The Role of Religion in History of the Holocaust - Coursework Example

THE STUDY OF RELIGION IN HISTORY: TO WHAT EXTENT IT INFORMS OUR UNDERSTANDING OF THE HOLOCAUST Introduction The Nazi regime in Germany which came to power in 1933 under the leadership of Adolph Hitler (1889-1945) planned to change the composition of the population of Eastern Europe by promoting domination of the German race through the expulsion of millions of Jews. In the Third Reich the anti-Semitic initiatives escalated in 1939, and by the autumn of 1941 the Nazis’ racial policies transformed from persecution and expulsion of Jews for “ethnic cleansing”, to the Final Solution which consisted of systematic and total mass murder of all the Jews that the Nazis could get hold of. This genocide was termed as the holocaust which denotes being burned whole and completely destroyed (Landau, 2006: 151). Following the German conquest of Poland in September 1939 by which nearly two million additional Jews were brought under Nazi control, to the beginning of the deportation of Jews to the concentration camps in the spring of 1942, Poland was turned into a laboratory for experiments in racial polices, away from the home country where ordinary German citizens did not approve of the Nazis’ extreme methods of anti-Jewish violence. The racial policies were implemented in Poland through expulsion, decimation, ghettoization and exploitation of Jews under the local German occupation authorities. The subsequent German attack on the Soviet Union led to highly revolutionary Nazi Jewish policies, and denoted the beginning of the Final Solution. The key decision-maker, approver and enforcer of the entire anti-Semetic actions and the organized annihilation of Jews was Adolph Hitler (Browning & Matthaus, 2007: 1-13). The origin of the anti-Semetic ideologies stemming from an ancient conflict between Christians and Jews is rooted in opposing religious beliefs. However, over the passage of several hundred years, the religious conflict evolved into one of racism. The severe discrimination and marginalization faced by the Jews was increasingly based on racism and deep-rooted hatred towards Jews by the Nazis in Germany who considered their own race to be far more superior. This fuelled their intention to see their own race established, and the Jewish race exterminated. The purpose of this essay is to examine to what extent the study of religion can help us to understand the holocaust. Further, the context of history and attitudes towards Judaism and Jews in Europe will be identified; and the Nazi adoption of the Final Solution will be discussed. The problems of using historical objectivity while examining the subject will be considered. Discussion A historical event with the immensity of human extermination such as the holocaust has discreetly been underplayed by some historians, to cover up the extent of injustice and inhumanity against the Jews. However, scholars (Browning & Matthaus, 2007; Cesarani, 1996; Niewyk & Nicosia, 2000; Schweid, 1988) have researched the historical background and events during the Third Reich which led to the seeking of a Final Solution to the problem of Jews, resulting in the Holocaust. “Several historical trends came together in the early twentieth century to make the holocaust possible: extreme nationalism, industrialism, antisemitism, racism, Social Darwinism, totalitarianism, and the nature of modern war” (Niewyk & Nicosia, 2000: 53). It is necessary to focus on the history of the Jews in order to understand what made them targets of prejudice, similar to the Gypsies and the handicapped who were also targetted in the same way The History of the Jews The main fact about Jewish history in the last two thousand years is the Jews’ dispersion from their original homeland in Palestine “and their failure to get assimilated into the nations in which they settled” (Niewyk & Nicosia, 2000: 57). The main reasons that are attributed to their carving out a unique position in European society are: Jewish particularism along with anti-Jewish prejudice. The Jews were originally a nomadic middle-eastern people who spoke a Semitic language. Around 1700 B.C. they settled in the Nile delta, and five hundred years later they made their exodus from Egypt to escape from slavery. The Jews conquered Canaan in contemporary Palestine and the new Hebrew state which was weak declined further in the tenth century B.C. and divided into two separate kingdoms: Judah and Israel. From the eighth century B.C. they were conquered by powerful nations like Assyria, Babylon, Persia, Greece and Rome, one after the other. The main factor that contributed to the continued existence of the Jewish people was their religion. Judaism contained a set of beliefs that promised the ultimate salvation of the Jews, as God’s chosen people. Abraham, the traditional founder of the Jewish people had entered into a covenant with God, and Abraham’s people were to obey His commandments, accept that “He was the only true God, live upright lives and lead all nations to worship Him. In return, God promised never to forsake His people. One day a messiah would appear to restore the Jews to Israel and establish world peace” (Niewyk & Nicosia, 2000: 58). This powerful message of Judaism coupled with the particular customs and traditions that preserved the Jews’ sense of ethnic uniqueness supported the continued existence of the Jewish religion for thousands of years. Concurrently, these customs and traditions made the Jews difficult to discipline as subjects, and they frequently revolted against their conquerors. Finally, after