Buddhist Catholic Contemplative Evangelical General Christian Hindu Jewish Latter-day Saint Muslim New Visions Progressive Christian

Beliefs

Topics

Columnists

Resource Library

Research Tools

Video

Podcasts

Thought Readers

Faith In Media Tracker

Newsletters

Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In Subscription Support

Follow Patheos

Home
Latter-day Saint
History and Religion
Gathering lessons from the past, both good and ill

Gathering lessons from the past, both good and ill

Last updated on: May 16, 2024 at 3:25 pm by Dan Peterson

0 Comments

Gathering lessons from the past, both good and ill 2024-05-16T15:25:38-06:00 Dan Peterson

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

A photo from Jeff Bradshaw, who is currently in Cotonou, Benin: “Geoffroy Koussemou and his wife have five lovely daughters. The oldest at left is waiting for a mission call. He was one of the first members in the Church here.”

I’m pleased to report that Jeff Bradshaw and others working on the Interpreter Foundation’s Not by Bread Alone film project are safely landed in Africa, where they have already begun their work.

I’m also pleased to note the appearance of a new article on the website of the Interpreter Foundation — which, according to its critics, is ever dying, but which is somehow never able to come to a direct knowledge of clinical death: “Hugh Nibley Observed: ““Words, Words, Words”: Hugh Nibley on the Book of Mormon,” written by Marilyn Arnold.

Photo and caption from Jeff Bradshaw, in Cotonou, Benin: “Our first interview was with Rogatien Lokosso (right), who studied many years to become a Catholic priest, but was immediately converted when he felt the truth of the missionaries’ words touch him, back when there was only one group in the entire country. He has been a faithful leader, now 80 years old, but doesn’t seem it. N’aouta Lamine (at left) was one of his counselors when he was bishop.

Very interesting! “Newly mapped lost branch of the Nile could help solve long-standing pyramid mystery”

Neuschwanstein Castle was designed and built on a romantic pseudo-medieval Wagnerian theme by the “mad” King Ludwig II of Bavaria. And, somehow, a fairy tale castle seems a perfect illustration for this blog entry. (Wikimedia Commons public domain image)

A couple of years ago, I bought a few books at the bookshop at KZ-Dachau, the former Nazi concentration camp located near Munich. One of them was Hitler: Die 101 wichtigsten Fragen (Munich: Verlag C. H. Beck, 2019). It was written by Volker Ullrich, who has also written several other books on German history, including a two-volume study of Adolf Hitler (2013, 2018). Here, in my translation, are three of the passages that I marked while reading Hitler: Die 101 wichtigsten Fragen. I hope that you too will find them of interest:

Hitler needed only five months to establish his dictatorship. By the summer of 1933, basic rights and the constitution had been nullified, the individual German states had been “coordinated,” the labor unions had been smashed, all political parties except the NSDAP [the Nazi Party] had been forbidden or dissolved, the print and broadcast media had been brought into line, the legal equality of the Jews had been abolished. It was not only the speed with which the transformation was accomplished that astonishes, but the ease with which it was done. “Everything that existed in Germany outside the National Socialist Party ,” reported the French ambassador in Berlin, André François-Poncet, “was destroyed, scattered, dissolved, annexed, or assimilated.” Hitler won over the Party at little cost. “He merely needed to puff, and the edifice of German politics collapsed like a house of cards.” (70)

The speed and ease with which Nazism transformed Germany from a free democracy into a totalitarian dictatorship should give all of us pause. And here’s something else that might be worthy of reflection:

Hitler’s private library has been estimated to have contained more than 16,000 volumes. U.S. soldiers discovered just a portion of it, roughly 3,000 volumes, in a salt mine near Berchtesgaden in the spring of 1945. Of those volumes, approximately 12oo made their way in the fifties to the Library of Congress in Washington. There, the American historian and journalist Timothy W. Ryback undertook a methodical investigation into not merely what Hitler read but how he read. For example, in his copy of the newly published 1934 Deutsche Schriften of the Jew-hater Paul de Lagarde, Hitler marked more than one hundred pages with underlining, vertical lines on the margin, and exclamation marks — though question marks were rare. From this emerges the conclusion that reading didn’t help Hitler to gain new insights but rather to reinforce his preexisting convictions. He was seeking mosaic pieces that could be fitted into his already-existing picture of the world. An avid reader, he stored in his memory what he could use for his purposes. Everything else he quickly forgot. (98)

It is imperative, of course, that we not follow Hitler in his approach to reading. (It is clearly imperative, of course, that we not follow him in much of anything at all!)

