Talk:Religious aspects of Nazism

Religious aspects of Nazism
This article was split of from the article Nazi occultism at 08:39, on June 5, 2008. Please see Talk:Nazi occultism for the previous discussions and further information. Zara1709 (talk) 07:35, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

"Many themes of Nazi religious theory have roots and parallels in Christianity."
Sorry, even if you add five references for this, such a sentence is too unspecific. There was no Nazi religion (and no Nazi religious theory), we had a longer discussion about this at the old article. I haven't taken a look at the web references yet, but generally, such pages are considered unreliable I had a discussion about that at Adolf Hitler's religious beliefs. Concerning the other sources: I am going to read Höhne myself, but Moynihan and Penick are themselves Neopagans, and Michael Moynihan (journalist) is even some sort of fascist, too. (I had also a discussion about that.) I will expand the article about this (that is why the Neopaganism sections was kept in both articles after the split), but meanwhile those two sentences should be left out. Zara1709 (talk) 05:12, 11 June 2008 (UTC)
 * There was no Nazi religion, but Nazi concepts are modeled after those of Christianity. Hilter associated the rise of Nazism to the rise of Christianity over paganism. Christianity was made the official religion of Nazi Germany and non-Christian minorities were persecuted. Remember also the oath of the SS: "Gott Mit Uns!. --Esimal (talk) 19:09, 11 June 2008 (UTC)


 * Gott Mit Uns was not an SS motto, it was omitted on their belt buckles unlike members of the SA. Besides what does that prove? There is nothing particularly Christian about the word "Gott", "Gott"/"God" as it is a fully Germanic pagan word in origins. Some even claim that when Nazis were encouraged to call themselves "Gottglaubigeren" (God believers) that it was to distance themselves from Christianity by not calling themselves Christians. (i.e. they were retaining the Germanic concept of such a usage of the word "God" in name and spirit, away from it's late translation as Jesus / Elohim etc.) 67.5.156.165 (talk) 08:29, 10 August 2008 (UTC)


 * Yes, that there were some parallels between Nazism and Christianity. But you would have to specify which parallels this are, you can't just put up a sentence: "Modern scholarship focuses on the strong parallels between Nazism and Christianity." And especially: The works of Nigel Pennick and Michael Moynihan (journalist) are NOT SCHOLARSHIP. According to his article, Pennick is "an author publishing on Occultism, or Odinic Runosophy, Magick and Natural Magic." And the review of the secret king which was in the meantime removed from a neopagan website, said something like. "This book is useful for defending Asatru (or Odinism) against the lie that Hitler was a Pagan." If you don't understand why this literature can not be used as reference in an article, please read: wp:reliable sources. (I know it is currently mentioned in the Neopaganism section, but I am about to reword that anyway.) Höhne and 	Steigmann-Gall are a different matter. They are reliable, but you are not actually quoting from them. I've got Höhne's book right here, and I would be rather surprised if he literally says that there are "strong parallels between Nazism and Christianity." Sorry, but I have to remove your contributions again. If you want to add something about this, please give the wording of what  	Steigmann-Gall actually says, a quote with a page number. Zara1709 (talk) 09:23, 15 June 2008 (UTC)
 * 1 this article is biased. 2 It treats Nazi occultism (lost island, Aryan race, etc.), not specifically religion. It should be completely re-written. 3 The article lacks completely of references to the Christian basises of Nazism, the adoption of Christianity as the official religion, and the developement of a proper Nazi Christianity. --Esimal (talk) 12:34, 15 June 2008 (UTC)
 * I know that the article needs to be improved. Hey, I was to busy sorting out how many occultists were actually working for the SS to expand this article with a badly needed section about Nazism as political religion. But you are currently not helping. Either you are able to give an actual quote from Steigmann-Gall about parallels between Nazism and Christianity, or you'd have to wait until I get the book myself from the library to see what it says. Höhne cannot be used to support a thesis of parallels between Nazism and Christianty. All he says is that Himmler admired the organization of the Jesuits, and, though he was -with reservations- a Neopagan, the SS didn't care about thatZara1709 (talk) 14:44, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

