Churches not provide more opposition toward Adolf Hitler and the Nazi regime?” As noted formerly, most scholars have linked past research of the Protestant Churches’ disappointments to aspects such as: (a.) post-war resentment, (b.) anti-Semitism, (c.) the secularism/liberalism of the Weimar Republic, (d.) problematic post-war circumstances, (e.) common enemies between the Nazi regime and the Protestant Churches, and (f.) an ingrained sense of nationalism.
A. Post-War Resentment
After Germany was beaten in World War I, its people were left in shambles. Germany was once part of the great Prussian Empire that was led by the Kaisers for numerous years. Germany was a place of pride before the war; however, the German people fell very hard following the war. Possibly, Germany’s worst resentment did not come from its defeat; it rather came from only one document that they were forced to sign. This document was called the Treaty of Versailles which was conceivably what really launched Germany into one of the darkest periods of history ever known to mankind. France had lost numerous people during the war. Their causalities numbered around 1.2 million soldiers and 40,000 civilians, and they wanted to control some of Germany’s factories for compensation for their sufferings. The Ruhr Area is where Germany transferred coal to France. After the plunder was divided amongst the victors, Germany was blamed for the war and was forced to pay back huge reparations. France’s leader (Georges Clemenceau) was very demanding, and he wanted to ensure that Germany was punished thoroughly for what they had done. As a result in 1923, when Germany had refused to pay their compensations, France went in to the Ruhr Area and occupied it. This incident became known as the Ruhr Crisis.
This maneuver was very frowned upon by other countries, in particular, the United States and the United Kingdom. This event was bad on many levels; foremost, French occupation continued in the Ruhr, so that Germany’s payments could still be collected. A consequence of these actions was that the German people of the Ruhr stopped working to keep from making these payments. This resulted in Germany printing additional money to support those of misfortune in the Ruhr, and this weakened the value of the German Papiermark or German currency. Everything was starting to take its toll on the German people by this point.
Germany had been humiliated by its defeat in the First World War. It was really no longer part of the renowned Prussian Empire. Its kings and princes were in exile, and on top of that France was controlling some of its most productive territories. When things seemed like that they could not get any worse, the Great Depression struck Germany. The only thing that the German people had left was their memories of the old German Reichs, and what it meant to be a Prussian. All of these events triggered them to long for the glory days of the Reichs. From a sociological standpoint, they felt alienated and this alienation led them to create in and out groups.
By creating in and out groups, the German people redefined a whole new social construction of reality. This produced a new wave of anti-Semitism as a coping mechanism. The train of thought, at that time, was that if an individual was not reverencing the past of the German Reichs, then they were an outsider. The Jewish people quickly became easy scapegoats for the Protestant Churches and all of Germany. Jewish custom and tradition was different to begin with which really drew attention to them at this point. It was almost comparable to a melting pot of all three types of anti-Semitism which included: conversion, expulsion, and then annihilation. The German people, along with the Protestant Churches, faulted the Jews for everything. The Jews were accredited with causing the loss of the war, the depression, and ruining the values and customs of Germany. The German citizens and the Protestant Churches felt they had been stabbed in the back by the Jews. With this type of mentality, the Jews became easy targets for the people and the Protestant Churches.
B. Anti-Semitism
As mentioned previously, anti-Jewish policies have really taken three different forms. This type of anti-Jewish policy began in the fourth century, and it has lasted until modern day times. The initial form of anti-Jewish policy is conversion. Conversion has been the anti-Jewish policy used by the church. Following conversion in anti-Jewish policy is expulsion. Expulsion is more of a secularized approach that sees more differences than simply religious traditions. The thought behind expulsion is that the Jews cannot live among them. The last approach taken toward anti-Jewish policy is annihilation. Annihilation was what Adolf Hitler and the Nazi regime used around 1941. This approach is literally to make the Jews extinct from the country by killing them all. The first two types of anti-Jewish policies had been evident all throughout Europe. However, the last advance in anti-Jewish policy was used by the Nazis in the early part of the Twentieth Century. As far as the Protestant Churches’ stance went on anti-Jewish policy. The Church Struggle was fought out within the churches and was not in opposition to the Nazi regime as such and certainly not to its anti-Jewish policies
Germany had a long history of anti-Semitism well before Adolf Hitler and Nazi regime had ever step into power. The Middle Ages depict Jews as satanic, demonic figures, clearly not human. This view of the Jews as being “evil people” persisted throughout Europe, and it was mostly headed up by the Catholic Church. Although this vision of the Jews as being murderers of the Messiah was believed by almost all Catholics, they did not feel that the Jews should be killed. The Catholic Church felt that Jews should be merely converted by being ridiculed which in most instances was their course of action. Nonetheless, the world was facing a great change in the late Fifteen and Sixteen Hundreds. A Renaissance Period was entering Europe, and Martin Luther, a German minister, introduced a new idea called “Protestantism.” Luther’s proposal was to reform the “corruption” of the Catholic Church. Luther faced great opposition, but his idea of reform was successful.
