expert
> for Judaic Studies at Regensburg University, speaks about a
> "sensation".
>
> If you want to protest, here are the fax numbers which may help
> you to get in touch with the right people:
>
> The Mayors of the City of Regensburg:
>
> - Oberbuergermeister: Fax +49-941-507-1029
> - Buergermeister: Fax: +49-941-507-2029
> - Stadtverwaltung: Fax: +49-941-507-1029
> - Department for the Preservation of Historical Monuments:
> +49-941-507-4459
> - Tourist Information: +49-941-507-4419
>
> Parties:
>
> - CSU (conservative) +49-941-507-1052
> - SPD (social-democratic, liberal) +49-941-507-1064
> - FW/FDP (liberal): +49-941-507-1058
>
> Please, let them know very soon, what you think about their
> plans. I did not find the fax-number of the "Mittelfraenkische
> Zeitung", which is situated in Regensburg. I shall add it, later
> on.
>
> c, Hamburg
> SMHeyl@aol.com
> Matthias Heyl, M.A.
> Universitaet Hamburg
> FB Erziehungswiss.
> Von-Melle-Park 8
> D-20146 Hamburg
> Tel.: +4940-4123-4743
> Fax: +4940-4123-2112
>
> heyl@erzicip.erzwiss.uni-hamburg.de
> smheyl@aol.com
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
___________________________________________________________
David Dickerson / / / ddickerson@igc.apc.org
"In a world of absurdity, we must invent reason; we
must create beauty out of nothingness." - Elie Wiesel
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 8 Jul 1996 14:06:05 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: Rene Ash
Subject: Re: Auschwitz Reconstruction
In-Reply-To: <960706234611_232272777@emout12.mail.aol.com>
The original generation is writing and of course one of the great sources
that is being produced is Spielberg's "Shoah" series. Here the survivors
are leaving behind an Eyewitness to History and Legacy for future
generations.
Rene L. Ash
On Sun, 7 Jul 1996, Richard Libowitz Temple University wrote:
> Your comment as to Holocaust writers and authorities should attract little
> disagreement. Consider: today, the bulk of Holocaust publications are being
> authored by women and men born after V-E Day. If only the original generation
> was "entitled" to write about events, our research would be nearly completed.
>
> Richard Libowitz
>
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 8 Jul 1996 14:06:31 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: kaki_bernard@smtp.facing.org
Subject: Re: Moral Indifference
It is a point which often seems to elude discussion that the term
"genocide" is not exactly an immutable and fixed referent, but is a
legal term coined fairly recently in response to a very specific
history. The decision whether or not a particular atrocity may be
labeled "genocide" is often complicated, for example, by the fact that
political murders of whatever scale do not consitute genocide. The
reasons for this should be patently obvious, when one recalls that
Stalin was in power at the end of World War II and at the time of the
definition of the UN resolution. In my own opinion, however, a definition
of genocide which excludes murders on the scale of the Stalinist purges or
of, say, Mao's Cultural Revolution, is a pretty useless one. The definition
of genocide is coded in other ways as well. Rape is not considered a
genocidal act, although its intent is often more than an expression of
violence, but a deliberate attempt to permanently defile its victims and
render them unfit progenitors. (This approach obviously assumes that a
raped woman _is_ thenceforth "unclean," a conception with which I most
forcefully disagree, but what I think is much less important in this case
than what the victimized think.)
Kaki Bernard
kaki_bernard@facing.org
______________________________ Reply Separator _________________________________
Subject: Re: Moral Indifference
Author: H-Net History of the Holocaust List at
INTERNET
Date: 7/8/96 7:43 AM
From: Franklin Littell
The problem of reaching agreement seems tied to the fact that "genocide"
is not yet a fixed term of reference. The fundamentalist Muslim govern-
ment of northern Sudan has for ten years been campaigning to root out
Christianity in the southern half of the country. c800,000 have died and
large numbers of children have been kidnapped by the authorities and are
sold as slaves in Khartum. Is this genocide?
If so, why are the inter-tribal and inter-clannish atrocities in "Bosnia,"
no where near as massive, condemned as "genocide" and allowed to become
a serious threat to European/American international relations while both
Europeans and Americans virtually ignore the crimes in Sudan?
