The Holocaust:A Quest for

Meaning

Prof. Heidi M. Szpek

Life Before the Holocaust

Kielce's Market: Kielce Museum, Jewish artist P.Schultz

Anti-Semitism before the Holocaust• Jew as ‘the Other’ under Rome & early Christianity• Persecution during the Crusades• Creation of the ghetto (Venice 1517)• Blood libel charges• Martin Luther

– Emphasis on conversion– Issue of Usury

• Mass expulsions throughout Europe (1500-1900)• Prominence of the Other (professional

accomplishments)• Change from Anti-Semitism based on religion to

ethnic discrimination

Pale of Settlement in Russia

• Est. 1791 by Czar Elizabeth II, under pressure to rid Moscow of Jewish business & ‘evil’ influence

• 90% of Jews lived in 4% of land

Pogroms (E. Europe)Yiddish/Russian term for ‘devastation’

Jewish Reaction

• Sought complete assimilation

• Fought to be accepted at local and national levels (e.g. WWI service)

• Maintained separate Jewish lifestyle

Excerpt: Norman Salsitz, A Jewish Boyhood in Poland:Remembering Kolbuszowa

Four-tiered Social Structure

• Poles (Catholic)• Ukranian peasant (Russian Orthodox)• Volksdeutsch/Ethnic German –

descendant of German settlers brought in during 18th century

• Jews (Yiddish)

Eastern Europe

Select Additional Sources

• Elie Wiesel, “The World of the Shtetl.” In Wise Men and Their Tales: Portraits of Biblical, Talmudic, and Hasidic Masters. Schocken, 2004 (pp. 316-336). [On Reserve]

• http://www.bagnowka.com • http://www.ushmm.org/ • http://motlc.learningcenter.wiesenthal.org

(hopefully soon back online)

After World War I

• Largest Jewish community was in Poland• Ukraine: Petlura Gang – 60,000 Jews killed• Germany: Weimar Constitution = democracy

– Walter Rathenau, Minister of Reconstruction

• Jews blamed for Germany’s humiliation• National Socialist German Workers’ Party

25 Point Program

• (Munich, 25 February 1920)• Creation of a Greater Germany• Return of Germany’s lost colonies• POINT FOUR:

– None but members of the Nation may be members of the State. None but those of German blood, whatever creed, may be members of the Nation. No Jew therefore may be members of the Nation.

Adolf Hitler

• 1920 #7 in the Nazi party• 1925 jailed for treason• 1925 first installment of Mein Kampf

– Marxism & Judaism greatest threats– Redefined Aryan and Semitic– Excerpt: Mein Kampf

• 1933 Chancellor of Germany

1925-1933 Germany

• Military organization within Nazi party established (SA, SS, Gestapo)

• 1926 Hitler Youth• Inflation & unemployment began to

rise• 1931 Rosh HaShanah – attack on

Jews returning from synagogue; symbolic

1933• 5 February 1933 Emergency Decree • 27 February 1933 Reichstag fire• 28 February 1933 Emergency Order• March 1933 Dachau opened• 23 March 1933 Enabling Act• Einzeloperationen “individual

operations”• Boycott of Jewish shops• Windows marked with Star of David

or Jude• 7 April 1933 Order retirement (all

non-Aryans)• Sachsenhausen & Esterwegen

camps• Jews expelled from Universities

(Einstein)• 10 May 1933 book burning, Berlin

Opera House• October 1933 Law of Revolution at

Dachau (hanging)

Jewish Reaction

• Despair• Suicide• Some left Germany to W. Europe• 5000 emigrated to Palestine• Others waited

1934-1935

• Intensified campaign to create Judenfrei villages

• May 1934 Der Sturmer

• Attempted legislation to prevent sexual relations between Jews and non-Jews

• Redefinition of who is Jewish• New term: Christian non-Aryans• 15 September 1935 Nuremberg Laws

– 1. Citizenship only belong to a national of German or kindred blood

– 2. Jews were not of German blood; intermarriages forbidden

– 3. forbid relations outside marriage between Jew and German

– 4. Jews forbidden to fly German flag

1936-August 31, 1939

• Assassination of Wilhelm Gustloff, head of Nazi party in Switzerland, THUS all police power centralized under Gestapo – One of events later used to justify Kristallnacht

• March 1936 Przytyk pogrom, s. of Warsaw– Poles would be accustomed to such actions

• Palestinian Arabs begin General Strike– Because British allowed Jews to emigrate in

Palestine• Hitler into Rhineland (violating Versailles)

– half of German Jews find refuge– Polish Jewry (c. 4 million) too extensive

The Eternal Jew8 November 1937

1938

• March 1938 Austria annexed (Anschluss)

• Buchenwald opens• June 1938 burning of synagogues• 6 July 1938 International Conference

at Evian – issue of refugees & avoid having a Jewish problem

• September 1938 Sudetenland to Germany

Kristallnacht

• 9 November 1938• Impetus:

Grynszpan affair (Paris)

• 191 synagogues damaged

• Jews fined for damage done

Berlin, Germany

Dortmund, Germany

• December 1938 first train to Britain with German Jewish children

• 3 May 1938 second ‘Jewish Law’: Hungary– Forbid Jews to be judge, lawyer, teacher …

• 17 May 1939 Palestine White Paper– 75,000 Jews to Palestine in next 5 years

• May 1939 plight of the St. Louis• 23 August 1939 non-aggression pact

between Nazi Germany & Soviet Union– If invade Poland, Soviet Union would do

nothing

1 September 1939: Germany invades Poland: World War II begins

Discussion

• Your response/reactions to stories/

photos/details in Gilbert’s Holocaust & Wiesel’s After the Darkness

• Life and character of Adolf Hitler

• Your response to: – response/reaction of world– human nature for action/thoughts to

oppressed at this time