Nazism was essentially anti-christian. In private, Hitler was staunchly opposed to christianity which, for him, amounted to little more than a "religion of slaves" with " strong jewish influences". In fact, Hitler blamed christianity for weakening the "superior races" as it made them lose their sense of superiority. Do not forget that Hitler was an admirer of warlike sparta and imperial Rome (before the rise of christianity). As for the motto "Gott mit uns", is was NOT nazi. It was a motto written on the belt of soldiers serving in the German IMPERIAL army during the 2nd reich. The practice did continue in the Wermacht (jusk like the iron cross,a decoration created during the napoleonic war was still issued by the nazi government) but not in the Waffen SS. The motto of the SS was "Meine Ehre heißt Treue" (my honour is loyalty). — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.68.28.178 (talk) 13:17, 26 June 2011 (UTC)

God referred to as "Hoheren Sinnestrager" in Nazi germany?
Google finds one match for "Hoheren Sinnestrager" and it is this page which says:

"According to his (Eichmann's) religious beliefs, which had not changed since the Nazi period (in Jerusalem Eichmann declared himself to be a Gottglaubiger, the Nazi term for those who had broken with Christianity, and he refused to take his oath on the Bible), this event was to be ascribed TO A HIGHER BEARER OF MEANING, an entity somehow IDENTICAL WITH THE MOVEMENT OF THE UNIVERSE, in itself devoid of higher meaning, is subject. (The terminology is quite suggestive. To call God a Hoheren Sinnestrager meant linguistically to give him some place in the military hierarchy".

Wherein did the Nazis or Eichmann ever use this term? I've never seen it attested to before, this "Hoheren Sinnestrager". 67.5.157.160 (talk) 10:02, 7 August 2008 (UTC)


 * I don't have time for a complete reply, but there are two points here that I need to address: 1) I don't know about the term "Hoher Sinnesträger", that seems to be particular phrase of Eichmann; this could possibly be included in his article. 2) The phrase "Gottglaubiger", though, would be highly relevant for this article. Next to the Positive Christians and the Nazi paganists there also was a third position within Nazism, that would have to be described as anti-clerical (but probably not as anti-Christian). If I had the time I would add it, but until then you'd have to read Steigmann-Gall for yourself if you're interested in this. Zara1709 (talk) 15:31, 10 August 2008 (UTC)

Nazism and Christianity
So, I finally started the subsection on this topic in this article; actually, as someone studying religious sciences, I am not that much interested in the debate about 'Nazism and Christianity', but more in the question how the religious aspects of movements like Nazism can be described generally; but it appears as if the public cares much more about the 'Nazism and Christianity' question than topics like 'political religion'. I mean, this is obvious from the discussion about Hitler's religious beliefs on the Internet, and those web pages have the advantage of being much more easily accessible than the academic literature, that is why I linked them. I am quite aware that this is not the optimal solution, and when I can get to the article on Adolf Hitler's religious beliefs I'll try to give a balanced overview of the discussion there.

But I think the general question of the relation between Nazism and Christianity has a higher priority. Currently I only got a review of Steigmann-Gall's book in that section, because I am going to use it as reference almost exclusively (simply because I don't have the time to read a lot more historians) and that needs to be justified. I think I should find the time to expand it within a few days. Zara1709 (talk) 14:49, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

