Hitler is often cited as an example of an evil atheist (along with Stalin and Mao). But there are several quotes from him that seem to indicate he believed in the Christian God - and even used this to justify his policies.
So what were Hitler's actual religious beliefs, as far as History is concerned? Is there any evidence that supports the claim that he was an atheist?
That's an interesting question. There is a book by Michael Hesemann, a German historian, in which he is interpreting Hitler's religion (that is actually the title of the book) like this:
Hitler's plans were going towards a "German pseudo-religion". Hitler got his first ideas from the "Ostara"-magazine, which was published from 1903 to 1931 and propagated Aryan and antisemitic theories.
The publisher, an Austrian named Jörg Lanz von Liebenfels, wanted to get his followers to convert to Protestantism, but most of the Austrian population was strictly Catholic at this time, so he failed.
So Hitler, not wanting to share the fate of Liebenfels, had to keep a Catholic facade. He needed the church (Catholic and Protestant) to get a chance to achieve his goals. Hitler found his idol in Richard Wagner. In his beliefs, Jesus Christ was Aryan, but was affected and influenced by the Jews and therefore his teachings were distorted.
Hitler's target was actually to destroy Christianity to make way for his German religion, but considering the percentage of German Christians, this was not possible, so Hitler started with the Jewish population.
Nonetheless there have been assaults on Catholic churches and priests too.
According to Hesemann, the destruction of Christianity in the Third Reich would have been Hitler's plan after the "Endsieg".
So, personally, I can't say if that is the truth, but it seems reasonable in some factors, but I want to close with a quote from Hitler, spoken in 1941:
Christianity is a rebellion against natural law, a protest against nature. Taken to its logical extreme, Christianity would mean the systematic cultivation of the human failure.
Source:
Michael Hesemann - Hitlers Religion
If "Christianity represents the cultivation of the human failure" it seems to me surprising that it has lasted this long. Indeed. Hitler was not the only one to have a biased understanding of Darwinism. He thought that the stronger must survive, while Darwin says that who survives is the strongest. Nietzsche understood but rejected Darwinism: he thought that people should be trained, educated, self-domesticated according to Greek rather than Biblical models. Hitler tried to mix Darwinism with Nietzscheanism (and failed), and to replace philosophy with propaganda (and succeeded).
– cipricus
Feb 21 '23 at 08:01
Here is a Wiki page on it: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adolf_Hitler's_religious_views
Below is a paragraph from the article above:
Persecution of the Christian Churches
In 1999 attorney Julie Seltzer Mandel, while researching documents for the "Nuremberg Project", discovered 150 bound volumes collected by Gen. William Donovan as part of his work on documenting Nazi war crimes. Donovan was a senior member of the U.S. prosecution team and had compiled large amounts of evidence that the Nazis persecuted Christian Churches. In a 108-page outline titled "The Nazi Master Plan" Office of Strategic Services investigators argued that the Nazi regime had a plan to minimize the influence of the Christian churches through a campaign of systematic persecutions. "Important leaders of the National Socialist party would have liked to meet this situation [of church influence] by complete extirpation of Christianity and the substitution of a purely racial religion," said the report. According to Annex 4 of The Nazi Master Plan, the best evidence came from "the systematic nature of the persecution itself." The document further stated that "direct evidence" of this plan could possibly be obtained by examining the "directives of the Reich Propaganda Ministry" or by "questioning of Nazi newspapermen and local and regional propagandists". According to the outline, the Nazis understood, even before they came to power, that they needed to neutralize the Christian churches. The report stated, "the destruction of Christianity was explicitly recognized as a purpose of the National Socialist movement" from the start but "considerations of expediency made it impossible, however, for the National Socialist movement to adopt this radical anti-Christian policy officially." Historian Alan Bullock agrees that it was Hitler's intention to wait until the war was over to destroy the influence of Christianity. The O.S.S. outline suggests that the plan to persecute the Churches was conceived by Hitler and an inner circle before the Nazis even came to power, however editor Richard Bonney stated this conjecture was an "interesting, but undocumented, assertion." Some moves were made to reduce Christianity's presence in German traditions, such as replacing Christian elements in Christmas carols with pagan references. In the political relations dealing with religion Hitler readily adopted a strategy "that suited his immediate political purposes".
