the event at 92nd St Y was scheduled to be video-linked to at least one other location. Temple Sinai in Pittsburgh placed radio ads on the local NPR affiliate -- a week before, then again for two days before the event. It was advertised as "open to the entire community," to hold a "civil discussion" of Israel-Palestine conflict.
I attend most of the J Street events at Temple Sinai or the nearby Jewish Community Center, and have come to know and respect the founder of the local group, Nancy Bernstein, and also have become acquainted with other regular participants in discussions that J Street conducts about every 6 weeks. I'm usually the only non-Jewish person in the group; early on, another non-Jew attended but he has not returned.
The meeting yesterday evening was scheduled to begin at 7:30 but I didn't arrive until 8:00: I was not sure it was a good idea for me to attend; I was afraid I would embarrass myself or say something out of line, so I called a dear friend to discuss with her the advisability of participating in an event that might get heated. I told her that I called her at 6:45 pm so that I would be talking when I should be leaving for the meeting, and our discussion would force a decision-by-default. We talked until 7:45, then I decided to go anyway, hurriedly jumped into the car and got to the event just in time to hear the Rabbi explain that 92nd St Y had "inexplicably" canceled the event in NYC, so we would not hear Christiane Amanpour.
Instead, four members of the congregation who were going to moderate the 92nd Street program, were called upon to pinch hit: each of the four spoke for 5 minutes (the Rabbi timed each and kept the event under tight order). Then, members of the audience were given one minute (timed by the Rabbi) to ask a question, and the four member panel responded. Only 4 or 5 questions from the audience were handled in that way.
Although the event was advertised to and for the broad community, once again, I'm pretty sure I was the only non-Jew among the 50 to 75 participants. No person who was not Jewish made any comment or was heard.
Phil and Adam, you know that I am an antisemite; that's why you banned me.
I wasn't always an antisemite. Years ago I lived in the home of a Jewish family who were members of Temple Sinai. My position in the family was as a companion to the family's elderly matriarch; I had accompanied her to Temple Sinai on numerous occasions. I loved Ida K. and she loved me, like mother and daughter.
Perhaps that's why it is so painful to hear hate and mendacity that I heard last night at Temple Sinai.
God bless Dr. Naftali, who spoke first, and, I thought, laid a foundation for what seemed to suggest a very different approach to the issue. Naftali said he wished to speak "not about what has happened but what is possible." He told the audience he was born in Haifa in 1951, and that from his early childhood he remembered how much he enjoyed the fine wood and beautiful details of the home where he lived with his parents, holocaust survivors. The house had been the home of a Palestinian family. He knew that in one part of his being; it was a fact like any other that a child knows. Dr. Naftali said that he matured, he realized that "the catastrophe of others was the price of his good life." Naftali spoke of the excitement and joy of the 1967 war, and also of the thrill of fear that he can still feel from that event. He marked it as the moment when Israel lost its soul. He called the twelve years after intifada (? or Oslo? my notes are fragmented) a "moral wasteland" for Israel.
In discussing his military service, Naftali noted that he lost 3 friends, who for some unknown reason were in Beirut when Israel started "that disgusting and immoral war" against Lebanon that was waged "for no reason other than to maintain dominance of power."
Similarly, Naftali registered abhorrence at the Gaza campaign, in which he lost three dear friends -- Dr. Abuelaish's children, who were known to him and were friends of his. This was the ONLY TIME in the entire duration of the event that Dr. Abuelaish was mentioned.
Then the other three persons began their comments. It was appalling. Nancy was first; even she slid into the standard Israel first rhetoric that someone like me recognizes all too frequently. Jewish people seem to have silos of thinking and speaking, and a rehearsed set of statements; it's as if their brains are cast in a mould that can comprehend and express only a pre-formed thought process and is incapable of even acknowledging that a different way of assessing facts, or a different set of facts, might exist. Nancy's comments were otherwise unremarkable: "growing up in DC I know the pain of My People . . .two-state is possible; 2400 people in DC; 500 students from 128 colleges -- the BEST colleges; 700 people lobbied Congress; Israel faces a threat to its Jewish character . . ."
The other two speakers were repugnantly and repulsively anti-Palestinian. One of those two, a past head of the local AIPAC, insisted that "Israel wants peace," then recited a list of headlines from Palestinian Authority media with the purpose of demonstrating that there IS no partner for peace. He said that Palestinians had squandered every opportunity for peace, listing from 1937 to the present the 6 or 7 opportunities that Palestinians had jettisoned. The former AIPAC leader was incensed at the notion that the US administration should be involved in pressuring Israel to make peace; it's condescending and patronizing." [So why was he a part of AIPAC, whose mission is to lobby US Congress on behalf of Israel?] He insisted that "settlements are not the issue; it's not about land," but rather, about the "existential threat to the Jewish people," and, his coup de grâce: the Palestinian Authority refuses to teach their children about the Holocaust. "We need to look into the education of Palestinian children; they need to learn about the holocaust."
Nancy affirmed Mr. AIPAC's declaration-- "Many children are not exposed" to holocaust education." She registered disappointment that no Palestinians were in the audience or on the panel, and said that future events would attempt to change that.
Mr. AIPAC said "J Street is the wrong tool to use,"
Most of the discussion between the panel members and between panel-and-audience devolved into "J Street good" "J Street bad" inside-Jewish-baseball attacks and counter-attacks.
As I recall them, the questions from the audience raised these issues:
Question 1. "Most Palestinians are Jordanian, so shouldn't they go back to Jordan." Responders corrected the Questioner's misapprehension, and asserted that "Jews should be able to live in Palestine and Palestinians should be able to live in Israel."
Question 2. "Al Jazeera reported that Wikileaks revealed that Palestinians made many, many concessions that were ignored." Response: [this is a direct quote]: IN THEIR MINDS they made concessions -- they've lost so many wars, they SHOULD make concessions." The responder continued, The Israelis are wise to proceed as they have; I trust Israel's government; they have been elected by the people.
Question 3. "First, Israel treats people badly. My second point, when Gershom Gorenberg spoke here he told us that settlements are illegal, and that Israel knows that the settlements are illegal." Can you comment? [I was at the Gershom Gorenberg talk. He showed on the large screen the document stating that the Israeli settlements are illegal. He came upon the document in archives that he spent five years attempting to search.]
My notes about the response to that questioner say only that Mr. AIPAC said, "thank god for Christian zionists."
I'm afraid I didn't stay and mingle after the panel was dismissed and people made their exits. I should have at least offered Dr. Naftali my hand in support; he was badly outnumbered. As I recall, 'Naftali' is a Sephardic name. I further recall David Sasha's explanation of pilpul-- it is an Ashkenazi technique, not practiced by Sephardic scholars. Facts are sometimes inconvenient things; Dr. Naftali has taken account of facts as they are, not as the received (Ashkenazi) narrative declares them to be. Since his mind is not pre-formed, he is able to make adjustment for other versions of reality without losing his identity.
And as I review my notes on the questions, it is heartening to see that most of the questioners were, like Dr. Naftali, far more rational and critical in their understanding than were three of the four panelists. "If the people lead, the leaders will follow."
The Rabbi closed the event with a brief explanation of a Torah passage (sorry, I don't have the citation) -- about two kinds of argument: "argument NOT for the sake of heaven," and "argument FOR the sake of heaven." He urged the group to argue FOR the sake of heaven.
Showing posts with label antisemitism. Show all posts
Showing posts with label antisemitism. Show all posts
Tuesday, March 8, 2011
Monday, March 7, 2011
Rvw of "The Popes Against the Jews: the Vatican's Role in the Rise of Modern Anti-Semitism"
The Popes Against the Jews: the Vatican's Role in the Rise of Modern Anti-Semitism
by David I. Kertzer. Published by Knopf.
Just what role, if any, did the Roman Catholic Church play in the development of anti-semitism during the modern era? This is a serious question, because the answer to it also helps us answer the question of what sort of culpability the Roman Catholic Church has for the eventual Holocaust and deaths of millions of Jews.
Although David Kertzer is certainly not the first historian to tackle the Vatican's role in the Holocaust, he does approach the issue from an unusual perspective. Usually, when people address this issue, they focus on the years immediately surrounding World War II, and only look at the Vatican's actions which related directly to Germany and the Holocaust.
Kertzer, however, takes a much broader view and attempts to find out just what sort of ideological responsibility the Vatican has. After gaining access to large amounts of previously unavailable Vatican material, he delves into the role the Vatican may have played in the development of modern anti-semitism, an ideology which played a large role in the eventual attempt to exterminate Europe's Jews.
The Vatican has attempted to try and deal with its ideological responsibility in this area, and in 1998, it isued the report "We Remember: A Reflection on the Shoah," which was supposed to exonerate the Church of complicity in the Holocaust. The thesis of this report is essentially that the Holocaust grew out of "an anti-Judaism that was essentially more sociological and political than religious."
In this way, the Vatican can take responsibility for the obvious and ancient religious prejudice while refusing to take responsibility for the modern racial and social prejudices which have come to be labeled anti-semitism. But is this distinction accurate? According to Kertzer, this report is "not the product of a Church that wants to confront its history," because the distinction created simply does not exist.
There are a number of key ideas which Kertzer describes as characterizing modern anti-semitism:
All of these developed largely due to a fear of modernity. Socially, the Jews were the group which benefited from modernity in some of the largest and most obvious ways. Because of this, at least in part, they became identified with modernity unlike any other group, and thus they became the scapegoat of modernity.
This explains why the anti-semitism in Catholic literature actually increased during the 19th century, rather than decreasing or remaining constant. Anti-semitism became a vital component of Catholic identity during these years, because it was the easiest way to communicate anti-modernism. As such, it was a new development rather than vestiges of medieval attitudes.
The characteristics listed above all share another important thing in common: all but a couple were very prominent in the beliefs and writings of the Roman Catholic Church, especially during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. It is because of this fact, exhaustively documented in Kertzer's book, that it is impossible to exhonerate the Church from responsibility for having helped develop the ideology behind the Holocuast.
The Vatican has tried to argue that their anti-Judaism was never "racial," but this can be demonstrated as false:
A good example of someone who explicitly used race when condemning the Jews was a French priest named Ernest Jouin who wrote during the 1920s, "From the triple viewpoint of race, of nationality, and of religion, the Jew has become the enemy of humanity." According to the Vatican, this is the sort of attitude which it rejected and condemned - yet Jouin was never criticized for his anti-semitic diatribes.
In fact, Pope Benedict XV made a point of praising Jouin's work. Shortly after Jouin published the first French edition of the "Protocols of the Elders of Zion," Pius XI praised him in a private audience because he was "combating our mortal enemy." It is worth noting that Pius XI has been seen in a very favorable light regarding the suffering of the Jews, but in a report of his while he was examining the situation in Poland following World War I, he stated, "One of the most evil and strongest influences that is felt here, perhaps the strongest and the most evil, is that of the Jews."
The Vatican has also tried to argue that in their anti-Judaism, they never portrayed the Jews as "irredeemable." This would be an important difference, because acceptance of it would cause people to move away from attempted conversions and toward expulsion or extermination as a "solution" to the "Jewish problem." But again, it is a difference that does not really exist:
The fact of the matter should now be clear: fascist anti-semitism in the twentieth century was a direct ideological outgrowth of Catholic anti-semitism of the nineteenth century. The connection is so close that many of the fascist anti-semitic policies and programs are direct inheritances from Vatican policies.
The chapter on Austria from the time of Pope Pius IX in the mid 19th century through the early 20th century is particularly interesting. For most of the book, Ketzer focuses on the actions of the Vatican in the areas where they had political control, because it is here that the responsibility of others can be factored out. Indeed, Ketzer is able to demonstrate that Jews had more rights and freedoms in many other places in Europe than they did while under the direct control of the Vatican.
But Austria, and particularly Vienna, during the late 19th and early 20th centuries is an especially important time period, because it was here that Adolf Hitler developed his political and social views towards the Jews. As Ketzer describes the situation, the papal nuncio, Monsignor Antonio Agliardi, enthusiastically supported the aggressively anti-Semitic political leader Karl Lueger, head of the nationalist Christian Socialist party, even though the Austrian church hierarchy itself was disturbed by Lueger's extremism.
The Vatican's attempt to make a distinction between its older, "religious" anti-semitism and the more recent "political" anti-semitism is not a new development. On the contrary, it first started just prior to World War II, when a few religious leaders started to realize that the anti-semitism they helped create might get out of their control.
As a result, they tried to tell people that there was a difference between the "good" anti-semitism promoted justly by the Church and the "bad" anti-semitism promoted by self-serving politicians and hate-mongers. But how could anyone really tell the difference? A good example of this comes from a pastoral letter written by the leading churchman of Poland, August Cardinal Hlond, in which he describes the Jews as "the vanguard of atheism, the Bolshevik movement and revolutionary activity." He added, however, that "one may not hate anyone. Not even Jews."
***Was Card. Hlond's statement factually correct? Did the facts that Hlond stated cause problems in the countries affected by them? Did NO ONE have a right to protest acts that were antithetical to the indigenous values? Does the community have the right to protest ideologies that it abhors, particularly when they are imposed from outside the community? ***
It must be remembered, of course, that the Vatican did not cause the Holocaust. It must also be remembered that even during the times when Catholic anti-semitism was at its worst, there were many Catholics who did not accept it. But if we can remember that, the Vatican should also be expected to remember just what responsibility - ideological and actual - it does bear. Instead, the truth is hidden or denied, which ultimately leads to victimizing the Jews all over again.
*** Jews must be expected to remember just what responsibility - ideological and actual - they do bear. Instead, the truth is hidden or denied, which ultimately enables Jews to subvert other communities all over again. ***
by David I. Kertzer. Published by Knopf.
Just what role, if any, did the Roman Catholic Church play in the development of anti-semitism during the modern era? This is a serious question, because the answer to it also helps us answer the question of what sort of culpability the Roman Catholic Church has for the eventual Holocaust and deaths of millions of Jews.
Although David Kertzer is certainly not the first historian to tackle the Vatican's role in the Holocaust, he does approach the issue from an unusual perspective. Usually, when people address this issue, they focus on the years immediately surrounding World War II, and only look at the Vatican's actions which related directly to Germany and the Holocaust.
Kertzer, however, takes a much broader view and attempts to find out just what sort of ideological responsibility the Vatican has. After gaining access to large amounts of previously unavailable Vatican material, he delves into the role the Vatican may have played in the development of modern anti-semitism, an ideology which played a large role in the eventual attempt to exterminate Europe's Jews.
The Vatican has attempted to try and deal with its ideological responsibility in this area, and in 1998, it isued the report "We Remember: A Reflection on the Shoah," which was supposed to exonerate the Church of complicity in the Holocaust. The thesis of this report is essentially that the Holocaust grew out of "an anti-Judaism that was essentially more sociological and political than religious."
In this way, the Vatican can take responsibility for the obvious and ancient religious prejudice while refusing to take responsibility for the modern racial and social prejudices which have come to be labeled anti-semitism. But is this distinction accurate? According to Kertzer, this report is "not the product of a Church that wants to confront its history," because the distinction created simply does not exist.