Atrocious as the Third Reich oppression of the Poles was, like the Soviet
oppression of subject peoples or like the oppression of subject peoples
by the present Indonesian dictatorship, where is the evidence the Germans
intended their murder rather than their enslavement? The Third Reich
intention toward the Jews is indisputable: murder and the eradication of
their culture and civilization.
Or are there degrees of genocide, as there are - in court - degrees of
murder? - FHL
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
| |
| FRANKLIN LITTELL FHL@VM.TEMPLE.EDU |
| DEPARTMENT OF RELIGION |
| TEMPLE UNIVERSITY 610-667-5437 |
| |
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
==========================================
From: Aharon Meytahl
The intent of remembering the crimes of Germans against Poles and Russians
is certainly commendable, in particular when "the 'courage of not knowing'
is in fashion" - if I may use an expression of Miroslav Holub written in
different context.
The suggestion as how to do it is not. History of Poland and of Soviet Union
during Second World War is of paramount importance on its own ground and
should be commemorated by its people and historians, after their own
fashion. Such history should not be degraded to second class resident in
history of others. It has its own justification and interest.
Again and again, various individuals and groups are complaining why the
Jewish Holocaust does not encompass other atrocities, those of Armenians,
Cambodians, of Rwanda and Biafra. Those events deserve better. They should
be studied and researched, on their own merit, which does not derive its
importance from the Holocaust.
Aharon Meytahl
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 8 Jul 1996 14:09:11 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: Stephane Bruchfeld
Subject: Re: Resistance in camp
Michael Thaler wrote:
>Jews were never incarcerated together with Ukrainians,nor were
>Ukrainians interned in slave labor camps. Ukrainians overwhelmingly
>supported the Germans against the Russians (the few Ukrainian communists
>having retreated east with the Red Army in 1941) in the hope of
>regaining their independence. Volunteer Ukrainian Wehrmacht units fought
>alongside the Germans on the Eastern front. As the Wehrmacht retreated
>from the Ukraine, heavily armed Ukrainian resistance groups under the
>command of General Bandera (the so-called banderovtsy) waged open warfare
>against the Red Army for months after the Germans had been pushed
>westward.
I have met a Ukrainian, who arrived in Sweden after the war and studied
to be a physician. He was a member in the Ukrainian anti-Nazi non-
communist resistance, was captured in Poland or Czechoslovakia (I'm not
sure which) and interned in Auschwitz-Birkenau as a political prisoner.
If I remember correctly he was later transferred to Ravensbru=A8ck.
Like many Jewish Holocaust survivors, he kept silent about his experiences
until very recently. The immediate reason he stepped forward was the first
visit to Sweden by Holocaust denier Robert Faurisson in December 1992. He
has since been giving lectures in schools here about what he witnessed as a
non-Jewish prisoner in those camps. In 1993 I was present at one such=
lecture,
and also had the opportunity to talk to him afterwards.
Stephane.Bruchfeld@ceifo.su.se (Stephane Bruchfeld)
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 9 Jul 1996 18:54:59 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: ursula duba
Subject: trouble w/e-mail provider
7-7-96
my internet provider has been out of commission all week. i would like
to ask all those who sent messages to me which bounced back to them, to
resend them to me.
thank you.
ursula duba
duba@cshore.com
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 9 Jul 1996 18:58:02 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: Aharon Meytahl
Subject: Wistrich on Godhagen and Weiss
--=====================_836937626==_
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
--=====================_836937626==_
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
Content-Disposition: attachment; filename="ant60710.txt"
Professor Robert Wistrich of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem reviews
Godhagen's book in the July issue of Commentary. Although he follows the line
of professional Holocaust scholars in denouncing the book, he concedes that
there is still no answer as to why the Holocaust did occur and why it was
'conceived' in Germany.
Wistrich mentions another book - John Weiss, 'Ideology of Death,' Chicago 1996 -
which has a similar thesis to that expounded by Goldhagen about German
antisemitism as the main cause of the Holocaust.
