The Foundations of the Nineteenth Century
LC Class CB83 .C45 1911 | | |
[1] |
The Foundations of the Nineteenth Century (Die Grundlagen des neunzehnten Jahrhunderts, 1899) is a
Synopsis
Published in German, the book advocates a form of
Certain anthropologists would fain teach us that all races are equally gifted; we point to history and answer: that is a lie! The races of mankind are markedly different in the nature and also in the extent of their gifts, and the Germanic races belong to the most highly gifted group, the group usually termed Aryan ... Physically and mentally the Aryans are pre-eminent among all peoples; for that reason they are by right ... the lords of the world. Do we not see the homo syriacus develop just as well and as happily in the position of slave as of master? Do the Chinese not show us another example of the same nature?[2]
Chamberlain's book focused on the claim that the Teutonic peoples were the
Building somewhat on the theories of de Gobineau and
All historically great races and nations have been produced by mixing; but wherever the difference of type is too great to be bridged over, then we have mongrels. That is the case here. The crossing between Bedouin and Syrian was — from an anatomical point of view — probably worse than that between Spaniard and South American Indian.[5]
Chamberlain also considered the
The noble Moor of Spain is anything but a pure Arab of the desert, he is half a Berber (from the Aryan race) and his veins are so full of Gothic blood that even at the present day noble inhabitants of Morocco can trace their descent back to Teutonic ancestors.[6]
Chamberlain (who had graduate training in biology) rejected Darwinism, evolution and social Darwinism, and instead emphasized "gestalt", which (he said) derived from Goethe. Chamberlain regarded Darwinism as the most abominable and misguided doctrine of the day.[7]
Chamberlain used an old biblical notion of the ethnic makeup of Galilee to argue that while Jesus may have been Jewish by religion, he was probably not Jewish by race, claiming that he descended from the Amorites.[8] During the inter-war period, certain pro-Nazi theologians, such as Walter Bauer and Walter Grundmann, and American Assyriologist Paul Haupt[9] developed these ideas as part of the manufacture of an Aryan Jesus. Chamberlain's admirer Adolf Hitler held a similar view, as evidenced in his table talk, where he canvassed the idea of Jesus as the illegitimate son of a Roman soldier stationed in Galilee.[10]
Reception
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The Foundations sold extensively: eight editions and 60,000 copies within ten years, 100,000 copies by the outbreak of World War I and 24 editions and more than a quarter of a million copies by 1938.[11] The Russian translation was especially popular and was carried by White Russians all the way to Siberia.
The 1911 translation received positive reviews in most of the British press.
It was praised in
The book was important to Wilhelm II, who became Chamberlain's friend (the two held a correspondence), and as a "spiritual" foundation of the Third Reich. Chamberlain's ideas on race were greatly influential to Adolf Hitler, who readily adapted them into his Nazi ideology; Chamberlain himself joined the Nazi party, and both Hitler and Goebbels visited Chamberlain whilst he was on his deathbed.
See also
- Antisemitism
- Kirchenkampf
- The Myth of the Twentieth Century
- Positive Christianity
- Race and appearance of Jesus
- Collective Aryan unconscious
- Adolf Hitler's religious views
Notes
- ^ "Library of Congress LCCN Permalink for a11000252". lccn.loc.gov. Retrieved 2016-09-12.
- ^ Foundations. p. 542. Archived from the original on 2007-12-23.
- ^ Foundations. p. 394. Archived from the original on 2007-12-23.
- ^ Foundations. p. 374. Archived from the original on 2007-12-23.
- ^ Foundations. p. 389. Archived from the original on 2007-12-23.
- ^ Foundations. p. 398. Archived from the original on 2007-12-23.
- ^ See Anne Harrington, Reenchanted Science: Holism in German Culture from Wilhelm II to Hitler, (Princeton University Press: 1999) online p. 106
- ^ "Chamberlain and the Jews". The New York Review of Books. Retrieved 15 January 2021.
- ISBN 978-0-691-12531-2.
- ^
ISBN 1929631057.
Galilee was a colony where the Romans had probably installed Gallic legionaries, and it's certain that Jesus was not a Jew. The Jews, by the way, regarded Him as the son of a whore — of a whore and a Roman soldier.
- ^ William L. Shirer The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, 1959, p.107 of 1985 Bookclub Associates Edition.
- ^ Theodore Roosevelt "History as Literature", 1913, http://www.bartleby.com/56/8.html