There are a number of key ideas which Kertzer describes as characterizing modern anti-semitism:
There is a secret Jewish conspiracy; the Jews seek to conquer the world; Jews are an evil sect who seek to do Christians harm; Jews are by nature immoral; Jews care only for money and will do anything to get it; Jews control the press; Jews control the banks and are responsible for the conomic ruination of untold numbers of Christian families; Jews are responsible for communism; Judaism commands its adherents to murder defenseless Christian children and drink their blood; Jews seek to destroy the Christian religion; Jews are unpatriotic, ever ready to sell their country out to the enemy; for the larger society to be properly protected, Jews must be segregated and their rights limited.
All of these developed largely due to a fear of modernity. Socially, the Jews were the group which benefited from modernity in some of the largest and most obvious ways. Because of this, at least in part, they became identified with modernity unlike any other group, and thus they became the scapegoat of modernity.
This explains why the anti-semitism in Catholic literature actually increased during the 19th century, rather than decreasing or remaining constant. Anti-semitism became a vital component of Catholic identity during these years, because it was the easiest way to communicate anti-modernism. As such, it was a new development rather than vestiges of medieval attitudes.
The characteristics listed above all share another important thing in common: all but a couple were very prominent in the beliefs and writings of the Roman Catholic Church, especially during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. It is because of this fact, exhaustively documented in Kertzer's book, that it is impossible to exhonerate the Church from responsibility for having helped develop the ideology behind the Holocuast.
The Vatican has tried to argue that their anti-Judaism was never "racial," but this can be demonstrated as false:
...the Church was in fact involved in the development of racial thinking about Jews. Nor was this new. Views of biological differences between Jews and Christians, although contradicting other important aspects of Christian theology, have a long history in the church. These helped prepare Catholics in the late nineteenth century and into the twentieth for further developments in racial thinking, some of which came into open conflict with Church teachings on the oneness of humankind.
A good example of someone who explicitly used race when condemning the Jews was a French priest named Ernest Jouin who wrote during the 1920s, "From the triple viewpoint of race, of nationality, and of religion, the Jew has become the enemy of humanity." According to the Vatican, this is the sort of attitude which it rejected and condemned - yet Jouin was never criticized for his anti-semitic diatribes.
In fact, Pope Benedict XV made a point of praising Jouin's work. Shortly after Jouin published the first French edition of the "Protocols of the Elders of Zion," Pius XI praised him in a private audience because he was "combating our mortal enemy." It is worth noting that Pius XI has been seen in a very favorable light regarding the suffering of the Jews, but in a report of his while he was examining the situation in Poland following World War I, he stated, "One of the most evil and strongest influences that is felt here, perhaps the strongest and the most evil, is that of the Jews."
The Vatican has also tried to argue that in their anti-Judaism, they never portrayed the Jews as "irredeemable." This would be an important difference, because acceptance of it would cause people to move away from attempted conversions and toward expulsion or extermination as a "solution" to the "Jewish problem." But again, it is a difference that does not really exist:
Given the level of hostility against the Jews inculcated by the Church, popular commitment to the official Church position that Jews could be transformed from evil to good through the baptismal waters proved increasingly difficult to maintain. It strained credulity to imagine that a people so demonic could so easily be changed, that the person who until yesterday was Jewish could today be one of us.
The fact of the matter should now be clear: fascist anti-semitism in the twentieth century was a direct ideological outgrowth of Catholic anti-semitism of the nineteenth century. The connection is so close that many of the fascist anti-semitic policies and programs are direct inheritances from Vatican policies.
The chapter on Austria from the time of Pope Pius IX in the mid 19th century through the early 20th century is particularly interesting. For most of the book, Ketzer focuses on the actions of the Vatican in the areas where they had political control, because it is here that the responsibility of others can be factored out. Indeed, Ketzer is able to demonstrate that Jews had more rights and freedoms in many other places in Europe than they did while under the direct control of the Vatican.
But Austria, and particularly Vienna, during the late 19th and early 20th centuries is an especially important time period, because it was here that Adolf Hitler developed his political and social views towards the Jews. As Ketzer describes the situation, the papal nuncio, Monsignor Antonio Agliardi, enthusiastically supported the aggressively anti-Semitic political leader Karl Lueger, head of the nationalist Christian Socialist party, even though the Austrian church hierarchy itself was disturbed by Lueger's extremism.
The Vatican's attempt to make a distinction between its older, "religious" anti-semitism and the more recent "political" anti-semitism is not a new development. On the contrary, it first started just prior to World War II, when a few religious leaders started to realize that the anti-semitism they helped create might get out of their control.
As a result, they tried to tell people that there was a difference between the "good" anti-semitism promoted justly by the Church and the "bad" anti-semitism promoted by self-serving politicians and hate-mongers. But how could anyone really tell the difference? A good example of this comes from a pastoral letter written by the leading churchman of Poland, August Cardinal Hlond, in which he describes the Jews as "the vanguard of atheism, the Bolshevik movement and revolutionary activity." He added, however, that "one may not hate anyone. Not even Jews."
***Was Card. Hlond's statement factually correct? Did the facts that Hlond stated cause problems in the countries affected by them? Did NO ONE have a right to protest acts that were antithetical to the indigenous values? Does the community have the right to protest ideologies that it abhors, particularly when they are imposed from outside the community? ***
It must be remembered, of course, that the Vatican did not cause the Holocaust. It must also be remembered that even during the times when Catholic anti-semitism was at its worst, there were many Catholics who did not accept it. But if we can remember that, the Vatican should also be expected to remember just what responsibility - ideological and actual - it does bear. Instead, the truth is hidden or denied, which ultimately leads to victimizing the Jews all over again.
*** Jews must be expected to remember just what responsibility - ideological and actual - they do bear. Instead, the truth is hidden or denied, which ultimately enables Jews to subvert other communities all over again. ***
WE REMEMBER: A REFLECTION ON THE SHOAH Vatican, 1998
COMMISSION FOR RELIGIOUS RELATIONS WITH THE JEWS
WE REMEMBER: A REFLECTION ON THE SHOAH
At a press conference on March 16, 1998, Cardinal Cassidy, President of the Holy See's Commission For Religious Relations With the Jews, presented for publication the document, We Remember: A Reflection On The Shoah. Joining him in the presentation were Bishop Pierre Duprey, Vice President of the Commission, and Father Remi Hoeckmann, O.P., its Secretary.
We publish here Cardinal Cassidy's presentation of the document, along with Pope John Paul II's letter to the Cardinal about the document, and the text itself.
Presentation by Cardinal Edward Idris Cassidy
The Holy See has to date published, through its Commission for Religious Relations with the Jews, two significant documents intended for the application of the Second Vatican Council's Declaration Nostra Aetate, n. 4: the 1974 Guidelines and Suggestions; and the 1985 Notes on the Correct Way to Present the Jews and Judaism in Preaching and Catechesis in the Catholic Church.
Today it publishes another document, which the Holy See's Commission for Religious Relations with the Jews has prepared at the express request of His Holiness Pope John Paul II. This document, which contains a reflection on the Shoah, is another step on the path marked out by the Second Vatican Council in our relations with the Jewish people. In the words which His Holiness wrote in his letter to me as President of the Commission, it is our fervent hope "that the document [...] will help to heal the wounds of past misunderstandings and injustices".1
It is addressed to the Catholic faithful throughout the world, not only in Europe where the Shoah took place, hoping that all Christians will join their Catholic brothers and sisters in meditating on the catastrophe which befell the Jewish people, on its causes, and on the moral imperative to ensure that never again such a tragedy will happen. At the same time it asks our Jewish friends to hear us with an open heart.
On the occasion of a meeting in Rome on 31 August 1987 of representatives of the Holy See's Commission for Religious Relations with the Jews and of the International Jewish Committee on Interreligious Consultations, the then President of the Holy See's Commission for Religious Relations with the Jews, Cardinal Johannes Willebrands, announced the intention of the Commission to prepare an official Catholic document on the Shoah. The following day, 1 September 1987, the participants in this meeting were received at Castel Gandolfo by His Holiness Pope John Paul II, who affirmed the importance of the proposed document for the Church and for the world. His Holiness spoke of his personal experience in his native country and his memories of living close to a Jewish community now destroyed. He recalled a recent address to the Jewish community in Warsaw, in which he spoke of the Jewish people as a force of conscience in the world today and of the Jewish memory of the Shoah as "a warning, a witness, and a silent cry" to all humanity. Citing the Exodus of the Jewish people from Egypt as a paradigm and a continuing source of hope, His Holiness expressed his deep conviction that, with God's help, evil can be overcome in history, even the awesome evil of the Shoah.
We can read in the Joint Press Communiqué which was released at that time, that the Jewish delegation warmly welcomed the initiative of an official Catholic document on the Shoah, and expressed the conviction that such a document will contribute significantly to combating attempts to revise and to deny the reality of the Shoah and to trivialize its religious significance for Christians, Jews, and humanity.
In the years following the announcement, the Holy See's Commission for Religious Relations with the Jews engaged in a process of consciousness raising and of reflection on several levels in the Catholic Church, and in different places.
In the Guidelines and Suggestions for Implementing the Conciliar Declaration Nostra Aetate, n. 4, published on 1 December 1974, the Holy See's Commission recalled that "the step taken by the Council finds its historical setting in circumstances deeply affected by the memory of the persecution and massacre of Jews which took place in Europe just before and during the Second World War". Yet, as the Guidelines pointed out, "the problem of Jewish- Christian relations concerns the Church as such, since it is when "pondering her own mystery" (Nostra Aetate, n. 4) that she encounters the mystery of Israel. Therefore, even in areas where no Jewish communities exist, this remains an important problem".
Pope John Paul II himself has repeatedly called upon us to see where we stand with regard to our relations with the Jewish people. In doing so, "we must remember how much the balance [of these relations] over two thousand years has been negative".2 This long period "which", in the words of Pope John Paul II, awe must not tire of reflecting upon in order to draw from it the appropriate lessonsÓ3 has been marked by many manifestations of anti-Judaism and anti-Semitism, and, in this century, by the horrifying events of the Shoah.
Therefore, the Catholic Church wants all Catholics, and indeed all people, everywhere, to know about this. It does so also with the hope that it will help Catholics and Jews towards the realization of those universal goals that are found in their common roots. In fact, whenever there has been guilt on the part of Christians, this burden should be a call to repentance. As His Holiness has put it on one occasion, "guilt must always be the point of departure for conversion".
We are confident that all the Catholic faithful in every part of the world will be helped by this document to discover in their relationship with the Jewish people "the boldness of brotherhood".4
***
1 The letter of His Holiness is dated 12 March 1998.
2 Cf. Notes on the Correct Way to Present the Jews and Judaism in Preaching and Catechesis in the Catholic Church (24 June 1985).
3 Speech delivered on the occasion of the visit of His Holiness to the Synagogue of Rome (13 April 1986), 4: AAS 78 (1986), 1120.
4 Pope John Paul II in his address to the Diplomatic Corps on 15 January 1994.
LETTER OF POPE JOHN PAUL II
To my Venerable Brother
CARDINAL EDWARD IDRIS CASSIDY
On numerous occasions during my Pontificate I have recalled with a sense of deep sorrow the sufferings of the Jewish people during the Second World War. The crime which has become known as the Shoah remains an indelible stain on the history of the century that is coming to a close.
As we prepare for the beginning of the Third Millennium of Christianity, the Church is aware that the joy of a Jubilee is above all the joy that is based on the forgiveness of sins and reconciliation with God and neighbour. Therefore she encourages her sons and daughters to purify their hearts, through repentance of past errors and infidelities. She calls them to place themselves humbly before the Lord and examine themselves on the responsibility which they too have for the evils of our time.
It is my fervent hope that the document: We Remember: A Reflection on the Shoah, which the Commission for Religious Relations with the Jews has prepared under your direction, will indeed help to heal the wounds of past misunderstandings and injustices. May it enable memory to play its necessary part in the process of shaping a future in which the unspeakable iniquity of the Shoah will never again be possible. May the Lord of history guide the efforts of Catholics and Jews and all men and women of good will as they work together for a world of true respect for the life and dignity of every human being, for all have been created in the image and likeness of God.
From the Vatican, 12 March 1998.
JOHN PAUL II
COMMISSION FOR RELIGIOUS RELATIONS WITH THE JEWS
WE REMEMBER: A REFLECTION ON THE SHOAH
I. The tragedy of the Shoah and the duty of remembrance
The twentieth century is fast coming to a close and a new Millennium of the Christian era is about to dawn. The 2000th anniversary of the Birth of Jesus Christ calls all Christians, and indeed invites all men and women, to seek to discern in the passage of history the signs of divine Providence at work, as well as the ways in which the image of the Creator in man has been offended and disfigured.
This reflection concerns one of the main areas in which Catholics can seriously take to heart the summons which Pope John Paul II has addressed to them in his Apostolic Letter Tertio Millennio Adveniente: "It is appropriate that, as the Second Millennium of Christianity draws to a close, the Church should become more fully conscious of the sinfulness of her children, recalling all those times in history when they departed from the spirit of Christ and his Gospel and, instead of offering to the world the witness of a life inspired by the values of faith, indulged in ways of thinking and acting which were truly forms of counter-witness and scandal".(1)
This century has witnessed an unspeakable tragedy, which can never be forgotten: the attempt by the Nazi regime to exterminate the Jewish people, with the consequent killing of millions of Jews. Women and men, old and young, children and infants, for the sole reason of their Jewish origin, were persecuted and deported. Some were killed immediately, while others were degraded, illtreated, tortured and utterly robbed of their human dignity, and then murdered. Very few of those who entered the Camps survived, and those who did remained scarred for life. This was the Shoah. It is a major fact of the history of this century, a fact which still concerns us today.
Before this horrible genocide, which the leaders of nations and Jewish communities themselves found hard to believe at the very moment when it was being mercilessly put into effect, no one can remain indifferent, least of all the Church, by reason of her very close bonds of spiritual kinship with the Jewish people and her remembrance of the injustices of the past. The Church's relationship to the Jewish people is unlike the one she shares with any other religion.(2) However, it is not only a question of recalling the past. The common future of Jews and Christians demands that we remember, for "there is no future without memory".(3) History itself is memoria futuri.
In addressing this reflection to our brothers and sisters of the Catholic Church throughout the world, we ask all Christians to join us in meditating on the catastrophe which befell the Jewish people, and on the moral imperative to ensure that never again will selfishness and hatred grow to the point of sowing such suffering and death.(4) Most especially, we ask our Jewish friends, "whose terrible fate has become a symbol of the aberrations of which man is capable when he turns against God",(5) to hear us with open hearts.
II. What we must remember
While bearing their unique witness to the Holy One of Israel and to the Torah, the Jewish people have suffered much at different times and in many places. But the Shoah was certainly the worst suffering of all. The inhumanity with which the Jews were persecuted and massacred during this century is beyond the capacity of words to convey. All this was done to them for the sole reason that they were Jews.
The very magnitude of the crime raises many questions. Historians, sociologists, political philosophers, psychologists and theologians are all trying to learn more about the reality of the Shoah and its causes. Much scholarly study still remains to be done. But such an event cannot be fully measured by the ordinary criteria of historical research alone. It calls for a "moral and religious memory" and, particularly among Christians, a very serious reflection on what gave rise to it.