Also in the wiki article:
In 1985 the Austrian author Wilfried Daim published a photograph of an alleged document signed by Hitler in 1943, which proposed the:
"Immediate and unconditional abolition of all religions after the final victory ('Endsieg') not only for the territory of Greater Germany but also for all released, occupied and annexed countries ..., proclaiming at the same time Hitler as the new messiah.
The reason there is ambiguity is because Hitler made himself appear like he supported Christian beliefs and at the same time he was moving farther away from them. If he immediately opposed Christianity he likely would never have risen to the power that he did so quickly.
If you know Christian beliefs you know that Hitler did not have Christian beliefs, no matter what he said. Actions speak louder then words.
In a sense Nazism is a religion and Hitler's book Mein Kampf is the guidebook to that religion.
Two good resources to finding out his beliefs are:
If you read them I'm sure you will find that his beliefs are nowhere near Christianity.
This is a very hard question to answer, and it's a hard question to even define!
You would have to decide what is a religious belief and what isn't (where do religion and politics overlap?). Hitler was big on racial supremecy (obviosly). Is that a religion? etc. Can one person have 2 (or more) religions?
You also have to decide what religions are called what. "Christian" is such a broad ambiguous term. It's common for there to be 2 religions, that would call themselves "Christian" and denouce the other as not Christian. Hence one person could say "Of course Hitler was Christian" and someone else can say "Of course Hitler wasn't Christian!". In order to answer this question, you would have to answer other questions like: Are Roman Catholics "Christian"? Are Anglicans "Christian"? Are Eastern Orthodox "Christian"?
This debate is futher muddy by combining the (well deserved) hatred of Hitler and what he did, and what Nazism stands for, with religion. Atheist Lobby Groups will say "Religion is bad, look Hitler was Christian" and Christian Lobby Groups will say "Atheism is bad, look Hitler was atheist!". If someone has a strong belief (either pro- one religion or anti a religion), they do not want to associate their grouping with Hitler. So many people will not approach this rationally and empirically, and will look for evidence to support the outcome they want to be true.
What were his religious beliefs? The reason this is worth answering is because it helps to answer a truly important question: what was the role of religion in Nazi Germany? After all Hitler is only interesting or important because he was the leader of a powerful country.
Historically, answers to this question have been contaminated by the No True Scotsman fallacy so common in discussions about religion. Christianity is good, and Hitler was not good, so Hitler wasn't a Christian. Even though Hitler said he was a Christian, this is not true because he was a Nazi, and therefore not good, and therefore not a Christian (there's good reason to think Hitler's profession of Christianity was insincere, but we'll get to that later). You can see the same pattern of thinking among Marxist-Leninists: Bolshevism is good, Stalin was not good, therefore Stalin was not a Bolshevik. And Islam is good, and ISIS is not good, therefore ISIS is not Islamic. And so on.
Buddhism is good, and the Buddhist mobs attacking Muslims in Sri Lanka are not good, therefore they are not Buddhists. Hinduism is good, and the Gujarat pogroms by Hindus were not good, therefore the perpetrators were not Hindus. And so forth.
I will confine my answer to Hitler's actions and self-identification, rather than saying whether he was a 'true Christian', because per Wittgenstein, universal terms like Christian can only have family resemblances and not a single defining characteristic. Of course (some) Christians believe there is a single internally coherent and true version of Christianity (theirs), and all other interpretations are heresy. However I am not a Christian, so thankfully I don't have to pretend that there is one true interpretation, so I won't.
The other leg to understanding his beliefs is Hitler's actions. How did he behave towards Christians and other religious groups, and what were his future plans?