Rather "Fuhrer Cult"?
While not being an expert on the subject, I believe that trying to decern some comprehensive religious ideology with in the 3rd reich is next to impossible and infact misleading. Among the rag-tag of the german socity elevated to it's highest positions I am sure that you can find examples of devout Lutherainians, Cahtholics, ateists and Occultists. To speak of nazi religion will remain strangely "particular" and depending on which lunatic you view. One important lunatic, Heinrich Himmler, seems to have had some occult inclinations and seems to have had a vision of a "Fuhrer Cult". In which Hitler, likely after his death, were to be portraitted/worshipped as some demi-god. F.ex. at Wewelsburg, it seems that Hitler were to be buried, surrounded (in a circle) by a number of SS-generals fallen in battle. Likely the SS were to be an Order of knights, protecting the arian Empire drawing religious legitimacy as some weird "Order of the grave" perhaps even "Order of death" (I'll return to the doubble meaning of this shortly). The inspiration to Himmler seems to be an unhealthy mix of what at the time was thought to be original germanic religious mythology, tales of early europe, christianity, particular the millitant orders of christianity. Germanic religious mythology should not be understood as the strange newage like Asa-tru (belief in some homemade religion of the old God's of the Norse), but the  central-germanic mythology around "Wotan" also known as "Attawolf" (of which the name Adolph is a form of). Odin in North germanic mythology (Norse mythology) is identical to Wotan, though Norse mythology is a synergy of a germanic mythology and, possibly, an older mythology (reflected in the two allied famillies of Gods; the Asa gods (the germanic "war Gods" Odin, Thor, Tyr etc) and then the Vanja Gods (who as a rule are gods of fertillity, and probably not Iron age germanic). The 10th-12th century Odin that meets us in the preserved  mythology of the Norse, have retained the  attributes of Wotan (God of death, God of wisdom. He is in a sense both the life-giver and the destroyer of life) though he is slightly moderated (likely under the influence of Christianity) compared to the older and more  "original"  Wotan faith. An important point is that Himmler  saw Wotan (which as mentioned through the form Attawolf shares name similarity with Adolph Hitler) and not Odin as the God of the germanics. The anglo-saxon tales of King arthur and the round table are also in the mix (notice the set up of the burial site at Wewelsburg: The dead demi-God surrounded by a round table of dead SS-knights). The German order (a religious millitant order much comparable to the Hospitaliers and Templars. Who after getting thrown out of the holy land made it into their buisness to inslave slavic people living around the southern coasts of the baltic. The preussian kingdom/State traces back to this "Order state") are central to Himmler's historical understanding of himself and the 3rd reich. And to my knowledge Wewelsburg was once a castle of exactly the German Order.

My point is that these quasi religious ideas or quasi mythology, was a mix and run together of a broad selection of real history, tales and mythos from Europe's past often carefully selected and warped, in a generally warped historical understanding, to fit present day political objectives. While it's possible that many people in the nazi herachi of the time engaged in more or less occult ideas and rites, I think it's very difficult to talk of religious aspects of Nazism. The SS seems to have attempted to implement some Occultismn (You had f.ex. special non-christian mariage rites), but it's difficult to gauge the depth of it. I think it's safe to say that the SS attempted some anti christian ideas, but have probably not pursued that with much vigor outside closed circles. After all the ordinarry germans were a result of more than 1000 years of christianity and that would not  have been easely replaced. Jomsviking (talk) 15:24, 26 April 2009 (UTC)

Further more I think it's more prudent to say that Nazi leadership held ideals of a "wagnerish" heroic germanic past and sought to connect the german people with these roots, partly through semi-occultismn but par excellence by historical pseudo parrallels. F.ex. The parrallel between Deutscher Order and SS, where the german order was understood as a germanic brotherhood dedicated to expand germanic culture (into hostile slavic areas), and not a christian religious millitant order, who had found a new purpose (and good buisness)  in  waging holy war against infidels in the  borderland of christian  Europe. In prciple the two has nothing incommon, but the pseudo parrallel serves to give the SS a light of historical legitimacy as a continuation of the German Order. The coincidence that Adolph Hitler's surname originates in a name, Attawolf, which is identical to the God Wotan could be, and was, also used handly.

In the spiritual void left by Nazism and it's uneasyness towards religion (F.ex. inspired by Nietzche's christiandom critique), I suspect than people with a tendency to the occult were more accepted, though I do not think that these people in any way can be seen as representative of the mass popular movement that Nazism was. Jomsviking (talk) 16:58, 26 April 2009 (UTC)

Article clean-up requests
After doing an extensive edit for grammar, spelling, etc., I have questions about possible substantive edits that I am punting to the experts on this topic, as well as some technical requests:

1. The introduction states:
 * The most prominent discourse here is the debate about Nazism as political religion,

I don't know what this phrase means, so I didn't change it. (I think it means, "The term 'religion' when used in reference to Nazism most commonly refers to political religion.") As this phrase is right at the beginning of the article, at present it suggests that the article is written in poor English. Would someone who knows what this means please revise it? 2. The text reads:
 * Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke's book The Occult Roots... is not only considered "without exception" to be the pioneering work on Ariosophy, but also the "definite book" on the topic.

