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The purple triangle was a concentration camp badge used by the Nazis to identify Bibelforscher (the German name for Jehovah's Witnesses and other Bible Students congregations) in Nazi Germany. A small number of Adventists, Baptists and pacifists (less than one percent) were also identified by the badge. Nazism opposed unorthodox-Christian religious minorities (along with Jews), but made the Bible Students the object of particularly intense persecution, including such extensive incarceration that a distinct badge was assigned to them.

Why Jehovah's Witnesses Did Not Salute Hitler
Jehovah’s Witnesses were discovered easily as they did not deny their God or who they were, making them easy targets to capture and label. All citizens, Jehovah’s Witnesses among them, were asked to salute Hitler with the traditional Hitler Salute - “Heil Hitler,” a term which means “salvation belongs to Hitler.”  Since Jehovah’s Witnesses believe in the salvation of their God, Jehovah, saluting a person as a god or rendering salvation from someone or something other than Jehovah would be a form of idolatry, one of the many practices warned against in the Ten Commandments set out in the Bible. Jehovah’s Witnesses use the New World Translation of the Holy Scriptures. In the book of Exodus chapter 20, verse three it reads, “You must not have any other gods before me.” Jehovah’s Witnesses are taught to obey the civil laws of the land, except when it conflicts with their faith. Since “having no other gods” was a direct command from Jehovah, saluting Hitler would have been a direct violation against one of the Ten Commandments laid out for His people, and therefore a conflict of faith. Not saluting Hitler when asked was considered a crime and the Jehovah’s Witnesses were arrested. Children attending school were expelled, detained and separated from their families. Many were eventually taken to concentration camps where they were marked with the Purple Triangle.

Other Forms of Resistance
Because Jehovah’s Witnesses see themselves as members not just of this world but also of Jehovah’s Kingdom, when Germany made it mandatory for military enlistment, Jehovah’s Witnesses were persecuted because they refused to bear arms for a leader other than Jehovah. Being politically neutral, they also refused to vote in the 1936 elections, Hitler’s attempt at making the Nazi regime legitimate. Jehovah’s Witnesses that did not fit the Nuremberg Laws of German descent wore a purple triangle badge superimposed upon a yellow triangle. The yellow triangle indicated that this prisoner was not only a Jehovah’s Witness, but also of Jewish descent. (The Nuremberg Laws classified “Jews” as a race, not a religion.)