The fact that the Shoah took place in Europe, that is, in countries of long-standing Christian civilization, raises the question of the relation between the Nazi persecution and the attitudes down the centuries of Christians towards the Jews.
III. Relations between Jews and Christians
The history of relations between Jews and Christians is a tormented one. His Holiness Pope John Paul II has recognized this fact in his repeated appeals to Catholics to see where we stand with regard to our relations with the Jewish people.(6) In effect, the balance of these relations over two thousand years has been quite negative.(7)
At the dawn of Christianity, after the crucifixion of Jesus, there arose disputes between the early Church and the Jewish leaders and people who, in their devotion to the Law, on occasion violently opposed the preachers of the Gospel and the first Christians. In the pagan Roman Empire, Jews were legally protected by the privileges granted by the Emperor and the authorities at first made no distinction between Jewish and Christian communities. Soon however, Christians incurred the persecution of the State. Later, when the Emperors themselves converted to Christianity, they at first continued to guarantee Jewish privileges. But Christian mobs who attacked pagan temples sometimes did the same to synagogues, not without being influenced by certain interpretations of the New Testament regarding the Jewish people as a whole. "In the Christian world—I do not say on the part of the Church as such—erroneous and unjust interpretations of the New Testament regarding the Jewish people and their alleged culpability have circulated for too long, engendering feelings of hostility towards this people".(8) Such interpretations of the New Testament have been totally and definitively rejected by the Second Vatican Council.(9)
Despite the Christian preaching of love for all, even for one's enemies, the prevailing mentality down the centuries penalized minorities and those who were in any way "different". Sentiments of anti-Judaism in some Christian quarters, and the gap which existed between the Church and the Jewish people, led to a generalized discrimination, which ended at times in expulsions or attempts at forced conversions. In a large part of the "Christian" world, until the end of the 18th century, those who were not Christian did not always enjoy a fully guaranteed juridical status. Despite that fact, Jews throughout Christendom held on to their religious traditions and communal customs. They were therefore looked upon with a certain suspicion and mistrust. In times of crisis such as famine, war, pestilence or social tensions, the Jewish minority was sometimes taken as a scapegoat and became the victim of violence, looting, even massacres.
By the end of the 18th century and the beginning of the 19th century, Jews generally had achieved an equal standing with other citizens in most States and a certain number of them held influential positions in society. But in that same historical context, notably in the 19th century, a false and exacerbated nationalism took hold. In a climate of eventful social change, Jews were often accused of exercising an influence disproportionate to their numbers. Thus there began to spread in varying degrees throughout most of Europe an anti-Judaism that was essentially more sociological and political than religious.
At the same time, theories began to appear which denied the unity of the human race, affirming an original diversity of races. In the 20th century, National Socialism in Germany used these ideas as a pseudo-scientific basis for a distinction between so called Nordic-Aryan races and supposedly inferior races. Furthermore, an extremist form of nationalism was heightened in Germany by the defeat of 1918 and the demanding conditions imposed by the victors, with the consequence that many saw in National Socialism a solution to their country's problems and cooperated politically with this movement.
The Church in Germany replied by condemning racism. The condemnation first appeared in the preaching of some of the clergy, in the public teaching of the Catholic Bishops, and in the writings of lay Catholic journalists. Already in February and March 1931, Cardinal Bertram of Breslau, Cardinal Faulhaber and the Bishops of Bavaria, the Bishops of the Province of Cologne and those of the Province of Freiburg published pastoral letters condemning National Socialism, with its idolatry of race and of the State.(10) The well-known Advent sermons of Cardinal Faulhaber in 1933, the very year in which National Socialism came to power, at which not just Catholics but also Protestants and Jews were present, clearly expressed rejection of the Nazi anti-semitic propaganda.(11) In the wake of the Kristallnacht, Bernhard Lichtenberg, Provost of Berlin Cathedral, offered public prayers for the Jews. He was later to die at Dachau and has been declared Blessed.
Pope Pius XI too condemned Nazi racism in a solemn way in his Encyclical Letter Mit brennender Sorge,(12) which was read in German churches on Passion Sunday 1937, a step which resulted in attacks and sanctions against members of the clergy. Addressing a group of Belgian pilgrims on 6 September 1938, Pius XI asserted: "Anti-Semitism is unacceptable. Spiritually, we are all Semites".(13) Pius XII, in his very first Encyclical, Summi Pontificatus,(14) of 20 October 1939, warned against theories which denied the unity of the human race and against the deification of the State, all of which he saw as leading to a real "hour of darkness".(15)
IV. Nazi anti-Semitism and the Shoah
Thus we cannot ignore the difference which exists between anti-Semitism, based on theories contrary to the constant teaching of the Church on the unity of the human race and on the equal dignity of all races and peoples, and the long-standing sentiments of mistrust and hostility that we call anti-Judaism, of which, unfortunately, Christians also have been guilty.
The National Socialist ideology went even further, in the sense that it refused to acknowledge any transcendent reality as the source of life and the criterion of moral good. Consequently, a human group, and the State with which it was identified, arrogated to itself an absolute status and determined to remove the very existence of the Jewish people, a people called to witness to the one God and the Law of the Covenant. At the level of theological reflection we cannot ignore the fact that not a few in the Nazi Party not only showed aversion to the idea of divine Providence at work in human affairs, but gave proof of a definite hatred directed at God himself. Logically, such an attitude also led to a rejection of Christianity, and a desire to see the Church destroyed or at least subjected to the interests of the Nazi State.
It was this extreme ideology which became the basis of the measures taken, first to drive the Jews from their homes and then to exterminate them. The Shoah was the work of a thoroughly modern neo-pagan regime. Its anti-Semitism had its roots outside of Christianity and, in pursuing its aims, it did not hesitate to oppose the Church and persecute her members also.
But it may be asked whether the Nazi persecution of the Jews was not made easier by the anti-Jewish prejudices imbedded in some Christian minds and hearts. Did anti-Jewish sentiment among Christians make them less sensitive, or even indifferent, to the persecutions launched against the Jews by National Socialism when it reached power?
Any response to this question must take into account that we are dealing with the history of people's attitudes and ways of thinking, subject to multiple influences. Moreover, many people were altogether unaware of the "final solution" that was being put into effect against a whole people; others were afraid for themselves and those near to them; some took advantage of the situation; and still others were moved by envy. A response would need to be given case by case. To do this, however, it is necessary to know what precisely motivated people in a particular situation.
At first the leaders of the Third Reich sought to expel the Jews. Unfortunately, the governments of some Western countries of Christian tradition, including some in North and South America, were more than hesitant to open their borders to the persecuted Jews. Although they could not foresee how far the Nazi hierarchs would go in their criminal intentions, the leaders of those nations were aware of the hardships and dangers to which Jews living in the territories of the Third Reich were exposed. The closing of borders to Jewish emigration in those circumstances, whether due to anti-Jewish hostility or suspicion, political cowardice or shortsightedness, or national selfishness, lays a heavy burden of conscience on the authorities in question.
In the lands where the Nazis undertook mass deportations, the brutality which surrounded these forced movements of helpless people should have led to suspect the worst. Did Christians give every possible assistance to those being persecuted, and in particular to the persecuted Jews?
Many did, but others did not. Those who did help to save Jewish lives as much as was in their power, even to the point of placing their own lives in danger, must not be forgotten. During and after the war, Jewish communities and Jewish leaders expressed their thanks for all that had been done for them, including what Pope Pius XII did personally or through his representatives to save hundreds of thousands of Jewish lives.(16) Many Catholic bishops, priests, religious and laity have been honoured for this reason by the State of Israel.
Nevertheless, as Pope John Paul II has recognized, alongside such courageous men and women, the spiritual resistance and concrete action of other Christians was not that which might have been expected from Christ's followers. We cannot know how many Christians in countries occupied or ruled by the Nazi powers or their allies were horrified at the disappearance of their Jewish neighbours and yet were not strong enough to raise their voices in protest. For Christians, this heavy burden of conscience of their brothers and sisters during the Second World War must be a call to penitence.(17)
We deeply regret the errors and failures of those sons and daughters of the Church. We make our own what is said in the Second Vatican Council's Declaration Nostra Aetate, which unequivocally affirms: "The Church ... mindful of her common patrimony with the Jews, and motivated by the Gospel's spiritual love and by no political considerations, deplores the hatred, persecutions and displays of anti-Semitism directed against the Jews at any time and from any source".(18)
We recall and abide by what Pope John Paul II, addressing the leaders of the Jewish community in Strasbourg in 1988,stated: "I repeat again with you the strongest condemnation of anti-Semitism and racism, which are opposed to the principles of Christianity".(19) The Catholic Church therefore repudiates every persecution against a people or human group anywhere, at any time. She absolutely condemns all forms of genocide, as well as the racist ideologies which give rise to them. Looking back over this century, we are deeply saddened by the violence that has enveloped whole groups of peoples and nations. We recall in particular the massacre of the Armenians, the countless victims in Ukraine in the 1930s, the genocide of the Gypsies, which was also the result of racist ideas, and similar tragedies which have occurred in America, Africa and the Balkans. Nor do we forget the millions of victims of totalitarian ideology in the Soviet Union, in China, Cambodia and elsewhere. Nor can we forget the drama of the Middle East, the elements of which are well known. Even as we make this reflection, "many human beings are still their brothers' victims".(20)
V. Looking together to a common future
Looking to the future of relations between Jews and Christians, in the first place we appeal to our Catholic brothers and sisters to renew the awareness of the Hebrew roots of their faith. We ask them to keep in mind that Jesus was a descendant of David; that the Virgin Mary and the Apostles belonged to the Jewish people; that the Church draws sustenance from the root of that good olive tree on to which have been grafted the wild olive branches of the Gentiles (cf. Rom 11:17-24); that the Jews are our dearly beloved brothers, indeed in a certain sense they are "our elder brothers".(21)
At the end of this Millennium the Catholic Church desires to express her deep sorrow for the failures of her sons and daughters in every age. This is an act of repentance (teshuva), since, as members of the Church, we are linked to the sins as well as the merits of all her children. The Church approaches with deep respect and great compassion the experience of extermination, the Shoah, suffered by the Jewish people during World War II. It is not a matter of mere words, but indeed of binding commitment. "We would risk causing the victims of the most atrocious deaths to die again if we do not have an ardent desire for justice, if we do not commit ourselves to ensure that evil does not prevail over good as it did for millions of the children of the Jewish people ... Humanity cannot permit all that to happen again".(22)
We pray that our sorrow for the tragedy which the Jewish people has suffered in our century will lead to a new relationship with the Jewish people. We wish to turn awareness of past sins into a firm resolve to build a new future in which there will be no more anti-Judaism among Christians or anti-Christian sentiment among Jews, but rather a shared mutual respect, as befits those who adore the one Creator and Lord and have a common father in faith, Abraham.
Finally, we invite all men and women of good will to reflect deeply on the significance of the Shoah. The victims from their graves, and the survivors through the vivid testimony of what they have suffered, have become a loud voice calling the attention of all of humanity. To remember this terrible experience is to become fully conscious of the salutary warning it entails: the spoiled seeds of anti-Judaism and anti-Semitism must never again be allowed to take root in any human heart.
16 March 1998.
Cardinal Edward Idris Cassidy
President
The Most Reverend Pierre Duprey
Vice-President
The Reverend Remi Hoeckman, O.P.
Secretary
TYPIS VATICANIS MCMXCVIII
(1) Pope John Paul II, Apostolic Letter Tertio Millennio Adveniente, 10 November 1994, 33: AAS 87 (1995), 25.
(2) Cf. Pope John Paul II, Speech at the Synagogue of Rome, 13 April 1986, 4: AAS 78 (1986), 1120.
(3) Pope John Paul II, Angelus Prayer, 11 June 1995: Insegnamenti 181, 1995, 1712.
(4) Cf. Pope John Paul II, Address to Jewish Leaders in Budapest, 18 August 1991, 4: Insegnamenti 142, 1991, 349.
(5) Pope John Paul II, Encyclical Letter Centesimus Annus, 1 May 1991, 17: AAS 83 (1991), 814-815.
(6) Cf. Pope John Paul II, Address to Delegates of Episcopal Conferences for Catholic-Jewish relations, 6 March 1982: Insegnamenti, 51, 1982, 743-747.
(7) Cf. Holy See's Commission for Religious Relations with the Jews, Notes on the correct way to present the Jews and Judaism in preaching and catechesis in the Roman Catholic Church, 24 June 1985, VI, 1: Ench. Vat. 9, 1656.
(8) Cf. Pope John Paul II, Speech to Symposium on the roots of anti-Judaism, 31 October 1997, 1: L'Osservatore Romano, 1 November 1997, p. 6.
(9) Cf. Second Vatican Ecumenical Council, Nostra Aetate, 4.
(10) Cf. B. Statiewski (Ed.), Akten deutscher Bischöfe über die Lage der Kirche, 1933-1945, vol. I, 1933-1934 (Mainz 1968), Appendix.
(11) Cf. L. Volk, Der Bayerische Episkopat und der Nationalsozialismus 1930-1934 (Mainz 1966), pp. 170-174.
(12) The Encyclical is dated 14 March 1937: AAS 29 (1937), 145-167.
(13) La Documentation Catholique, 29 (1938), col. 1460.
(14) AAS 31 (1939), 413-453.
(15) Ibid., 449.
(16) The wisdom of Pope Pius XII's diplomacy was publicly acknowledged on a number of occasions by representative Jewish Organizations and personalities. For example, on 7 September 1945, Dr. Joseph Nathan, who represented the Italian Hebrew Commission, stated: "Above all, we acknowledge the Supreme Pontiff and the religious men and women who, executing the directives of the Holy Father, recognized the persecuted as their brothers and, with effort and abnegation, hastened to help us, disregarding the terrible dangers to which they were exposed" (L'Osservatore Romano, 8 September 1945, p. 2). On 21 September of that same year, Pius XII received in audience Dr. A. Leo Kubowitzki, Secretary General of the World Jewish Congress who came to present "to the Holy Father, in the name of the Union of Israelitic Communities, warmest thanks for the efforts of the Catholic Church on behalf of Jews throughout Europe during the War" (L'Osservatore Romano, 23 September 1945, p. 1). On Thursday, 29 November 1945, the Pope met about 80 representatives of Jewish refugees from various concentration camps in Germany, who expressed "their great honour at being able to thank the Holy Father personally for his generosity towards those persecuted during the Nazi-Fascist period" (L'Osservatore Romano, 30 November 1945, p. 1). In 1958, at the death of Pope Pius XII, Golda Meir sent an eloquent message: "We share in the grief of humanity. When fearful martyrdom came to our people, the voice of the Pope was raised for its victims. The life of our times was enriched by a voice speaking out about great moral truths above the tumult of daily conflict. We mourn a great servant of peace".
(17) Cf. Pope John Paul II, Address to the New Ambassador of the Federal Republic of Germany to the Holy See, 8 November 1990, 2: AAS 83 (1991), 587-588.
(18) Loc. cit., no. 4.
(19) Address to Jewish Leaders, Strasbourg, 9 October 1988, no. 8: Insegnamenti 113, 1988, 1134.