The phrase "definite book" is not the correct phrase in English, and seems to be a mistranslation from German; the English phrase is "definitive book." Please check and revise the article if necessary.

3. Since the introduction states that political religion is the "most prominent discourse," the section on political religion should be longer. At present, it's just a list of authors with no information on what they state or how they differ. I suggest expanding this section. Or explain why the rest of the article is devoted to occultism, The Thule Society, etc.

4. Re section "Nazism and Christianity", what is christianism? Is it a technical term, or a mistranslation from another language?

5. The statement "Adolf Hitler's religious beliefs are a difficult case." is not clear. I think it means "Adolf Hitler's religious beliefs are difficult to know." or the equivalent. I suggest a rewrite.

6. When the leading Nazis are first mentioned, they should be introduced with a phrase stating who they were. Remember this is an encyclopedia and people who read this article may not know why Himmler, Hess, etc., were important people.

7. Re section "Nazi archaeology"
 * A great deal of time and resources were spent on researching or creating a popularly accepted “historical”, “cultural” and “scientific” background so the ideas about a “superior” Aryan race could be publicly accepted.

I'd like to see another one or two examples, in addition to the Tibet and Andes expeditions.

8. Section "Das Schwarze Korps"
 * Also in 1935, the SS journal

Is the "SS journal" Das Schwarze Korps? If so, call it a newspaper as in the previous paragraph or by name.

8. Same section
 * Is Germanisches Leben available in other languages or electronically? If so, please add information.

9. Section "Karl Maria Wiligut" and other places
 * He is even supposed to have designed a chair for Himmler; at least, this chair and its covers are offered for sale on the Internet.[76][77]

All references to nonWiki web sites should show the date the information was confirmed to be accurate, in the form "Retrieved on 2009-04-30." just before the closing ref tag.

10. Section "Otto Rahn"
 * According to eyewitnesses, Nazi archaeologists and military officers were present at that castle.[82]

When? Why? Under whose direction?

11. I'd like to see a section called "Current research" or "Unanswered questions". Is current research on Nazi religion focusing on one of the areas referred to in the introduction? If so, add something to the introduction that gives the reader a sense of the hot issues in history now.

12. If anyone feels particularly masochistic, or has nothing to do, the references should be systematized for order of elements, punctuation, etc.

13. A reference like "Time/Life book "The Third Reich - The SS" needs a date and place of publication and page number. Please check through all references to include this information.

I am in awe of the huge amount of knowledge and work that went into this article, and found it quite enlightening, but it's written at the graduate level. For the Wikipedia audience, it needs lead-ins and summaries, on the pattern of "I tell you what I'm going to tell you, I tell you, then I tell you what I've told you", both in major sections and in the article as a whole. Sofia Roberts (talk) 01:33, 22 May 2009 (UTC)


 * Reply: 1, 3) Yes, I know. If you would take a look what historians have actually been discussing, you would see that they didn't that talk much about the connection between Nazism and Occultism or whether Nazism was Anti-Christian or not (not until Steigmann-Gall's book that is), but about "whether Nazism would constitute a political religion". However, I couldn't read much on that debate, because I was busy with the questions that are in the focus of the popular interest.


 * Most other issues you mentioned can be cleaned up without the need for a discussion. I am aware that my wording might sometimes sound awkward to a native English speaker, but this is due to the fact that, although I read a lot of academic English literature, I rarely have the opportunity to speak English. Zara1709 (talk) 02:50, 27 May 2009 (UTC)

This vs Nazism and occultism
Shouldn't the content of Nazism and occultism be integrated here, or vice versa? -- 77.7.167.132 (talk) 21:07, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

