Latter-Day Saint Authority: Theologians and Critical Thinkers Need Not Apply.

    Inside the Latter-day Saint faith there is little room for critical thinking, individualism, or external validation. From a young age you are taught to follow the Prophet, obey your parents, study the scriptures, to learn line upon line, and to trust in God’s plan that you signed up for before you came to earth. There is no need for you to philosophize or dive deep into the unknowns as you are given your knowledge by God through a living prophet that tells you he will do the hard work for you instead. All you have to do is to just follow him, believe in him, and have faith that he is the only one with the authority to do so. In this paper I will show how authority within the LDS Church keeps its members from developing into philosophers and theologians by teaching them that theology and critical thinking will make believers more worldly and distant from the divine guidance of their religious leaders for spiritual direction.

Authority Keeps Theology on the Outside

    Theology is described in many different ways by many different authors. David Ford defines it as, “at its broadest as thinking about questions raised by and about the religions” (Ford,3) Louis Midgley describes it as, “to seek understanding of God’s reality, to describe divine things rationally, and to elaborate the present meaning of past manifestations of God, whether theoretically, practically, descriptively, or critically.” (Midgley,1475) James Faulconer on the other hand takes a different approach and calls theology prophetic revelation in his paper titled “Rethinking Theology” as he describes it as, “the continuously revealed word of God.” (Faulconer, 175-199) Latter-day Saints believe that their current Prophet continues to receive revelation from God and that this was restored to the Prophet Joseph Smith in 1829. Each prophet since Smith has been able to receive revelation from God which has been passed down to their current Prophet today. Since continuing revelation is a key part of the LDS religion, dogmatic theology really has no place inside the tradition as it can always be replaced by new revelation. Faulconer warns Latter-day Saints that, “theologizing by those who are not prophets may put the kingdom at a distance by making talk about the gospel merely talk about our own learning.” (Faulconer, 175-199)

    This opinion of Faulconer is not a new one inside the Latter-day Saint faith, it is actually one expressed often by those in authority. Keeping members disciplined and blindly following the words of their prophets and leaders, members gather to listen to their prophet and other leaders of the church twice yearly as they deliver sermons over a two day period. This event is televised all over the world to reach as many members as possible. The Prophet, and the other 14 highest ranking officers in the church also identified as prophets, will captivate the audience and each member will listen intently to each of the words that they think are written just for them. They hope revelation will come and that divine words will be spoken that they can hold onto for another six months until the next conference. They are fully aware that their current prophet can reveal new things, even if it means contradicting a prophet from the past.

    Current Latter-day prophets have not made any major revelations like the Prophet Joseph Smith did in his day. We can easily count the number of official revelations that have been added to the open canon of the LDS Church since then. Gordon B. Hickley, a Latter-day Saint prophet, gave the following quote in an interview in 1997. “Now we don’t need a lot of continuing revelation. We have a great, basic reservoir of revelation. But if a problem arises, as it does occasionally, a vexatious thing with which we have to deal, we go to the Lord in prayer.” (Hinckley) Since not a lot of new revelation has been revealed, each statement made by prophets old and new have been dissected over the years by church members. With an impressive collection of conference talks on many different topics given by many different prophets past and present, members can study their words and can easily go down rabbit holes that lead to misinformation as canon has changed over the years with no set doctrine or theology in place. In an effort to keep things current and members on the right track, the current prophet has what Robert Millet calls “prophetic prerogative” (Millet, 2009) in his paper titled “Defining Doctrine”. Millet describes this as the ability to edit sermons of the past, giving prophets divine editorship to weed out the doctrine that is no longer taught, and giving sticking power to doctrine that has, “endured the test of time, that continued to be taught by Church leaders in later generations, would generally bear the mark of truth.” (Millet, 2009)

    Some examples of this would include the Adam-God doctrine that was taught during Brigham Young's time and had to be edited out of the conversation as it was false and led to many problems as members believed it long past the time it was talked about. Nathan Oman mentions Bishop Bunker of Bunkerville Nevada in his paper titled “Truth, Doctrine, and Authority”. (Oman, 2009) This bishop was excommunicated in the 1880s for teaching the doctrine of the Adam-God theory to his congregation after the rest of the Church stopped teaching it. Because of open canon, revelation was received around 30 years later by the First Presidency and they issued a Doctrinal Exposition titled “The Father and the Son” (Improvement Era, 934-942) which replaced the Adam-God theory altogether with this new official revealed doctrine. Since revelation replaced the outdated Adam-God theory, even if it once was doctrine, it now no longer had a place in that same realm.

    Another example of doctrine that has been rewritten is the idea that people with black skin were less worthy, fence sitters in heaven, and not part of the “chosen lineage”. This was another idea that caught on during the early days of the Church and was very hard to write out of the narrative. The topic of Black people not being part of the LDS faith for a long time is a part of history most leaders would rather forget than remember. Joseph Smith let Elijah Abel, a young Black convert, join the early church in 1830, as well as Jane Manning James who joined in Illinois some years later. These two Black Latter-day Saints were not the only ones who joined the growing church as Joseph Smith and others welcomed them with open arms. Elijah Abel was given the priesthood by Joseph Smith as he himself did not see a problem with Black people having that authority. Years after the death of Joseph Smith, Latter-day Saints began to theorize about the hierarchy of lineages. With the belief that God had restored his one true Church back on the earth again through Joseph Smith also came the belief that they, Latter-day Saints, were from the chosen line that would be gathered with the gathering of Israel in the last days. Joseph Smith had taught them about life before they came to earth, a premortal life, where they were righteous, noble, and followed God’s plan for them. “To the Prophet Joseph Smith it was revealed that we are all literal spirit sons and daughters of heavenly parents. He received a revelation of information once made known to Moses. Intelligences were organized before the world was, and among these were many great and noble ones, such as Abraham and Moses. God stood in their midst, saw that they were good, and chose them for responsibilities on earth and throughout eternity.” (Brown, 1124) With this knowledge they started to see themselves, and the color of their skin, more righteous, and part of this royal blood line that God talked about in the premortal life. Brigham Young officially instituted a policy restricting Black men from holding the priesthood as opinions differed on chosen lineage and who was eligible and worthy. With this new ban in place came a lot of speculations over the years as to why Black men could not hold the priesthood. Many church leaders would share their words and opinions over the pulpit and members would take these words as doctrine and a lot of misinformation was spread this way. All of what was said by past prophets and leaders has now been rewritten to make the past history seem more like personal opinion and not prophetic infallibility. In 1978 a new revelation was given to Spencer W. Kimball, the Prophet at that time, that lifted the ban preventing Black men from holding the priesthood inside the Latter-day Saints faith.

    Joseph Smith himself declared that, “a Prophet is not always a Prophet, only when he is acting as such.” (Smith) This declaration from the original founder of the Church shows that even back then there was confusion of what was supposed to be revelation and what was opinion. Since Smith has uttered those words, other church leaders have made similar statements regarding prophetic infallibility. D. Todd Christofferson declared that, “Not every statement made by a church leader, past or present, necessarily constitutes doctrine. A single statement made by a single leader on a single occasion often represents a personal, though well-considered, opinion, but is not meant to be officially binding for the whole church.” (Christofferson, 86-90) Since the LDS Church does not have an official canon, and continuing revelation can change the wording on the canon that is currently in place, Armand Mauss, a renowned sociologist of religion who studied the LDS faith in depth, presented a “Scale of Authenticity” by which we can gauge what can be seen as official doctrine at any given time. Brian Birch explains this scale in detail in his paper titled “Beyond the Canon: Authoritative Discourse in Comparative Perspective.” (Birch)

