What was the role of German Romanticism in forming the Nazi ethos?

[bloodeagle]

People think that Nazism erupted out of the abuses of the Armistice reparations and the 1929 market crash. But what was the fertile ground that anti-semitism and fanatic anti-bolshevism grew out of? Who were the authors and artists of German Romanticism? Why did Reifenstahl's movie "The Blue Light" captivate Hitler? Why didn't Wagner write operas about starving poets or industrialists? What was the lure of fantasist paganism in the early 20th century?

[Neutrality]

Hi, thought provoking question. Have you read mein kampf?

[Bernaschek]

"Der Mann, der Hitler die Ideen gab" (The man who gave Hitler his ideas), by Wilfried Daim, about Jörg von Lanz-Liebenfals and his occult "Neutempler" group - Romanticism with a very, very nasty streak .
As far as I know, it is proofen, that Hiler was influenced by him during his Vienna years.

In German you can find more on occult roots of Nazi ideologie.

[michael mills]

Oh please, not the "occult roots of Nazism" yet again. This forum is supposed to be about real history, not eccentric theories.

German artistic and literary romanticism certainly fed into political nationalism, but National Socialism was by no means the only form of German nationalism. Without the trauma of the First World War and the German defeat, and the resultant economic and social collapse, it is extremely unlikely that such radical and extreme form of German nationalism would have emerged.

[Bernaschek]

Whilst you are basically right, Lanz-Liebenfels did a lot to help Hitler develop his antisemitism.
I wouldn't speak of "roots", but of occult elements in the ideologie. And thing like the "nordic" whatever where strong elements of the same.

[BarKokhba]

I have no doubt that 'German Romanticism/nationalism' played a significant part in the rise of nazism, but a major, consistent thread in the central antisemitism and anti-communism of fascism/nazism is from the Church. For 700 years prior to the 20th century, outrages by the various church sects in Europe against Jews fertilized the soil in preparation for the 'Final Solution'. Catholic, Lutheran, Russian & Ukraine Orthodox churces for generations pushed an unrelenting hatred of Jews and Jewish culture. By the 1860's they were sermonizing against communism with the same vitriol. By the 1930s these same Churches (with the rare exception of passivist lone sheep) went pro-fascist/pro-nazi. Just look at all the photos of Catholic leaders w Franco in Spain and Mussolini in Italia giving the fascist salute. And all the priests blessing the SS in the field, or the horrible Church atrocities in Croatia during the War.

[michael mills]

For 700 years prior to the 20th century, outrages by the various church sects in Europe against Jews fertilized the soil in preparation for the 'Final Solution'

That assertion is belied by the fact that it was precisely in Christian Europe, the place where the Christian Church actually had political power, that the largest population of Jews survived up until the present.

If the Church had wanted to eliminate Judaism in Christian lands, it could easily have done so, in the same way as it was able to eliminate all pre-Christian religions and all heresies within Christianity itself. In that case, Jews would have been given the choice between conversion to Christianity or death or exile, and the Jews would have disappeared from Europe in Medieval times, just as the practitioners of pre-Christian religions and Catharism disappeared.

The fact is that the Church did not want to destroy Judaism or the Jewish people. To be sure it preached that the Jews had lost the favour of God through their rejection of the divinity of Jesus Nazarenus, and that they deserved punishment by being relegated to a subordinate position. But the Church also preached that the Jewish people should be preserved so that it could be converted and thereby usher in the Second Coming.

A prime example is provided by the Jews of Rome, who lived there uninterruptedly since before the Roman Empire adopted Christianity, and were never expelled, even though they were situated at the very heart of the Church's power. Surely if the Church had wanted to eliminate the Jews from all Christian lands, the Jews of Rome would have been the first to go.

[michael mills]

Whilst you are basically right, Lanz-Liebenfels did a lot to help Hitler develop his antisemitism.

In fact, research into Hitler's early life has shown that he did not become fully anti-Semitic until after the First World War, under the influence of refugees from Bolshevik Russia such as Rosenberg.

In his Vienna years be was not any more anti-Jewish than the average Austrian, and he actually had friendly relations with a number of Jews. Nor did he show any anti-Jewish tendencies while he was serving with the Bavarian Army during the First World War.