Weiss makes his conclusions on German antisemitism not only on what happened
during the war, but also on the attitude of Germans to Jews, and their memory
of the 'Final Solution' after the war. He describes the mockery of the German
legal system with Nazi judges sitting on the bench, after the war' and
sentencing Nazi criminals. According to the German legal system, somebody could
have been tried on a charge of murder only if his killing was 'murder' under
the (Nazi) law prevailing at the time the crime was committed. Weiss points out
to a poll after the war where 37 percent of the respondents were of the opinion
that extermination of Jews and Poles was important for the security of Germans.
[In a recent poll one third of respondents in Germany said that they would
prefer not to have Jews as neighbors. AM]
Weiss compares Germany and Italy. When Mussolini ordered the Jews be handed over
to Germans, the local bureaucracy sabotaged him and out of every 5 Jews 4 were
saved, while in Germany only one in 500 survived.
Recently, an article by the late Jewish-French philosopher, Vladimir
Jankelevitch, 'Pardonner?' written on the occasion of the debate on statue
limitation on Nazi crimes was translated into English. Jankelevitch has also
no kind words for Germans after the war.
Weiss and Goldhagen, both believe that the Holocaust was the result of
'elimination' antisemitism. In one of the concluding paragraphs of his book,
Weiss writes:
"It is misleading to speak, as many do, of the 'hidden potential' for racial
murder in all of us. All mankind has cruel impulses, of course, but much more
significant is the simple fact that German culture and society *were* different
from those of other Western nations, and German business leaders, bureaucrats,
lawyers, army officers, and civilian personnel who helped in the killings were
creatures of a long history that made murderous antisemitism respectable and
normal even among the educated."
Wistrich does not believe that antisemitism is the only or the main cause of the
Holocaust. The main cause, he thinks, is the frustration of Germans with the
results of the First War. Wistrich does not explain the connection between the
two. If the only venue for German frustration is killing of Jews, then
Goldhagen and Weiss must be right.
Interestingly, in a recent article in the Atlantic Monthly, Hans Konig, writing
about German Irredenta, mentions the imperial dreams of Germans during both
wars in the context of present demands of Sudeten Germans to return to their
pre-war homes.
Wistrich thinks that that Goldhagen is wrong (though not intentionally) in his
emphasis on ordinary police battalions and on cruelty of 'willing
executioners.' This emphasis, according to Wistrich, de-emphasizes the fact the
most of the killings were done by the state machinery. As to cruelty he
maintains that it is a phenomenon of every war. I disagree. The state machinery
was efficient first of all because its extermination effort was supported by
many, and objected to by almost none. The willingness and popular support
during the war, and the deception as to the extent of knowledge and support
after the war, are essential for understanding of what did transpire.
Cruelty and torture by the perpetrators are not similar to the familiar biased
picture of Ginghis Khan, or even to the pogroms of Khmielnitzki. Here the
torturers and their supporters were officers of the army, policemen, scientists
- Mengele was a respected scientist in Germany - Nobel prize laureates,
attorneys, businessmen, flowers of the German nation. Schindler, as Weiss
writes, was not only important because he saved Jews, historically it is
significant how relatively easy it was for a minor entrepreneur to save so
many. Why was he the only one?
Little by little we comprehend the extent of overwhelming support for the Nazi
Germany within the German society. According to recent biography of Erika Mann,
the beloved daughter and practically the literary executioner of Thomas Mann,
it took her three years from 1933 to 1936 to convince her father that he should
denounce the Nazis. She threatened stopping any relations with him if he will
not make public his anti-Nazi views. The Germans never forgave him.
Aharon Meytahl
--=====================_836937626==_--
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 9 Jul 1996 19:03:18 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: liz vasile
Subject: Moral Indifference: Petrie, Littel etc.
Franklin Littel asks about the Poles: "Where is the evidence the Germans
intended their murder rather than their enslavement ?" And "Are there
different degrees of genocide, as . . of murder ?"
Aharon Meytahl writes "[The] history of Poland and of the Soviet Union
during [the] Second World War is of paramount importance on its own ground
and should be commemorated by its people and historians, after their own
fashion."
I assume Littel is responding in part to my statement of a few days ago
that no one in the Holocaust community appears to be bothered by
Goldhagen's denial of a German genocidal killing of ethnic Poles, and that
Meytahl is in part responding to my complaint (in the same message) of
misrepresentation of Polish and Soviet death in the Holocaust Museum
(Washington) and the failure of Holocaust scholars to object.