Mauss’ Scale of Authenticity

    Canon doctrine is what is currently being taught as revelation within the Church and as such is the most important doctrine. The scriptures, this includes the Book of Mormon, the Bible, the Doctrine of Covenants, and the Pearl of Great Price, are also considered part of the most important doctrine taught within the Latter-day Saints tradition. Official doctrine would include statements from the Prophet, the First Presidency, official Church publications, and curriculum currently being taught within the Church. Since the Church has open canon the next prophet can change any of the official doctrine at will when he comes to power making this level of doctrine hold less authority on the scale. Finally there are two more categories which include authoritative doctrine and popular doctrine. Authoritative doctrine is all the literature and talks given by Church authorities and educators over the years. In 1983, a disclaimer had to be added to all books published by the Church stating that, “the views expressed in this book do not represent the official position of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.” (1983 Letter) With so many books published by so many different Church leaders putting their own opinion into their work, the Church could no longer control what was being put out there for members to read. In the past prophets had to rewrite and edit doctrine that was no longer taught inside the faith with new revelation, or it had to be written out of the narrative all together. Now with this disclaimer, the Church could just say this was the personal opinion of the author and not official Church doctrine and there would be a lot less rewriting and editing later on when doctrine would change. Popular Doctrine includes all the literature containing folk theology and doctrine that circulated among the membership that was never officially adopted by the Church. This would include the racist theological beliefs that Black individuals were from the cursed line of Cain, the Adam-God theory, the three Nephites from the Book of Mormon that still wander the earth today, the opinion that God will restore the Adamic language before the second coming, the King Follett Discourse, and more. With almost 200 years of revelation and doctrinal changes that is a lot to keep track of to know which particular policy or doctrine is accurate and currently being used and which one is outdated or has been replaced. The changes alone from Joseph Smith's time to today when it comes to the Word of Wisdom, Polygamy, and the Temple ceremony are significant to name just a few. There are many other changes that are less noticeable that I want to point out just to show you how they fly under the radar. Many Church leaders gave talks on the topic of divorce such as David O. McKay, Spencer W. Kimball, and John A. Widtsoe. Their words were given during General Conference and while they were speaking as Prophets and Apostles. Back in the 60s and 70s their words on divorce were harsh and not very eloquent. For example David O. McKay wrote, “When one puts business or pleasure above his home, he that moment starts on the downgrade to soul-weakness. When the club becomes more attractive to any man than his home, it is time for him to confess in bitter shame that he has failed to measure up to the supreme opportunity of his life and flunked the final test of true manhood. No other success can compensate for failure in the home.” (McKay, 5) If you were to look up the official Church stance on divorce today all of these past Prophets and Apostles words are replaced by much more neutral wording, talks given by more recent prophets, and scripture references. Another example of this is when we look up homosexuality. J. Reuben Clark, Joseph Fielding Smith, Harold B. Lee, Boyd K. Packer, and N. Eldon Tanner, to name a few, wrote very strong words about homosexuality in the 60s and 70s. Church leaders perceived homosexuals as depressed, unhappy, sinful, and in need of repentance. (Brough,157) In 2006 the official position of the Church changed and the word homosexuality was removed and substituted by same-gender attraction. “The Church does not have a position on the causes of … susceptibility or inclinations … related to same-gender attraction. Those are scientific questions - whether nature or nurture - those are things the Church doesn’t have a position on.” (Bergera, 418) The previous statements written by the Prophets and Apostles in the 60s and 70s are no longer up on the Church website, they have been edited out of the narrative.

Follow the Prophet

    In 1980, Ezra Taft Benson, gave a talk to the membership of the church titled, “Fourteen Fundamentals in Following the Prophet.” (Benson, 1980) He would become the next Prophet five years later. Over the years the focus on listening to authority would increase even more. The very first point he mentions is that the Prophet is the only man that can speak for God in everything. He is making sure that all members stay aware of this fact as this is a very important matter within the Church as the Prophet is the man that can change doctrine and has as we have seen. The second point is that the Prophet is more vital than the scriptures. A living prophet today can rewrite and edit what was written all those years ago if God comes to him and gives him a revelation to change it. Number three on his list was that a living prophet was more important than a dead prophet. Again here the Prophet today can rewrite history if God wants him to and as we have seen by some of my examples above, a lot of prophets seem to do so in a sense. His fourth point quickly after that tells us that the Prophet can never lead his people astray. His fifth point is that a prophet is not required to have any sort of earthly training to be a prophet as God will be his mentor. He warns that there will be those out there who may feel that they may be more qualified on certain topics than the current prophet and this may be why members are not encouraged to become philosophers and theologians because they would be able to understand more than the current prophet when it comes to religion or philosophy. Number six on the list is that the Prophet does not have to say “Thus saith the Lord” for his words to become scripture. He goes on to say that some people may argue with the Prophet if they don’t agree with some of the things he is asking the members to do. This leads into number seven which is that the Prophet tells us what we need to know, not always what we want to know. He quotes Harold B. Lee here, another former prophet, “You may not like what comes from the authority of the Church. It may conflict with your political views. It may contradict your social views. It may interfere with some of your social life… Your safety and ours depends on whether or not we follow… Let’s keep our eye on the President of the Church.” A man with authority telling its members that if they don’t listen and follow everything their prophet tells them they could be in danger and put their fellow neighbors, members, and family members in danger as well is a great tactic to keep members in line and keep them from thinking for themselves. Number eight on his list is that the Prophet is not limited by man’s reasoning. Here again you are told to put your entire trust in God and the Prophet even if you might not understand why at times. Number nine and ten go together as nine is that the Prophet can receive revelation on temporal and spiritual matters and ten is that the Prophet may give advice on civic matters. I think this is an interesting idea as I personally believe in separation of Church and State and don’t believe that those two should ever mix. The Church has a lot of power and I have seen LDS authority use that power to make sure the Equal Rights Amendment was not passed in Utah in 1975. They again used that authority within the Church to rile up members to vote against proposition 8 in California in 2008 as they did not want same-sex marriage to become legal there. Number 11 on the list reads that the two groups who have the most difficulty following the Prophet are the proud who are learned and the proud who are rich. Again this is a reference to if you think you know more than the Prophet you are not in harmony with the teachings of the gospel. Number twelve reads that the Prophet will not necessarily be popular with the world or be worldly. Number thirteen just states that the Prophet and his counselors make up the First Presidency, the highest quorum in the Church. And finally number fourteen states that if you follow the Prophet and the First Presidency you will be blessed and if you reject them you will suffer. After hearing all that, who would not want to obey and follow the Prophet's words because you are told the alternative means suffering.

Theology Can Be Beneficial

    “Active Mormons are surrounded by church teachings and ideals at every turn: the time commitments required of a faithful Saint make the religious social sphere the primary sphere in his or her life, creating an arguably insular LDS culture wherein children and converts are gradually and completely oriented to social norms and regulations. At church meetings, LDS doctrine is continually taught and reinforced beginning at 18 months of age (through simplified “nursery” lessons) and continuing through adulthood, using Church-published manuals to organize lessons around pre-approved doctrine or themes. Moreover, through ubiquitous use of media such as Church-sanctioned magazines, books, pamphlets, and videos, the Church gains a pervasive presence in the lives of active members, constantly reaffirming the doctrine and standard of the Church in all areas of life.” (Avance, 12) Since philosophy, theology, and critical thinking are not part of the curriculum within the Latter-day Saint church, it always amazes me when I meet new people who discover Plato and Aristotle for the first time and are in awe. Philosophy is all about being curious about the world and asking the right questions and then trying to answer them. The most complex philosophical questions never seem to change over the years as we never seem to be able to answer them. Theology is the same in a sense where we are trying to understand God, human beings, and how it all fits together. The fact that Latter-day Saints “don’t do” theology is something they should look into as there are many conflicting issues within the faith that could benefit from some critical studies involving more than revelation. Stephen Davis wrote a paper titled “Philosophical Theology for Mormons: Some Suggestions from an Outsider.” One of the points he brings up is logical consistency. He points out that not all the doctrine within the Church is consistent with each other. There are conflicting principles and statements here and there which can make sense when you can change your doctrine at will and you have been doing this for almost 200 years. Davis points out that the Church has two ways in which it changes doctrine, officially and unofficially. When revelation is received, it can officially make a change and the new doctrine takes over for the old doctrine. Unofficially, when Church leaders decide to stop teaching something that is believed by most members, they don’t make an announcement, they just stop. I pointed this out above with my examples on divorce and homosexuality. There were never any announcements made that the views of the Church changed on those topics, you would only know this if you were to search for it. Another part of this that Davis points out is that church leaders should distinguish between normative doctrine and traditional, but not permitted doctrine. As I pointed out earlier again, Mauss has a scale for this which we can look at which would put the traditional doctrine all the way at the bottom with the folk beliefs and hopefully members will know the difference between the doctrine currently taught and doctrine that is just talk.