Now we've got that out the way, as I said we'll take a direct look at Hitler. First there's his public statements. They are pretty unambiguous: Christianity is good, atheism is bad. He said some rude things about Catholicism, but anti-atheism was the main thrust of his arguments. This wiki page cites quite a few of them; it was part of his attempt to discredit his Social Democrat and Communist rivals. All this worked, and he got the support of German Christians: the vast majority of those in his party were practising Christians. We know this for the simple reason that 95% of Germans were Christians.2 Even if every single non-Christian had been a Nazi member (many were Sozis or Commies, wherefore Hitler's anti-atheist propaganda) then mathematically they would still be swamped by Nazi-supporting Christians going by 1939 population figures. Note that per the above paragraph I am not making some essentialist claim that theoretical 'true Christians' supported Hitler, I'm saying that practical Christians, who lived, breathed, and physically existed supported him.
Many atheists were executed; not necessarily communists, just anyone who had vocally supported some party other than the Nazis. A small minority of Catholics and an even smaller minority of Protestants interpreted their religion as incompatible with the Nazis' rule, and were also executed. These people are very famous (and boasted about) so I won't go into detail, except to say there is nothing contradictory in persecuting Christians and atheists. Remember, the first Christians were executed by the Romans for being atheists, in that they denied the existence of the Roman gods. And as we'll see below, Hitler had his own gods.
Hitler's private statements were less friendly to Christianity. He viewed it as a religion of weakness, and planned to extinguish it after the war was over. However, it is not accurate to characterise him as a secret atheist. He believed in some kind of divine presence, which was guiding the German race to master the world.
That's how he saw himself, anyway. In practical terms he never had a solid grip on reality, and after a couple of successful annexations he went totally off the rails; he believed that he was God. Both his statements and actions back that up. Unlike many of his Nazi colleagues, he really had no interest in neo-paganism and did nothing to encourage it.
I said above that Hitler's religious beliefs are not as important as people think they were. Hitler is not the same thing as Nazi Germany. If Hitler was not a Christian, this does not mean that Christianity came out of the war with clean hands. People make a big fuss out of Bonhoffer and Niemoller these days, but the uncomfortable fact is that most Germans, and therefore most Lutherans and a good chunk of Catholics, supported Hitler partly because he portrayed his war as a war against Bolshevist atheism, and inflamed their long-standing antisemitism.
To the extent that these people were complicit in the crimes of the Nazi state, they did not see a contradiction between their crimes and their Christian identity and beliefs. This may mean they were 'not true Christians', but what use is the concept of 'true Christians' if most people who think they are Christians are just confused? Equally, what use is the idea of 'true Communism' if none of the Communist regimes in history have been 'true Communists'?
what use is the concept of 'true Christians' - of no use whatsoever.
– cipricus
Feb 21 '23 at 08:27
Because of his importance to history, and his oft-described sense of messianism at the time of his early successes, I think some people often look to Hitler to provide evidence of a comprehensive philosophy, which would include things like his religious views.
But I am not sure that knowing what he thought about any religious or philosophical subject is of any more value than knowing what anyone of a substantially maladjusted psyche thinks on the matter. Hitler was both a megalomaniac and a fantasist. I am certainly not prepared to attach any value whatever to knowing the religious views of such a troubled individual. For all practical purposes Hitler was the personification of evil. Attempting to divine from his writing or speeches some kind of devout motive, behind his warped ideas, seems to me entirely ridiculous.
We do know that he had been brought up, at least nominally, as an Austrian Catholic. But Hitler's expressed religious beliefs in Mein Kampf and elsewhere do not follow any consistent pattern. He would bore the staff at his HQ with lengthy dinner monologues about the history of mankind, the nature of the cosmos, interwoven with narcissistic stories about his youth in Vienna, and his "struugles".(Kershaw). He would repeat endlessly his justifications for anti-Semitism, which as Alan Bullock points out borrowed heavily from attitudes of some red-necked Austrians of the early-twentieth century, and especially the visceral prejudices of the gut-right-wing elements of some of the German-speaking petit bourgeoisie in cosmopolitan Vienna. This corresponds with the time Hitler was a down-at-heel artist, mixing with ne'er-do-wells in down-market cafés and doss houses. Almost certainly he did not have the capacity and mindset to develop and sustain a consistent religious position, radically outside of the mainstream. As far as I know, he was not a man given to spiritual reflection.
