UNIVERSITY of CALIFORNIA, SAN DIEGO Preaching to Nazi Germany
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UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, SAN DIEGO Preaching to Nazi Germany: The Confessing Church on National Socialism, the Jews, and the Question of Opposition A dissertation submitted in partial satisfaction of the requirements of the Doctor of Philosophy in History by William Stewart Skiles Committee in charge: Professor Frank Biess, Co-Chair Professor Deborah Hertz, Co-Chair Professor Richard Biernacki Professor Patrick Patterson Professor Cynthia Truant 2016 Copyright William Stewart Skiles, 2016 All rights reserved. The Dissertation by William Stewart Skiles is approved, and it is acceptable in quality and form for publication on microfilm and electronically: ________________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________________ Co-Chair ________________________________________________________________________ Co-Chair University of California, San Diego 2016 iii DEDICATION Dedicated to Giesela Kriebel Hale, whose enigmatic story captivated me as a boy and still inspires me today iv TABLE OF CONTENTS Signature Page……………………………………………………………………………iii Dedication………………………………………………………………………………...iv Table of Contents………………………………………………………………………….v List of Tables…..................................................................................................................vi List of Graphs……………………………………………………………………………vii Acknowledgements……………………………………………………………………..viii Vita……………………………………………………………………………………......xi Abstract of the Dissertation………………………………………………………...…....xii Chapter 1 A Word of Opposition: An Introduction to Confessing Church Sermons...…1 Chapter 2 A Historiography of the German Church Struggle.........................................52 Chapter 3 “The Church Must Remain the Church”: The Historical and Theological Background of the Confessing Church………………………………..............................86 Chapter 4 Opposing Persecution and Nazi Ideology: Confessing Sermons on the Nazis and National Socialism...……………………………………………….………………183 Chapter 5 “The Bearers of Unholy Potential”: The Confessing Church on Jews and Judaism…………………………………………………………………………………282 Chapter 6 The Nazi Persecution of German Pastors of Jewish Descent...…………….371 Chapter 7 Preaching from the Periphery: The Sermons of German Pastors of Jewish Descent…………………………………………………………………………………413 Conclusion...……………………………………………………………………………508 Bibliography……………………………………………………………………………515 v LIST OF TABLES TABLE 1 – List of Confessing Church Members……………………………………….16 TABLE 2 – List of German Pastors Affected by Nazi Racial Laws…………………...403 vi LIST OF GRAPHS GRAPH 1 – Sermons Critical of the Nazi Persecution of the German Churches……...212 GRAPH 2 – Sermons Critical of National Socialism as a False Ideology……………..237 GRAPH 3 – Anti-Judaic Expressions from the Pulpit………………………………….290 GRAPH 4 – Proportion of New Testament and Hebrew Bible Texts Compared………321 GRAPH 5 – Proportion of New Testament Texts in Sermons….……………………...322 GRAPH 6 – Proportion of Hebrew Bible Texts in Sermons …………………………..322 GRAPH 7 – Expressions of Support for Jews from the Pulpit........................................326 vii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS This project has been possible only with the support and encouragement of friends, family members, colleagues, and mentors. I would like to give special thanks to my co-chairs. Frank Biess has provided invaluable guidance throughout the project, always offering advice on new avenues to follow up and important questions to ponder. Deborah Hertz has provided support and direction since the inception of this project, and her critiques of the drafts has immeasurably led to a more precise and readable final product. I would also like to thank my committee members. Richard Biernacki has demonstrated unwavering support and commitment to my research and the progress of my dissertation. Cynthia Truant has always been ready and available to discuss the themes of my research, and has been a wonderful mentor from the start. I want to thank Patrick Patterson, whose support and encouragement at crucial points helped me carry on and get it done, and who suggested a great idea for the title of this dissertation (which I gratefully adopted). Thanks to the Leo Baeck Institute and the Deutscher Akademischer Austausch Dienst for providing me with my first research grant to devote to this project. The Jewish Studies Department at UC San Diego provided me with another much-needed research grant that enabled me to spend a summer in Berlin to complete my research with the primary sources at the Evangelisches Zentrumarchiv (EZA) in Berlin. The archivists and staff at the EZA, and