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Title: A Moral Reckoning : The Role of the Catholic Church in the Holocaust and Its Unfulfilled Duty ofRepair by Daniel Jonah Goldhagen ISBN: 0-375-41434-7 Publisher: Knopf Pub. Date: 29 October, 2002 Format: Hardcover Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $25.00 |
Average Customer Rating: 2.44 (16 reviews)
Rating: 5
Summary: The second best book about european antisemitism
Comment: "A Moral Reckoning : The Role of the Catholic Church in the Holocaust and Its Unfulfilled Duty of Repair",
by Daniel Jonah Goldhagen, is the second best book about european antisemitism history, of all times. To know it and to not forget the birth of european historical holocaust against Israel People. A book for Low and High Schools students, I hope, in Italy too, now, in these doom times.
Nicola Facciolini
Journalist
Teramo
Italy
Rating: 1
Summary: Author is so anti-Catholic/Christian that he can't reason
Comment: The author does not understand Christianity/Catholicism. His theology interpretations are completely wrong and offensive. If it weren't so serious, it would be laughable. His transparent and ill-founded bias, viewed through a 21st Century lens, given away by a preachy and pretentious how-dare-they-believe-in-what-their-religion-teaches-if-it's-not-what-I-believe tone, undermines the entire work, such as it is. (Note extensive errors discussed by other reviewers.)
Goldhagen is stuck on the old ridiculous standby steretotypes that Christians/Catholics believe that the Jews killed Jesus, that all Jews are going straight to hell, etc.* He wants to edit the Bible to satisfy his personal sensibilities. Nevermind 2000 years of history or that he's not even Christian or that he doesn't understand what he would alter!
If Goldhagen had his way, Christians would have had to start the faith from scratch, nevermind that Christians did not start out a separate religion but as Jews who believed Jesus was the Messiah. He claims New Testament scripture is antisemetic because it contains accounts criticizing early Messianic Jews for making mistakes in setting up churches and disciplining members. But the Bible criticizes Gentile start-ups the same. In 362 tedious pages, he somehow fails to mention that Christians/Catholics have every respect for Jews, God's chosen people, because Jesus himself was Jewish, along with the Virgin Mary, early apostles, etc. Christians use the Hebrew scriptures; calling them the "Old Testament" isn't antisemetic, contrary to Goldhagen's claims (p. 207), and actually Catholics have MORE Old Testament books than Protestants.
Goldhagen calls the biblical accounts "not a reliable rendition of facts and events, but legend." (p. 264) Unbelievably, Goldhagen wants Christians to remove portions of the bible Goldhagen considers offensive and antisemetic (p. 273). Hm, how ironic. You'd think, given the subject matter, that this is EXACTLY the kind of hate-filled stereotyping and micromanagement that persecuted minority groups (e.g., Catholics in the U.S.) should fear.
The author's motive is finally revealed in the conclusion: FINANCIAL RESTITUTION!
What a whiny, mean spirited waste of paper this book is. Glad I just got it from the library for free and didn't support this "scholar" for his next work: maybe a revamping of the Islamic KORAN! Or eliminating Old Testament accounts of the Hebrew God wiping out evil nations of non-Jewish infidels and sinners. Where to draw the line?
THEOLOGY FOOTNOTE: * From a Christian/Catholic perspective:
1. Factually, the Romans executed Jesus, but morally, we all do, every day, because - Jew or Gentile - we fail to apply the Golden Rule and to support/protect each other.
2. Some fundamentalists would say all without Jesus go to hell. Catholics don't presume one way or the other for themselves or others, but rather pray even for the dead, and hope for purgatory.
Rating: 2
Summary: Strong Message, Poorly Written
Comment: A Moral Reckoning: The Role of the Catholic Church in the Holocaust and Its Unfulfilled Duty of Repair by Daniel Jonah Goldhagen is a difficult book to read not because of the strong message, but because of the way that it is delivered. Goldhagen central thesis is one that has historical and moral resonance - that the Catholic Church, as a moral force, is culpable as a collaborator, if not an instigator, in the Final Solution. The Church as the self professed embodiment of Christ, participated in creating the climate that lead to the Final Solution through the dissemination of virulent anti-Semitism, and then turned its back on any responsibility in mitigating the effects of its policy or acting as a break on the Final Solution.
This is not a book on the history of the Church's involvement in the Nazi movement, but a moral inquiry into that involvement. Goldhagen message centers around the proposition that the Church is supposed to be more than organization whose purpose is its own perpetuation, regardless of the costs to others. Rather, the Church as the representative of Christ on Earth has a higher moral obligation which includes the responsibility not to encourage hatred of others, nor participate in the genocide of non-believers, as the Church directly did in Fascist Croatia and elsewhere.
The Church has taken the position that it is innocent of all wrong doing, and has attempted to explain away, or at best minimize, any involvement that it did have. Goldhagen writes that until the Church takes full responsibility for its acts there can never be any true reconciliation nor can Church rid itself of its guilt. This is especially necessary given the Church's emphasis on the need to ask forgiveness of ones sins.
There is nothing wrong with Goldhagen's message, although it is unquestionably controversial. However, the way that it is delivered makes it difficult to hear. What Goldhagen takes almost 400 pages to say could more easily be said in less than half the apace. The book is highly repetitive, so much so that the message loses its effect and is difficult to read. It reminds one of the statement by Mark Twain, where he apologized for writing a long letter because he didn't have time to write a short one. The bottom line is that Goldhagen should have turned the book into a long essay.
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Title: Hitler's Willing Executioners : Ordinary Germans and the Holocaust by Daniel Jonah Goldhagen ISBN: 0679772685 Publisher: Vintage Pub. Date: 28 January, 1997 List Price(USD): $16.00 |
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Title: The Popes Against the Jews: The Vatican's Role in the Rise of Modern Anti-Semitism by David I. Kertzer ISBN: 0375406239 Publisher: Knopf Pub. Date: 18 September, 2001 List Price(USD): $27.95 |
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Title: The Case for Israel by Alan Dershowitz ISBN: 047146502X Publisher: John Wiley & Sons Pub. Date: 01 August, 2003 List Price(USD): $19.95 |
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Title: The New Anti-Semitism : The Current Crisis and What We Must Do About It by Phyllis Chesler ISBN: 078796851X Publisher: Jossey-Bass Pub. Date: 11 July, 2003 List Price(USD): $24.95 |
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Title: Architects of Annihilation : Auschwitz and the Logic of Destruction by Gotz Aly, Susanne Heim, A. G. Blunden ISBN: 0691089388 Publisher: Princeton Univ Pr Pub. Date: 25 February, 2003 List Price(USD): $29.95 |
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