(20) Pope John Paul II, Address to the Diplomatic Corps, 15 January 1994, 9: AAS 86 (1994), 816.
(21) Pope John Paul II, Speech at the Synagogue of Rome, 13 April 1986, 4: AAS 78 (1986), 1120.
(22) Pope John Paul II, Address on the occasion of a commemoration of the Shoah, 7 April 1994, 3: Insegnamenti 171, 1994, 897 and 893.
Other Statements
LETTER OF JOHN PAUL II
TO THE LATIN-RITE DIOCESE OF JERUSALEM
The Holy Father wrote a Letter to the Latin-rite Diocese of Jerusalem to mark the 150th anniversary of Pope Pius IX's reorganization of that see. The Pope called on Catholics to prepare in every way to celebrate the coming Holy Year. Here is a translation of those paragraphs of his letter pertaining to relations with the Jews.
É By its presence in the same territory as the Islamic and Jewish communities and through the exchanges it has with them, the Latin community has been prepared over time to understand the importance of interreligious dialogue in the spirit desired and recommended by the Second Vatican Ecumenical Council. Daily life presupposes continuous contact with believers of other religious traditions, for the human, spiritual and moral development of peoples. It is obvious that respectful dialogue and joint, fraternal collaboration among all society's members can be a vigorous appeal for this same understanding to be achieved in other countries.
É Regarding the ties with those who belong to the Jewish religion, it should be recalled that Jews and Christians have a common heritage which links them spiritually (cf. Nostra aetate, n. 4). Both are a blessing for the world (cf. Gn 12:2-3), to the extent that they work together so that peace and justice prevail among all people and all individuals and do so in fullness and in depth, according to the divine plan and in the spirit of sacrifice which this noble project can demand.
They are all called to be conscious of this sacred duty and to fulfil it, through honest and friendly dialogue and by collaboration for the benefit of man and society; I am certain that this readiness to do God's will for the world will also be a blessing for our different communities and enable us to cry out with the psalmist: "Steadfast love and faithfulness will meet; righteousness and peace will kiss each other. Faithfulness will spring up from the ground, and righteousness will look down from the sky" (Ps 85 [84]: 10-11).
November 28, 1997
General Audience
January 14, 1998
To the English-speaking pilgrims and visitors the Holy Father said:
I welcome the members of the Bsnai Bsrith Anti-Defamation League, and I express the hope that your visit will help to strengthen the co-operation of recent years.
Pastoral visit to Cuba
January 21-26, 1998
Address OF JOHN PAUL II
to the Jewish Community
January 25, 1998
On the morning of Sunday, January 25, the Holy Father met representatives of the Cuban Council of Churches at the Apostolic Nunciature in Havana. During the course of his address, the Pope also specifically spoke to the Jewish community.
1. On this memorable day, I am very pleased to meet you, the representatives of the Cuban Council of Churches and of various other Christian communities, accompanied by members of the Jewish community in Cuba, which participates in the Council as an observer. I greet all of you with great affection and I assure you of my happiness at this meeting with those with whom we share faith in the living and true God. This auspicious occasion prompts us to say before all else: "How good and pleasant it is when brothers live together in unity" (Ps 132:1).
4. I also wish to address a particular greeting to the Jewish community represented here. Your presence is an eloquent expression of the fraternal dialogue aimed at a better understanding between Jews and Catholics, and which, promoted by the Second Vatican Council, continues to be ever more widespread. With you we share a common spiritual patrimony, firmly rooted in the Sacred Scriptures. May God, the Creator and Saviour, sustain our efforts to walk together and, encouraged by the divine word, may we grow in worship and fervent love of him. May all of this ever find expression in effective action for the benefit of each and every person.
5. To conclude, I wish to thank each one of you for your presence at this meeting, and I ask God to bless you and your communities and to keep you in his ways so that you may proclaim his name to the brethren. May he show you his face in the midst of the society which you serve, and may he grant you peace in all your undertakings.
Havana, 25 January 1998
Feast of the Conversion of St Paul
WE REMEMBER: A REFLECTION ON THE SHOAH
At a press conference on March 16, 1998, Cardinal Cassidy, President of the Holy See's Commission For Religious Relations With the Jews, presented for publication the document, We Remember: A Reflection On The Shoah. Joining him in the presentation were Bishop Pierre Duprey, Vice President of the Commission, and Father Remi Hoeckmann, O.P., its Secretary.
We publish here Cardinal Cassidy's presentation of the document, along with Pope John Paul II's letter to the Cardinal about the document, and the text itself.
Presentation by Cardinal Edward Idris Cassidy
The Holy See has to date published, through its Commission for Religious Relations with the Jews, two significant documents intended for the application of the Second Vatican Council's Declaration Nostra Aetate, n. 4: the 1974 Guidelines and Suggestions; and the 1985 Notes on the Correct Way to Present the Jews and Judaism in Preaching and Catechesis in the Catholic Church.
Today it publishes another document, which the Holy See's Commission for Religious Relations with the Jews has prepared at the express request of His Holiness Pope John Paul II. This document, which contains a reflection on the Shoah, is another step on the path marked out by the Second Vatican Council in our relations with the Jewish people. In the words which His Holiness wrote in his letter to me as President of the Commission, it is our fervent hope "that the document [...] will help to heal the wounds of past misunderstandings and injustices".1
It is addressed to the Catholic faithful throughout the world, not only in Europe where the Shoah took place, hoping that all Christians will join their Catholic brothers and sisters in meditating on the catastrophe which befell the Jewish people, on its causes, and on the moral imperative to ensure that never again such a tragedy will happen. At the same time it asks our Jewish friends to hear us with an open heart.
On the occasion of a meeting in Rome on 31 August 1987 of representatives of the Holy See's Commission for Religious Relations with the Jews and of the International Jewish Committee on Interreligious Consultations, the then President of the Holy See's Commission for Religious Relations with the Jews, Cardinal Johannes Willebrands, announced the intention of the Commission to prepare an official Catholic document on the Shoah. The following day, 1 September 1987, the participants in this meeting were received at Castel Gandolfo by His Holiness Pope John Paul II, who affirmed the importance of the proposed document for the Church and for the world. His Holiness spoke of his personal experience in his native country and his memories of living close to a Jewish community now destroyed. He recalled a recent address to the Jewish community in Warsaw, in which he spoke of the Jewish people as a force of conscience in the world today and of the Jewish memory of the Shoah as "a warning, a witness, and a silent cry" to all humanity. Citing the Exodus of the Jewish people from Egypt as a paradigm and a continuing source of hope, His Holiness expressed his deep conviction that, with God's help, evil can be overcome in history, even the awesome evil of the Shoah.
We can read in the Joint Press Communiqué which was released at that time, that the Jewish delegation warmly welcomed the initiative of an official Catholic document on the Shoah, and expressed the conviction that such a document will contribute significantly to combating attempts to revise and to deny the reality of the Shoah and to trivialize its religious significance for Christians, Jews, and humanity.
In the years following the announcement, the Holy See's Commission for Religious Relations with the Jews engaged in a process of consciousness raising and of reflection on several levels in the Catholic Church, and in different places.
In the Guidelines and Suggestions for Implementing the Conciliar Declaration Nostra Aetate, n. 4, published on 1 December 1974, the Holy See's Commission recalled that "the step taken by the Council finds its historical setting in circumstances deeply affected by the memory of the persecution and massacre of Jews which took place in Europe just before and during the Second World War". Yet, as the Guidelines pointed out, "the problem of Jewish- Christian relations concerns the Church as such, since it is when "pondering her own mystery" (Nostra Aetate, n. 4) that she encounters the mystery of Israel. Therefore, even in areas where no Jewish communities exist, this remains an important problem".
Pope John Paul II himself has repeatedly called upon us to see where we stand with regard to our relations with the Jewish people. In doing so, "we must remember how much the balance [of these relations] over two thousand years has been negative".2 This long period "which", in the words of Pope John Paul II, awe must not tire of reflecting upon in order to draw from it the appropriate lessonsÓ3 has been marked by many manifestations of anti-Judaism and anti-Semitism, and, in this century, by the horrifying events of the Shoah.
Therefore, the Catholic Church wants all Catholics, and indeed all people, everywhere, to know about this. It does so also with the hope that it will help Catholics and Jews towards the realization of those universal goals that are found in their common roots. In fact, whenever there has been guilt on the part of Christians, this burden should be a call to repentance. As His Holiness has put it on one occasion, "guilt must always be the point of departure for conversion".
We are confident that all the Catholic faithful in every part of the world will be helped by this document to discover in their relationship with the Jewish people "the boldness of brotherhood".4
***
1 The letter of His Holiness is dated 12 March 1998.
2 Cf. Notes on the Correct Way to Present the Jews and Judaism in Preaching and Catechesis in the Catholic Church (24 June 1985).
3 Speech delivered on the occasion of the visit of His Holiness to the Synagogue of Rome (13 April 1986), 4: AAS 78 (1986), 1120.
4 Pope John Paul II in his address to the Diplomatic Corps on 15 January 1994.
LETTER OF POPE JOHN PAUL II
To my Venerable Brother
CARDINAL EDWARD IDRIS CASSIDY
On numerous occasions during my Pontificate I have recalled with a sense of deep sorrow the sufferings of the Jewish people during the Second World War. The crime which has become known as the Shoah remains an indelible stain on the history of the century that is coming to a close.
As we prepare for the beginning of the Third Millennium of Christianity, the Church is aware that the joy of a Jubilee is above all the joy that is based on the forgiveness of sins and reconciliation with God and neighbour. Therefore she encourages her sons and daughters to purify their hearts, through repentance of past errors and infidelities. She calls them to place themselves humbly before the Lord and examine themselves on the responsibility which they too have for the evils of our time.
It is my fervent hope that the document: We Remember: A Reflection on the Shoah, which the Commission for Religious Relations with the Jews has prepared under your direction, will indeed help to heal the wounds of past misunderstandings and injustices. May it enable memory to play its necessary part in the process of shaping a future in which the unspeakable iniquity of the Shoah will never again be possible. May the Lord of history guide the efforts of Catholics and Jews and all men and women of good will as they work together for a world of true respect for the life and dignity of every human being, for all have been created in the image and likeness of God.
From the Vatican, 12 March 1998.
JOHN PAUL II
COMMISSION FOR RELIGIOUS RELATIONS WITH THE JEWS
WE REMEMBER: A REFLECTION ON THE SHOAH
I. The tragedy of the Shoah and the duty of remembrance
The twentieth century is fast coming to a close and a new Millennium of the Christian era is about to dawn. The 2000th anniversary of the Birth of Jesus Christ calls all Christians, and indeed invites all men and women, to seek to discern in the passage of history the signs of divine Providence at work, as well as the ways in which the image of the Creator in man has been offended and disfigured.
This reflection concerns one of the main areas in which Catholics can seriously take to heart the summons which Pope John Paul II has addressed to them in his Apostolic Letter Tertio Millennio Adveniente: "It is appropriate that, as the Second Millennium of Christianity draws to a close, the Church should become more fully conscious of the sinfulness of her children, recalling all those times in history when they departed from the spirit of Christ and his Gospel and, instead of offering to the world the witness of a life inspired by the values of faith, indulged in ways of thinking and acting which were truly forms of counter-witness and scandal".(1)
This century has witnessed an unspeakable tragedy, which can never be forgotten: the attempt by the Nazi regime to exterminate the Jewish people, with the consequent killing of millions of Jews. Women and men, old and young, children and infants, for the sole reason of their Jewish origin, were persecuted and deported. Some were killed immediately, while others were degraded, illtreated, tortured and utterly robbed of their human dignity, and then murdered. Very few of those who entered the Camps survived, and those who did remained scarred for life. This was the Shoah. It is a major fact of the history of this century, a fact which still concerns us today.
Before this horrible genocide, which the leaders of nations and Jewish communities themselves found hard to believe at the very moment when it was being mercilessly put into effect, no one can remain indifferent, least of all the Church, by reason of her very close bonds of spiritual kinship with the Jewish people and her remembrance of the injustices of the past. The Church's relationship to the Jewish people is unlike the one she shares with any other religion.(2) However, it is not only a question of recalling the past. The common future of Jews and Christians demands that we remember, for "there is no future without memory".(3) History itself is memoria futuri.
In addressing this reflection to our brothers and sisters of the Catholic Church throughout the world, we ask all Christians to join us in meditating on the catastrophe which befell the Jewish people, and on the moral imperative to ensure that never again will selfishness and hatred grow to the point of sowing such suffering and death.(4) Most especially, we ask our Jewish friends, "whose terrible fate has become a symbol of the aberrations of which man is capable when he turns against God",(5) to hear us with open hearts.
II. What we must remember
While bearing their unique witness to the Holy One of Israel and to the Torah, the Jewish people have suffered much at different times and in many places. But the Shoah was certainly the worst suffering of all. The inhumanity with which the Jews were persecuted and massacred during this century is beyond the capacity of words to convey. All this was done to them for the sole reason that they were Jews.
The very magnitude of the crime raises many questions. Historians, sociologists, political philosophers, psychologists and theologians are all trying to learn more about the reality of the Shoah and its causes. Much scholarly study still remains to be done. But such an event cannot be fully measured by the ordinary criteria of historical research alone. It calls for a "moral and religious memory" and, particularly among Christians, a very serious reflection on what gave rise to it.
The fact that the Shoah took place in Europe, that is, in countries of long-standing Christian civilization, raises the question of the relation between the Nazi persecution and the attitudes down the centuries of Christians towards the Jews.
III. Relations between Jews and Christians
The history of relations between Jews and Christians is a tormented one. His Holiness Pope John Paul II has recognized this fact in his repeated appeals to Catholics to see where we stand with regard to our relations with the Jewish people.(6) In effect, the balance of these relations over two thousand years has been quite negative.(7)
At the dawn of Christianity, after the crucifixion of Jesus, there arose disputes between the early Church and the Jewish leaders and people who, in their devotion to the Law, on occasion violently opposed the preachers of the Gospel and the first Christians. In the pagan Roman Empire, Jews were legally protected by the privileges granted by the Emperor and the authorities at first made no distinction between Jewish and Christian communities. Soon however, Christians incurred the persecution of the State. Later, when the Emperors themselves converted to Christianity, they at first continued to guarantee Jewish privileges. But Christian mobs who attacked pagan temples sometimes did the same to synagogues, not without being influenced by certain interpretations of the New Testament regarding the Jewish people as a whole. "In the Christian world—I do not say on the part of the Church as such—erroneous and unjust interpretations of the New Testament regarding the Jewish people and their alleged culpability have circulated for too long, engendering feelings of hostility towards this people".(8) Such interpretations of the New Testament have been totally and definitively rejected by the Second Vatican Council.(9)
Despite the Christian preaching of love for all, even for one's enemies, the prevailing mentality down the centuries penalized minorities and those who were in any way "different". Sentiments of anti-Judaism in some Christian quarters, and the gap which existed between the Church and the Jewish people, led to a generalized discrimination, which ended at times in expulsions or attempts at forced conversions. In a large part of the "Christian" world, until the end of the 18th century, those who were not Christian did not always enjoy a fully guaranteed juridical status. Despite that fact, Jews throughout Christendom held on to their religious traditions and communal customs. They were therefore looked upon with a certain suspicion and mistrust. In times of crisis such as famine, war, pestilence or social tensions, the Jewish minority was sometimes taken as a scapegoat and became the victim of violence, looting, even massacres.
