Hitler's views on christianitySelected quotes from Joseph Goebbels' diaries "Tagebücher" detailing Adolf Hitler's anti-christian sentiments and related discussions, primarily from entries in 1939–1941.
The Führer hates christianityThe Führer considers christianity ripe for destruction.
It may take a long time, but it's coming.We come back to religious questions again.The Führer is deeply religious, though completely anti-christian.He views christianity as a symptom of decay. Rightly so.
It is a branch of the jewish race.This can be seen in the similarity of religious rites. Both judaism and christianity have no point of contact to the animal element, and thus, in the end, they will be destroyed.
The Führer is a convinced vegetarian, on principle.His arguments can not be refuted on any serious basis.They are totally unanswerable.He has little regard for homo sapiens. Man should not feel so superior to animals.He has no reason to. Man believes that he alone has intelligence, a soul, and the power of speech.
Has not the animal these things? Just because we, with our dull senses, can not recognise them, it does not prove that they are not there.
The Führer is a man totally attuned to antiquity.He hates christianity because it has crippled all that is noble in humanity.
According to Schopenhauer, christianity and syphilis have made humanity unhappy and unfree.What a difference between the benevolent, smiling Zeus and the pain-wracked, crucified christ.
The ancient peoples’ view of God was also much nobler and more humane than the christians’. What a difference between a gloomy cathedral and a light, airy ancient temple. He describes life in ancient Rome: clarity, greatness, monumentality.
It is the most wonderful republic in history. He believes we would feel no disappointment if we were now suddenly to be transported to this old, eternal city.
The Führer can not relate to the Gothic mind.He hates gloom and brooding mysticism. He wants clarity, light, and beauty. These are the ideals of life in our time.
In this respect, the Fuhrer is a totally modern man.
To him, the Augustinian period is the high point of history....And so far as the slaves are concerned, the people who were supposedly freed by christianity: they were far less free and far more oppressed than in ancient Rome.
What do we mean by slavery? Is a member of today’s industrial proletariat perhaps freer than a slave before the Americans brought ‘freedom’ to their southern states?
It is all a question of preconceptions. Afterwards, we have long discussions about the Vatican and christianity. The Fuhrer is a fierce opponent of all that humbug, but he forbids me to leave the church...For tactical reasons....And so for a decade now, I've paid my church taxes to support such rubbish.
These quotes are drawn from specific diary entries, including December 29, 1939 discussing Hitler's anti-christian views and christianity as a "symptom of decay" linked to judaism, April 8, 1941 on hating christianity for crippling nobility in humanity, and April 29, 1941 discussions on the Vatican and forbidding Goebbels from leaving the church for tactical reasons.
Other elements, such as vegetarianism and admiration for antiquity, appear in surrounding contexts.
~Source: "The Goebbels Diaries, 1939-1941" English translation edited by Fred Taylor; original German: Die Tagebücher von Joseph Goebbels.
Direct supporting archive.org links scans and texts of the diaries.
https://archive.org/details/goebbelsdiaries10000goeb_e8q8
Full scan of the 1939-1941 diaries
https://archive.org/details/goebbelsdiaries10000jose_k6i4
Additional scan of the 1939-1941 diaries
https://archive.org/details/goebbelsdiaries0000jose
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