    Davis gives us three reasons why he thinks Latter-day Saints don’t like theology. The first is that they don’t want to concern themselves with academic problems and would rather deal with down-to-earth problems. Number two is that the scriptures are more important than dealing with theology. Third, revelation and open canon, would make theology useless as it would just override anything theology could come up with. Latter-day Saints have always been taught to study from the best books and get an education, so I don’t understand why academic problems would be a concern. In my personal opinion I believe Church leaders don’t want their members to think critically, develop theories of their own and study the deep questions that philosophers have been studying for years. But this is exactly what they should be studying because this kind of thinking would, “help Latter-day Saints understand their own religion, help settle internal disputes as to what church doctrine is and what is not, and enter into informed dialogue with non-Mormons and assist Mormon scholars whenever necessary to defend Mormonism from criticism” (Davis, 2007) according to Davis.

    James Faulconer points out in his paper titled “Performative Theology: Not Such a New Thing” that studying the scriptures inside the Latter-day Saints church, understanding the history behind them, and reflecting on them in a scholarly way, can be a form of theology. (Faulconer, 1-24) Many members read the same scriptures multiple times in their lifetime hoping to gain new insight each time they read the same passages. Benjamin Huff compares Latter-day Saint learning to Theology in a one-room schoolhouse. (Huff, 2004) Every member continues to learn throughout their life, line upon line, precept upon precept with the goal that in the end they are all unified in one faith. Each Sunday, members gather together to study the scriptures and discuss doctrine with other members who may not have their same level of knowledge. Huff calls the scriptures messy and polyphonic (layered) in his paper, and advocates for studying the scriptures together with those of all levels of knowledge to gain a better understanding than you would studying alone. This could be considered a form of philosophizing with others as you dive deeper into the meaning behind what you are reading and thus bring the scriptures into theology.

    When it comes to Davis’ third point about the LDS Church having revelation and open canon and thus not being able to have theology, he addresses that by stating that this should not be a barrier but that it should just be treated how doctrine is being treated inside the LDS Church today. When things change, the current theological statements can be indexed with the old doctrine or they can be revised alongside with the changes that were made.

Theologians and Critical Thinkers Need Not Apply

    Latter-day Saint members should be able to weigh their prophet's words and personally filter out the components they believe they want to follow in their lives. They should be able to use their own critical thinking to study their scriptures, doctrine, and other components of their religion. They should be able to raise intellectual questions about their faith and their leaders without fear of discipline. A culture wherein philosophy and intellectually stimulating conversations can be had would be beneficial as discipline, group thinking, and blind obedience only keeps members from reaching their true potential in life. Past theologians such as John Calvin, Martin Luther, Thomas Aquinas, and many theologians today are worth studying as they can enlighten us in so many ways.

Sources:

Avance, R. (2010). Worthy “Gods” and “Goddesses.” Journal of Religion & Society, 12.

Benson, Ezra T. (1980) Fourteen Fundamentals in Following the Prophet. Brigham Young University address

Bergera, G. J. (2007). Statements of the LDS first presidency: A topical compendium. Signature Books. Page 418 sexual relations

Birch, Brian D. Beyond the Canon: Authoritative Discourse in Comparative Perspective (could not locate anymore information online for citation)

Brough, R. Clayton (1980) His Servants Speak: Statements by Latter-day Saint Leaders on Contemporary Topics, chapter 32 homosexuality, page 157

Brown, Gayle O. (1992) Premortal Life. Encyclopedia of Mormonism V.3 Macmillan, page 1124.

Christofferson, D. Todd. (2012) “The Doctrine of Christ,” Ensign, May, 2012, 86-90.

“Compass Interview with Prophet Gordon B. Hinckley,” Compass, November 9, 1997, transcript at http://www.abc.net.au/compass/intervs.hinckley.htm.

Faulconer, J. E. (2020). Performative theology: Not such a new thing. Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought, 53(3), 1–24.

Faulconer, J. E. (2007). Rethinking theology: The shadow of the apocalypse. The FARMS Review, 19 (2007)(1), 175–199.

Ford, David (2003) Theology: A Very Short Introduction (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000), 3.

Huff, Benjamin. (2004) Theology in the One-Room Schoolhouse. Society for Mormon Philosophy and Theology Conference 2004.

Joseph Smith Collection, Box 1, Folder 5 Church History Library

Letter to General Authorities, March 22, 1983, LDS Church History Library.

McKay, David, O. (1964) President of the Church, CR, April, 1964, pp 5

Midgley, Louis. C. (1992) Theology. Encyclopedia of Mormonism V.4 Macmillan, page 1475.

Millet, Robert L. (2009) Defining Doctrine: A Response to Loyd Ericson. Element Vol. 5 Issue 1 (Spring, 2009)

Oman, Nathan B. (2009) Truth, Doctrine, and Authority. Element Vol. 5 Issue 1 (Spring, 2009)

Stephen, T. Davis, (2007) Philosophical Theology for Mormons: Some Suggestions from an outsider. Element Vol 3. Issues 1 & 2 (Spring & Fall 2007)

The Father and the Son. (1916) Improvement Era, 934-42

[Paper written for PHIL 490R class UVU Summer 2024]

Amy Brouwer . 2024 . All Rights Reserved

The Tragic Consequences of Perceived Superiority: Hatred, Persecution, and the Holocaust.

    European anti-Semitism goes back many generations and is rooted mainly, but not only, in religious beliefs. The idea that Jews are responsible for the death of Jesus is a notion that has survived thousands of years, as well as the idea that Jews are shrewd moneylenders, which also stems from that same period. Nazi anti-Semitism, however, is composed of completely different beliefs about Jews and has nothing to do with religion, but everything to do with blood. The hatred, persecution, and ultimate extermination of Jews stemmed from the fact that they saw themselves as the more superior race. They answered the Jewish question by proposing to eliminate them completely through state-sponsored policies, laws, and violence fueled by eugenics.

    In 1903, the Pan-German League tried to invigorate German citizens to unite and keep the awareness of themselves as “Germans” at the forefront. They wanted to make sure their ethnicity was preserved and that the next generation was being educated correctly about who they were. (Kruck, 10) Many Germans were swept up with this idea, Adolf Hitler being one of them. He gave a speech in September 1921, where he argued that Jews could not change because their qualities were inherited, and so the solution would be to separate the Jew from the rest of society to prevent corruption so that the Aryan race could be kept vibrant and healthy. “And in this characteristic, which he cannot transcend, which lies in his blood… -in this characteristic itself lies the necessity for the Jew that he must present himself as destructive to the state.” (Griech-Polelle, 67-8) Hitler was very passionate about excluding anyone from the community who could potentially disrupt the purity and health of the perfect German race, all before he was even in a high position of power.