By the end of the 18th century and the beginning of the 19th century, Jews generally had achieved an equal standing with other citizens in most States and a certain number of them held influential positions in society. But in that same historical context, notably in the 19th century, a false and exacerbated nationalism took hold. In a climate of eventful social change, Jews were often accused of exercising an influence disproportionate to their numbers. Thus there began to spread in varying degrees throughout most of Europe an anti-Judaism that was essentially more sociological and political than religious.
At the same time, theories began to appear which denied the unity of the human race, affirming an original diversity of races. In the 20th century, National Socialism in Germany used these ideas as a pseudo-scientific basis for a distinction between so called Nordic-Aryan races and supposedly inferior races. Furthermore, an extremist form of nationalism was heightened in Germany by the defeat of 1918 and the demanding conditions imposed by the victors, with the consequence that many saw in National Socialism a solution to their country's problems and cooperated politically with this movement.
The Church in Germany replied by condemning racism. The condemnation first appeared in the preaching of some of the clergy, in the public teaching of the Catholic Bishops, and in the writings of lay Catholic journalists. Already in February and March 1931, Cardinal Bertram of Breslau, Cardinal Faulhaber and the Bishops of Bavaria, the Bishops of the Province of Cologne and those of the Province of Freiburg published pastoral letters condemning National Socialism, with its idolatry of race and of the State.(10) The well-known Advent sermons of Cardinal Faulhaber in 1933, the very year in which National Socialism came to power, at which not just Catholics but also Protestants and Jews were present, clearly expressed rejection of the Nazi anti-semitic propaganda.(11) In the wake of the Kristallnacht, Bernhard Lichtenberg, Provost of Berlin Cathedral, offered public prayers for the Jews. He was later to die at Dachau and has been declared Blessed.
Pope Pius XI too condemned Nazi racism in a solemn way in his Encyclical Letter Mit brennender Sorge,(12) which was read in German churches on Passion Sunday 1937, a step which resulted in attacks and sanctions against members of the clergy. Addressing a group of Belgian pilgrims on 6 September 1938, Pius XI asserted: "Anti-Semitism is unacceptable. Spiritually, we are all Semites".(13) Pius XII, in his very first Encyclical, Summi Pontificatus,(14) of 20 October 1939, warned against theories which denied the unity of the human race and against the deification of the State, all of which he saw as leading to a real "hour of darkness".(15)
IV. Nazi anti-Semitism and the Shoah
Thus we cannot ignore the difference which exists between anti-Semitism, based on theories contrary to the constant teaching of the Church on the unity of the human race and on the equal dignity of all races and peoples, and the long-standing sentiments of mistrust and hostility that we call anti-Judaism, of which, unfortunately, Christians also have been guilty.
The National Socialist ideology went even further, in the sense that it refused to acknowledge any transcendent reality as the source of life and the criterion of moral good. Consequently, a human group, and the State with which it was identified, arrogated to itself an absolute status and determined to remove the very existence of the Jewish people, a people called to witness to the one God and the Law of the Covenant. At the level of theological reflection we cannot ignore the fact that not a few in the Nazi Party not only showed aversion to the idea of divine Providence at work in human affairs, but gave proof of a definite hatred directed at God himself. Logically, such an attitude also led to a rejection of Christianity, and a desire to see the Church destroyed or at least subjected to the interests of the Nazi State.
It was this extreme ideology which became the basis of the measures taken, first to drive the Jews from their homes and then to exterminate them. The Shoah was the work of a thoroughly modern neo-pagan regime. Its anti-Semitism had its roots outside of Christianity and, in pursuing its aims, it did not hesitate to oppose the Church and persecute her members also.
But it may be asked whether the Nazi persecution of the Jews was not made easier by the anti-Jewish prejudices imbedded in some Christian minds and hearts. Did anti-Jewish sentiment among Christians make them less sensitive, or even indifferent, to the persecutions launched against the Jews by National Socialism when it reached power?
Any response to this question must take into account that we are dealing with the history of people's attitudes and ways of thinking, subject to multiple influences. Moreover, many people were altogether unaware of the "final solution" that was being put into effect against a whole people; others were afraid for themselves and those near to them; some took advantage of the situation; and still others were moved by envy. A response would need to be given case by case. To do this, however, it is necessary to know what precisely motivated people in a particular situation.
At first the leaders of the Third Reich sought to expel the Jews. Unfortunately, the governments of some Western countries of Christian tradition, including some in North and South America, were more than hesitant to open their borders to the persecuted Jews. Although they could not foresee how far the Nazi hierarchs would go in their criminal intentions, the leaders of those nations were aware of the hardships and dangers to which Jews living in the territories of the Third Reich were exposed. The closing of borders to Jewish emigration in those circumstances, whether due to anti-Jewish hostility or suspicion, political cowardice or shortsightedness, or national selfishness, lays a heavy burden of conscience on the authorities in question.
In the lands where the Nazis undertook mass deportations, the brutality which surrounded these forced movements of helpless people should have led to suspect the worst. Did Christians give every possible assistance to those being persecuted, and in particular to the persecuted Jews?
Many did, but others did not. Those who did help to save Jewish lives as much as was in their power, even to the point of placing their own lives in danger, must not be forgotten. During and after the war, Jewish communities and Jewish leaders expressed their thanks for all that had been done for them, including what Pope Pius XII did personally or through his representatives to save hundreds of thousands of Jewish lives.(16) Many Catholic bishops, priests, religious and laity have been honoured for this reason by the State of Israel.
Nevertheless, as Pope John Paul II has recognized, alongside such courageous men and women, the spiritual resistance and concrete action of other Christians was not that which might have been expected from Christ's followers. We cannot know how many Christians in countries occupied or ruled by the Nazi powers or their allies were horrified at the disappearance of their Jewish neighbours and yet were not strong enough to raise their voices in protest. For Christians, this heavy burden of conscience of their brothers and sisters during the Second World War must be a call to penitence.(17)
We deeply regret the errors and failures of those sons and daughters of the Church. We make our own what is said in the Second Vatican Council's Declaration Nostra Aetate, which unequivocally affirms: "The Church ... mindful of her common patrimony with the Jews, and motivated by the Gospel's spiritual love and by no political considerations, deplores the hatred, persecutions and displays of anti-Semitism directed against the Jews at any time and from any source".(18)
We recall and abide by what Pope John Paul II, addressing the leaders of the Jewish community in Strasbourg in 1988,stated: "I repeat again with you the strongest condemnation of anti-Semitism and racism, which are opposed to the principles of Christianity".(19) The Catholic Church therefore repudiates every persecution against a people or human group anywhere, at any time. She absolutely condemns all forms of genocide, as well as the racist ideologies which give rise to them. Looking back over this century, we are deeply saddened by the violence that has enveloped whole groups of peoples and nations. We recall in particular the massacre of the Armenians, the countless victims in Ukraine in the 1930s, the genocide of the Gypsies, which was also the result of racist ideas, and similar tragedies which have occurred in America, Africa and the Balkans. Nor do we forget the millions of victims of totalitarian ideology in the Soviet Union, in China, Cambodia and elsewhere. Nor can we forget the drama of the Middle East, the elements of which are well known. Even as we make this reflection, "many human beings are still their brothers' victims".(20)
V. Looking together to a common future
Looking to the future of relations between Jews and Christians, in the first place we appeal to our Catholic brothers and sisters to renew the awareness of the Hebrew roots of their faith. We ask them to keep in mind that Jesus was a descendant of David; that the Virgin Mary and the Apostles belonged to the Jewish people; that the Church draws sustenance from the root of that good olive tree on to which have been grafted the wild olive branches of the Gentiles (cf. Rom 11:17-24); that the Jews are our dearly beloved brothers, indeed in a certain sense they are "our elder brothers".(21)
At the end of this Millennium the Catholic Church desires to express her deep sorrow for the failures of her sons and daughters in every age. This is an act of repentance (teshuva), since, as members of the Church, we are linked to the sins as well as the merits of all her children. The Church approaches with deep respect and great compassion the experience of extermination, the Shoah, suffered by the Jewish people during World War II. It is not a matter of mere words, but indeed of binding commitment. "We would risk causing the victims of the most atrocious deaths to die again if we do not have an ardent desire for justice, if we do not commit ourselves to ensure that evil does not prevail over good as it did for millions of the children of the Jewish people ... Humanity cannot permit all that to happen again".(22)
We pray that our sorrow for the tragedy which the Jewish people has suffered in our century will lead to a new relationship with the Jewish people. We wish to turn awareness of past sins into a firm resolve to build a new future in which there will be no more anti-Judaism among Christians or anti-Christian sentiment among Jews, but rather a shared mutual respect, as befits those who adore the one Creator and Lord and have a common father in faith, Abraham.
Finally, we invite all men and women of good will to reflect deeply on the significance of the Shoah. The victims from their graves, and the survivors through the vivid testimony of what they have suffered, have become a loud voice calling the attention of all of humanity. To remember this terrible experience is to become fully conscious of the salutary warning it entails: the spoiled seeds of anti-Judaism and anti-Semitism must never again be allowed to take root in any human heart.
16 March 1998.
Cardinal Edward Idris Cassidy
President
The Most Reverend Pierre Duprey
Vice-President
The Reverend Remi Hoeckman, O.P.
Secretary
TYPIS VATICANIS MCMXCVIII
(1) Pope John Paul II, Apostolic Letter Tertio Millennio Adveniente, 10 November 1994, 33: AAS 87 (1995), 25.
(2) Cf. Pope John Paul II, Speech at the Synagogue of Rome, 13 April 1986, 4: AAS 78 (1986), 1120.
(3) Pope John Paul II, Angelus Prayer, 11 June 1995: Insegnamenti 181, 1995, 1712.
(4) Cf. Pope John Paul II, Address to Jewish Leaders in Budapest, 18 August 1991, 4: Insegnamenti 142, 1991, 349.
(5) Pope John Paul II, Encyclical Letter Centesimus Annus, 1 May 1991, 17: AAS 83 (1991), 814-815.
(6) Cf. Pope John Paul II, Address to Delegates of Episcopal Conferences for Catholic-Jewish relations, 6 March 1982: Insegnamenti, 51, 1982, 743-747.
(7) Cf. Holy See's Commission for Religious Relations with the Jews, Notes on the correct way to present the Jews and Judaism in preaching and catechesis in the Roman Catholic Church, 24 June 1985, VI, 1: Ench. Vat. 9, 1656.
(8) Cf. Pope John Paul II, Speech to Symposium on the roots of anti-Judaism, 31 October 1997, 1: L'Osservatore Romano, 1 November 1997, p. 6.
(9) Cf. Second Vatican Ecumenical Council, Nostra Aetate, 4.
(10) Cf. B. Statiewski (Ed.), Akten deutscher Bischöfe über die Lage der Kirche, 1933-1945, vol. I, 1933-1934 (Mainz 1968), Appendix.
(11) Cf. L. Volk, Der Bayerische Episkopat und der Nationalsozialismus 1930-1934 (Mainz 1966), pp. 170-174.
(12) The Encyclical is dated 14 March 1937: AAS 29 (1937), 145-167.
(13) La Documentation Catholique, 29 (1938), col. 1460.
(14) AAS 31 (1939), 413-453.
(15) Ibid., 449.
(16) The wisdom of Pope Pius XII's diplomacy was publicly acknowledged on a number of occasions by representative Jewish Organizations and personalities. For example, on 7 September 1945, Dr. Joseph Nathan, who represented the Italian Hebrew Commission, stated: "Above all, we acknowledge the Supreme Pontiff and the religious men and women who, executing the directives of the Holy Father, recognized the persecuted as their brothers and, with effort and abnegation, hastened to help us, disregarding the terrible dangers to which they were exposed" (L'Osservatore Romano, 8 September 1945, p. 2). On 21 September of that same year, Pius XII received in audience Dr. A. Leo Kubowitzki, Secretary General of the World Jewish Congress who came to present "to the Holy Father, in the name of the Union of Israelitic Communities, warmest thanks for the efforts of the Catholic Church on behalf of Jews throughout Europe during the War" (L'Osservatore Romano, 23 September 1945, p. 1). On Thursday, 29 November 1945, the Pope met about 80 representatives of Jewish refugees from various concentration camps in Germany, who expressed "their great honour at being able to thank the Holy Father personally for his generosity towards those persecuted during the Nazi-Fascist period" (L'Osservatore Romano, 30 November 1945, p. 1). In 1958, at the death of Pope Pius XII, Golda Meir sent an eloquent message: "We share in the grief of humanity. When fearful martyrdom came to our people, the voice of the Pope was raised for its victims. The life of our times was enriched by a voice speaking out about great moral truths above the tumult of daily conflict. We mourn a great servant of peace".
(17) Cf. Pope John Paul II, Address to the New Ambassador of the Federal Republic of Germany to the Holy See, 8 November 1990, 2: AAS 83 (1991), 587-588.
(18) Loc. cit., no. 4.
(19) Address to Jewish Leaders, Strasbourg, 9 October 1988, no. 8: Insegnamenti 113, 1988, 1134.
(20) Pope John Paul II, Address to the Diplomatic Corps, 15 January 1994, 9: AAS 86 (1994), 816.
(21) Pope John Paul II, Speech at the Synagogue of Rome, 13 April 1986, 4: AAS 78 (1986), 1120.
(22) Pope John Paul II, Address on the occasion of a commemoration of the Shoah, 7 April 1994, 3: Insegnamenti 171, 1994, 897 and 893.
Other Statements
LETTER OF JOHN PAUL II
TO THE LATIN-RITE DIOCESE OF JERUSALEM
The Holy Father wrote a Letter to the Latin-rite Diocese of Jerusalem to mark the 150th anniversary of Pope Pius IX's reorganization of that see. The Pope called on Catholics to prepare in every way to celebrate the coming Holy Year. Here is a translation of those paragraphs of his letter pertaining to relations with the Jews.
É By its presence in the same territory as the Islamic and Jewish communities and through the exchanges it has with them, the Latin community has been prepared over time to understand the importance of interreligious dialogue in the spirit desired and recommended by the Second Vatican Ecumenical Council. Daily life presupposes continuous contact with believers of other religious traditions, for the human, spiritual and moral development of peoples. It is obvious that respectful dialogue and joint, fraternal collaboration among all society's members can be a vigorous appeal for this same understanding to be achieved in other countries.
É Regarding the ties with those who belong to the Jewish religion, it should be recalled that Jews and Christians have a common heritage which links them spiritually (cf. Nostra aetate, n. 4). Both are a blessing for the world (cf. Gn 12:2-3), to the extent that they work together so that peace and justice prevail among all people and all individuals and do so in fullness and in depth, according to the divine plan and in the spirit of sacrifice which this noble project can demand.
They are all called to be conscious of this sacred duty and to fulfil it, through honest and friendly dialogue and by collaboration for the benefit of man and society; I am certain that this readiness to do God's will for the world will also be a blessing for our different communities and enable us to cry out with the psalmist: "Steadfast love and faithfulness will meet; righteousness and peace will kiss each other. Faithfulness will spring up from the ground, and righteousness will look down from the sky" (Ps 85 [84]: 10-11).
