Throughout the centuries there have been Christians who have actually protested against Christianity. People like Pelagius who protested against Augustine. People who believed in the humanity of Jesus, not the divinity. Who didn't want to think of the death of Jesus as being a sacrifice, a theological sacrifice, but simply the martyrdom of a great man in the cause of freedom. He was fighting against Rome, not against the Jews. People who think of Jesus as a model teacher. And Jesus would be in the same position then, as Moses is in Judaism, as Mohammed is in Islam, a human teacher. There is nothing anti-religious in this.
Explaining Hitler
THE SEARCH FOR THE ORIGINS OF HIS EVIL
Ron Rosenbaum
Chapter 18
The Passion Play of Hyam Maccoby
page 329
The beginning of our journey causes alarm to those who do not join us.
Forward one step, backward two steps, like clockwork.
It is difficult to feed everyone.
At times we cross state borders, then recross.
There is a sanctity to our footsteps, the rolling of cartwheels over broken glass.
It is an an appalling sound.
We cover ourselves with prayer.
We believe in God's blessing.
Troubles follow.
There is ungovernable treachery.
We try to remain inconspicuous.
The sun thwarts our clandestine movements.
A nameless man joins the landlocked voyagers we have become.
He holds children close to his breast, gives them comfort and helps them stop crying.
There is no stopping this type of evil when it strikes children.
We are kin to God but our armor is insufficient to raze down the illicit tabernacle of murder.
A mass of rolling clouds, the wetness of it changing reality from white to grey:
A shattering wail of evil intentions from beyond the sky.
We pass a camp of Roma.
They wave.
Their little children are bright like butterflies.
My wife begins weeping.
I try but cannot stop her bitter sadness.
"God is good," she whispers.
"God is just," I reply.
My words make her grief terrible.
A nameless mad thing slices into our hearts.
I say no more.
The sobbing of my wife's horror makes me want to die.
Genocide has two phases: one, destruction of the national pattern of the oppressed group; the other, the imposition of the national pattern of the oppressor. The imposition, in turn, may be made upon the oppressed population which is allowed to remain, or upon the territory alone, after removal of the population and colonization of the area by the oppressor's own nationals.
Genocide: a coordinated plan of different actions aiming at the destruction of essential foundations of the life of national groups, with the aim of annihilating the groups themselves.
Raphael Lemkin
Axis Rule
The perpetrators of genocide would attempt to destroy the political and social institutions, the culture, language, national feelings, religion, and economic existence of national groups. They would hope to eradicate the personal security, liberty, health, dignity, and lives of individual members of the targeted group.
A group did not have to be physically exterminated to suffer genocide. They could be stripped of all cultural traces of their identity. "It takes centuries and sometimes thousands of years to create a national culture," Lemkin wrote, "but Genocide can destroy a culture instantly, like fire can destroy a building in an hour."
Samantha Power
"A PROBLEM FROM HELL"
AMERICA and the AGE of GENOCIDE
Chapter 1
The Crime With A Name
Page 43