    Once Hitler assumed power he had to be careful not to alienate the German people by enforcing his agenda too fast. The Nazi party created a 25-point party program back in 1920, where they declared their intentions to segregate the Jews from the Aryan nation. (Nazi Conspiracy and Aggression, Volume IV, Document No. 1708-PS) They never tried to hide this and were vocal and public with their intentions for years. During Hitler's rise to power, they were finally able to implement many of the points of their plan, using him as their vehicle every step of the way. Hitler had to work in such a way that the German people would also come to understand his point of view when it came to the Jewish question in slow, subtle, yet powerful ways. The meticulous and carefully planned propaganda against the Jews started by including communists and socialists in the same category thus making them all seem part of a bigger problem. On April 7, 1933, the “Law for the Restoration of the Professional Civil Service” was proclaimed, announcing that you could no longer work in civil service unless you were of Aryan descent. This was the very first anti-Semitic law of Hitler’s regime and the start of a laundry list of policies and laws aimed at Jews to ruin them financially with the hopes that they would give up and leave Germany voluntarily. (Griech-Polelle, 79)

    The idea that German blood and being of Aryan descent is what makes you superior was of great importance to Hitler and many others within Nazi leadership. After implementing policies and laws limiting Jews in many capacities, the Nazi party finally saw the need to define what it truly meant to be a German citizen. On September 15, 1935, the German parliament, now made up entirely of Nazi representatives, passed two new laws known as the Nuremberg Laws. “The Reich Citizenship Law” is the first of those two new laws and it defined a citizen as someone of German or kindred blood. If you were a citizen, you would be able to enjoy full political rights such as the right to vote. If you were Jewish, you were no longer considered a citizen, according to this new law, even if you came from a mixed Jewish family. This new law was a huge step backward for Jews in Germany, as they were now no longer considered citizens in a nation that many had lived in for generations. Article 2.1 of the new law states that a Reich citizen: “proves by his conduct that he is willing and fit to faithfully serve the German people and Reich.” (USHMM) Many Jews fought bravely for their country in World War I and considered themselves maybe even more German than Jewish. Now they were tossed aside like garbage because their blood on the inside mattered more than what they had contributed to their country in the past.

    The second law created was the “Law for the Protection of German Blood and German Honor.” The first paragraph of that law reads: “Moved by the understanding that purity of German blood is the essential condition for the continued existence of the German people, and inspired by the inflexible determination to ensure the existence of the German nation for all time, the Reichstag has unanimously adopted the following law.” (USHMM) This law banned marriage between Jews and non-Jewish German citizens. It even criminalized a relationship between them and labeled it as race defilement. If you tried to skirt the law by getting married outside of the country, there was an addition that stated that your marriage would be invalid when you returned and that the government had the authority to annul it. Violation of this law resulted in prison time which could even include hard labor. The matter of race was taken very seriously in the eyes of the Nazi party, and the idea of defiling pure, healthy, German blood had caused them to take extreme measures such as the Nuremberg Laws.

    Between 1933 and 1939 more than four hundred different regulations, policies, and laws were implemented that affected Jews in all aspects of their lives. These included the laws I already mentioned above, as well as many others, ranging from ever-changing restrictions for Jewish students at Universities to Jewish officers being expelled from the army, and so much more.

    The never-ending list of anti-Semitic policies and laws were not created because of anti-religious beliefs against Jewish people. They were simply a way for the Nazi party to keep pressure on a group that already felt like they were drowning and there was nobody there to pull them to safety. With each new law restricting them even further some only saw suicide as the way out, and some paid the enormous tax and left with only the clothes on their backs, many thought this possibly could not last forever and things would eventually go back to normal again, but most could never predict that it would get much worse. The Nazi party would never see the Jewish people as citizens, and if they did not leave voluntarily after six long years of tightening restrictions and making life unbearable for them, the Nazis would have to come up with another plan, because they couldn’t have them stay and defile their superior race of strong and pure German blood. The final solution would have to involve something more sinister as expulsion was not working.

Sources:

Beth A. Griech-Polelle, Anti-Semitism and the Holocaust: Language, Rhetoric and the Traditions of Hatred (London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2023)

Alfred Kruck, Die Geschichte des Alldeutschen Verbandes 1890-1939 [The History of the Pan-German League 1890-1939] (Wiesbaden: Steiner, 1954)

Nazi Conspiracy and Aggression, Volume IV, Document No. 1708-PS, Translation of Document 1708-PS, edited by Dr. Robert Ley (Munich: Central Publishing House of the N.S.D.A.P., Franz Eher, successor).

United States holocaust memorial museum, https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/article/nuremberg-laws.

[Paper written for HIST 4130 class UVU Fall 2024]

Amy Brouwer . 2024 . All Rights Reserved

UVU Sustainability Tour: Water

    I love seeing the giant reflection pools outside of the BA building with that water spraying up, and I always wondered how they could justify that water when Utah had drought restrictions. During our sustainability tour, the gentlemen from facilities were able to answer so many of those questions, and really put UVU’s water consumption and conservation into perspective for me.

    I worked for Alpine School District as a head custodian for 9 years between 2013 and 2022. During that time I was in charge of a lot of the same things facilities explained to us on our tour, but on a much smaller scale. My area was just one elementary school as opposed to one University. I had to deal with the water restrictions during dry years, events or soccer games at the last minute and someone calling me to come shut off the water, broken sprinkler lines (and not knowing when one was broken until someone notified me), dying bushes or trees and having to replace them because they were not getting enough water, wind carrying the mist from small sprinklers and so the edges getting brown on small strips off lawn, and so much more. I received one of those fancy digital sprinkler clocks that hooked to my phone and it made my life so much easier. I was able to see weather patterns, and it would turn off the sprinklers when it rained. If a sprinkler broke, it would turn off that section and alert me instead of shooting a giant stream of water straight into the air for hours on end. The new technology was amazing and probably saved the district a lot of money and water. It also saved me a lot of time, energy, and frustration.

    I was able to understand a lot of what they were talking about in the tour as I was one of “them” for many years and loved what I did. I started UVU as a freshman in 1994 (it was UVSC back then) and it has grown a lot in the last 30 years. There are many more buildings, and more grassy areas. There are more parking lots and concrete walkways connecting them all together. As the school is growing in size by building and mass, it is also growing with people and that means more feet that walk over that grass. I think they are really taking all that into account, as they mentioned that they are adding compost to the water that will help the roots become stronger and thicker, to stand up to the extra amount of wear and tear so that it endures more people walking on it, sitting on it, playin on it. They are seeing the bigger picture, and they know they need to keep looking outside of that even further as the school continues to expand, so that they can keep up with technology and sustainability efforts, even if they may seem small.

[Paper written for SOC 3520 class UVU Fall 2024]

Amy Brouwer . 2024 . All Rights Reserved

From Segregation to Extermination: The Role of Ghettos in the Holocaust

    With the newly acquired Lebensraum in Poland, Heinrich Himmler, Minister of the Interior, was put in charge of bringing ethnic Germans from all over the world to live in the new German Reich territories. The plan was to have 4 to 5 million Germans settle where the Poles and Jews were currently living. (Griech-Polelle, 167) This was a huge problem with conflicting ideas on how to make this happen. Joseph Goebbels, the Minister of Propaganda, was successful in making sure the people in the Old German Reich were fully onboard with the deportations that were going to happen. Over the last few weeks, I have read many different opinions that have pointed to either a functionalist or an intentionalist view when it comes to Hitler and his persecution of the Jews. I want to take a closer look at why the Jewish people were put into ghettos by comparing and contrasting those two different points of view as they both have valid arguments and explanations. At the beginning of Hitler’s reign, he wanted the Jewish people out of the old German Reich to make room for ethnic Germans and to further his goals to achieve racial purity. Many of the early laws and policies created were supposed to force the Jews to leave on their own. When that was not as successful as originally anticipated, and with the outbreak of World War Two, the remaining Jewish population was segregated into ghettos instead. The creation of ghettos was to control and monitor the Jews, to be able to exploit them for labor, and ultimately to round them up for deportation to concentration and extermination camps.

