Indiana University Press
Indiana University Press
Indiana University Press
and Broszat
Author(s): Jrn Rsen and William Templer
Source: History and Memory, Vol. 9, No. 1/2, Passing into History: Nazism and the Holocaust
beyond Memory In Honor of Saul Friedlander on His Sixty-Fifth Birthday (Fall 1997), pp.
113-144
Published by: Indiana University Press
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JORNRtJSEN
After all, life consists of nothing but hazy images. When the haze is
The taboo that lies upon Auschwitz for us will not begin to be loosened
until we are ... prepared to relinquish all the internal resistance we
Christian Meier3
113
the periphery. But the exchange of letters between Martin Broszat and
Saul Friedlander prompted by the former's provocative "Plea" was
different.4 It also addressed political constellations in German historical
culture and National Socialism's place inGerman memory. Yet itdiffered
from the historians' debate in several ways: the two conversants
only arises when subjects are existentially involved in the nexus between
past and present, and this charged bond takes on a manifesdy historical
perspective as the past recedes. The present immediacy of this past
dissolves, becoming a temporal distance that can now be freshly
114
past cannot and will not pass away. Until now, the problem seemed to
be that the one past was transitory, the other abiding. But how about
the reverse case?
In the following, therefore, I intend to shift the problem of
historicization into the frame of basic txiinking on the nature of
meaningful link with the present. Moreover, that distance does not
history.
115
increasing distance between the present and National Socialism, and the
consequent and unavoidable historicization of our relation to it.
Broszat's "Plea" is propelled by his repeated assertion that moral
condemnation acts as a blockade to knowledge. Friedlander did not dispute
the necessity of a historicizationthat can serve to open up such windows
on new knowledge. Yet he clearly saw the concomitant
danger: the
historical experience of National Socialism?and the Holocaust in
116
"history."
This broaches a second complex of problems, one whose explosive -
ness also springs from the imbrication of existential involvement as
117
knowledge.
Broszat placed special emphasis on a specific quality of experience
he claimed was excluded by the moralism of an undistanced "present
118
boundary experience of the historical as such. One can also say that
although the counterpositioning of knowledge and myth proceeds from
a historical processing of the Holocaust it ultimately
experience,
intersects with thatmode of historical thinking that seeks to operate on
the level of experience and interpretation?a level perceived "objectively"
in relation to the Holocaust as provocative.
Not every relation to the past is historical per se. Only after the past is
infused with a definite quality of pastness?and itspastness related to the
119
attempt ismade to reach into the past over and beyond the boundaries
of personal (autobiographical) remembrance in order to interpret one's
120
precisely here that we can find that "authenticity" of the past that
Broszat reclaims for the historicization of National Socialism.
Since "history" is not an attribute of the past inherent in it as an
121
historicity of the relation to the past because it can fulfill the necessary
precondition for this historicity, namely the capacity to bridge over the
temporal difference between past and present (in terms of narrative).15
It can do so precisely by creating the coherent meaning in and by which
the past as past is history. The authenticity of constitutive memories that
is particularly allowed to the survivors is a metahistorical dimension. This
122
123
"end";23 or, more precisely, by a difference between earlier and later that
poses a challenge to historical thinking.
So where does the problem lie? The difficulty is that the chain of
events liftedfrom experience?an explanatory, narrative sequence?always
extends its reach into the present, at leastwhen questions of identity are
at stake. So theHolocaust and the "German catastrophe" are indeed not
the terminus of contemporary history, but constitute one link in a longer
over time must be organized according
temporal chain. Then prospection
to a line of development that reduces the catastrophe to being one
constituent in an overarching whole?not its end to which everything
leads. This "reduction" of the Holocaust to the status of a single link in
124
125
on its own distinctive historical contours, just as its singularity can only
be made plausible by means of cognitive comparison.