Luther was one of the most influential men of his time; however, he led the next great wave of Jewish hatred. His anti-Semitic slurs would prove to have a detrimental effect on the Jewish people in Germany during the Holocaust. Adolf Hitler and the Nazi regime used many of Luther’s slurs to manipulate the Protestant Churches and the German people into thinking that this is what Luther really wanted. Lutheran Protestanism, in particular, disappointed by the refusal of the Jews to accept their new religion, was rabidly hostile. Luther wrote in one of his booklets, Of the Jews and Their Lies:
“First, their synagogues or churches should be set on fire, and whatever does not burn up should be covered and spread over with dirt so that no one may ever be able to see a cinder or stone of it…Secondly, their homes should likewise be broken down and destroyed…They ought to be put under one roof or in a stable, like gypsies…Thirdly, they should be deprived of their prayer books and Talmuds…Fourthly, their rabbis must be forbidden under threat of death to teach
any more…If, however, we are afraid that they might harm us personally, then let us apply the same cleverness [expulsion] as the other nations, such as France, Spain, Bohemia, etc., and settle with them for that which they have exhorted usuriously from us, and after having divided it up fairly let us drive them out of the country for all time.”
With such statements by Martin Luther as these, it should be to no wonder that Adolf Hitler and the Nazi regime could create a common interest between them and Lutheran Protestants. Jews not accepting Jesus as being the Messiah continued to plague them throughout the Renaissance period and up until the early twentieth century when the Prussian Empire was defeated in World War I (WWI).
C. Secularism/Liberalism of the Weimar Republic
When researching the Protestant Churches, in Germany, during the Weimar years; it is not hard to find that the Protestant Churches did not like the Weimar government. Mainly, this dislike occurred due to the secularism/liberalism of the Weimar’s leaders toward the Protestant Churches. The predominately conservative Protestant leaders and pastors associated the Weimar Republic with Social Democrats like Friedrich Ebert, its first president. Conservatives within the church trusted the Social Democrats only slightly more than they did the Communists. The Protestant Churches’ leadership detested the Weimar government because of its secularization policies on the German culture. Many of the church leaders felt that some of these policies were attacks against the church itself. The Protestant Churches’ were not the only group that abhorred the Weimar government. Embittered nationalists put the blame for Germany’s defeat not on the Kaiser and his military commanders but on fragile new government that now saw itself compelled to observe the terms of the Versailles Treaty.
D. Problematic Post-War Circumstances
Germany’s defeat in WWI was a major blow to its people. As noted formerly they had been held accountable for the war, and they had to disburse huge reimbursements to the war’s winners. Many circumstances arose in Germany during the 1930s. As mentioned previously, one of the largest frustrations came when France occupied some of Germany’s territories. On top of all of these awful circumstances, the German people were also suffering from other situations such as: post-war resentment, inflation, and most Germans were in a state of almost pure shock which was widespread all throughout Germany. Referred to these factors as “difficult life conditions.” also introduced an idea that he called a “continuum of destruction.” In other words, the German people were synchronized to Nazi ideologies. He emphasized that the pressures from this “continuum of destruction” was a direct result of the “difficult life conditions” that the German people had faced. Once an individual gets started down this path; the rest kind of just flows into place. These concepts directed the German people, along with the Protestant Churches, down a zigzagged path that ultimately led to the Holocaust.
E. Common Enemies or Shared Values
One reason the National Socialists were elected into power was their successful attempt to set mutual enemies between them and the Protestant Churches’ leadership. Mass Society Theory claims, “…modernity is distinguished by the emergence of large-scale social structures but the disappearance of mid-level groups that would provide social anchors for individuals. With the demise of smaller scale social groups, modern society becomes a mass society in which isolation, depersonalization, and alienation become prevalent”.
To lends further assistance to understand the gradual acceptance of the Nazis from the Protestant Churches’ perspective. Experts elucidated that when things are changing rapidly, people will search for a world that has vanished. In this instance, the Protestant Churches were looking back for the glory days of the German Reichs. When looking at the current situations that were arising in Germany, during the Weimar Republic years, the Protestant Churches’ were getting desperate to get back to their lost nation. “Social stability and political continuity keep history in the past; instability and uncertainty keep its ghosts alive”.