1) I am not sure that ethnic Polish or Soviet suffering/death should be
represented in what is essentially a Museum of the Jewish Holocaust. But
given that the Museum represents itself as commemorating all of the Nazi
victims and does devote a bit of space to the Soviet and Polish experience,
I think what is presented in that space has to be accurate. For example,
on the panel entitled "Invasion of the Soviet Union" the statement should
be made that about four million Soviet soldiers were captured or killed in
the period of constant German advance, June 22, 1943 -late November 1943,
and that most of the captured were dead within six months. Instead the
panel states "hundreds of thousands were captured or killed". The
diminishment of death and suffering of one group of people is, I think,
morally questionable in all circumstances. I think it particularly
unpleasant in the context of the supposed memorialization of all death at
Nazi hands, a memorialization that is given the imprimatur of accuracy by
the association with the Holocaust Museum of many well known Holocaust
historians.
2) I agree with Littel that there are different degrees of genocide. A
problem with words in general is that they can mean different things in
different contexts and also mean different things to different people.
(Consider the word "Christian".) We make do with the words we have,
accepting that often they are blunt instruments. Many Holocaust scholars
consider that German killing of ethnic Poles was genocidal. Putting the
word "genocide" aside for the moment, there is plenty of evidence that,
contra Goldhagen, German actions against Poles went well beyond "brutal
slaying of all opposition" (Goldhagen, p. 471). In a morally sensitive
universe, a universe which values all suffering equally, some Holocaust
scholars would question Goldhagen's apologetic representation of the German
killing of ethnic Poles.
3) I don't think it is possible to know what would have happened to the
Poles if Hitler had won the war. Sometimes I suspect discussions of what
the Germans intended after the war are a way of escaping acknowledging what
the Germans actually did to the Poles during the war. I think there is
little question that the Germans killed over a million ethnic Polish
non-combattants, a few hundred thousand of these in concentration camps, at
least 75,000 at Auschwitz. A basic grasp of the German mindset in Eastern
Europe requires knowledge of this massive killing of Poles. And Jewish
Holocaust studies, to the extent that it is interested in the German
perpetrators, has to look at what happened to the Poles.
Jon Petrie (at elizav@ . . .)
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 9 Jul 1996 19:05:33 CDT
Reply-To: Michael Thaler
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: Michael Thaler
Subject: Re: Resistance in camp
In-Reply-To: <199607072301.XAA27566@mail.datakom.su.se>
On Mon, 8 Jul 1996, Stephane Bruchfeld wrote:
>=20
>=20
> Michael Thaler wrote:
>=20
> >Jews were never incarcerated together with Ukrainians,nor were
> >Ukrainians interned in slave labor camps. Ukrainians overwhelmingly
> >supported the Germans against the Russians (the few Ukrainian communists
> >having retreated east with the Red Army in 1941) in the hope of
> >regaining their independence. Volunteer Ukrainian Wehrmacht units fought
> >alongside the Germans on the Eastern front. As the Wehrmacht retreated
> >from the Ukraine, heavily armed Ukrainian resistance groups under the
> >command of General Bandera (the so-called banderovtsy) waged open warfar=
e
> >against the Red Army for months after the Germans had been pushed
> >westward.
>=20
> I have met a Ukrainian, who arrived in Sweden after the war and studied
> to be a physician. He was a member in the Ukrainian anti-Nazi non-
> communist resistance, was captured in Poland or Czechoslovakia (I'm not
> sure which) and interned in Auschwitz-Birkenau as a political prisoner.
> If I remember correctly he was later transferred to Ravensbru=A8ck.
> Like many Jewish Holocaust survivors, he kept silent about his experience=
s
> until very recently. The immediate reason he stepped forward was the firs=
t
> visit to Sweden by Holocaust denier Robert Faurisson in December 1992. He
> has since been giving lectures in schools here about what he witnessed as=
a
> non-Jewish prisoner in those camps. In 1993 I was present at one such lec=
ture,
> and also had the opportunity to talk to him afterwards.