In an address at the Berghof on 22 August 1939 to the foremost commanders of the military, Hitler laid out how he pictured the war against Poland [which would be launched on 1 September]: “Heart closed against mercy. Brutal procedure. . . . The stronger has that right. Maximum hardness.” The dictator had thereby made it unmistakably clear that the imminent campaign would violate the norms of traditional warfare. Poland was conceived as an experimental laboratory for the re-ordering of Europe according to racial-ideological criteria. For the very first time, this would be a concrete test of what the “conquest of living space [Lebensraum]” actually meant. (124)

On the Königssee, not far from Hitler’s mountain retreat in the Bavarian Alps.
(Wikimedia Commons public domain photograph). The contrast between the beauty of Hitler’s beloved mountains and the hell that his regime created for millions of human beings has always stunned and amazed me.

But Hitler was a relative piker. An amateur, right? The contents of the Christopher Hitchens Memorial “How Religion Poisons Everything” File™ make it absolutely clear that the abominations perpetrated by theism and theists aren’t merely sudden “crimes of passion.” In many cases, as in this one, they are the product of cold, cruel calculation and long-term planning: “Taking the Long View: Latter-day Saints Continue to Help Brazil Flood Victims: “When the waters recede and things begin to return to normal — for the next few years — people will need help, and we cannot fail to notice that,” says Brazil Area President”

As, probably, these also were:

“Canadian Youth Participate in Global Youth Service Month”

“Empowering Education in West Africa: Enhancing the Succeed in School Program in Sierra Leone: Program administrators meet with local Church leaders in Freetown”

“Mothers in Pakistan and Yemen Find Hope in the Fight Against Maternal and Neonatal Tetanus: The Church supports UNICEF’s efforts to eliminate deadly maternal and neonatal tetanus in Africa and the Middle East”

And so the dreary litany of religious offenses goes on and on and on.

History and Religion

Travel and Religion

Previous Post

May 15, 2024

Of Decision-Making and Ignorance

Next Post

May 17, 2024 A really serious challenge

Recent Comments

0 | Leave a Comment

"I have cpnsidered in my mond if the 4 volume Saints could be made into ..."

John Pack Lambert

From Serbia’s “White City,” Belgrade

"DP: “But Mr. Sutherland worries about the fact that our time, when we can communicate ..."

Theodore Brandley

Learning more about a region of ..."

"Another class of memories are of individuals who previously lived. Some of these remembered individuals ..."

PlasmaMiasma

Accounts of Premortality?

"Sutherland's lecture sounds interesting. He seems to restate the Washington consensus that trade brings peace ..."

B. Wilson

Learning more about a region of ..."

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category Uncategorized

Select a Month October 2026 September 2026 August 2026 July 2026 June 2026 May 2026 April 2026 March 2026 February 2026 January 2026 December 2025 November 2025 October 2025 September 2025 August 2025 July 2025 June 2025 May 2025 April 2025 March 2025 February 2025 January 2025 December 2024 November 2024 October 2024 September 2024 August 2024 July 2024 June 2024 May 2024 April 2024 March 2024 February 2024 January 2024 December 2023 November 2023 October 2023 September 2023 August 2023 July 2023 June 2023 May 2023 April 2023 March 2023 February 2023 January 2023 December 2022 November 2022 October 2022 September 2022 August 2022 July 2022 June 2022 May 2022 April 2022 March 2022 February 2022 January 2022 December 2021 November 2021 October 2021 September 2021 August 2021 July 2021 June 2021 May 2021 April 2021 March 2021 February 2021 January 2021 December 2020 November 2020 October 2020 September 2020 August 2020 July 2020 June 2020 May 2020 April 2020 March 2020 February 2020 January 2020 December 2019 November 2019 October 2019 September 2019 August 2019 July 2019 June 2019 May 2019 April 2019 March 2019 February 2019 January 2019 December 2018 November 2018 October 2018 September 2018 August 2018 July 2018 June 2018 May 2018 April 2018 March 2018 February 2018 January 2018 December 2017 November 2017 October 2017 September 2017 August 2017 July 2017 June 2017 May 2017 April 2017 March 2017 February 2017 January 2017 December 2016 November 2016 October 2016 September 2016 August 2016 July 2016 June 2016 May 2016 April 2016 March 2016 February 2016 January 2016 December 2015 November 2015 October 2015 September 2015 August 2015 July 2015 June 2015 May 2015 April 2015 March 2015 February 2015 January 2015 December 2014 November 2014 March 2014 August 2013 February 2012

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz

What does Paul tell Timothy to flee from in 2 Timothy?

Select your answer to see how you score.

Evil desires of youth Persecution False teaching The love of money