    The first point I make in my thesis statement is that Jews were put into ghettos so that the Nazis could control and monitor them more easily. From an intentionalist perspective, the ghettos would be a conscious next step before total annihilation. You round up all Jews, concentrate them together, but isolate them from the outside world so that they lose hope and see who is really in control. Starving them inside of the ghettos could have been part of the plan as well, but when the Nazis realized it would take a very long time, as the Jews were able to smuggle in food and other things to sustain themselves a little, they had to turn to more advanced measures of elimination instead. From a functionalist perspective, the ghettos could have easily been unplanned but became a necessary and temporary holding place while Himmler figured out how to move around millions of Poles, Jews, and ethnic Germans to get Hitler the Reich he wanted. Once the Nazis figured out that rounding up all Jews into more contained locations, such as ghettos, would be more beneficial, instructions were sent out by Reinhard Heydrich, Himmler's deputy, to dissolve Jewish communities into those contained ghettos instead. (Yad Vashem, 73)

    My second point is that the ghettos helped the Nazis exploit the Jews for labor. At the higher levels of Nazi leadership, there were conflicting opinions when it came to rounding up the Jews. Hermann Göring, the second most powerful man in Germany at that time, “opposed the deportation of any useful manpower, especially agricultural labor.” (Browning, 13) To balance this out, at first, ghettos were open and those who worked could do so when they produced the necessary documents. Later, ghettos were closed off and life inside became much worse for everyone as nobody was allowed to leave anymore. The intentionalist argument here makes less sense to me as you would not want to starve your workforce or round them all up if they are providing much-needed labor for you during the war. The functionalist perspective is unplanned and so it makes more sense that the Nazis believed they could still benefit from the Jews even inside the ghettos, and that they could exploit them for as long as possible that way. Those that were too weak to work, because of the inadequate food supplies inside the ghettos, could just be replaced by others who were willing and still able to work for the time being. In November of 1940, all Jews between the ages of 18 and 45 were forced to complete compulsory labor (Griech-Polelle, 183) thus keeping the labor pool large for the Nazis to exploit inside and outside of the ghettos.

    My third point is that the ghettos made it easier to round up the Jews for deportation to concentration and extermination camps. From an intentionalist perspective, this is their ultimate goal, and the ghettos were just a temporary resting place while they were perfecting their instruments of death and torture. The Nazis were able to observe the starvation in the ghettos and knew they needed to come up with better and faster ways to eliminate the Jews. One way they did this was by introducing gassing vans as mass shootings were taking an emotional toll on their soldiers. (Becker, 999-1000) While the functionalist perspective did not plan for the Jews to be sent to ghettos in the first place, the Nazis still did not see them as human, and so it was only natural to either shoot them all and bury them in large mass graves on site, (Poliakov, 125-126) or move them to concentration and extermination camps when the time was right.

    Whether you find the intentionalist or functionalist view more compelling, both perspectives, in the end, come to the same conclusion, that the only way to answer the Jewish question at that time, was to exterminate them all. The ghettos made control over the Jews easier, and the Nazis could monitor any resistance that was potentially forming. While the Nazis differed on their ideas on timing when it came to rounding up the Jews into the ghettos, as the Jewish population was heavily involved in the workforce, they still were able to exploit them until many were too weak to work. When the Nazis were ready to move onto their next phase, having the Jews in concentrated ghettos, all the cumulative efforts up to that point resulted in a successful outcome of the final solution. The intentionalist or functionalist viewpoint in reality actually does not matter, the outcome of the ghettos, as we have seen, performed its functions and cost millions their lives. Maybe adding a perspective helps break down the damage done in some ways, or helps others sort through the indescribable horrors. Maybe it can even help some find ways to explain why this was done to an entire group of people for reasons that in today’s society would not make sense, and really in the end can not be justified.

Sources:

Dr. August Becker, SS Untersturmführer, to SS-Obersturmbannführer Rauff, May 16, 1942, in Nazi Conspiracy and Aggression, Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1946.

Christopher R. Browning, The Path to Genocide: Essays on Launching The Final Solution, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992.

Beth A. Griech-Polelle, Anti-Semitism and the Holocaust: Language, Rhetoric and the Traditions of Hatred, London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2023.

Leon Poliakov, Harvest of Hate, Syracuse, N.Y.: Syracuse University Press, 1954.

Yad Vashem, Documents on the Holocaust: Selected Sources on the Destruction of the Jews of Germany and Austria, Poland and the Soviet Union, Jerusalem: Yad Vashem, 1981, Document no. 73.

[Paper written for HIST 4130 class UVU Fall 2024]

Amy Brouwer . 2024. All Rights Reserved

Vision Board

Photo 1 - Changing Family

Basic family units have changed from the ideal “nuclear” family of the 50s with each new generation. Higher rates of divorce, women’s rights movements, and the sexual revolution have all contributed to this change in society. We are seeing more blended families, single parents, and adults who choose not to have children at all. The legalization of same-sex marriage in 2015, and the trans rights movements currently sweeping the country, are still changing the way we are looking at the word “family.” The social institution of the family is definitely in flux as we talked about during week 5 in class by changing how we look at families and defining what that word even means. (Malae, 9/20) My family dynamic changed drastically when I got divorced and I have been trying to figure out how to label my new “family” ever since. When my kids moved out and started their own lives I traded in my car for a smaller compact one that would suit my new lifestyle. My life no longer revolved around dinner times together at home, extra-curricular activities my girls were involved in after school, or being home together at night, but instead my schedule was now my own to keep and adjust as I saw fit.

Photo 2 - Adaptive Strategies

When life gives you lemons, the only option is not always to make lemonade. I have had to come up with many different adaptive strategies in my life. (Malae, 8/31) My 20 year long marriage was one filled with abuse that left me as a shattered mess of a person with no clue what was holding me together in the end. Through self-care, breathwork, and lots of help, I have slowly been able to uncover the adaptive strategies I used (and some I still use today) that helped guide me onward, and will continue to guide me through my life as I age. Art and music are very powerful and can take me far away. Both run deep in my family and go back many generations and I can feel that everytime I pick up a paintbrush or am inspired while listening to music. All of my tattoos are ones I have drawn and designed myself and they all have a story. Stress and burnout, like discussed in the book about care work (Emily Abel) have been all too real in my life as well as I cared and enabled a now ex-spouse for too long. I continue to care for both of my kids as they have a lot of chronic illnesses that put financial burdens on them that they cannot handle and so I try to help them out when I can financially and emotionally. My adaptive strategies continue to help me today and will continue to help me throughout my life as my kids will always “need me,” and I will hopefully always be there for them in some capacity.

Photo 3 - Active Aging

We are constantly told to “stay active” and “stay positive.” (Malae, 9/9) While this may be easy for some, it can be a real challange for others. I am very lucky as I grew up being quite active. I biked everywhere when I was younger as that was the norm in the Netherlands. I own 3 bikes today and use them whenever the weather permits. I tried to raise my kids the same way and they loved to bike and be active when they were younger. Unfortunately, both of them have chronic health problems today that prevent them from staying active and enjoying the outdoors with me now. While active aging can be a great theory for some, the access, cost, and limitations can prevent many from achieving this.

Photo 4 - Life-Long Learner

All the accumulated knowledge over our lifetime from schooling, career, and experiences that shape us, can be beneficial for anyone to learn from. (Jovic and McMullin) Education is a social institution that can facilitate more knowledge for me (Malae, 9/18) as I never tire from learning more throughout my lifetime. While I am no longer the “typical” college student, and most of the time am surrounded by many in my class much younger than I am, I am always pleasantly surprised that I learn new things from my fellow pursuers of knowledge and make new relationships along the way.

Photo 5 - Role Transition

Role transition refers to the role changes individuals make as they move through different social roles that provide them with different identities. (Malae, 9/4) My kids are 22 and 24 right now and need me less and less it seems. Almost 5 years ago I had a major role transition when I got divorced, and in the years since then, both of my kids have been in and out of my home trying to make it on their own out in the world. I went from caring full-time for 3 “adults” to only having myself to care for and that was a big change as I had forgotten that I needed to also be taken care of. My kids encouraged me to spend time, energy, and money on myself for a change. This was hard at first, as I had not done this in a very long time, but now I am embracing my newfound role as a single empowered individual who diserves fulfillment and enjoyment.