>=20
>=20
>=20
> Stephane.Bruchfeld@ceifo.su.se (Stephane Bruchfeld)
>=20
An "anti-Nazi (or,more correctly, anti-German), non-communist" organized
resistance movement called AK (Armia Krajowa) existed in Poland. No
evidence of a comparable underground in the Ukraine exists. The man you met=
=20
was most likely captured in Poland where he presumably operated as a Pole,=
=20
since as a Ukrainian he would have had more to fear from locals than
from Germans. This speculation is consistent with the fact that he was
sent to Auschwitz, the place where Polish politicals but few if
any Ukrainians were confined. Ukrainian-speaking Poles from the
Eastern provinces (now Western Ukraine) in the underground
occasionally posed as Ukrainians when in danger or captured, since the
Germans were much friendlier toward the latter, whom they regarded as allie=
s.=20
Jews from the Western Ukraine also tried to save themselves by passing as
Ukrainians but very few eluded capture due to the extreme difficulty of
fooling authentic Ukrainians. =20
Finally, the only male in Ravensbrueck was its commander, all guards and
inmates being women.
Michael Thaler
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 9 Jul 1996 19:06:08 CDT
Reply-To: ajacobs@interaccess.com
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: Alan Jacobs
Subject: Re: Mauthausen- Hours Of Operation
> Subject: Mauthausen- Hours Of Operation
> Author: H-Net History of the Holocaust List at
> INETMAIL
> Date: 6/26/96 3:58 PM
>
> By the way, does anyone know the hours and days that Mauthausen is open? I
> will be going there in a few weeks.
>
> David Brotsky
I just returned from that place last Saturday.
Some info might be helpful:
Administration:
Offentliches Denkmal und Museum Mauthausen
A-4310 Mauthausen/Marbach 38
Phone: +43 7238/ 2269 and 3639
Management of Archives and Library:
Bundesministerium fur Inneres, Abteilung IV/7
Herrengasse 7
A-1010 Wein
Phone: +43 1/531 26
We took the train from Veinna, about 2hrs., and changed at St.
Valentine. From there its about a 9 min. ride to the town of Mauthausen.
If you want to get some hint of the prisoners experience you might try
walking to the camp as they did. Though I doubt if you will ahve
children throwing stones at you along the way. Its about 6 km. right
through the town. And by all means walk down the 186 steps to the Weiner
Graben (the quarry). Its very quiet there now. Very quiet. At the base
of the stairs on your right as you face to walk up is a typical block of
granite the inmates had to schlepp up the stairs. Try to lift it.
If stairs are a problem you can either walk or drive around to a place
where the quarry opens on a road.
If you need a taxi when you get to the train stop at Mauthausen:
TAXI Brixner
Markstrasse 84/ 4310 Mauthausen
Tel: 07238/2439
D-Netz 0663/870099
0663/9176617
I'm not certain but I think the camp is open 8-5 every day.
Jake
Alan Jacobs http://www.bravenewweb.com/idea
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 9 Jul 1996 19:07:06 CDT
Reply-To: ajacobs@interaccess.com
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: Alan Jacobs
Subject: Re: Mauthausen
I just returned last Saturday from photographing Mauthausen. Just when
you think you've seen and heard it all. I climbed the 186 stairs in the
Weiner Graben (quarry) schlepping my fourty pound camara bag... damn it
was difficult... poor me, well rested, fed, in shape, and free... with
my Miphisto walking shoes and my photographer's vest... Still, it was a
bitch. I don't think I could have made it then. I put my camera down at
one point and just listened to the silence and the wind...
I am so very angry, I can't put it into words... but I needed to share
it here.
Jake
--
Alan Jacobs http://www.bravenewweb.com/idea
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 9 Jul 1996 19:08:00 CDT
Reply-To: ajacobs@interaccess.com
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: Alan Jacobs
Subject: Re: Auschwitz Reconstruction
Jim Mott wrote:
>
> From: Sid and Judy Cohen
>
> Dear Suzanna Hicks,
>
> We Jews (male and female, the word Jewess is obsolete) have, what is
> nowadays called, "a common historical memory", which probably orginates with
> the beginning of antisemitism from time immemorial. The history of the ebb
> and flow of the: hatred-tolerance-acceptance-persecution-tolerance-again
> etc. of the Jews in any given time of history/place/country/regime/.