During the days of his youth, when he was trying to make it as an artist, Hitler pretended to intellectual thought - but based on Bullock's assessment it was shallow. The milieu in which he lived during this period of his life i.e. the time when many young people give thought to life's big questions, was hardly conducive to the sort of profound thought and discussion necessary for developing religious and philosophical positions.
It is also worth remembering that Hitler, though he did not lack for political cunning, was not an academically educated man. (Before he became a politician he had been a corporal in the army.) There is ample evidence that he was ill-at-ease in educated company. He was far more comfortable in a beer hall - especially if he was able to grab the floor, and, heaven-forbid, a microphone.
Hitler's religious utterances throughout his life tend to be disorganised and haphazard, perhaps not unlike the expressions of someone not tied into a church structure, and lacking the disciplines of higher education. Nor do they indicate any particular personal religious commitment.
There were times when the Nazi regime was embarrassed by the criticism of religious people, such as when sections of the public became aware of the extent of the euthanasia programme. Kershaw* ,reporting on Hitler's attitude around the end of 1941, says "there would be no place in this utopia [an "eastern Reich covering most of Russia] for the Christian churches". And Goebbels in his diaries commented at the time 'There is...an insoluble opposition between the Christian and a Germanic-heroic world-view'. Later Kershaw (p516) records Hitler as having indicated his determination, (Spring 1942) "after their insidious behaviour during the winter...to destroy the Christian Churches after the war". And when he was persuaded that the Vatican was deeply inplicated in the plot to oust Mussolini, in a military briefing, Kershaw says that he talked wildly of occupying the Vatican and "getting out the whole lot of swine". (Kershaw p596)
The religious question had bedevilled German unification for centuries, and one of Hitler's predecessors, Otto von Bismarck, (Chancellor 1871-1890) had pursued a Kulturkampf against Catholics, in which the term Reichsfeind (Enemy of the state) had been widely employed. The notion of a cultural "enemy within" was not therefore new to recent German history. Thus it was that politicians who wanted to succeed as badly as Hitler, needed to tread carefully as between Protestants and Catholics in a Federal Germany.
It would appear from reading historians such as Kershaw* that there was religious pressure - notably from Catholics - on the regime from time to time, but the Nazi authorities were careful, it would seem to keep it under control and it was not allowed to develop into a contest.
Events may to some extent have followed a pattern set in the later 19th century, where religion in Germany, as elsewhere in Europe, had undoubtedly been challenged by intellectuals. The writings of German philosophers such as Marx, Hegel, Nietzsche, as well as scholars elsewhere, such as Charles Darwin, feed into the general zeitgeist of the defeated post-war nation, and undoubtedly influenced the climate in which National Socialism prospered. Hitler's pot pourri of ideas and expressions borrow variously from these different sources.
Who knows what Hitler would have become had he ultimately been successful, and what path he might have taken as regards the churches? He would not have been the first German Chancellor to have taken on the Roman Catholic Church if that had been his plan. So in answer to the question, I believe that while Hitler, like many in society, would have had a perfunctory religion of Catholicism, any beliefs associated with his divers utterances on the subject, from time to time, were held more in service of his political ambitions than for personal reasons. Hitler's only really compelling ideologies were national socialism and German world domination
**There exists on YouTube an excellent lecture on Christianity in Nazi Germany by UK historian Professor Alec Ryrie which is well worth the 55 minutes that it lasts.
*Ian Kershaw; Hitler 1936-1945; Nemesis (London 2001). *Alan Bullock; Hitler: a Study in Tyranny (London 1962).
Adolf Hitler was a self confessed positive Christian
Positive Christian
Religious views of Adolf Hitler
Hitler and the Nazi party promoted "Positive Christianity",[11] a movement which rejected most traditional Christian doctrines such as the divinity of Jesus, as well as Jewish elements such as the Old Testament.[12][13] In one widely quoted remark, he described Jesus as an "Aryan fighter" who struggled against "the power and pretensions of the corrupt Pharisees"[14] and Jewish materialism.[15]
Adolf Hitler was also in to mysticism and occultism. Whilst some historians say his interest was fleeting, that did not stop him promoting Occultists to the highest positions in the Nazi party.