especially Dr. Peter Beier, were immensely helpful in answering my questions about the identities, biographies and viii sources of Confessing Church pastors. I am immeasurably grateful for their patience and assistance. Likewise, Dr. Jens Murkens at Landeskirchliches Archiv der Evangelischen Kirche von Westfalen in Bielefeld was immensely helpful in finding Confessing Church sermons, especially those of Hans Ehrenberg. I would also like to thank the organizers and participants of the various seminars and conferences in which I shared my research and received invaluable feedback. In particular, I would like to thank Margarit Frölich for inviting me to present to the History Department’s Graduate Student Colloquium in May 2013. The encouraging comments, insights, and observations greatly improved the dissertation, especially chapters five and six. I would like to thank Richard Weikart of CSU Stanislaus, whom I met at the World War II Conference on Religion in December 2012, and who subsequently invited me to present on his panel at the German Studies Association (GSA) in October 2013 on War and Religion. I have greatly appreciated his interest in my research and his comments on my work. Also, thanks to my co-panelist Derek Hastings and moderator Kevin Spicer at the GSA conference for their helpful insights and commentary. The innumerable hours spent chatting with my colleagues and friends in the History Department and the Revelle Humanities Program have helped me to fine tune my thinking on this project. Special thanks to Ryan Zroka, Amy Zroka, and Suzanne Hillman, who were always there to engage in stimulating conversation on all matters history and literature. My deepest thanks and gratitude goes to my family, whose support and encouragement knows no bounds. My mother and father instilled in me a love of reading ix and the importance of perseverance and determination. My twin brother George and his wife Dena have been a steady source of support and encouragement. My wife Renee and I have spent countless hours conversing over bottomless cups of coffee about the ideas and arguments in this dissertation. Her insights and criticisms have been invaluable from start to finish. And her patience and understanding are saint-like, as she has time and again granted me the time and space to write. And my children, little William, Marie, and Theodore – all born as I was writing this dissertation – have been an inspiration and an impetus to write and to finish. Lastly, Chapters 4, 5 & 7 contain material that is being prepared for publication in an article entitled, “Preaching to Nazi Germany: Sermons of the Confessing Church in the Second World War,” as a chapter in the book, Outside the Foxhole: Religion and World War Two, edited by John Corrigan and G. Kurt Piehler. x VITA 1998 Bachelor of Arts, University of California, Los Angeles 2002 Master of Arts, California State University, Northridge 2006 Master of Divinity, Fuller Theological Seminary 2007-2013 Section Instructor, University of California, San Diego 2010 Candidate of Philosophy, University of California, San Diego 2013-2015 Lecturer, California State University, San Marcos Lecturer, Palomar Community College 2016 Doctor of Philosophy, University of California, San Diego Fellowships and Grants 2006 History Department Fellowship, University of California, San Diego 2009 Leo Baeck Institute – DAAD Research Grant, Deutscher Akademischer Austausch Dienst 2011 Judaic Studies Research Grant, University of California, San Diego xi ABSTRACT OF THE DISSERTATION Preaching to Nazi Germany: The Confessing Church on National Socialism, the Jews, and the Question of Opposition by William Stewart Skiles Doctor of Philosophy in History University of California, 2016 Professor Frank Biess, Co-Chair Professor Deborah Hertz, Co-Chair This dissertation examines sermons delivered by Confessing Church pastors in the Nazi dictatorship. The approach of most historians has focused on the history of the Christian institutions, its leaders, and its persecution by the Nazi regime, leaving the most elemental task of the pastor – that is, preaching – largely unexamined. The question left unaddressed is how well did Confessing pastors fare in articulating their views of the Nazi regime and the persecution of the Jews through their sermons? To answer this xii question, I analyzed 910 sermons by Confessing Church pastors, all delivered or disseminated between 1933 and the end of World War II in Europe. I argue that new trends in preaching popular among Confessing Church pastors discouraged deviation from the biblical text in sermons, and thus one result was few criticisms concerning German politics and society. Nevertheless, a minority of pastors criticized the Nazi regime and its leaders