several Jewish rebellions, in A.D.70, the Romans demolished Jerusalem and compelled the Jews to scatter. This dispersal from Palestine, known as the Diaspora would form the basis for Jewish existence in the next 1900 years. Those Jews who migrated to Europe during the Diaspora preserved their ethnic identity by maintaining their religion-oriented lives, centred on their Synagogue. They welcomed converts but stayed away from non-believers who in turn regarded them with suspicion. The early Christian church as well as Judaism competed for converts to their own religion. Christianity taught that the Jews were the enemies of God for having rejected and crucified Jesus. The Christians could not convert them, and hence sought to keep them isolated and subservient. The Jews moved to France and then on to German lands and the rest of Europe wherever they could secure protection and privileges from kings or other mainly secular authorities. The Jews entered a Europe shattered by Germanic invasions and the collapse of the Roman Empire, and found opportunities to participate in the recovery of commercial and financial activities which had declined. Successful Jewish merchants started lending money, which was an occupation that the Christians could not participate in, because of the church’s ban on “usury” (Niewyk & Nicosia, 2000: 59). The Jews were increasingly blamed for all the ills in society including diseases like the Black Death. They moved on to under-developed parts of eastern Europe, where the rulers of Poland and Lithuania required their skills as merchants and bankers, and were willing to permit them privileges and protection. The Jews brought with them a form of the German language called as Yiddish, and a thriving Jewish culture strongly devoted to Talmudic studies. Through their own provincial councils they were permitted to have their own self-government. However, in eastern Europe also, the Jews were no more popular among the common people than elsewhere in Europe. They were specifically hated by the peasants, in their capacity of managers of noble estates. The Court Jews, financial advisors to secular rulers were also disliked intensely, as they were considered to be the equivalent of tax collectors (Niewyk & Nicosia, 2000: 59). During the eighteenth century Enlightenment, the development of rationalist thought as well as the growth of capitalist economies helped the European Jews to make use of new opportunities. Advocates of emancipation in Europe took initiatives to encourage the assimilation and acculturation of Jews with the rest of society. At the same time, a minority of Jews tried to modernize their religion and culture in order to reconcile with European culture. This resulted in the development of Reform Judaism in western Europe in the nineteenth century. “The Reform movement adopted the vernacular in religious services and stripped Judaism of its nationalist content” (Niewyk & Nicosia, 2000: 59). However, eastern European Jews did not leave Orthdoxy. For the western European Jews who embraced Reform Judaism, being Jewish applied to religion alone. In all other aspects, these Jews strove to be good Europeans and loyal to the countries where they lived. The gap became very wide between the eastern European Jews who were poor, isolated and devoutly Orthodox and the prosperous and growing Jewish communities in the big cities and in western Europe who were modern and increasingly assimilated. The gap continued to persist into the twentieth century, with the poor Jews of eastern Europe always constituting the majority although their numbers declined due to emigration to western Europe and America. In spite of Jewish emancipation and assimilation in western and central Europe, most Jews continued to hold fast to Judaism and Jewish traditions. Even those Jews who abandoned Judaism kept themselves in touch with their religion in secular terms, by taking an interest in their people’s history and culture. By the eve of the Holocaust the interaction of nearly two thousand years of Jewish particularism and European antisemitism had placed the Jews in precarious economic, political and social positions. Their comparatively higher incomes drew negative attitudes, especially in hard times. Nationalists who equated national greatness with national homogeneity, were unable to accept the Jews’ incomplete assimilation and acculturation with Germans. Niewyk & Nicosia (2000: 61) state that although Jewish peculiarities were slowly decreasing and might well have disappeared over time, Hitler intervened. His abstract image of the Jews as evil incarnate, was the only perspective he had of them, unwilling to consider the various facts of Jewish life. The Religious Origin of the Final Solution Christians and Jews had lived in an adversarial relationship since the first century A.D., from the time the early followers of Jesus who were Jews themselves could not convince a significant number of their fellow Jews that Jesus was the Messiah. The followers of Jesus did not want to have an identity of a reformed Jewish sect, and preferred to solidify their identity as belonging to the new religion of Christianity. They were unable to convert the Jews to Christianity. Pauline Christianity undertook the mission of seeking converts not only among the Jews but also from the pagan population of the Roman Empire. Further, around forty to sixty years after the death of Jesus the gospel writers tried to placate the Roman authorities in Palestine, while concurrently stigmatizing their rivals by portraying the Jews instead of the Roman