Sources:

Abel, E. K. (2022). Elder care in crisis: How the Social Safety Net Fails Families. New York University Press.

Jovic, E and McMullin, R.A. (2011) Handbook of Sociology of Aging. Learning and Aging. Springer Science+Business Media, CH 15

Malae, K. (2024). Sociology of Aging 375G-001 [PowerPoint Presentation]. Utah Valley University, Canvas.

[Paper written for SOC 375G class UVU Fall 2024]

Amy Brouwer . 2024 . All Rights Reserved

From Reformation to Reich: The Nationalist and Anti-Semitic Legacies of Luther and Hitler

    To most, William L. Shirer is considered to be the grandfather of Nazi ideology as his book titled The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, published in 1960, is out of date, and many new scholars and authors have come onto the scene since then. He did however accurately portray what I wish to convey in that particular book when he said: “It is difficult to understand the behavior of most German Protestants in the first Nazi years unless one is aware of two things: their history and the influence of Martin Luther. The great founder of Protestantism was both a passionate anti-Semite and a ferocious believer in absolute obedience to political authority. He wanted Germany rid of the Jews. Luther’s advice was literally followed four centuries later by Hitler, Goering and Himmler.” (Shirer,236) Luther’s ideas of German nationalism and his writings, particularly his later anti-Semitic text titled On the Jews and Their Lies, served as a blueprint for the pervasive culture of hatred that had evolved over centuries, ultimately facilitating the Nazi regime’s exploitation of his ideas to justify racial ideologies. This historical trajectory culminated in horrific events such as Kristallnacht, where the dehumanization and vilification of Jews, rooted in Luther’s rhetoric, were enacted on a national scale, revealing how deeply entrenched nationalism and anti-Semitism can lead to catastrophic violence.

    Martin Luther, born November 10th, 1483, was a German priest who changed Christianity with his influence during the Reformation. His criticism of the Catholic Church led to the creation of the Protestant Church and ultimately Lutheranism. “Wanting all Christians in Germany to have access to the gospel, Luther created a translation of the Bible into German, therefore allowing all Germans to read and understand it, and thereby uniting them. In every house one could find a copy of Luther’s Bible, whose teachings became an integral part of German national heritage.” (Ritter,216) Luther’s nationalism went far beyond patriotism as he wholly believed the German people were God’s chosen people and he was the one to lead them. The pride he had in his faith and country made him blind to anyone who was not a true German Christian. He fought for freedoms by taking on the Catholic Church who he believed was keeping his people oppressed. “Martin Luther and German nationalism are inextricably linked. In addition to initiating the Protestant Reformation, Luther accomplished other tasks, all for the benefit of the German people. It has been argued that Luther’s message was ‘not for Christendom, but for the German people - for he was not a Christian, he was first and foremost a German.’ Luther considered himself the Prophet of the Germans.” (Olsen,10) Luther saw that his country was in danger from many outside forces and so his national pride encouraged him to fight for the German people and to rid it of foreigners with their strange ways who did not belong there.

    In 1523, Luther still tried to encourage friendly conversations between Jews and Protestants hoping that those might lead to conversion to Christianity. “If I had been a Jew and had seen such dolts and blockheads govern and teach the Christian faith, I would sooner have become a hog than a Christian. They have dealt with the Jews as if they were dogs rather than human beings; they have done little else than deride them and seize their property.” (Luther,200) Since Luther was disenfranchised by the Catholic Church and its corruption he thought he could collaborate with those of the Jewish faith and help them see the truth and light of Protestantism. “The Jews’ special status as the people that both had rejected Jesus’ revelation and had “killed” him, although they, of all people, ought to have recognized and embraced him as their messiah, was the source of the enduring and bitter hatred of Jews by the Church, the Christian clergy, and the people of Europe.” (Goldhagen,52) In 1526, Luther visited with three rabbis and one of the rabbis said to Luther, “We rejoice that you Christians learn our language and our books such as Genesis and the rest. We hope that in the future you will become Jews.” (Lamport,387) Luther replied in return that he hoped they would become Christians. By 1543, Luther had changed his tune as he realized he could not convert the Jews. He started to see them as foreigners in his country with their strange rituals and non-German ways. He started to emphasize their blindness, stubbornness, and love of lies by bringing back all the stereotypes Jews had been accused of for generations. Instead of the beautiful sermons he was known for, he wrote the treatise titled On the Jews and Their Lies which was long and very specific when it came to his new stance on how he viewed these outsiders. His words were so “violent and vulgar that they offended contemporaries and remain offensive to this day.” (Edwards,3) Part four of the treatise is known as the most infamous section of all as Luther provided advice on how to deal with the Jews back in 1543. Emily Paras in her article titled The Darker Side of Martin Luther, wrote that Luther had four reasons as to why he wrote the treatise. According to Paras, he wanted to expose their false boasts of lineage, to debate key biblical passages, to highlight medieval superstitions, and most importantly, he wanted to give recommendations for dealing with the Jews. (Paras) The treatise, On the Jews and Their Lies, in its origional German, is 135 pages long and filled with the ramblings of someone trying to sway good Christians to his point of view. The part that is the most severe and shocking are the seven recommendations that he gave about dealing with the Jews, and while they were powerful and full of hate they only filled 5 of those 135 pages.

    “Next to the Devil, you have no more bitter, more poisonous, more vehement an enemy than a real Jew who earnestly desires to be a jew.” (Luther,28) Luther gave his council in the form of warnings to all Christians. He painted the Jews as liars and blasphemers who were disgracing God by what they did inside their buildings. “Moses writes in Deuteronomy that where a city practiced idolatry, it should be entirely destroyed with fire and leave nothing. If he were living today he would be the first to put fire to the Jew schools and houses.” (Luther,40) While this is a pretty straightforward paragraph from Luther he made sure to mention that this destruction should be done to the glory of God and Christendom. Burning synagogues and homes was not a new concept and Luther encouraged Christians to perform that act in the name of God as he believed they were defiling his country with their strange new ways. To be a good German you needed to be Christian and do everything you could for love of country. Luther’s second piece of council was to not let Jews own their own homes. “For they practice the same thing in their houses as they do in their schools. Instead, you might place them under a roof, or stable, like the Gypsies, to let them know that they are not lords in our country as they boast, but in exile as captives.” (Luther,40) Again, Luther warned his fellow Christians that the Jews were foreigners in his country and that they should not have been allowed to feel like they belong. Comparing them to Gypsies made them second class citizens and not worthy of the equality that real Germans received even if some had lived in Germany their entire lives. Third, Luther counciled that all the prayer books of the Jews should be taken away as that is where the lying and blaspheming was being taught from. His translation of the Bible into German was seen as a tremendous gift to the German people so why would these outsiders scoff at that and read from other religious books. (Luther,41) Fourth, Luther counciled that Rabbis should be prohibited from teaching. Being German meant Christian and reading the Bible, if rabbis could not teach anymore and their books were taken away, then maybe the German people stood a chance at getting their country back. (Luther,41) Fifth, Luther counciled that the Jews should no longer be protected and if you did protect them you would be a partner of their abomination. (Luther,41-42) Sixth, all their currency, silver, and gold should be taken away as everything the Jews had was probably something they had stolen. (Luther,42) Luther relied on stereotypes from centuries past as that stigma had followed the Jews through generations. Finally, the last council Luther gave was that Jews were lazy and should be put to work. “That young, strong Jews be given flail, ax, spade, spindle, and let them earn their bread in the sweat of their noses as imposed upon Adam’s children.” (Luther,45) This again was a stereotype that had not changed over centuries and so Luther knew just how he could use it to rile people up. The treatise continued on for many more pages after the council defaming the Jews with more harsh and violent words.

