Walter Benjamin derided Werner Scholem as a ‘rogue’ in 1924. Josef Stalin referred him as a ‘splendid man’, but soon backtracked and labeled him an ‘imbecile’, while Ernst Thälmann, chairman of the Communist Party of Germany (KPD), warned his followers against the dangers of ‘Scholemism’. For the philosopher and historian Gershom Scholem, however, Werner was first and foremost his older brother. The life of German-Jewish Communist Werner Scholem (1895–1940) had many facets. Werner and Gerhard, later Gershom, rebelled together against their authoritarian father and the atmosphere of national chauvinism engulfing Germany during World War I. After inspiring his younger brother to take up the Zionist cause, Werner himself underwent a long personal journey before deciding to join the Communist struggle. Scholem climbed the party ladder and orchestrated the KPD's ‘Bolshevisation’ campaign, only to be expelled as one of Stalin's opponents in 1926. He was arrested in 1933, and ultimately murdered in the Buchenwald concentration camp seven years later. This first biography of Werner Scholem tells his life story by drawing on a wide range of original sources and archive material long hidden beyond the Iron Curtain of the Cold War era. First published in German by UVK Verlagsgesellschaft as Werner Scholem - eine politische Biographie (1895-1940), Konstanz, 2014.

The first comprehensive history of the German Jews on the eve of Hitler's seizure of power, this book examines both their internal debates and their relations with larger German society. It shows that, far from being united, German Jewry was deeply divided along religious, political, and ideological fault lines. Above all, the liberal majority of patriotic and assimilationist Jews was forced to sharpen its self-definition by the onslaught of Zionist zealots who denied the "Germanness" of the Jews. This struggle for the heart and soul of German Jewry was fought at every level, affecting families, synagogues, and community institutions. Although the Jewish role in Germany's economy and culture was exaggerated, they were certainly prominent in many fields, giving rise to charges of privilege and domination. This volume probes the texture of German anti-Semitism, distinguishing between traditional and radical Judeophobia and reaching conclusions that will give no comfort to those who assume that Germans were predisposed to become "willing executioners" under Hitler. It also assesses the quality of Jewish responses to racist attacks. The self-defense campaigns of the Central Association of German Citizens of the Jewish Faith included publishing counter-propaganda, supporting sympathetic political parties, and taking anti-Semitic demagogues to court. Although these measures could only slow the rise of Nazism after 1930, they demonstrate that German Jewry was anything but passive in its responses to the fascist challenge. The German Jews' faith in liberalism is sometimes attributed to self-delusion and wishful thinking. This volume argues that, in fact, German Jewry pursued a clear-sighted perception of Jewish self-interest, apprehended the dangers confronting it, and found allies in socialist and democratic elements that constituted the "other Germany." Sadly, this profound and genuine commitment to liberalism left the German Jews increasingly isolated as the majority of Germans turned to political radicalism in the last years of the Republic. This full-scale history of Weimar Jewry will be of interest to professors, students, and general readers interested in the Holocaust and Jewish History. Donald L. Niewyk studied at the Free University of Berlin and Tulane. He has taught at Xavier University and Ithaca College, and since 1982, he has been a professor of modern European history at Southern Methodist University. He is author of six books, including most recently Fresh Wounds: Early Narratives of Holocaust Survival.

The first comprehensive history of the German Jews on the eve of Hitler's seizure of power, this book examines both their internal debates and their relations with larger German society. It shows that, far from being united, German Jewry was deeply divided along religious, political, and ideological fault lines. Above all, the liberal majority of patriotic and assimilationist Jews was forced to sharpen its self-definition by the onslaught of Zionist zealots who denied the "Germanness" of the Jews. This struggle for the heart and soul of German Jewry was fought at every level, affecting families, synagogues, and community institutions.Although the Jewish role in Germany's economy and culture was exaggerated, they were certainly prominent in many fields, giving rise to charges of privilege and domination. This volume probes the texture of German anti-Semitism, distinguishing between traditional and radical Judeophobia and reaching conclusions that will give no comfort to those who assume that Germans were predisposed to become "willing executioners" under Hitler. It also assesses the quality of Jewish responses to racist attacks. The self-defense campaigns of the Central Association of German Citizens of the Jewish Faith included publishing counter-propaganda, supporting sympathetic political parties, and taking anti-Semitic demagogues to court. Although these measures could only slow the rise of Nazism after 1930, they demonstrate that German Jewry was anything but passive in its responses to the fascist challenge.The German Jews' faith in liberalism is sometimes attributed to self-delusion and wishful thinking. This volume argues that, in fact, German Jewry pursued a clear-sighted perception of Jewish self-interest, apprehended the dangers confronting it, and found allies in socialist and democratic elements that constituted the "other Germany." Sadly, this profound and genuine commitment to liberalism left the German Jews increasingly isolated as the majority of Germans turned to political radicalism in the last years of the Republic. This full-scale history of Weimar Jewry will be of interest to professors, students, and general readers interested in the Holocaust and Jewish History.