authorities as being responsible for the crucifixion of Christ; which forms the scriptural origin of the fateful “Christ-killer” label. Moreover, the Jewish rebellion and the destruction of the second temple in Palestine formed the basis for early Christians to dissociate themselves completely from the Jews and also to see the Jewish catastrophe as a deserved punishment for the stubborn refusal to accept Jesus as the Messiah and as a divine vindication of their own beliefs (Browning & Matthaus, 2007: 1). The two small sects: Christians and Jews had more in common with each other by virtue of both groups basing their faith on a messenger of God - for the Christians: Jesus and the for the Jews: Abraham. Moreover the remaining people were pagans who worshipped the elements of nature. Both groups competed to win over as many converts as possible to their own religion. When the Roman Emperor Constantine converted to Christianity and consequently Rome transformed into a Christian country, there was a an immediate tilt in the balance, with the Christians in a predominant role, while the Jews became a minority community, much maligned and barely tolerated by the ruling religious group. There was swift action taken by the Christians to completely erase paganism, although for some unknown reason, the Jews’ synogogues were not demolished. Had the destruction of the Jews’ religious symbols been done at that time, along with those of paganism, the several centuries of mistreatment, discrimination and marginalization of Jews which ultimately culminated in the Final Solution of the Holocaust would never have been necessary (Browning & Matthaus, 2007: 2). In the tenth century A.D. growth of urban societies, expanding literacy and university education, along with the discovery of Aristotelian rationalism posed a potential and unsettling threat to traditional Christian religion; giving way to bewilderment, doubt and frustration (Browning & Matthaus, 2007: 2). In the eyes of the Christians, the Jewish minority stood for all the problems in the modernization crisis that were new, unsettling, threatening and incomprehensible. The initial teachings of Christian theologians regarding anti-Judaism, and contempt for the Jewish religion in the first millennium, was rapidly replaced by xenophobic anti-Semetism which was a prevalent negative stereotype that was composed of various assertions about Jews which was not true to fact and did not describe the real Jewish minority. On the other hand, it was the formulation of various threats and menaces that the Christian majority were fearful of, and they could not as well as would not comprehend (Browning & Matthaus, 2007: 3). Anti-Jewish incidents started occurring in the first decade of the eleventh century A.D., and this signalled a change that became more apparent with the murderous onslaughts by roving groups of knights on their way to the First Crusade. The anger and violence that the Christian crusaders exhibited towards Jews was based on their loss of sense of identity by rapidly changing social conditions which they could not control or understand, and to which they could not adapt successfully. Since many of the Jews were urban and commercialized, they were comparatively better off economically, and since they were not allowed into any of the prestigious professions such as the fighting and land-owning, they were non-military. These realities and most importantly the fact that they were non-believers contributed to their being targetted in Europe’s first pogroms or officially encouraged massacres and also faced the long-term threat of an increasing negative stereotype. The Jews were often barred from economic activities which were controlled through Guilds by the Christian majority. “The Jewish minority was branded not only as unbelievers but now also as cowards, parasites and usurers. Relgiously driven anti-Semitism took an economic, political and social dimension” (Browning & Matthaus, 2007: 3). In the following centuries, the negative stereotype of xenophobic anti-Semitism was increased and dominated by fantastical accusations such as the Jews’ alleged practices of ritual murder and torturing the Host. Xenophobic anti-Semitism permitted such concepts to take multiply and spread, and were ultimately legitimized by the authorities. As the Jews were increasingly dehumanized and demonized the anti-Semitism of the medieval period culminated in the wide-spread massacres and expulsions of the Jews that accompanied the Black Death. Society’s wide-spread hostility towards Jews increased in Christian culture to a great extent, even in conditions of the absence of real Jews. The concept of innate Jewish evil was deeply ingrained, and in Spain which was the land of the last and great expulsions of Jews, even conversion was considered inadequate to overcome the evil. The persecution and expulsion of Jews coupled with the notion of pure-blooded Christians were eerie precursors of events that were to happen five hundred years later, during the holocaust (Browning & Matthaus, 2007: 4). The Dual Revolutions and Social Transformation in Europe Europe’s Jews were able to survive the escalating onslaught of persecution because though the Church sanctioned it, it also set limits on it. Permeable boundaries permitted Jews to escape and settle elsewhere. On the other hand, these permeable boundaries and effective limits to persecution were not applied in the twentieth century holocaust and the final solution to the Jewish problem. With the gradual secularization of early modern European society, as well as the introduction