    The German people believed in Luther’s nationalism and faith and built on that for years following his death. “If we wish to find a scapegoat on whose shoulders we may lay the miseries which Germany has brought upon the world - I am more and more convinced that the worst evil genius of that country is not Hitler or Bismarck or Frederick the Great, but Martin Luther.” (Paras,1) Only a few months after the Nazi’s seized power in Germany it was the 450th anniversary of Luther’s birth. Gauleiter Erich Koch, a political official governing a district under Nazi rule, testified in 1949: “I held the view that the Nazi idea had to develop from a basic Prussian-Protestant attitude and from Luther’s unfinished Reformation.” (Steigmann-Gall,275) Koch truly believed that the National Socialists were the true inheritors of Luther’s legacy. “Only we can enter into Luther’s spirit [...] Human cults do not set us free from all sin, but faith alone. With us the church shall become a serving member of the state. We struggle for the completion of the highest good of the nation: truth and right, freedom and honor. There is a deep sense that our celebration is not attended by superficiality, but rather by thanks to a man who saved German cultural values.” (Steigmann-Gall,284) There were many other officials in the Nazi party that held on to the religious ideals of Luther and combined them with the national ideals of Hitler. Gauleiter Hans Schemm, head of the National Socialist Teachers League, was known for his slogan: “Our religion is Christ, our politics Fatherland.” (Steigmann-Gall,276) Schemm praised Luther by saying: “Luther’s engagement against the decomposing Jewish spirit is clearly evident not only from his writing against the Jews; his life too was idealistically, philosophically antisemitic. Now we Germans of today have the duty to recognize and acknowledge this. Only in this way will we do justice to Luther’s life.” (Kahl-Furthmann,126) Schemm was an avid follower of Luther but also believed wholehearedly in Hitlers idea of race. “The spiritual for us always remains primary, blood and race secondary. The cause of all things is and remains the Creator [...] Race, Volk and nation represent only instruments which lead to God.” (Kahl-Furthmann,127) Walter Buch was Chairman of the Party’s Investigation and Consilation Commitee and President of the Party’s Supreme Court. He was also an ardent Lutheran and made direct comparisons between Luther and Hitler. “We have all seen how, in our movement and in the work of our fuhrer, the same ideas can live in many people, that the same spirit is produced. Many people confess their amazement that Hitler preaches ideas which they have always held. [...] From the Middle Ages we can look to the same example in Martin Luther. What stirred in the soul and spirit of the German people of that time, finally found expression in his person, in his words and deeds.” (Steigmann-Gall,278) Bernard Rust, the Prussian (and later Reich) Education Minister, was another ardent Luther and Hitler supporter. He believed that Hitler and Luther were one and the same. “Since Martin Luther closed his eyes, no such son of our people has appeared again. It has been decided that we shall be the first to witness his reappearance. The poor orphan from a broken home in Braunau, the worker from the big city of Vienna, the rifleman from the World War, has had to arrive in order for the people once again to raise the flag before their son from its midst and to hear its voice [...] I think the time is past when one may not say the names of Hitler and Luther in the same breath. They belong together; they are of the same old stamp.” (Steigmann-Gall,136-7)

    Hitler was a staunch nationalist just as Luther had been in his day. We can see evidence of this just by reading Mein Kampf where Hitler mentioned that “my nationalistic entusiasm was no empty obsession.” (Hitler,47) We can also see that Hitler was a follower of Luther and very familiar with writtings. He called Luther a great warrior in Mein Kampf and said: “Among them must be counted the great warriors in this world who, though not understood by the present, are nevertheless prepared to carry the fight for their ideas and ideals to the end. They are men who some day will be closest to the heart of the people; it almost seems as though every individual feels the duty to compensate in the past for the sins which the present one commited against the great. Their life and work are followed with admiring gratitude and emotion, and especially in days of gloom they have the power to raise up broken hearts and despairing souls.” (Hitler,213) Hitler admired this great warrior and followed Luther’s council from 400 years earlier almost exactly. “Hitler is without a doubt considered the most prominent and most fanatical anti-Semite in the history of the world. He, however, would presumably have given Martin Luther that honor.” (Olsen,27)

    In the treatise written by Luther in 1543, Luther counciled that Jewish synagogues and homes should be burned to stop blasphemy. “On November 10, 1938, on Luther’s birthday, the synagogues are burning in Germany. The German people ought to heed these words of the greatest antisemite of his time, the warner of his people against the Jews.” (Nellessen,265) These were the words of Bishop Martin Sasse of Thuringia as he wrote a short summary after Kristallnacht in which he praised the violence that occured that night. Hitler and the Nazi party followed the first council of Luther’s treatise by burning the synagogues and homes of Jews. The fact that it happened on Luther’s birthday could be a coincidence or planned event to emulate the person that wrote down those exact instructions 400 years earlier. Diarmaid MacCulloch said, “Luther’s writings of 1543 is a blueprint for the Nazi’s Kristallnacht of 1938” in his book titled The Reformation. He continues, “it recommends that in retaliation for Jewish obstinancy, synagogues should be burned, Jewish literature confiscated, Jewish teachings forbidden, and vengeance taken for the killing of Christ.” (MacCulloch,666) Kristallnacht became the shift when anti-Semitism became state-sanctified and outwardly acceptable. It was a coordinated attack on Jews in Hitler’s Reich that left 91 Jews dead, over 30,000 Jewish men arrested, over 1000 synagogues burned and destroyed, and tens of thousands of Jewish businesses and homes damaged or destroyed. (Gilbert,13) During the two days of the 10th and 11th of November, Jewish men between the ages of sixteen and sixty were taken to concentration camps. They ended up in Dachau, Sachsenhausen, and Buchenwald. Henny Prilutzky’s father was one of the men taken to Dachau where conditions were horrific. When he came back from Dachau he told her to never ask about what he had seen inside the concentration camp. Fifty years later Henny asked him, “Can you tell me now?” and again he told her, “No.” (Gilbert,139) Hitler had just talked about peace with Chamberlain and was not at war. “The detailed accounts of the scale and virulance of the attacks on Jews and Jewish property during Kristallnacht created shock waves in all democratic countries and effectively ended whatever attractions Nazism had earlier held for ordinary people and their governments.” (Gilbert,14) Propaganda and centuries of hate had led up to many followers of Hitler accepting an all out war against an entire group of people all because they were not Christian nor Aryan. Ulrich von Hassel, a German diplomat noted in his diary five days after Kristallnacht that “organizers were shameless enough to mobilize school classes (in Feldafing, on the Starbergersee, they even armed the pupils with bricks)”. (Gilbert,38) While the violence was widespread across the entire German Reich, a lot of it took place in Berlin. Hugh Green, the Berlin correspondent of the Daily Telegraph wrote: “I have seen several anti-Jewish outbreaks in Germany during the last five years, but never anything as nauseating as this. Beginning in the early hours of the morning, and continuing far into tonight, the pogrom puts the final seal to the outlawry of German Jewry. German women who remonstrated with children who were running away with toys from a wrecked Jewish shop were spat upon and attacked by the mob” (Gilbert,42) A prominent Nazi official told a correspondent of the British Press: ”We began seizing goods from Jewish shops because sooner or later they would have been nationalized anyways. The goods thus seized, the official added, will be used to compensate us for at least part of the damage which the Jews have been doing for years to the German people.” (Gilbert,59) Years of nationalism and anti-Semitism had turned ordinary civilians into propaganda-believing individuals who believed the Jews were responsible for everything that was going wrong in Germany. They believed the same stereotypes Jews had been labeled with for centuries and blamed them for Germany’s economic woes. Lassar Brueckheimer remembered trying to get help from the police during Kristallnacht. “They told us to go away, the matter had nothing to do with them. This, too, proves that the police had their instructions well beforehand. Probably we were one of the few families who were still innocent enough to believe that the police would be even-handed.” (Gilbert,105)