Hitler on mysticism and occultism
According to Bullock, as an adolescent in Vienna, Hitler read widely, including books on Occultism, Hypnotism, Astrology. However, his interest in these subjects was fleeting, and there is no evidence that he ever subscribed to any of these schools of thought.[99] Bullock found "no evidence to support the once popular belief that Hitler resorted to astrology" and wrote that Hitler ridiculed those like Himmler in his own party who wanted to re-establish pagan mythology, and Hess who believed in Astrology.
Though Hitler was in to Occultism as a youth.
According to Ron Rosenbaum, some scholars believe the young Hitler was strongly influenced, particularly in his racial views, by an abundance of occult works on the mystical superiority of the Germans
And while Hitler publically condemned Occultists in his society, he still promoted them to highest realms of Nazi party
Although Hitler expressed negative views towards the mystical notions of some of his senior Nazi underlings in private, he nevertheless appointed Heinrich Himmler and Alfred Rosenberg to senior positions in the Nazi movement.[50][51]
Hitler was not Atheist, Protestant or Catholic. Perhaps in Hitler's early life he may have considered himself a catholic or protestant or even sincerely doubted there was a God and declared to himself an atheist. It is obvious that he was never really a practicing Christian of any denomination and that as far as religion goes he considered Church organizations as political organizations, to be replaced by the Nazi system of belief, just as all other political organizations at the time in Germany.
This answer is informal and just my opinion based on a lot of reading over the years about Hitler and the war.
Hitler was not an atheist, because Hitler believed in his own divinity. Hitler believed that he was chosen by divine providence to save the German race. Hitler's God was to Hitler the only true God. Hitler believed that everything he did was morally correct. He believed that any thought he had was of divine origin. As far as Hitler was concerned, Hitler was infallible because he was the true servant of God. No matter how many people died, no matter how much destruction was wrought at the bequest of Hitler, to Hitler it was all moral because it was of his divine will. In his megalomania he could not distinguish between his will and the will of god, for him it was one in the same. As far as religion was concerned, he was above it, he was the only true representative of god. Nazism was the only true religion, because Hitler was the only person in the world that was perfectly divine and understood God and God's will. The only moment of doubt that Hitler may have had about this is when he was biting the cyanide and pulling the trigger.
Adolf Hitler was a believer not in traditional Abrahamic faith, but a form of monotheism. According to Historian Percy Ernst Schramm, a German historian who infiltrated the Nazi's inner circle, Hitler's religion is "a variant of the monism so common before the First World War". Monism is the belief that only one supreme being exists. Historian Maximilian Bernhard Domarus says Hitler believed in a personal "German" god. Hitler even stated:
"I believe in God, and I am convinced that He will not desert 67 million Germans who have worked so hard to regain their rightful position in the world."
Basically, Hitler wasn't an atheist or Christian like many claim, but he was a monotheist who believed in his own God that would leave the German people to victory.
There is a Wikipedia page which attempts to answer this exact question.
The upshot of the analysis is that Hitler was originally Catholic, but stopped attending mass at age 15.
The official position of the Nazi party (and therefore of its Fuhrer) was constructive Christianity, meaning that all Christian religions were tolerated. In practice, the party persecuted church leaders if they criticized the regime at all. So, while toleration was the official policy, any sort of divisive behavior in the name of religion was heavily punished.
Personally, Hitler exhibited the behavior of an agnostic, never attending church services, and never expressing any belief either in public or in private as to the existence of a power higher than man. Towards those who had faith, he was antagonistic and suspicious; often expressing the view in private that religious faith was contradictory to party progress. This behavior was consistent with and typical of socialist/communist leaders and thinkers of the time.
A form of Social Darwinism.
Hitler's view were actually very similar to Madison Grant and Lothrop Stoddard. The idea that there was one unique aristocratic race that carried "the burden of civilization."
From here he assumes that there's a "natural order" in life devised by Nature. So he replaces God with Nature and religious laws with natural laws that are immutable. Eugenics and blood are actually very similar as well. Since you can interchange the concept of "IQ" with "vitality of blood."