of Renaissance humanism, the fracturing of religious unity in the Reformation, the scientific discoveries of Galileo and Newton in the seventeenth century, and the Enlightenment, there was a gradual decline in the virulence of anti-Semitism. “Western Europe was no longer a Christian commonwealth with religion at the core of its culture and identity” (Browning & Matthaus, 2007: 4). During this comparative respite, the Jews began moving into some areas of western Europe from where they had been previously expelled. However, the main population of European Jewry was firmly settled in the east from the medieval period when they had been welcomed by the rulers for the complementary economic functions that they provided. By the eighteenth century, there was a Jewish population explosion. All Eurpeans, both Jews and non-Jews were greatly affected by the “Dual Revolution” of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. The French Revolution fuelled the emergence of liberalism and nationalism; and the Industrial Revolution initiated a profound economic and social transformation. Initially the Dual Revolution appeared to be a great boon to the Jews, with the unprecedented opening up of economic opportunities for the minority group who were mobile, educated and adaptable. But Europe’s second great modernization crisis which took place nearly one millennium after the previous modernization era, was fraught with danger for the Jews. Once again, the social losers who were traditional elites and small-scale producers, who were impacted by the modernization due to industrial development, targetted the Jews as the root of their anguish and problems in the new era. Since the Jews were benefiting from the changes that were destroying Europe’s traditional way of life, those whose fortunes declined due to inherent reasons, still blamed the Jews as the cause of these changes. “But in the far more secular and scientific world of the nineteenth century, the explanation was not provided by the differences in religious beliefs” (Browning & Matthaus, 2007: 5). Jewish behaviour was now accounted for by the characteristics of their race. The implications of racial anti-Semitism now posed a different kind of threat for the Jews. Previously, the Christian majority had pressured Jews to convert and later to assimilate into the native culture of the country where they settled. On the other hand, racial anti-Semitism provided no escape by change of behaviour. Racism implied that since Jews could not change their ancestors, they could only disappear. Developments in the history of anti-Semitism went beyond national boundaries and encompassed Europe. However, increased anti-Semitism which took the shape of violent actions, deportations to death camps and the liquidation of millions of Jews were measures taken by the Nazis in Germany. The reasons for this include the conditions in Germany which declined to levels that became conducive to the onset of the holocaust. In Germany there was distorted and incomplete embrace of the Enlightenment and western liberal and democratic ideals, as a result of resentment and reaction against conquest and change imposed by revolutionary and Napoleonic France. The ant-westernism of many German intellectuals who were concerned about an increasingly endangered traditional world, resulted in a rejection of the liberal-democratic values on the one hand, and on the other hand a selective adoption of aspects of modernity such as modern technology and end-means rationality. A socio-structural approach that explains Germany’s march towards the holocaust is that the prolonged political disunity and fragmentation in Germany, in contrast to England and France, provided an environment that was less conducive to economic development and the rise of a healthy middle-class. “Germany became a schizophrenic nation” (Browning & Matthaus, 2007: 6), an increasingly modern society ruled by an autocratic monarchy and traditional elites who were incapable of gradual democratic reform. The Development of Nationalism and the Pseudosciences as Precursors of the Genocide In the nineteenth and early twentieth century Europe, nationalism was a powerful concept. Liberal political movements broke down the sovereignty of royalty, and replaced it with the rule of the people. Especially during World War I, international tensions created patriotic fervour, resulting in the incorporation of the principle of national self-determinism in the peace process, and nationalism becoming a secular religion for the people in Europe. Though nationalism was a liberating principle, it caused problems at the same time. Since several centuries Europe especially Eastern Europe contained many national minorities that were different in language, history, culture and customs from their neighbours, being either from other countries, or those without established homelands such as the Jews and the Gypsies (Niewyk & Nicosia, 2000: 54). Nationalists commonly maltreated the minorities and forced them to assimilate completely into the dominant culture or else leave the country. They also used minorities as foils in creating national identities. They attributed positive qualities such as cleanliness, piety, diligence, and honesty to themselves; and the opposite traits to the minorities. Hence nationalism gave rise to hatred and intolerance of outsiders while it helped to free oppressed nationalities and organized modern European nation states. The industrial revolution, development in science and technology, modern medicine and sanitation improved the length and quality of life of