The Nazi Holocaust is one of the most momentous events in human history. Yet, it remains on many levels a baffling and unfathomable mystery. By shunning simplistic 'explanations' Ronnie Landau has set out, in a clear, thought-provoking and enlightened fashion, to mediate betweeen this vast, often unapproachable subject and the reader who wrestles with its meaning. Locating the Holocaust within a number of different contexts - Jewish history, German history, genocide in the modern age, the larger story of human bigotry and the triumph of ideology over conscience - Landau penetrates to the very heart of its moral and historical significance. Deeply concerned lest the Holocaust, as a 'unique' phenomenon, be cordoned off from the rest of human history and ghettoized within the highly charged realm of 'Jewish experience', he is at pains to show that transmitting understanding of the Holocaust is about connecting with all humanity.Intended both for the general reader and for students and academics (especially in history, psychology, literature and the humanities), this work is an important breakthrough in the struggle to perpetuate the memory of a tragedy which the world is all too ready to forget.

Jews and Germans is the only book in English to delve fully into the history and challenges of the German-Jewish relationship, from before the Holocaust to the present day. The Weimar Republic era—the fifteen years between Germany’s defeat in World War I (1918) and Hitler’s accession (1933)—has been characterized as a time of unparalleled German-Jewish concord and collaboration. Even though Jews constituted less than 1 percent of the German population, they occupied a significant place in German literature, music, theater, journalism, science, and many other fields. Was that German-Jewish relationship truly reciprocal? How has it evolved since the Holocaust, and what can it become? Beginning with the German Jews’ struggle for emancipation, Guenter Lewy describes Jewish life during the heyday of the Weimar Republic, particularly the Jewish writers, left-wing intellectuals, combat veterans, and adult and youth organizations. With this history as a backdrop he examines the deeply disparate responses among Jews when the Nazis assumed power. Lewy then elucidates Jewish life in postwar West Germany; in East Germany, where Jewish communists searched for a second German-Jewish symbiosis based on Marxist principles; and finally in the united Germany—illuminating the complexities of fraught relationships over time.

The Germany between the two world wars, which produced some of the greatest literary lights of the century, also produced a forum worthy of them: the brilliantly edited, crusading, lef-oriented (but not party-affiliated) Weltbühne. The present book tells the history of this weekly Berlin journal, discusses the men that ran it and wrote it, and outlines the causes for which it fought. The Weltbühne had three editors--the uncompromising style-conscious Siegfried Jacobsohn, the sharp-tongued, satirical Kurt Tucholsky, and the enigmatic, aristocratic Carl von Ossietzky, martyred by the Nazis. The radical, intellectual elite of Germany (and to come extent outside Germany) contributed to the journal -- Heinrich Mann, Alfred Polgar, Erich Kästner, Alfred Doblin, Bertolt Brecht, Leonhard Frank, Theodor Plievier, Rene Schickele, Lion Feuchtwanger, Ernst Toller, Arnold Zweig; also Arthur Koestler, Romain Rolland, Henry Barbusse, and Leon Trotsky. These men stood for the demilitarization of Germany, the purge of the reactionary administration and judiciary, the end of all restraints on human rights (including the restraints on abortion and homosexuality), complete equality of women, pacifist educational policies, the intellectualization of politics and politicization of the intellectuals, unity of the working-class parties, and socialism. When, on May 11, 1933, on Opera Square in Berlin, the stormtroopers burned books of fifteen authors sinning against the German Volk, thirteen of them had made contribution to the Weltbühne; and since many of them were Jews, the auto-da-fé gave special pleasure to the mob. Mr. Deak recreates with unusual empathy the atmosphere of the era, characterized by terrific social and political issues, which eventually lead to the disaster of the Thirties. The campaigns of the Weltbühne failed, and the contributors were killed or went into exile, with the journal itself moving from Berlin to Vienna to Prague to Paris before it died. Mr. Deak makes a lasting contribution to history by opening to a broader public the records preserved in the pages of this important but largely ignored journal, by selecting and interpreting the issues, and by brining to life the personalities that gave the era its intellectual profile. And understanding of the Weltbühne campaigns is indispensable for an appraisal of Central European politics in the first half of our century. Mr. Deak, in this readable book written with the passionate interest of a person who seems to have been a participant rather than a chronicler, makes this understanding possible by a lucid exposition and a searching analysis of the events. This title is part of UC Press's Voices Revived program, which commemorates University of California Press's mission to seek out and cultivate the brightest minds and give them voice, reach, and impact. Drawing on a backlist dating to 1893, Voices Revived makes high-quality, peer-reviewed scholarship accessible once again using print-on-demand technology. This title was originally published in 1968.

The genocide of Jewish and non-Jewish civilians perpetrated by the German regime during World War Two continues to confront scholars with elusive questions even after nearly seventy years and hundreds of studies. This multi-contributory work is a landmark publication that sees experts renowned in their field addressing these questions in light of current research. A comprehensive introduction to the history of the Holocaust, this volume has 42 chapters which add important depth to the academic study of the Holocaust, both geographically and topically. The chapters address such diverse issues as: continuities in German and European history with respect to genocide prior to 1939 the eugenic roots of Nazi anti-Semitism the response of Europe's Jewish Communities to persecution and destruction the Final Solution as the German occupation instituted it across Europe rescue and rescuer motivations the problem of prosecuting war crimes gender and Holocaust experience the persecution of non-Jewish victims the Holocaust in postwar cultural venues. This important collection will be essential reading for all those interested in the history of the Holocaust.

The series was designed in response to the research experiences accumulated by the Center for Research on Antisemitism of Berlin Technical University since 1982. The first two volumes presented normative thinking on the social and psychological mechanisms effective in antisemitism. The present volum