Friedlander is quite correct in characterizing the Holocaust as a
"historical 'boundary event'," viewing this as an "unresolved theoretical
research, but rather the quality ofmemory of what inquiry explores. That
dimension is already manifest prior to any and all research in the shaping
of meaningful perspectives that guide mquiry. One might call this an
plane of an object for research. In principle, however, that holds true for
every possible historical experience, not just the Holocaust, insofar as it
has previously entered historical memory and generates meaning
126
especially true in the case of theHolocaust. In its sheer facticity, and the
dearth of facts yielded by the extant sources, it resists bids tomake sense
of it.
Another way to formulate this is to say that historical experience has
a say in its own interpretation because it already bears within itself
127
ignores the subjectivity of the observed. For the sake of moralism, the
observed are silenced ex post facto. To counteract this, Broszat proposes
that hermeneutically they be given back their voices. They should then
be taken seriously as participants in the hermeneutic production of
historical meaning within the historical time-link with the present.
Friedlander attaches a condition to this internal, subjective, identity
now: in this bond, theHolocaust as
generating nexus between then and
128
premise, but it is not clear what that means in specific terms. Moral
criticism should be tied concretely to the empirically determined attitudes
of those affected by the Nazi regime, to the objectives that guided their
knowledge about what happened later. On the other hand, the call for
criticism (with its intrinsic normative criteria) while holding any
knowledge of later consequences in abeyance cannot be as vigorous and
resolute as itmust be today in the light of the monstrous crimes that
past enfolds.
The contemporaries past were historically blind
of the Nazi
129
standpoints that differ from those of the earlier generation(s) they are
attempting to understand. But it is absolutely crucial that those
points.
"Empathy" with the subjects in the past would be baldly unhistori
cal were it not propelled by questions as to the how and why of what
insight ("authentic," ifyou will) into the era's special tenor precisely by
entering into the distinctive configurations of its contemporaries'
subjectivity.
What does "normality" signify? Ifwe are talking about themass of
130
contemporaneity with theHolocaust and who fully share the same value
quality the present, due to its objective linkwith this experience, must
have knowledge about. What is at issue here is not the "mythical" quality
131
of the weight of its remembrance, for that is precisely the quality that
purpose of historical description," one that "we have not yet encoun
tered very much in historiographical work."36
Narration has quite definite limitswhen it comes to the Holocaust
if it is only conceived as a mode of narrative representation of the past
132
133
Second, it does not provide any cognitive basis for locating the genealo
gy of the perpetrators and victims?and the genealogy of the nexus
between them?in the time-span that begins before the Nazi era and
issues into our own. The strands of perpetration and victimization reach
134
back into times prior to National Socialism and flow on cognitively over
present. How can one do the one and not the other? Saul Friedlander
has pointed out that these "neutral" factors in continuity were so
affected by the Nazi period that their contextualization with it consti
tutes the essential difference.42 They simply cannot be "neutralized," or
isolated, they cannot pass through the terrain 1933-1945 and emerge
unscathed. On the other hand, it is hard to make a plausible case that
this fundamental difference makes it impossible to discern any continuity
at all.
So there is a constellation of both continuity and connectibility on
the one hand, radical discontinuity and critical distance on the other.
Whether?and if so, how?these two poles can be reconciled indeed
135
meaning.
I am not advocating here that this category be replaced by one of
manipulation, etc.). That direction would serve to keep the path open for
136
6. German Identity
137
precisely at the locus where the appropriated past is inscribed into the
contours of present historical identity. In the process of historical
appropriation, the Nazi era can only become relevant for identity if the
Germans define themselves within the frame of a continuity containing
within itself a genealogical nexus with the perpetrators. Ultimately, the
entire debate really hinges on this perspective of the perpetrators:
without this perspective National Socialism cannot be historicized, and
judgment. What does this imply for the contours of historical identity of
those tied genealogically to the perpetrators?