POV overemphasis of pagan religious influence in Nazism
Respected historian and scholar on fascism, Roger Griffin rejects the claim that Nazism was primarily pagan, noting that although there were some influential neo-paganists in the Nazi Party, such as Heinrich Himmler and Alfred Rosenberg, that they represented a small minority of the Nazis and that their views on religion did not influence Nazi ideology, and notes that Hitler denounced Germanic paganism in Mein Kampf and that he condemned Rosenburg's and Himmler's paganism. (Roger Griffin. Fascism, Totalitarianism and Political Religion. Oxon, England, UK; New York, New York, USA: Routledge, 2005. Pp. 93.) Hitler explicitly told Himmler and Rosenberg that such views would only be tolerated by him as their private opinions on religion, and ordered them to cease promoting this in the name of Nazism. (Roger Griffin. Fascism, Totalitarianism and Political Religion. Oxon, England, UK; New York, New York, USA: Routledge, 2005. Pp. 93.) That and more demonstrates that the influence of paganism as a religion on Nazism was minimal, it is grossly exaggerated in this article.--R-41 (talk) 14:41, 25 June 2012 (UTC)

Furthermore Roger Griffin notes that those who make exaggerated claims of German pagan religious influence always utilize Himmler and Rosenburg as examples, even though they were a minority in the movement. (Roger Griffin. Fascism, Totalitarianism and Political Religion. Oxon, England, UK; New York, New York, USA: Routledge, 2005. Pp. 93.) Looking at this article's sources I see two things: (1) That it is following what the scholar Griffin has criticized with inaccurate studies of pagan influence - by focusing on Himmler; and (2) that several of the major sources used in this article are from books that were specifically authored to promote the claim of deep pagan and occult religious roots in the party.--R-41 (talk) 14:41, 25 June 2012 (UTC)
 * As you know we have recently discussed this at length on the Nazism talk page. As I said there, the Nazi movement centered "around messianic destiny". God's will for the German people. Historian Chris McNab writes that Nazi rituals were "akin to high church ceremonies". Some Party members explored and encouraged "...Nordic paganism as a form of Germanic replacement for Christian faith". He then has a chart as to how certain Norse Mythology ties into Nazi symbolism. And mainly Himmler tried to incorporate aspects of it into the SS. However, it should not be missed that he goes on to state: "Yet while some scholars have attempted to forge substantial links between Nazism and pagan or even occult practices, the link should not be taken too far. Hitler actually frowned on overt occultism...Looking at Nazism for signs that it was an organized religion or cult is misguided. The Nazis did have a spiritual relationship to their symbolism...it was powerful imagery". So it was mainly the symbolism that was used by the Nazis. Source: McNab, Chris, "The Third Reich", pp. 182-185. Kierzek (talk) 16:19, 25 June 2012 (UTC)
 * Use of ancient symbols by the Nazis to emphasize Germanic national pride, should not be confused with supporting a religion. For instance, Italy's coat of arms uses a wreath with a laurel branch and oak branch in it, based on the historic use of laurel branch wreaths for Roman rulers and oak branch wreaths by the Romans which back then represented the Roman god Jupiter. Just because Italy uses the laurel and oak wreath symbol that connects with a Roman pagan religious past, that does not mean that the Italian government promotes Roman pagan religion, in fact Italy's coat of arms have been used in conjunction with the rule of Christian Democrats for years. Again showing that use of pagan symbolism does not imply support of pagan religion.--R-41 (talk) 09:04, 27 July 2012 (UTC)
 * I am not confusing the two at all. If you read my comment closely you will see where I said that for the Nazi Party overall, it only went as far as symbolism. One other point, this article does suffer from a listing (college style) of a debate of authors. And it relies heavily on the POV of certain ones. It should incorporate the general points in a presentation of a more readable fashion. Kierzek (talk) 12:21, 27 July 2012 (UTC)

Hitler's views
It has come to my attention that the topic about Hitler's personal views lacks any source and goes against the information found on the main page about the subject matter (implying that he was a religious Christian, while the page contains various sources pointing to the contrary). Perhaps it would be better to change the information here and adapt it to the sources mentioned there.

2804:7F5:D180:B3FD:E0E8:56C3:7F7E:C39 (talk) 03:20, 19 August 2018 (UTC)

I update the information in the Hitler's Views section to match the information in the main article. I did not add any of the sources from the main article because I was not sure what was already sourced on this page and did not want to copy redundant or incorrect sources. I do not have time to add any sources now, but will at a later date if no one else does so first. Klyster7 (talk) 17:04, 23 November 2018 (UTC)

Se você quiser traduzir e possa fique a vontade. 2804:14C:5BB3:A319:E0:4F2D:EAA9:289E (talk) 16:10, 10 July 2020 (UTC)