>
> And this could be the reason why a Jewish and non-Jewish person would have,
> emotionally at least, a different reaction visiting a former death camp. Or
> reading about pogroms or any other mode of persection of the Jews. Somehow,
> one cannot help but put oneself in the picture. (*But for the grace of God
> go I* kind of reaction.)
>
> And I'd go further. There is a different reaction even between Jews who
> were or those weren't incarcerated in camps. Especially death camps. No
> matter how vividly and accurately we can transmit the historical facts, no
> matter how many artifacts and other displays one views, no matter how
> sensitive the imagination of the viewer, nothing but nothing can transmit
> the experience how it *felt* being there. Being there day in and day out.
> The psychological beatings we all took aside from the physical ones. And
> those *feelings* usually come rushing back. For others it is only an
> intellectual endevour.
>
> Perhaps therein lies the differene in reaction, in my humble opinion.
>
> Judy (Weissenberg) Cohen.
I wonder Judy, can anyone know anyone else's experience? Such talk as
yours discourages those who were not there from learning more about it.
For all his greatness, Weisel says something similiar and I think it is
paradoxical. He wants people to remember, but then implies that they
will never understand. How can one remember in any meanigful way what he
or she cannot understand?
--
Alan Jacobs http://www.bravenewweb.com/idea
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 10 Jul 1996 16:00:38 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: Eric Epstein
Subject: Re: Resistance in camp
The Orhanizatsyia Ukrainsaykh Nationalistiv (OUN) was an anti-Semitic
independence movement in the Uk. and Poland. After the german
occupation of Pol., it cooperated with the Nazis and formed 2
battalions in the German Army. The Stefan Bandera faction became
dominant in 1940. Bandera despised Jews, Soviets and Poles. Many of his
followers were arrested by the Gestapo and sent to concentration camps.
Bandera fought the Nazis and Soviets. He was eventually defeated by
Stalin in the 1950s.
Perhaps this entry can clear up the confusion of Ukrainians
interned in German concentration camps.
Eric Epstein, PSU-Harrisburg
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 10 Jul 1996 16:01:01 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
From: "Dr. Harriet Sepinwall"
Subject: book by David Rausch needed
Pastor Murdoch Macpherson of the Faith Lutheran Church in
New Providence, New Jersey has asked me to contact members
of holocaus to see if anyone could help him locate copies
of a book by David Rausch entitled: A LEGACY OF HATRED:
WHY CHRISTIANS MUST NOT FORGET THE HOLOCAUST, 2nd editiion
(Grand Rapids, Michigan: Baker Book House, 1990). He plans
to teach a course on the Holocaust at his church in the
fall and wants to include this book among those he and his
students will use in the course. He has a few copies
already, but learned that the book is out of print. He
would like to purchase as many as 20-25 additional copies
for use in the course.
Pastor Macpherson, who spoke at a conference in May, 1995,
at the College of Saint Elizabeth on the topic of the legacy
of the Holocaust for New Jersey and American society (excerpts
of which were reprinted in REMEMBER, the newspaper of the
American Gathering of Jewish Holocaust Survivors, in June,
1995) attended the Scholars' Conference in Minneapolis
in March, 1996, and is committed to doing more to teach about
the Holocaust to those in his Lutheran (Evangelical Lutheran
Church in America/ELCA) denomination and to ensuring that
he does whatever he can do to work against antisemitism and
all that goes with it. He is taking a church group to Israel
this summer (including Yad Vashem) and plans to attend the
Scholars' Conference in Tampa next March.
I will send all respones to this request for help in finding
the book to him. Please respond by email to me (or contact
him directly by telephone: 908-464-1978 or FAX: 908-464-2447).
THANK YOU!
Harriet Lipman Sepinwall, Project Director
College of Saint Elizabeth
Holocaust Education Resource Center
2 Convent Road
Morristown, NJ 07960
sepinwal@liza.st-elizabeth.edu
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 10 Jul 1996 16:01:31 CDT
Reply-To: H-Net History of the Holocaust List
Sender: H-Net History of the Holocaust List