November 28, 1997
General Audience
January 14, 1998
To the English-speaking pilgrims and visitors the Holy Father said:
I welcome the members of the Bsnai Bsrith Anti-Defamation League, and I express the hope that your visit will help to strengthen the co-operation of recent years.
Pastoral visit to Cuba
January 21-26, 1998
Address OF JOHN PAUL II
to the Jewish Community
January 25, 1998
On the morning of Sunday, January 25, the Holy Father met representatives of the Cuban Council of Churches at the Apostolic Nunciature in Havana. During the course of his address, the Pope also specifically spoke to the Jewish community.
1. On this memorable day, I am very pleased to meet you, the representatives of the Cuban Council of Churches and of various other Christian communities, accompanied by members of the Jewish community in Cuba, which participates in the Council as an observer. I greet all of you with great affection and I assure you of my happiness at this meeting with those with whom we share faith in the living and true God. This auspicious occasion prompts us to say before all else: "How good and pleasant it is when brothers live together in unity" (Ps 132:1).
4. I also wish to address a particular greeting to the Jewish community represented here. Your presence is an eloquent expression of the fraternal dialogue aimed at a better understanding between Jews and Catholics, and which, promoted by the Second Vatican Council, continues to be ever more widespread. With you we share a common spiritual patrimony, firmly rooted in the Sacred Scriptures. May God, the Creator and Saviour, sustain our efforts to walk together and, encouraged by the divine word, may we grow in worship and fervent love of him. May all of this ever find expression in effective action for the benefit of each and every person.
5. To conclude, I wish to thank each one of you for your presence at this meeting, and I ask God to bless you and your communities and to keep you in his ways so that you may proclaim his name to the brethren. May he show you his face in the midst of the society which you serve, and may he grant you peace in all your undertakings.
Havana, 25 January 1998
Feast of the Conversion of St Paul
Friday, February 25, 2011
re John Knox, a rvw of his hatchet job on James McReynolds
notice one example of reviewer's bias: a LADY FRIEND states antisemitic feelings; both Knox and the reviewer use that persons words to tar McReynolds
Knox has tainted the study; the real question is, Was McReynolds opposed to Brandeis and Frankfurter because they were JEWS or because their policy choices and support were, in McReynolds' judgment, harmful to American interests?
Knox has tainted the study; the real question is, Was McReynolds opposed to Brandeis and Frankfurter because they were JEWS or because their policy choices and support were, in McReynolds' judgment, harmful to American interests?
ISSN 1062-7421
Vol. 12 No. 8 (August 2002) pp. 439-442 (University of Maryland, College of Behavioral and Social Sciences)
THE FORGOTTEN MEMOIR OF JOHN KNOX: A YEAR IN THE LIFE OF A SUPREME COURT CLERK IN FDR'S WASHINGTON by Dennis J. Hutchinson and David J. Garrow (Editors). Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 2002, xxiii, 288 pp. Cloth $32.50. ISBN 0-226-44862-2.
Reviewed by Tinsley E. Yarbrough, Department of Political Science, East Carolina University.
Parents caution their children, "Be careful what you wish for; you might get it." John Frush Knox (1907-1997) longed to become a clerk to a Supreme Court justice, and his wish came true. Knox served during the Court's watershed 1936-37 term as secretary to James Clark McReynolds, the most stridently reactionary of the "Four Horsemen," with whom working was likened to a daily walk through a mine field.
Even at seventy-five, the justice was an impressive physical specimen-tall, trim, impeccably dressed, with the countenance of a Roman senator and a host of female admirers. To his credit, the wealthy bachelor jurist also apparently had a genuine affection for children, providing financial support for over thirty child victims of the Nazi blitzkrieg in England and offering to contribute the first $10,000 to the Save the Children Fund.
But McReynolds was also one of the pettiest, most irascible, bigoted, and mediocre justices ever to sit on the high bench. He detested the Court's Jewish justices, admonishing his staff not to associate with them or their staffs. Indeed, no official Court photograph exists for 1924 simply because McReynolds refused to sit next to Justice Louis D. Brandeis, as required by Court protocol. The justice forbade his clerks, moreover, to fraternize with his "darky" messenger and cook. When McReynolds died in 1946, no member of the Court attended his funeral.
Not surprisingly, John Knox's year with the justice proved a painfully frustrating experience, relieved only by the friendship of McReynolds's servants, the attentions of one of the justice's women friends, the sympathetic indulgence of several other justices, Knox's fascination with Washington, the thrill of attempting surreptitiously to circumvent McReynolds's myriad rules and idiosyncrasies-and the detailed diary entries that would become the basis for his fascinating memoir.
Knox was almost as eccentric as his subject. Raised in suburban Chicago in the 1920s, he received a bachelor's degree from the University of Chicago, a LL.B. at Northwestern, and a LL.M. at Harvard. As a lonely high school senior, he had begun keeping a daily diary. A descendant of a Confederate veteran and fascinated with war, he also began corresponding with veterans, then turned his efforts to seeking the autographs of celebrities, and finally began corresponding with Justices Oliver W. Holmes, Willis Van Devanter, and Benjamin N. Cardozo, who not only responded but eventually granted Knox personal audiences. In fact, when
Knox was offered a clerkship with McReynolds, Justice Van Devanter was
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the intermediary, not Felix Frankfurter, who was the major conduit to a Supreme Court clerkship in that era, but had given Knox a minimal passing grade in a Harvard class and obviously enjoyed absolutely no influence with the anti-Semitic McReynolds.
Knox's career after his clerkship was as lackluster as McReynolds's judicial record. He initially landed a position with a prestigious Chicago firm but was fired when he failed the Illinois bar. Although he passed the bar on his third attempt, he never acquired a secure and permanent position with a firm. An attempt to run the faltering family mail-order book business after his father's death proved disastrous, but he eventually found his niche in the Chicago claims office of the Allstate Insurance Company, a Sears subsidiary, working there until his retirement in 1973. The dwindling value of the Sears stock on which his retirement income was
based made Knox's last years extremely precarious ones. A lonely bachelor who struggled with prostate cancer the last decade of his life, he died in 1997.
The Supreme Court Historical Society published Knox's unsigned account of Justice McReynolds's career in 1983 and a lengthy summary the next year of his recollections of Chief Justice Charles Evans Hughes, particularly during the 1936-37 Term. He tried for several years to interest Simon & Schuster in his memoir, but that and similar efforts were unavailing, in part because Knox was willing to release only portions of his manuscript prior to signing a contract.
Thanks to Professors Hutchinson and Garrow, the memoir is now available and well worth the wait. Knox certainly did not succeed in his stated intention to surpass Pepys as a diarist, and his work is often more revealing of its author than its subject. But it is clearly the most intimate and candid account of a clerk's relationship with a justice, that justice's lifestyle and personality, and the daily workings of the Court ever to appear in print.
By the time Knox began his clerkship, the Court's sessions were being held in the recently completed Supreme Court building. But most justices, including McReynolds, continued to work at home. Home to the justice was Suite 502, a luxurious thirteen-room apartment at 2400 16th Street, N. W. Knox began his duties there with great anticipation for a rewarding year.
But disillusionment quickly followed. McReynolds seemed decidedly more insistent that Knox master the rituals of his household and Washington society, including its complicated rules for the exchange of calling cards, than his official duties. Early in his tenure, the justice asked his clerk to draft an opinion. Knox worked diligently for days, producing draft after draft. With hardly a glance at his clerk's handiwork, McReynolds then quickly wrote his own-in Knox's view, inferior-opinion in the case.
Knox found the treatment the justice accorded his African-American messenger Harry Parker and cook Mary Diggs especially disturbing. Messengers were regularly obliged to go beyond their Court duties, acting as personal servants to their justices, but McReynolds's demands of Parker were excessive by any measure. Parker served McReynolds until the justice retired in 1941, and then became Robert H. Jackson's clerk. Two of his sons also worked at the Court. Katherine Ogden Savage, the McReynolds lady friend who befriended Knox, providing him regular
Page 441 begins here
social opportunities without the justice's knowledge, said that for years Harry Parker "did almost everything but breathe for the Justice." Mary Diggs was also extremely efficient and an exceptionally talented cook. And although both referred to McReynolds as "Pussywillow" behind his back, they were invariably respectful and scrupulously attentive to the justice's every need. McReynolds, by contrast, generally treated them with contempt and suspicion. Most demeaning of all, McReynolds enlisted Parker as a human bird dog on hunting trips, obliging his messenger to wade through icy water to retrieve the justice's kill.
McReynolds admonished Knox, for obviously social and racial reasons, not to become too familiar with his servants, but to no avail. Parker and Diggs became his closest friends and allies, offering him valuable advice in his efforts to cope with the justice. ("You can't smoke or drink," the messenger explained at one point, "and you can't have no dates with girlfriends during the year. If anybody is going to do any dating, it will be the Justice and nobody else.") When they invited Knox to share lunch with them in the kitchen while McReynolds was away, they seated the clerk at a separate table-a nod to racial tradition Knox quickly corrected.
The justice's anti-Semitism hardly escaped his clerk either. Parker told Knox of McReynolds's bitter distaste for Justices Brandeis and Cardozo, but a note to the justice from one of his women friends was perhaps most revealing. While confined in a hospital, she wrote McReynolds, "[t]he head doctor on the floor . . . has been in here a number of times to talk with me on one pretext or another. But he is a Jew! It's obvious. Imagine! ... I was, of course, REPELLED. He even touched me with his hands! What lengths these Jews will go in order to make a conquest!" When Mary Diggs showed the letter to a shocked Knox, she began laughing. "Mr. Knox, you sure do look surprised! But you know he don't like no Jews and neither do his lady friends."
Accounts of McReynolds's female relationships also provide moments of humor for his readers, if not for Knox himself. Desperate to keep each woman friend ignorant of the others, the justice was enraged when Knox confused one woman telephone caller's voice with another's. Knox's association with Mrs. Savage, who lived one floor above the justice's apartment, was entirely platonic, as he repeatedly assured an initially dubious Parker. But he was obliged to be constantly on guard lest the justice learn of their relationship, and once had to hide in a bedroom when the justice made an unexpected call at Mrs. Savage's suite.
The most interesting portions of Knox's memoir are devoted to changes in McReynolds's mood and behavior as the Court's eventful 1936-37 term progressed. Bolstered by the LITERARY DIGEST and its grossly unreliable sample survey predictions of a Republican landslide against FDR in the 1936 presidential election, the justice's spirits remained reasonably good through the early fall. But when GOP candidate Alf Landon won the electoral votes of only two states, the LITERARY DIGEST disappeared from the McReynolds household and the justice's disposition grew increasingly dark. McReynolds took some comfort from the opposition FDR's Court-packing plan provoked. But the defection of Owen Roberts to the liberal side doomed the Court's anti-New Deal coalition to permanent defeat. The "Four Horsemen" gathered at 2400 for strategy sessions and persuaded McReynolds to draft the group's
Page 442 begins here
dissent in the monumental JONES & LAUGHLIN case, which the justice delivered extemporaneously and forcefully from the bench. As time went on, though, McReynolds, never a very industrious jurist under the best of circumstances, grew increasingly indifferent to the Court's docket-and difficult for his staff to tolerate.
Whatever the frustrations of his post, Knox had fully intended to complete the term with McReynolds. But that was not to be. When the justice learned that his clerk had been studying for the bar and planned to take the examination, McReynolds issued an ultimatum: if Knox persisted with his plans, he would be discharged and his salary stopped immediately. When Knox refused, the justice promptly followed through with his threat, without so much as a goodbye to a person with whom he had close contact for most of a year. In 1938, when Knox paid a visit to Harry Parker and Mary Diggs, the messenger insisted that he say hello to the justice so that the two "could be friends again." McReynolds greeted his former clerk in a "cordial but distant manner," leaving Knox "feeling a bit chilled despite
the warm weather." He never saw the justice again. With the publication of this memoir, however, Knox has finally had the last word.
***************************************************************************
Copyright 2002 by the author, Tinsley E. Yarbrough.
John Knox's notes on James McReynolds
Excerpts from
The Forgotten Memoir of John Knox
A Year in the Life of a Supreme Court Clerk in FDR's Washington
Edited by Dennis J. Hutchinson and David J. Garrow
"John Knox was an earnest young man, fresh from Harvard Law School in 1936, who lucked his way into a Supreme Court clerkship—only 'luck' isn't quite the right word. What he did not realize until too late was that his new boss, Justice James C. McReynolds, was notorious within the court as an obnoxious grouch and as a racist and anti-Semite to boot. Mr. Knox's memoir of his clerkship, published now for the first time, offers a rare glimpse into the private world of the Supreme Court at a remarkable time in our history. …Just a few months into his clerkship, Mr. Knox found that 'a chill was gradually descending on my spirits.' Little wonder. He went on to an undistinguished legal career. The memoir he left behind, though, is a fascinating achievement."—David A. Price, The Wall Street Journal
"Fascinating.…If it is the semi-inside view of the Court in 1936-37 that brings readers to this book, it is the story of this bizarre mÉnage À quatre that will keep them hooked. The mean old judge, the ambitious but feckless secretary, the two mistreated** but keenly watchful servants, all four contained within the walls of a spiffy yet cold and claustrophobic apartment—it is a delicious combination, packed with drama, irony and drollery."—Jonathan Yardley, Washington Post Book World **how do we know they were mistreated?
"Had Balzac turned his wit on our nation's capital, the resulting novel might have been the story of John Knox.…Eccentric and exciting political and social history."—Jeff Greenfield, Harper's
"This book has novelistic force, like One L or The Paper Chase. It's about a weird quartet: the author, who is a nice young man, a bit of the obtuse narrator; his boss, McReynolds, a kind of legal Bluebeard; and the two black servants, who call McReynolds (behind his back of course) 'Pussywillow.' This is literature, rather than just history—the charm is in the telling."—Judge Richard A. Posner
"This is American history and Supreme Court history written from the inside as a drama/comedy of people and manners. Most telling for me was the view of black Americans as they study, protect, and sometimes shake their heads at the powerful white people they know as flawed human beings."—Juan Williams
John F. Knox was the secretary and law clerk to Justice James C. McReynolds of the United States Supreme Court during the term that President Franklin D. Roosevelt tried to "pack" the Court, 1936-37. [1] Knox came to the job by an unusual route. He held two law degrees, including an LL.M. from Harvard, but he owed his appointment to a habit he began in high school—writing pen pal letters to celebrities. He began with Civil War veterans and proceeded to luminaries of the day such as Helen Keller, William Howard Taft, and Admiral Byrd. Even before law school, he established an on-going correspondence with members of the Supreme Court, including Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., Benjamin N. Cardozo, and Willis Van Devanter. His most sustained correspondence was with Van Devanter, one of the conservative "Four Horsemen," as they were then called.
