Spins of Omission - A Review of 'The Popes Against the Jews'
The Popes Against the Jews: The Vatican's Role in the Rise of Modern Anti-Semitism David I. Kertzer, Knopf, 2001, 355 pages, $27.95
Pius XII and the Holocaust: Understanding the Controversy José M. Sánchez, The Catholic University of America Press, 2002, 200 pages, $39.95
The role of the Church in the events leading to the Holocaust has attracted a great deal of attention over the past few years. In these new books, authors David Kertzer and José Sánchez both deal with "Vatican-Nazi-Holocaust" issues, but their focus is very different.
Kertzer looks at the popes of the 19th and early 20th centuries. He contends that modern anti-Semitism was "embraced" and "actively promulgated" by popes from Pius VI (1775) through Pius XI (1923-1939). The informative part of his book comes in the early chapters. Here, Kertzer gives the reader a reasonable account of Jewish life in the papal dominions before 1870, when popes had real temporal power. Too often, Jews were treated with religious and political contempt.
Catholic officials of this period were fearful of Jews. Kertzer discusses the ancient charge that during the Passover, Jews ritually murdered Christian children to get their blood. In fact, he devotes far too much attention to this subject for a book about papal anti-Semitism. The "blood libel" was not an invention of Catholics, and the popes frequently condemned it. Popes did, however, fear that Jews would lead Catholics away from Christ. It was this fear, hardly mentioned by Kertzer, that led to most of the measures that we now find so offensive. This sad history is more damning of the ignorance that bred such suspicion and mistrust than of any specific religious beliefs.
Kertzer's thesis of papal anti-Semitism ultimately stands or falls on what happened after the collapse of the papal states. At this point, however, the popes are no longer central to Kertzer's book. Instead he looks to newspapers, magazines, and local prelates—wherever he can find evidence of Catholic anti-Semitism. With no direct evidence of papal anti-Semitism, Kertzer purports to give a "secret" history developed from diplomatic cables, private audiences, and letters conveying papal benedictions to individual Catholics.
Kertzer does not consult the encyclicals written by Pope Leo XII—many of them dealing directly with the social order. Instead, he contorts an interview given to a French journalist. The pope's reference to a new plague that was affecting modern society, which he termed "the kingdom of money," is converted into a "Catholic anti-Semitic campaign." Kertzer appears unaware that just a few months earlier, Leo had railed against the economic policies of European governments in his 1891 encyclical on the plight of the workers, Rerum Novarum. Discussing the treason trial of Alfred Dreyfus, Kertzer emphasizes the French Catholics who contributed to the persecution of an innocent man, but he fails to mention the papacy's opposition to this anti-Semitic campaign. In a book about papal anti-Semitism, this is a rather serious oversight.
Discussing Pope Benedict XV, Kertzer overlooks the most significant direct piece of evidence. In 1916, American Jews petitioned Benedict on behalf of Polish Jews. The response was as follows:
The Supreme Pontiff...never ceases to indicate...the observance of the principles of the natural law, and to condemn everything that violates them. This law must be observed and respected in the case of the children of Israel, as well as of all others, because it would not be comformable to justice or to religion itself to derogate from it solely on account of divergence of religious confessions.
This express papal condemnation of anti-Semitism was published in the Jesuit journal, Civilta Cattolica, which—as Kertzer fails to mention—became notably less anti-Jewish in the 1900s. Benedict was succeeded by Pope Pius XI. On September 6, 1938, in a statement that quickly made its way around the world, this pope said:
Anti-Semitism...is a movement with which we Christians can have nothing to do. No, no, I say to you it is impossible for a Christian to take part in anti-Semitism. It is inadmissible. Through Christ and in Christ we are the spiritual progeny of Abraham. Spiritually, we are all Semites. The National Jewish Monthly reported that "the only bright spot in Italy has been the Vatican, where fine humanitarian statements by the Pope have been issuing regularly." Jacques Maritain wrote: "No stronger word has been uttered by a Christian against anti-Semitism, and this Christian was the successor to the Apostle Peter." But Kertzer tries to diminish the importance of Pius XI's statement.
In 1937, the Vatican issued Pius XI's encyclical Mit Brennender Sorge on the Church and the German Reich. This still stands as one of the strongest condemnations of any national regime that the Holy See has ever published, and it contains a significant discussion of why Scripture and the Incarnation itself forbid racial derogation of the "chosen people." In incorrectly asserting that the pope made "no direct attack on anti-Semitism," Kertzer cites not the encyclical but Hitler's Pope by John Cornwell (see interview with Cornwell on page 26).
Kertzer is not delving into history here; he is advancing a thesis. He does not weigh the evidence impartially but tries to make it fit his theory. In a strategy remarkably similar to that of Cornwell in his book on Pius XII, Kertzer takes some selected quotes from a letter written by Monsignor Ratti before he became Pope Pius XI, notes some uncomfortable language, and, on this foundation, attempts to build his case that the future pope was a lifelong anti-Semite.
In point of fact, Pius XI was long known to be on good terms with Jews. As a young man, he learned Hebrew from a rabbi, and he enjoyed warm relations with Italian Jewish leaders in the early years of his priesthood. Instructed by Pope Benedict to direct the distribution of Catholic relief in postwar Poland, Ratti provided funds to impoverished Jews who had lost their homes and businesses. Whereas Kertzer asserts that Ratti only met once with Poland's Jews and studiously tried to avoid them, other reports have documented that he greeted and assisted Jews throughout his three-year appointment in Poland.
In the end, a fair evaluation of the years Kertzer covers shows the papacy to be one of the few protectors of the Jews, even when other Catholics were not as charitable as they should have been.
In Pius XII and the Holocaust, José Sánchez picks up chronologically where Kertzer leaves off. As his title implies, Sánchez is interested in understanding the debate over Pope Pius XII. This is similar to, but not precisely the same as, seeking the historical truth. That makes his book both interesting and at times frustrating.
Sánchez has identified a dozen or so books on Pius XII that he finds meritorious and uses them to work through the various questions involved in the dispute. One might have hoped for more primary sources and better discretion as to secondary ones, but he has obviously tried for balance. The most notable omission would seem to be the Vatican's viewpoint, which is best reflected in writings he does not use.
Because he is trying to come to terms with the controversy as a controversy, Sánchez tends to fall into a rut of "he said, she said," contrasting one author with another without always giving his own analysis. This can be quite frustrating for those familiar with the subject, though it might help someone new to the topic.
The best individual chapter in the book is on the 1933 concordat between the Holy See and Germany. Unlike many others who see this as a Vatican endorsement of Nazism, Sánchez explains that this was a simple and necessary measure to protect Catholics in Germany. Sánchez makes it clear that there was no single motivation for Pius XII's decision not to condemn the Nazis by name during the war; there were many factors. Overall, the pope comes off pretty well under this analysis. Sánchez rejects the recent (and illogical) thesis that Vatican rescue efforts took place in Italy without papal support or knowledge. Unfortunately, he accepts without proof (and contrary to the best evidence) the charge that the Vatican helped Nazis to flee Europe after the war.
Sánchez presents his book as an honest attempt to come to grips with these difficult issues. He argues that other authors—critics and defenders, historians and journalists—"start with a particular point of view and use documents to bolster their contentions." While I agree that this has happened in a case or two, my assumption is that most authors begin by trying to know the truth. Unfortunately, some—like Kertzer—get sidetracked by their theories along the way.
Ron Rychlak is a professor of law at the University of Mississippi. He is the author of Hitler, the War, and the Pope (Our Sunday Visitor, 2000).
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