the people. For increasing progress and prosperity, Europeans focused on improving science and technology; though there was a lack of the ability to distinguish between genuine and false science. Pseudosciences such as “racism, Social Darwinism, and eugenics undermined traditional moral values and liberal ideas about the value of the individual and the brotherhood of man” (Niewyk & Nicosia, 2000: 54). This further undermined the condition of minorities like Jews. Anthropologists put forth theories of differences in races due to the time of their origination, the diverse ways in which they had evolved, a biological basis for some races being more advanced and thereby superior; all of which indicated inequality among races. Racism combined easily with the powerful nationalism of the late nineteenth century, resulting in Europeans being given the exalted position of superiority. This resulted in racist nationalism which aimed for racial homogeneity while concurrently holding minorities in contempt as inferior or corrupting elements, and as threats to racial purity (Niewyk & Nicosia, 2000: 55). Similar to racism, Social Darwinism claimed scientific certainty and based its unwarranted conclusions from biology. From around 1870, Social Darwinists like Herbert Spencer applied the theory of natural selection and survival of the fittest which took place over aeons in plants and animals in nature, to human social relationships in the present. Among Social Darwinists concluded that life was a struggle between races for land and power; and securing victory for the superior race was key to furthering the human race. Eugenics was the third popular pseudoscience which was the last to develop. Introduced in the 1880s by the British scientist Francis Galton, it aimed to improve “the race” by selective breeding. The purpose was to minimize the number of human beings born with undesirable traits and maximise those with desirable traits in the same way in which plant and animal scientists bred for specific characteristics. This theory gained ground powerfully in the twentieth century with the discoveries in genetics by Gregor Mendel. Combined with Social Darwinism, eugenics could lead to the conclusion that unless drastic preventive measures were taken, “one’s own race was in danger of being overwhelmed by prolific but morally and intellectually inferior aliens” (Niewyk & Nicosia, 2000: 55). Thus, nineteenth century nationalism was divided along ethnic lines. This was supported by racism, Social Darwinism and eugenics which introduced the concepts of biological superiority and racial struggle that were precursors of twentieth century ethnic cleansing and genocide. The trends of nationalism and the development of the pseudosciences may not have resulted in genocide and inhumanity, had it not been for World War I. This led to a series of developments which resulted in the victory of Nazism in Germany. Organizing savage force and brutalizing millions of men began to be accepted as the method of solving problems, since vast social and political problems which undermined liberal democracies had also resulted from World War I, especially in the defeated and despondent Germany. World depression reached Germany in 1930, the Communists benefited, but the Nazis did so even more. They still blamed the Jews as the cause of the country’s problems, but mainly attacked the ruling Weimar Republic for failing to overcome the depression and maintain order. The German voters who had very little choice, voted Hitler into power in 1932, and in 1933 he was appointed Chancellor in a coalition government with conservative allies. “Hitler succeeded in neutralizing his allies and making himself dictator” (Niewyk & Nicosia, 2000: 57). With Hitler in power, the elements of extreme nationalism, antisemitism, racism, Social Darwinism, eugenics, and totalitarianism took hold; and these were supported by a dynamic police and terror system in an advanced industrial society which was fully capable of total warfare. Hitler’s Key Leadership Role in Perpetuating the Holocaust Hitler’s central role in the holocaust is acknowledged by Kershaw (1993: 61), and that the support given by ideological consensus by not only key National Socialism (NS) or Nazi leaders, but also non-NS allies as well is according to polycratic functionalism which is the presence of ideological consensus along with conflicts and contradictions between ministries; whereas the monocratic intentionalists focus on the administrative anarchy and disorder in the Nazi regime. The intentionalists charge functionalists with trivializing the Nazi atrocities and covering up moral issues, while on the other hand, functionalists advance that intentionalists avoid the broader questions of responsibility, indicating an ideological gap between the two groups. However, the older and more influential intentionalist schools generally agree that most dimensions of the Nazi operations was the result of a consensus of intentions among the NS leadership, which was fully dominated by Hitler who planned and conducted all the major initiatives of the Third Reich, while turning his ideological beliefs into governmental policy (Kershaw, 1993: 5-10). The extremes of Hitler’s racial policies could be successfully implemented only due to the strong support from Heinrich Himmler, the head of Hitler’s Protection Troops or S.S. (Schutzstaffel) and Reinhard Heydrich who was another of Hitler’s most ruthless Nazis among several others. Without the support, it is highly likely that another authoritarian or Nazi-dominated police system might have