After years of exchanging letters, Knox finally screwed up the courage to ask Van Devanter for a job. Van Devanter retained a permanent secretary and clerk, but his colleague McReynolds suffered high turnover, and the justice recommended Knox. But what Knox thought was a dream job turned out to be a constant trial. McReynolds was a severe and distant man of intense passions and biases, including naked racial bigotry and anti-semitism. Ironically Knox developed his closest relationships in the McReynolds household with the Justice's two black servants, Harry Parker, the messenger and general factotum, and Mrs. Mary Diggs, the housekeeper and cook. Although the new Supreme Court building had been opened for a year, all but two of the justices maintained their old habits of working at home and attending the Court only for oral arguments and delivery of opinions.
Knox was seared by his year with McReynolds, and at mid-life began writing his memoirs, based on his daily diary, carbon copies of letters he had written, and his meticulous memory. After ten years of work he had a 978-page manuscript, which, despite constant effort, remained unpublished at his death in 1997. The memoir is unique: no other law clerk to a Supreme Court justice has documented the experience. Knox's work is a candid, sometimes naive, account of what might be called "Upstairs, Downstairs" at the Court during a politically tumultuous period in which the country and the Court were changing dramatically. The following excerpts are drawn from the book.
*
[September 18, 1936:] Harry then became quiet, looked at me intently for some moments and then decided to change the subject of conversation. He finally said, "Say, Mr. Knox, did you ever sort of notice anything different when you hear me talking to Mary?"
"Well," I replied, after a pause to collect my thoughts, "now that you mention it, I guess I did. Sometimes I hear you and Mary talking about funny things—like, for instance, pussy-willows and queens."
"That's just it," said Harry excitedly, "and Mary and me has now decided to initiate you into our secret!"
At this announcement I straightened up a bit in my chair and began to show more interest. "Secret?" I inquired, "You mean you want me to join a club or something?"
"Naw, it ain't nothing like that!" said Harry. "What I means is that once you is initiated, the three of us can talk about the Justice and all his friends without his knowing it or understanding us!"
"Indeed!" I declared with real interest. "I'm all ears. Just what do you have in mind?"
"Well, it's like this," said Harry triumphantly. "When Mary and me is getting dinner, the Justice often pokes his head in the kitchen door to give us some last minute instructions. Or he sometimes hears Mary and me talking when we is cleaning up the dining room or fixing for me to go to market. Now all the time the Justice thinks we is just talking about some of our no count colored friends, but we ain't at all. We is really talking about him and his friends!"
"Well, you don't say so," I countered. "But how do you talk about the Justice and his friends without his knowing it if he hears you?"
"That's easy," said Harry beaming, "and that's our secret. You see, we gives secret names to everybody. Take the Justice himself, for instance. We calls him 'Pussywillow'. Now his best lady friend is 'Madam Queen'—that's Mrs. [Camilla Hare] Lippincott."
"So that explains my hearing you two talk about pussywillows and queens!" I exclaimed. "Very clever, very clever indeed!"
"And now," Harry announced dramatically, "we have given you a name, too. You are going to be Mr. Shoefenicks. After this, when you hear that word you will know we are talking about you."
And so it came to pass that from that day forward I was always referred to in private by Harry and Mary as "Shoefenicks". Why they chose this name, or from whence it came, I was never to know. Nor did I ever question their selection of such a name. If the Justice, for instance, overheard Harry and Mary discussing Shoefenicks and whether he got sick after finding too many pussywillows yesterday, McReynolds must have wondered what sort of jungle dialect was being spoken in his presence.
Following this conversation, Harry began to refer at once to Justice McReynolds as "Pussywillow" in all subsequent conversation with me. Having been "taken into" the secret, I became a part of it at once. To this day McReynolds is, in reality, "Pussywillow" to me instead of "Mr. Justice". Several times, while serving as his secretary and law clerk, I narrowly avoided addressing him as "Pussywillow".
With the Justice, or rather "Pussywillow", gone to play golf, and it being a Friday, I continued my conversation with Harry in a leisurely manner. After a pause, during which I looked up toward Harry as I sat there at the typewriter, I said slowly, as if groping for words, "You know something, Harry. I think I'll call up Justice Brandeis and ask to meet him. He's not so busy now as he will be after the Court opens, and maybe he would have time to see me."
In one shattering moment, however, Harry's expression changed. His face took on a look almost of horror. "Justice Brandeis! Have you gone out of your mind?"
"Of course, Justice Brandeis. Why not? He's going to be 80 years old in November, and I'd like to meet him. Besides, his new secretary was at Harvard when I was there."
Harry made a helpless, dazed sort of gesture with his right hand, as he stood there in the doorway of my room, and he said, "Sometimes I think I never will be able to teach you nothing at all about Washington! Don't you know that we has absolutely no relations with Justice Brandeis?"
"What do you mean, we don't have any relations with him? Doesn't he come over here now and then to discuss cases that are up for decision?"
"Come over here?" exclaimed Harry in amazement. "Oh you got so much to learn! Of course, he never comes over here. Don't you realize that Justice Brandeis is Jewish?"
"Yes, but what about it?" I inquired innocently.
"Why," said Harry emphatically, "there's been only one Jewish fellow who ever got to come to this apartment, and he was Mr. Garfinckel who had the department store. You know, Garfinckel's downtown where they don't have no basement in the store."
In a tone of quiet sarcasm I said, "And how did Mr. Garfinckel ever get in here? Did he sell some merchandise wholesale to the Justice?"
This question caused Harry to pause for some moments before replying. "Say, maybe that was why he came here. I always did think it kind of funny like. Pussywillow sure don't like to buy nothing if he can get out of it, and even some of the furniture here was given to him. Take that Japanese screen, for instance. One of his lady friends sent us that a couple of years ago."
"Now Harry," I ventured, "do you really mean to say that the Justice, I mean Pussywillow, is at outs with Brandeis because he's Jewish. And does that mean Cardozo doesn't come over here either?"
Without replying to the first question, Harry immediately commented, "Now Justice Cardozo, he's a sort of special case. He couldn't come over here even if he wasn't Jewish because the Justice is real mad at him."
"Mad at Cardozo? What did he ever do to upset Pussywillow?"
"Well," said Harry thoughtfully. "It was some time ago—soon after Justice Cardozo came to Washington. Pussywillow wrote an opinion and circulated it around to the other eight Justices, as he was supposed to do, of course, but Cardozo went and made a suggestion or two about improving the wording of a few sentences. That was when he was real new to the Court, too, and Pussywillow had been here for many years. Well, Pussywillow never had no more to do with Cardozo after that, and I guess they're not even on speaking terms to this day."
"Oh Harry," I said, shaking my head slowly back and forth, "sometimes I wonder how these cases ever get decided at all. Is everybody mad at everybody else on the Supreme Court of the United States?"
***
[September 26, 1936:] The next morning my first glimpse of Justice McReynolds was when he summoned me to his study and rather impatiently shoved a letter across the desk in my direction. "Take care of this. Somebody wants my autograph. I've signed my name on a piece of paper here, and you can send it to this child. It's nonsense, that's what it is, wanting stranger's autographs—and for what?"
This was my first introduction to a phenomenon that I was to see much of during the months to come—requests from strangers for the autograph of the Justice. It finally became rather burdensome to answer such requests by return mail and always accompany my answers with the autograph of the Justice. In the Spring of 1937 these requests became very numerous following President Roosevelt's attack upon the Supreme Court. Yet never once did I venture to suggest to McReynolds that the matter would be simplified if he would only give me 25 or 30 autographs at one time, which I could keep "in reserve" for future requests. "If I asked him to sign his name on pieces of paper that many times and all at once, I suppose he would fire me for sure!" I rationalized to myself.
There was, however, something intriguing about this very first request for an autograph. In fact, the next time Harry stopped by the door of my office that day to ask if the Justice or I had any errands for him, I showed Harry the letter. "Nobody ever asks for my autograph," he said with a chuckle. "Say, why don't you send him my signature, too, along with your autograph and the Justice's?" And at the very thought of such a thing, Harry threw back his head, smiled from ear to ear and gave a hearty laugh. McReynolds was at that time sitting in his study but not near enough to hear what we had been talking about. Yet almost immediately the buzzer on my desk began ringing with an insistent hissing sound. Grabbing my shorthand pad, I walked in at once to the Justice's study after throwing a knowing glance at Harry. He then turned and walked back toward the kitchen.
"I don't want to dictate any letter," McReynolds said rather impatiently, "but I do feel that this is the time to speak about one thing. I realize you are a Northerner who has never been educated or reared in the South, but I want you to know that you are becoming much too friendly with Harry. You seem to forget that he is a negro and you are a graduate of the Harvard Law School. And yet for days now, it has been obvious to me that you are, well, treating Harry and Mary like equals. Really, a law clerk to a Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States should have some feeling about his position and not wish to associate with colored servants the way you are doing." And with a genuine sigh McReynolds continued, "Of course, you are not a Southerner, so maybe it's expecting too much of someone from Chicago to act like a Southerner, but I do wish you would think of my wishes in this matter in your future relations with darkies."
"Yes, sir," I said, in a low and almost inaudible voice. I then turned and left the room as the Justice indicated that he did not wish to discuss the matter further. Walking back to my office I sat down at the typewriter but began running my fingers absent-mindedly through my hair and saying to myself, "What's the matter with me anyway? Am I a coward or something? Why don't I march right back in there and tell him that I am a Southerner! Of course, I wasn't born down South, I never lived down South, and I know very little firsthand about the South. But, at least many of my ancestors were born in North Carolina and Virginia during the 1700's, my great-great grandfather was married in Warrenton, Virginia, after his return from the Revolutionary War, my grandfather was born in Richmond in 1833, and a small Confederate flag hangs on one of the walls in my home next to autographed pictures of Generals Lee and Beauregard. Why, I not only know many Confederate veterans personally, but I even know a member of General Robert E. Lee's staff. I'm not just a Northerner; I'm a Southerner, too!" But on second thought I decided not to go back into the Justice's study and revive the conversation, and in fact he was destined never to know anything about my ancestors, the Confederate flag, or my Confederate friendships. Nor did Harry or Mary ever learn of this conversation of mine with the Justice.
***
[Late September, 1936, McReynolds cleared his throat and said:] "You asked me—umph—about what advice I would give to someone just starting out to practice law."
"Oh yes, I remember," I replied hastily.
I turned suddenly in my chair and looked intently at the Justice. I had, in fact, not even had time to rise upon his entrance into the room and then wait until he indicated that I should be seated again. There also flashed through my mind the realization that he could never be quite at ease in the presence of his law clerk—at least when he was talking to the clerk as "man-to-man". And somehow at that moment I felt a genuine burst of admiration for him, for I suddenly realized the care he had apparently taken in mulling over my question.
"I'm glad to see you are so earnest about the law," McReynolds said in a brusque sort of way. "You must be or you wouldn't have asked the question in the first place." Then with an almost inaudible sigh the Justice continued, "I think, first of all, that honesty and integrity are the most important things for a young lawyer to keep in mind. A man must have sound principles and stand by them these days, and he should not endorse every wild scheme that comes along. I suppose you know that Washington is full of impractical lawyers, and I must say that many of them seem to have come from Harvard. You might as well realize right now that I think the Harvard Law School is highly overrated!"
McReynolds drew a long breath and then continued. "I also hope that you did not come under the influence of Frankfurter when you were in law school. There was some doubt in my mind about Justice Van Devanter's selection of any law clerk who graduated from a school where Frankfurter teaches. He is certainly one man not to be trusted! Even though he is dangerous to the welfare of this country, he evidently has a powerful influence at the White House."
"I only had Professor Frankfurter for one class at Harvard," I managed to reply. "There were about two hundred students in that class, and I am sure he did not even know that I existed." I was just about to add, however, that I did consider Frankfurter a very stimulating and interesting professor, but on second thought I decided to remain silent on this point.
"But with or without Frankfurter's help," the Justice continued, "the present administration has made many mistakes. Now just suppose we review a few of them. I was a Democrat when I was appointed to the Court, but I must recognize this administration for what it is. It began, for instance, by repudiating the campaign platform of 1932. That was the first betrayal. Then it recognized Soviet Russia. Imagine restoring diplomatic relations with that country! Justice Van Devanter was over there last year, and he even saw pregnant women working on the railroads in section gangs. And yet the Communists propose to infiltrate their ideas throughout the world. And Roosevelt recognizes them and installs the Soviets in the old embassy of the Czars right here on Sixteenth Street!"
I remained silent, fascinated by the flow of conversation that I had so unwittingly released. "Shortly after we recognized soviet Russia," McReynolds continued, "we took another step down the road to Socialism and the destruction of states' rights!"
"What happened?" I ventured to suggest.
"Why a large bureaucracey began to mushroom here in Washington, and with this growth in the Federal government there has been a greater and greater centralization of power in this city. And another thing! Before he was elected the President pledged that he would cut government expenditures by, I believe, twenty-five per cent. The national debt then stood at about 21 billion dollars. But the President did just the opposite of what he had pledged himself to do. In fact, he has squandered money so fast that Congress last year had to enact a law making 45 billion dollars the national debt limit. Imagine 45 billion dollars! Why this is a sum so vast that it cannot even be comprehended!"
I could not imagine the sum of 45 billion dollars, either, except to assume that if this amount was all in dollar bills they would probably reach from Washington to the moon.
"I remember reading about your dissenting views in the gold clause cases last year," I next said.
At this statement McReynolds' eyes began flashing, and memories crowded upon him with ever increasing rapidity. "We were assured that this country would not be taken off the gold standard! [2] Not only Roosevelt promised that but also Garner and even Carter Glass. But these promises were repudiated! The dollar was depreciated to sixty cents. This meant that mortgages were depreciated, as were bank deposits and insurance funds. I want you to realize that this Administration has deliberately sought to repudiate its national obligations and to confiscate private rights. As I said last year, when the gold cases were decided, this can only lead to the moral and financial breakdown of the country!"
"What do you think the results of the Schechter decision [invalidating the administration's National Industrial Recovery Act] have been?" I next suggested.
"Well," McReynolds continued, "for one thing businessmen throughout the country have become more and more confident because of the Court's decision in that case. The decision stimulated industry, which had been hampered by the N.R.A. laws." And then after a momentary pause McReynolds said, "But I guess I have strayed a little from the subject! I just want you to realize, however, that if it were not for the Court this country would go too far down the road to Socialism ever to return. We have been at the crossroads for several years, and it is our great misfortune to have a man as President who ignores the Constitution and dominates a weak and politically-minded Congress. A man like Roosevelt can do great harm to this country, but I feel that the worst is now over. And so, getting back to what advice I would give you, let me see, well I think a young lawyer should make all the contacts that he can—but in sincerity, of course. They will help him in building up a clientele later on. He should also be able to analyze the merits or defects of each individual judge before whom he may practice. This will be of great aid to him throughout his legal career."
There was another momentary pause, and McReynolds now seemed to be groping for something to say next. Then he suddenly blurted out, "Also don't be a bachelor! I think a lawyer can be more successful as a general rule if he has a wife and family to work for. They will keep him alert and on his toes, and there will be the companionship of his wife through the years. And another thing! Don't ever wear a red tie. It is much too effeminate for a lawyer to do. I don't like red ties!"
At this statement I could not refrain from glancing down at my own tie even though I knew that it could not be red. While at Harvard I had heard that red ties were somehow taboo, and as a consequence I was careful never to purchase a tie with any red in it. The one I happened to be wearing on that particular September day was, I was glad to note, an innocuous blue in color.