F. Ingrained Nationalism
Nationalism ascended in Germany following WWI. Many negative attitudes emerged from patriotic Germans toward people whom were not nationalistic. Role theory states, “These roles emerge from interaction in which two or more persons have a set of common expectations about what is appropriate behavior for both themselves and for others. Culture is regarded as an organization of learned behaviors (roles) and the products of behavior that are shared and transmitted. These learned behaviors are no more than the actions of persons occupying roles”. Secular anti-Semitism becomes increased during this phase in Germany’s history. One of the possible reasons was because of this ingrained nationalism throughout the country. Jews were seen heavily as outsiders because they did have their own country at this point-in-time. Jewish cultural traits were dramatically dissimilar than the nationalistic Germans’ traditions. Jewish customs kept them practicing old traditions and this made Jews even more suspicious to the German nationalists.
The methods used throughout this manuscript are rooted by a historical content analysis. Historical documents such as: the National Socialist German Workers’ party (NSDAP’s) 25-Point Program, Adolf Hitler’s speeches delivered to the public, the German Christians’ 10-Point Church Plan, the Protestant Reich Church’s 30-Point Church Plan, which was developed by Alfred Rosenberg, and the Lutheran Protestants’ German Church Yearbook. These historical documents were compared with the chronological events that took place during the Church Struggle. From this information an investigation was launched to measure the tactics and counter-tactics from both groups, which were tracked through a chronological time-order-line to the literal events that occurred comparatively close to the day that these doctrines, speeches, or other forms of information was released.
Events such as the restructure of the Protestant Churches’ authority was a key aspect in the Protestant Churches’ incapability to suppress the Nazi’s tactics. Another observation that was made came from looking at how Hitler and the Nazi regime had taken over other bureaucratic structures by setting up “parallel organizations.” After extensive research two major assumptions were concluded: (1) the land reduction caused a large restructure to take place which deeply weakened the Protestant Churches’ on an organizational level. (2) Adolf Hitler and the Nazi regime set up a parallel structure, the German Christians, next to the Protestant Churches’ organization to keep them occupied, so that he and the Nazi regime could fully assimilate the Protestant Churches’ into a state sponsored Nazi ecclesia.
Strong evidence emerged through a historical content analysis that demonstrated that Prussia’s defeat in World War I led to a major land reduction. This land reduction produced resentment, along with an enormous diminution in the Mainstream Protestant Churches’ membership and authority structure. The Weimar years added to the Protestant Churches’ wounds by instilling more secularism into German’s society school systems; this government also had a fairly large Centre Party that was made up of Catholics. Catholics and Lutherans had an enormous history of disliking one another. Even with all of these troubles, more problems arose such as the Great Depression which caused a large inflation in Germany. The inflation produced problems with the Protestant Churches’ finances as well. The loss of World War I, restructure of membership and authority, secularism/liberalism of the Weimar years, and the Great Depression seemed to create mutual enemies between the Protestant ministers and laity with a newly emerging political party, the Nationalists Socialist German Workers’ party.
The National Socialist party provided the Protestant clergy with the assurance of a religious revival. This gave the National Socialist party a dissimulation for Adolf Hitler’s slowly merging tyrannical reign. With the Protestant and Catholic Churches’ support, this gave the National Socialist party the edge that they needed to emerge into power. The National Socialist party did this by setting up a movement called the, German Christian Faith Movement, which presented a false pretense to the Protestant Churches that it was a Protestant Christian movement.
This movement would later become the parallel organization that succeeded in assimilating Mainstream Protestantism. After the assimilation was complete, the German Christian Faith Movement (GCFM) sat up a Protestant Reich Church that was built on nationalism and Nazi ideology. However, the GCFM knocked its own feet out from under it. At the Sports Palace Rally, they got too radical and numerous Protestant ministers resigned or quit. The GCFM never regained full control over the Protestant Churches again; however, they did show themselves to be useful to Adolf Hitler and the Nazi regime by creating a concept developed by what is called a “buffer.” Adolf Hitler and the Nazi regime used the GCFM, from 1934 throughout the rest of the Nazi’s reign, as a buffer between them and the Protestant Churches.
All of the following are examples where materials were drawn and evaluated or critiqued: Hitler’s speeches, the German Churches’ Yearbook, the 25-Point Plan of the NSDAP, and the 30-Point Church Plan for the National Reich Church to name only a few. These historical documents (along with numerous others) were evaluated and compared to the events that took place in Germany during the early period of the Church Struggle. After making connections between the two, commonalities as to why the Protestant Churches’ failed to provide more resistance to Adolf Hitler and the Nazi regime began to appear which pointed to their structural features. This led the researcher to formulate a theory that structural flaws as an organization led to the Protestant Churches’ lack of dissent. This theory is simply to add to all of the past research. This research is not to disprove any aged theories; actually, this study was assembled off of the past research and uses theories of the past to lucidly enlighten why the structural collapse led to lack of dissent.
