Chilling History

The significance of learning from the mistakes of others through the study of history seems lost these days. For those of you who have an uncritical view of any political figure, consider these quotes from Germans before WWII writing of the "delusion" that swept over a population inoculated against Christianity and bent on "free-thinking." A thoughtful corrective for those of any party who uncritically look to politics to do what only the Lord can do when He changes heart. I first heard these quotes in a 1999 sermon mp3 by a British prince of the pulpit in our day, Dick Lucas. The context was a discussion of 2 Thessalonians 2 and the "man of lawlessness." Mr. Lucas saw Hitler as one of many examples of "men of lawlessness" who have been (and will be) brought into a positions of power because God sent a "strong delusion" on the populace that those who support these "men" might fully invest themselves in believing what it false. All this because they refused to believe the Truth.

The atmosphere of general enthusiasm into which the old city has been plunged is amazing and quite indescribable: the peculiar frenzy which has gripped hundreds of thousands of men and women, the romantic excitement and mystic ecstasy which has overtaken them like a holy rapture. An effect is produced which many find irresistible. They return home seduced and taken in, ready to serve the cause, with no idea of the dangerous reality which is concealed beneath the deceptive pomp of the huge processions and parades.

The French Ambassador to Germany upon witnessing the extraordinary impact which the 1937 Nuremberg Rally had on the crowds

The most seductive factor was Hitler’s messianic image. For Germany found itself in an ideological and ethical vacuum. We had lost our Emperor, our national identity had been damaged. The majority of the population had no religious faith. I think that for many National Socialism was a substitute religion which aroused a deep enthusiasm and provided a new source of strength. People wanted to get stuck in and work for a better life.

Isa Vermehren, German film actress and entertainer who later was imprisoned at Ravensbrück, Buchenwald, and Dachau, writing after the war.

Frustrated by an insoluble political crisis, the German people had tired of rational thinking, and believed those who taught that “reason paralyses the will, saps the spirit, destroys the basis of society.” This made them vulnerable to the collective self-delusion that: “a man would come, a leader, a Caesar, a Messiah, and perform miracles. He would assume responsibility for the future, take control of everyone’s lives, banish fear, put an end to misery, create a new people, a glorious new Reich, and, fulfilling a supernatural mission, change old Adam into a new man.”

Ernst Toller, German Marxist and expressionist painter on May 10, 1933, the day that his books were ritually burnt as part of the Nazi purge of decadent literature