been victorious, causing significant differences in the outcome. Any developments “other than Himmler’s triumph in the struggle for police power could have altered Hitler’s ability to execute genocide and might therefore have reduced the scope of his racial destruction to more conventional forms of persecution” (Browder, 2004: 6). This is acknowledged by Kershaw (1993: 80), who states that only a “synthesis of intention and structure” can help to create conducive circumstances for the realization of the intentions. Hitler’s intention and the socio-economic structural determinants of Nazi rule were not at opposite ends diverging away from each other, but were aligned together in the same direction. Consequently, it was nearly impossible to identify intention as the cause since it was not an autonomous force, but depended on circumstances which it may have been instrumental in creating, but which develops a powerful momentum on its own. Browder (2004: 6) agrees that no leader can execute his programmes without suitable instruments, and genocide of this magnitude is shaped only by opportunities to act on inclinations. Further, since all competitors including many non-Nazi collaborators aimed for an authoritarian police state, they all contributed to the ultimate system of the Final Solution. Historical Objectivity The problems of using historical objectivity while examining the subject is that of reconciling the fact that improvement in economic and social conditions in Europe both in the 11th century A.D. and in the twentieth century formed the basis for increased anti-Semitism and violent action against the Jews. This was mainly caused by those elites and small-scale producers who stood to lose in the new economically improved social conditions; and who blamed the relatively prospering Jews for their own declining conditions. Further, Christianity is based on the principles of peace and toleration of fellow human beings, as most other religions of the world are. The reasons for discrimination, marginalization and maltreatment of the minority religion of the Jews from the beginning of the existence of the two religious sects, from forty to sixty years after the passing away of Christ, for the last two thousand years, cannot be explained in Christian terms, in the same way as it would be difficult to give reasonable explanations for the carnage of innocent civilians during the Crusades. Moreover, Christians’ undertaking violent acts of expulsion, deportation, exploitation, experimentation of racial policies in Poland, and extermination of millions of Jews for the purpose of purging Germany of the people of “an inferior race” in order to propagate only the “racially superior and pure-blooded” Christians is totally at odds with the principles that Christianity is based on. That the extent of inhumanity was master-minded by the motivation and determination of one man, Adolph Hitler, and this was viewed dispassionately by the Christian world, will not explainable to future generations. Viewing history objectively, the political, social, cultural and economic conditions in Europe, specifically in Germany form the crucial background that contributed to the implementation of the Final Solution planned by Hitler. Schweid (1988: 395) agrees that the crisis of the divinity in religion, in both Christian and Jewish thought, after the holocaust “resulted from the believers’ realization that their religion had utterly failed ethically”. Christian thinkers were confronted not only with Christianity’s failure to prevent or even oppose the horrible crime, but also its contribution in developing the anti-Semetic stereotype and promoting hatred towards the Jews. At the same time, both Orthodox and Liberal Jewish thinkers realized that their understanding of the Jewish religion had made them unaware of the inherent dangers that were leading to the Holocaust; hence, they failed to fulfill their religious responsibility as leaders in guiding and protecting the Jewish people. The reality of human existence in the modern era has to be taken into consideration by the principles formulated by religion, and substantial changes in content and norms should be brought about. Conclusion This paper has highlighted the German Holocaust and Nazi adoption of the Final Solution in the context of history, and studied the attitudes towards Judaism and Jews in Europe. The extent to which religion played a part in the conditions that led to the extermination of Jews who had been discriminated against for nearly two thousand years was examined. It is found that the conflict between Jews and Christians originated on the basis of religion, in around 40 to 60 A.D., and continued to be the central cause through several centuries of oppression against the Jews who practised their own faith of Judaism. However, it is clear that religion was not the only cause. Economic disparity in times of social reform and progress when the Jews used the opportunities to their advantage, while some sections of the population suffered a decline was also an important reason for targetting the Jews as the cause of the problem. Other significant causes for the Jews being marginalized were the development of nationalism which led to the expulsion of minority groups, and the development of pseudosciences such as racism, Social Darwinism and eugenics, all of which raised anti-Semitism and the desire for establishing the nation populated only by pure-blooded Christians, who were considered to be racially superior. References Browder, G.C. 2004. 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