    Hitler followed Luther’s second council as well when Luther mentioned to not let them own their own homes. The Nazi’s created ghettos and rounded up all the Jews and took away their property. “To the largest of those ghettos, that of Warsaw, 10,000 German Jews were deported. In the first six months of 1941, 13,000 Jews died of starvation in the Warsaw ghetto, including many of the deportees from Germany.” (Gilbert,240) They created new laws that restricted what they could own taking away more rights each time. “Hatred as intense as Luther’s and Hitler’s toward the Jews was not only unprecedented and has rarely been duplicated since. While the anti-Jewish sentiments were not unique to Luther and Hitler, the extremes to which both men went to spread their beliefs and call upon others for action was unparalleled. The level of bitter loathing and anti-Jewish ideology was virtually the same, despite a four century gap. The similarities shared between Luther and Hitler were not limited to hatred for anything Jewish, however. Both men were led by a strong sense of German nationalism and a yearning for unity among their fellow Germans.” (Olsen,36) Hitler implemented more restrictions and laws and followed Luther’s council by restricting professions for Jews. He took away all their silver, gold, and other possessions as well. He put every young, strong, Jew to work by placing them all into concentration camps where they slowly starved and withered away. Joseph Goebbels, Reich Minister of Propaganda, wrote in his diary: “We are now definitely pushing the Jews out of Berlin. They were rounded up last Saturday and are to be carted off to the East as quickly as possible. Unfortunately our better circles, especially the intellectuals, once again have failed to understand our policy about the Jews and in some cases have even taken their part. As a result, our plans were disclosed prematurely, and a lot of Jews slipped through our hands. But we will catch them. I certainly won’t rest until the capital of the Reich, at least, has become free of Jews.” (Gilbert,263)

    Hitler built on the list that Luther had created and added more items of his own. He prohibited marriage between Aryans and Jews, he forced sterilization of those not part of his master plan, and in the end, when other avenues had failed to rid Germany of the Jews, he turned to extermination. January 20th 1942, a large group of senior German government officials met in Wannsee, just outside Berlin, to discuss the Final Solution of the Jewish question. Hermann Goering, one of the most powerful men in Nazi leadership, had entrusted Reinhard Heydrich, one of the masterminds of Kristallnacht, with the implementation of elimination of Jewish life in Germany. Arresting and deporting all Jews to death camps became a Nazi priority after this meeting as there were still a large number of Jews in Germany and Austria. Those that had survived Kristallnacht and stayed behind in Germany would face greater dangers coming their way. Serem Freier wrote: “My uncle was in the habit of saying that he would leave Germany in the last carriage of the last train. Instead he was in the first train to leave for Buchenwald.” (Gilbert,254) The Jews that had lived in Germany considered themselves to be German. Rita Braumann turned 12 on November 10th 1938, and remembered her father receiving a warning call to get their family out of town. “The synagogue and the Jewish schools have been set on fire. Jewish homes are being wrecked and the men arrested but we did not go. My usually pessimistic father was full of confidence, maintaining that nothing would happen to us because he had fought at the front during the war and had even been decorated.” (Gilbert,78) German Jews had believed they would be safe in their own country since Luther’s time and continued to do so in Hitler’s time. Some had fought bravely for the Fatherland in World War I, spoke German, and believed they had a right to be there even if Hitler never did. “The Jews, although they are a good people whose core is not entirely uniform in terms of race, are nevertheless a people with certain essential particularities that distinguish it from all other people living on earth. Judaism is not a religious community; rather, the religious ties between the Jews are in reality the current national constitution of the Jewish people. The Jews has never had his own terretorially defined state like the Aryan states. Nevertheless, his religious community is a real state because it ensures the preservation, propagation, and future of the Jewish people.” (Hitler,229-230) Hitler never saw those Jews living in Germany as real Germans as they did not belong to the land. He saw them as Gypsies as Luther had and did not see them belonging in his future vision of Germany. He believed that eliminating all Jews from his Reich would finally get him the Aryan country he and Luther had dreamed of. Luther had said something similar 400 years earlier. “They live among us in our homes, under our protection, use land and highways, market and streets. Princes and government sit by, snore and have their mugs open, let the Jews take from their purse and chest, steal and rob whatever they will. That is, they permit themselves and their subjects to be abused and sucked dry and reduced to beggars with their own money, through the usury of the Jews. For the Jews, as foreigners, certainly should have nothing; and what they have certainly must be ours.” (Luther,28) Luther considered the Jews to be foreigners just as Hitler did and both did not want them to be a part of Germany. The strong national pride that both men held can be seen even 400 years apart in the way they talked about Jews and their actions that followed those words. “The positive spirit of nationalism typically brings forth a sense of pride in one’s country; but on the opposite side, a destructve nationalism can create disdain for other cultures.” (Olsen,39)

    We can learn several lessons from kristallnacht according to Martin Gilbert. If we let prejudice dictate our actions “a whole people can be demolished; a whole nation can be turned totally and obscenely against a decent, hard-working, creative, loyal and integral part of its own society.” (Gilbert,267) Those who had fought bravely for their country clung to the hope that they would be accepted by their fellow countrymen as equals and not seen as outsiders anymore. After Kristallnacht a lot of those hopes were dashed when even war veterans were treated with disrespect and rounded up to be taken to concentration camps. More than a quarter of a million Jews left their homes and their homeland after Kristallnacht because they no longer felt safe in a country that they had sacrificed much for. Their own government turned their backs on them when they needed it most, and made them feel like foreigners in a country they should have felt they belonged in. Kristallnacht shocked many other governments who were inundated with requests for immigration and only a few countries opened their borders while many others shut out thousands pleading for help. “Kristallnacht taught the Nazi administrators and planners that they must in future act with silence and secrecy, hiding what they were doing to the Jews and the eyes of world indignation. The less the outside world knew or saw, the more efficient would be whatever policy they chose, and the less liable to outside concern or interference.” (Gilbert,268) As the extermination of the Jews escalated after Kristallnacht, the Nazi’s knew to not leave survivors to draw attention to their heinous acts. They perfected many of their ways and were able to accomplish mass killings away from public scrutiny in secrecy. “Kristallnacht taught, in hindsight, a historical lesson, that what begins as something finite in destruction and limited in time can quickly develop into a monster of mass murder; that evil has graduations, but is also a process, and can move smoothly, effortlessly forward to greater evil.” (Gilbert,268-269)

    Luther’s blueprint was a starting point for Hitler as he used their combined sense of nationalism as justification and duty to country. “The Third Reich and in its wake the whole Western world capitalized upon Luther, the fierce Jew-baiter.” (Oberman,292) Hitler used Germany’s love for country and faith to elevate himself to a position of power as he promised to take up Luther’s mantle to finish what he had started. Luther was a German hero not only to Hitler but also to many Germans. Nationalism was the driving force behind many to rid Germany of all foreigners. Hitler’s powerful speeches enthralled many and invigorated nationalism to a new level. Violence and villification were justified as patriotism and loyalty. After the dust of World War II settled, and the truly horrifying scenes were laid bare, the world was shocked at how far the Nazi’s had strayed for Hitler. While blaming a singular person for those catstrophic events such as Kristallnacht, many forgot to include the person that influenced Hitler. “Martin Luther’s antisemitism was ferocious and influential enough to have earned him a place in the pantheon of antisemites.” (Goldhagen,53) Hitler built upon ideas that had evolved over centuries even before Luther. He exploited human weaknesses such as fear and envy and turned them into utter hatred and disdain for the Jews who had always been at the center of exploitation. Hitler convinced millions by preying on their faith and love of country that had been rooted in Luther’s rhetoric to justify his racial ideologies. The catastrophic violence that followed was because of deeply entrenched nationalism that over centuries had turned into a pervasive culture of hatred.

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[Paper written for HIST 4130 class UVU Fall 2024]

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