The Justice then closed the conversation by saying that there were a lot of crackpot theorists in Washington who were bent on ruining the government if given half a chance. He enumerated several of them by name, and having done that he suddenly stood up and left the room. The conversation was over, but before he disappeared into his own study I did manage to thank him for answering my question in such detail. Then as soon as he had gone, I began to sketch out on the typewriter a short memorandum of his conversation so that I would not forget what he had just said.
***
[Late September, 1936:] The next time Justice McReynolds called me into his study for some dictation, I mentioned my surprise at learning how many campaign promises the President had broken. After some reflection the Justice slowly replied, "No trait in Roosevelt is more dangerous than the fact that he does one thing while planning just the opposite." And shaking his head back and forth he concluded, "I don't know where all this is going to end!"
Noticing a copy of the current issue of "The Literary Digest" on the Justice's desk I chanced to remark, "It will probably end in Roosevelt's defeat. What does this week's 'Digest' poll say about Landon's chances?"
McReynolds then handed me the October 3, 1936, issue of "The Literary Digest". On page 7 there was an article entitled "Landon Holds Lead in 'Digest' Poll. Kansan Ahead in 21 States, Roosevelt in 10, Lemke in None."
"Landon seems to be gaining," the Justice ventured, "I think we may be due for a change. Let's hope so at least!"
To this I replied, "I notice Roosevelt said last week that he expects to balance the budget in a year or two without imposing any additional new taxes."
"I suppose he said that in one of his campaign speeches," McReynolds remarked dryly. "Well, then, you can just be sure he is getting ready to spend some more money!"
I then left the Justice's study to peruse the copy of "The Literary Digest" which he had given me. And at the moment it seemed that McReynolds might even be right in anticipating Landon's election. "The Digest" polls in the past had proved remarkably correct. In 1920, 1924, 1928 and 1932 not only had the "Digest" picked the correct Presidential winner, but it had forecast the actual popular vote within such a small percentage of error that the magazine's polls were considered extremely accurate by 1936. For instance, the percentage of error in the 1932 poll had been less than 1%.
Not only did the "Digest" predict that Landon was leading in 21 states, but these states carried an electoral vote of 290. On the other hand, the 10 states in which Roosevelt was alleged to be leading contained only 111 electoral votes. Then, too, Al Smith had just made a stirring speech in Carnegie Hall telling a New York audience that "the remedy for all the ills that we are suffering from today is the election of Alfred M. Landon". The fact that the Democratic candidate of 1928 would endorse a Republican candidate in 1936 carried great weight with me. "Maybe he will influence several million votes throughout the country," I thought. "If Smith could swing New York State to Landon, Roosevelt might be seriously hampered."
In the evenings, however, I would tune in on some of Landon's campaign speeches [using the] small radio in my apartment. But when I listened to his voice and delivery I began to have grave doubts again that he could win against Roosevelt. It was like trying to imagine a pygmy attempting to lasso an elephant. And all the while Jim Farley remained very calm and kept saying that whatever Al Smith or Alf Landon did was quite immaterial, and that Roosevelt's victory in 1936 would be an even greater one than his 1932 success. Yet Justice McReynolds continued to place his faith in "The Literary Digest" polls. It was the only magazine that I ever saw on the desk in his study. He read each issue carefully and compared Landon's chances week by week with those of the occupant of the White House. The "Digest's" predictions were something to hold to, and to keep faith in. They were, in fact, like a guiding star which seemed to forecast the early end of the four year New Deal nightmare.
***
[Mid-November, 1936, after being introduced to Mrs. Katherine Ogden Savage, a wealthy widow who lived one floor away from McReynolds in the same apartment building:] At dinner held by Mrs. Savage on Saturday, November 14th, I sat near the Admiral from the Navy Department. I noticed Mrs. Savage's Negro maid eyeing me rather sharply. She was busily serving someone on the opposite side of the table, and she had just heard me tell the Admiral that I was Justice McReynolds' secretary. In no time at all this same maid informed Harry of what she had learned. A few days later he took me aside in the kitchen of McReynolds' apartment and in a very serious tone of voice asked me if I had ever heard of a Mrs. Francis M. Savage.
"Why Harry," I exclaimed in surprise. "Don't you remember? You introduced me to her when I went to Court the other day."
"That I did," Harry replied glumly, "and I'm real sorry to hear you have become a gigolo so soon."
"A gigolo?" I inquired in surprise. "Just what do you mean?"
"You know what I mean!" replied Harry. "Mrs. Savage is a widow twice your age. She is also a friend of Pussywillow's. You were seen eating with her in the dining room downstairs—right out in public where everybody could see you! And then you even went to dinner in her apartment! I know because her maid told me."
It took some time and considerable discussion before Harry was prepared to concede that perhaps I wasn't exactly a gigolo after all, but he was certain that the whole affair had an element of great disaster in it. "No good will come of this!" he said, shaking his head from side to side. "Mark my word, when Pussywillow hears about you and Mrs. Savage, you will really be in trouble—and just when everything is going nice and calm like now that the Court is hearing arguments again. In fact, you won't last until Christmas. You'll be looking for a nice new job by the time snow comes!"
"The Justice won't need to hear of it," I said, "that is unless somebody tells him."
"Well, nobody's going to snitch on you," replied Harry, "but some day soon Pussywillow will come walking down the lobby swinging his cane and see his secretary as big as life eating right there in the dining room with his lady friend from upstairs. And when that happens it sure will be curtains for you!"
"I'm prepared to take the risk," I finally replied. "After all, he only plays golf with Mrs. Savage. He isn't married to her, and he can't tell her who to invite to dinner."
"O. K." Harry concluded with a sigh, "but don't say I didn't warn you! Pussywillow is real jealous of all of his lady friends—even the ones he only sees on a golf course." And with that statement the subject of Mrs. Savage was closed for the time being. In fact, a few minutes later McReynolds arrived home from Court, and soon he was immersed in dictating a letter to me.
***
[Mid-January, 1937:] Not long after the White House reception [for the judiciary on January 12, 1937] I noticed a subtle change beginning to take place in the Justice's conduct of his affairs, and as the month progressed McReynolds began to exhibit marked signs of irritability and uneasiness. I finally wrote in my diary as follows:
. . . The Justice has been tipped off to something, but I don't know yet what it is. He is either fearing inflation or being forced to resign. He has had me go through his records back to 1903, he has been calling up his stock brokers, etc. A millionaire from Wall Street came down to advise him to ship part of his money to Canada and England. Beyond that I don't know what happened but will find out in due time, I suppose . . . Something is wrong somewhere . . . There may be a blow-up somewhere along the line . . .
Since McReynolds was in contact with a number of prominent people in Washington, I finally assumed that someone from Capitol Hill was upsetting him considerably by forecasting what the President's plans for the country might be. The Justice, for instance, was a friend of Representative Hatton W. Sumners of Texas, the able Chairman of the House Judiciary Committee. Was Sumners the one who was causing the Justice such uneasiness? I assumed that he was, and for years I felt that Sumners was the one who had warned the Justice, [but Congressman Summers denied "ever discussing the matters" when I corresponded with him in 1961]. In any event, shortly after President Roosevelt's message to Congress on January 6, 1937, Sumners revived a bill which he had previously introduced in the House of Representatives. He may have read between the lines of the President's message and anticipated Roosevelt's impending assault upon the Supreme Court. In his revived bill Representative Sumners looked toward the day when some of the Justices might resign but still need a guaranteed income each year. This bill, therefore, sought to establish a retiring Justice in a new position in which he would exercise certain minor judicial functions. In return, the Justice would be guaranteed a certain salary which would not be subject to reduction.
Now it so happened that while serving as Attorney General in 1913 Justice McReynolds had recommended the passage of a bill providing that when any federal judge, except justices of the Supreme Court, failed to avail himself of the privilege of retiring at the age provided by law, the President should appoint another judge to preside over the affairs of the Court and have precedence over the older one. "This," said McReynolds, "will insure at all times the presence of a judge sufficiently active to discharge promptly and adequately all the duties of the court." McReynolds had made this recommendation to President Wilson in 1913, but no action had ever been taken on it. Now in 1936 McReynolds, as the arch conservative member of the Supreme Court, was on the verge of finding these words turned against him by the occupant of the White House. Whether he knew this or surmised it during the month of January, 1937, I have no way of knowing for sure. But for many years I have assumed that he did know for he became more and more uneasy as he occupied himself with day by day routine Court work. He was busily preparing three decisions which he expected to read at the next opinion day—February 1, 1937—but writing these decisions was certainly not the cause of his growing uneasiness. I finally began to wonder just what was really going to happen after the Inauguration scheduled for Wednesday, January 20, 1937.
*
On February 5, 1937, Roosevelt announced the judicial reform legislation, which immediately caused a political crisis for the President and daily speculation on if and how the Court would respond. The proposal died in Congress during the summer, but not before the Court issued a series of dramatic decisions more sympathetic to the New Deal and to the directions of social reform that had been developing simultaneously at the state level. The "Old Court," dominated by McReynolds and the other Four Horsemen, was no more.
*
Notes
1. Buoyed by an overwhelming landslide re-election in November 1936, Roosevelt proposed legislation in February of 1937 that would have added one new justice for each who was then aged 70 or older. If enacted, Roosevelt would have realized six appointments to the Court and a comfortable majority in an institution which had found one constitutional obstacle after another to various New Deal programs.
2. [Editors' note: McReynolds ran unsuccessfully for Congress in 1896 as a "Gold Democrat," breaking with the Party's Presidential nominee, William Jennings Bryan, who campaigned for free silver and against the the opposition's policy which he derided as a "Cross of Gold."]
Copyright notice: ©2002 Excerpted from The Forgotten Memoir of John Knox: A Year in the Life of a Supreme Court Clerk in FDR's Washington, edited by Dennis J. Hutchinson and David J. Garrow, published by the University of Chicago Press. ©2002 by Dennis J. Hutchinson and David J. Garrow. All rights reserved. This text may be used and shared in accordance with the fair-use provisions of U.S. copyright law, and it may be archived and redistributed in electronic form, provided that this entire notice, including copyright information, is carried and provided that the University of Chicago Press is notified and no fee is charged for access. Archiving, redistribution, or republication of this text on other terms, in any medium, requires the consent of the University of Chicago Press.
John Knox
The Forgotten Memoir of John Knox: A Year in the Life of a Supreme Court Clerk in FDR's Washington
Edited and with a Foreword and Afterword by Dennis J. Hutchinson and David J. Garrow
©2002, 310 pages, 18 halftones
Cloth $32.50 ISBN: 0-226-44862-2
Paper $17.50 ISBN: 0-226-44863-0
John Knox, loser.
John Frush Knox
Born 1907
Oak Park, Illinois
Died 1997
Oak Park, Illinois
Occupation memoirist
Nationality American
Subjects United States Supreme Court justices and culture
John Frush Knox (1907 – 1997)[1] served as secretary and law clerk to United States Supreme Court Justice James Clark McReynolds from 1936 to 1937. He is chiefly known for his memoir of that experience. ***but more importantly, McReynolds is chiefly known from Knox's memoir, and perhaps, McReynolds is slandered by Knox's misinterpretations.
Knox was born in 1907, in Oak Park, Illinois.[2] In high school, he began writing pen pal letters to celebrities. He began with Civil War veterans and proceeded to such luminaries of the day as Helen Keller, William Howard Taft, and Admiral Byrd. He established an on-going correspondence with members of the United States Supreme Court, including Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., Benjamin N. Cardozo, and Willis Van Devanter. His most sustained correspondence was with Van Devanter, one of the conservative "Four Horsemen" of the Supreme Court.[3]
Knox did undergraduate work at the University of Chicago (Ph.B. 1930) and then studied law at Northwestern University School of Law (J.D. 1934) and the Harvard Law School (LL.M. 1936).[4] He was an indefatigable diarist, generating more than 750 pages of scrapbook, commentary and written recollection by the time he reached college. At one time, Knox claimed that he intended to surpass Samuel Pepys as a diarist.[1]
[edit] The year in Washington
After his graduation from Harvard, Knox sought employment with Van Devanter. Van Devanter recommended Knox to fellow justice James Clark McReynolds, who suffered from high employee turnover (Knox soon found out why).[3] Knox served as private secretary and law clerk to McReynolds during the Supreme Court's October 1936 term. Knox would later write a long memoir of that experience, A Year in the Life of a Supreme Court Clerk in Franklin D. Roosevelt's Washington, centered mostly on his relations with McReynolds and McReynolds's two black servants, but also containing observations on other members of the Supreme Court at that time, and the historical period in general.[1] Such memoirs are unique; few other law clerks to Supreme Court justices have documented the experience, and Knox's memoir, though not the first published, represents the earliest such document.
[edit] Subsequent career
Knox’s clerkship ended when McReynolds fired him for taking time off to sit for the Washington, D.C. bar examination, which Knox failed. The remainder of his life was a succession of personal and professional disappointments.[2] He returned to Illinois in 1937. He initially landed a position with a prestigious Chicago law firm but was fired when he failed the Illinois bar examination. Although Knox finally passed the exam (on his third attempt), he never acquired a secure and permanent position with a firm. An attempt at running his family's already faltering mail-order book business after his father's death proved disastrous, but Knox eventually found his niche in the Chicago claims office of the Allstate Insurance Company, a Sears subsidiary, working there until his retirement in 1973.[5]
Knox was a member of the Bars of Illinois, New York and of the Supreme Court of the United States. He also belonged to the Society of Mayflower Descendants, the Society of Colonial Wars, the Sons of the American Revolution, the Sons of the Revolution, and the Society of the War of 1812. Knox's club at Harvard was Lincoln's Inn.[4]
The dwindling value of the Sears stock on which Knox's retirement income was based made his last years difficult. A lonely bachelor who struggled with prostate cancer the last decade of his life,[5] Knox died in 1997 in Oak Park, leaving many of his papers (including his letters from Civil War Veterans) to Harvard Law School.[4]
[edit] References
1. ^ a b c "Knox, John: The Forgotten Memoir of John Knox". http://www.press.uchicago.edu/cgi-bin/hfs.cgi/00/14805.ctl.
2. ^ a b "New Hutchinson book opens window on FDR’s New Deal, opposition it faced in Court". http://chronicle.uchicago.edu/030109/hutchinson.shtml.
3. ^ a b "Excerpts from The Forgotten Memoir of John Knox". http://www.press.uchicago.edu/Misc/Chicago/448622.html.
4. ^ a b c "Knox, John, 1907-. Papers, 1920-1980: Finding Aid.". http://oasis.harvard.edu:10080/oasis/deliver/~law00008.
5. ^ a b "Review of Knox's memoir". http://www.bsos.umd.edu/gvpt/lpbr/subpages/reviews/hutgar.html.
[edit] Bibliography
* Knox, John (2004). Dennis J. Hutchinson & David J. Garrow, eds.. ed. The Forgotten Memoir of John Knox: A Year in the Life of a Supreme Court Clerk in FDR's Washington. University of Chicago Press. ISBN 0-226-44863-0.
* Knox, John (1984). "A Personal Recollection of Justice Cardozo". Supreme Court Historical Society Quarterly.
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