"All the great civilizations of the past became decadent because the originally creative race died out, as a result of contamination of the blood. The most profound cause of such a decline is to be found in the fact that the people ignored the principle that all culture depends on men, and not the reverse. In other words, in order to preserve a certain culture, the type of manhood that creates such a culture must be preserved. But such a preservation goes hand-in-hand with the inexorable law that it is the strongest and the best who must triumph and that they have the right to endure. "-Mein Kampf
Sources: "The Revolt Against Civilization," Lothrop Stoddard. "Mein Kampf," Hitler. "Hitler's second book," Hitler. "Landmark Speeches of National Socialism," Randall L. Bytwerk. "The Passing of the Great Race," Madison Grant
What were Hitler's religious beliefs?
Not much is known (based on facts and knowlage) that can be varified.
Based on my reading about he whom I do not desire to cite (other than how not to act as a responsible person), the following seems to me to be the most realistic:
Adolf Hitler - Ideologie
Hitler blieb trotz Ablehnung der Amtskirchen, die er als Konkurrenz auf ideologischer und organisatorischer Ebene sich unterzuordnen suchte, zeitlebens Mitglied der römisch-katholischen Kirche.Hitler remained a lifelong member of the Roman Catholic Church, despite the rejection of the official churches, which he tried to subordinate to himself as competition on an ideological and organizational level.
Other than that, he whom I do not desire to name is not the only person, in the course of history (or even in the present day (-written on Easter Sunday (slightly sloshed)-)), who has not acted in accourdance to the lessons (possibly) taught as a child.
One answer on this question quotes, as a source that in the provided link, states that the author:
became known in Germany as an author of several books on UFOs and extraterrestrial visitors on Earth. Later in his career he turned to topics related to Catholicism.
The other (presently of the 14 answers (all togeather)) offer some (possibly) philosophical posibities as to what he whom I do not desire to name (he) actually believed in.
For me, (again slightly sloshed while writing on this on Easter Sunday) it is important to point out, that not withstanding, what he (possibly) was taught to believe, that he did not practice it
Important is, in my opinion, only that he (and not the pitiful imitations of the present day) to be considered the prime example of what not to follow
So the answer to the question 'What were Hitler's religious beliefs' has, in my personal opinion, based on his activities as a politician (between 1920-1945), nothing to do with established religions.
So, as an historian, I believe that he did not practice what most religions preached as being good.
(And thus the Easter Sunday preach comes to an end, which (as always) the greater portion of congregation gives a (discrict) great sigh of relief.)
Sources:
Hitler was atheist, church was only an instrument for him. 62% of the Germans were Protestants and 32% were Catholics, so it was important to work together with the church, which might seem to be impossible, because Christianity is based on altruism and national socialism definetely not. But as always Hitler had some good working propaganda stuff going on...
For the Protestants there was a the "Glaubensbewegung Deutsche Christen"(religious movement of German christians)[Protestants] initiated by the NSDAP to get more influence on the church. Most protestants voted for them, because they promise to reunite the churches to one (there have been28 regional churches). But the Nazis also had some strong enemies in the Protestantic church: the confessing church
The Catholics didn't accept the Nazis first, not till Hitler promised to let them keep their intitutional rights. Then they started working together officially, but many critics have been chased.
Text by the German Historical Museum(only German)
Kirchenkampf- Hitlers attitude toward the churches in Germany
Hitler was most likely an atheist who respected the cultural values of German paganism. Nazi propaganda was notably anti-religious and the "Nazi Master Plan" involved the eradication of religion from Nazi Germany.
Many senior Nazis were also devout anti-theists like Joseph goebbels, the Nazi Minister of Propaganda.
If Hitler wasn't an atheist, he most certainly was anti-religious at the very least judging by his desire to remove religion from Germany.
The better question then is why do atheists continue to deny his anti-religious beliefs and promote lies that he was a Christian? In Hitler's Table Talk, he's quoted as calling Christianity a lie, worst than the pox and invention of the Jew. That alone should tell you he didn't like Christianity.