If historical identity is based largely on a process whereby experien
tial components of the past with which one can identify in a positive
sense (victories, deeds and exploits, primary foundational acts with
traditional relevance for longer periods) are imputed to the present
integrated into the alterity of the others, from whom one has to be
in order to become oneself. Those are elements, for
distinguished
example, that do not buttress the nonempirical identity one wants to
part of the other. Who is to serve as this other? That remains an open
138
139
stand). This applies likewise to the perpetrators. With their deed, they
also murdered their own humanness?and thus, in a certain way,
humanity as a whole. It is here that the monstrousness of theHolocaust
lies, an enormity that does not permit its inclusion in a continuity of
historical developments that could serve as a positive fulcrum for
appropriation.
But so conceptualized,
does it not also destroy the basis of one's
own humanness? Of course not. Yet it does reveal a basic truth: namely
that the normative quality of humanness, one's own and at the same
time universal Menschheitlichkeit, is itself contingent. It was murdered in
theHolocaust. Those who recall theHolocaust in historical imagination
must view this death as the loss of an essential part of their own selves.
Yet in historical retrospect, this loss can be simultaneously perceived and
overcome.
140
Notes
(1985), translated in Peter Baldwin, ed., Reworking the Past: Hitler, the
Holocaust, and theHistorians'Debate (Boston, 1990), 77-87 (hereafter"Plea");
Martin Broszat and Saul Friedlander, "A Controversy about theHistoricization
of National Socialism," in ibid., 102-134 (hereafter"Controversy").
5. Saul Friedlander, "Reflections on the Historicization of National Socialism,"
in ibid., 88-101 (hereafter"Reflections").
6. See Johann Gustav Droysen, Historik, ed. Peter Leyh, vol. 1 (Stuttgart,
1977), 69.
7. Martin Broszat, "Was heifit Historisierung des Nationalsozialismus?"
141
common educational bugbear in support: the need to deal with theNazi period
in the framework of "popular education."
9. "Historisierung," 2-3.
ized as the proper sphere of the historical sciences and regarded as an objective
complex of facts,while memory is conceived as being subjectively constituted in
its entirety.Friedlander follows thisdistinction, cf. hisMemory,History and the
Extermination of theJews ofEurope (Bloomington, 1993), viii. But he points out
that memory and history are interconnected, and both are conveyed via the
of historical consciousness. Paul Ricoeur takes a similar tack inhis
instrumentality
in Klaus E. Muller and Jorn Rusen, eds.,
"Gedachtnis?Vergessen?Geschichte,"
Historische Sinnbildung?Problemstellungen, Zeitkonzepte, Wahrnehmungs
142
20. Ibid.
21. "Plea," 82.
28. Christian Meier has remarked that the mythical quality which Broszat
accords the memories of the victims "adheres to the event itself." See Meier,
34. Ibid.
35. "Controversy," 132.
narration, a that reveals in vivid form the meaning of what is narrated via
telling
the chain of events described.
37. Ibid., 127.
38. "Historisierung," 6.
143
39. See, for example, "Controversy," 132. The expression "continuity" has
had now been ended; see his "Martin Broszat und die Historisierung des
Nationalsozialismus," inHenke and Natoli, eds., Mit dem Pathos der Niichtern
heit, 155-71, here 159). Yet thisdoes not resolve the issue of continuity in the
form of that basic problem for historical theory, namely, the question of
historicization as it emerges from the arguments put forward by Broszat and
Friedlander.How indeed can National Socialism have acquired in retrospect the
attributeof connectible continuity in conjunction with patterns of social life,as
a resultof reunification?
Moreover, the genealogy of the perpetrators has been
reinforced in the wake of reunification, not attenuated.
43. Ibid.
44. Wolfgang Welsch has impressivelydemonstrated that this is a mode of
reason; see Vernunft:Die zeitgendssischeVernunftkritikund das Konzept der
transversalenVernunft (Frankfurt/Main, 1996).
45. Cf. Jorn Riisen, "Den Holocaust erklaren?aber wie? zu
Uberlegungen
Daniel J. Goldhagens Buch 'Hider's Willing Executioners'," Theoretische
Geschiedenis, forthcoming.
46. Christopher R. Browning, OrdinaryMen: Reserve Police Battalion 101 and
theFinal Solution inPoland (New York, 1992).
47. Cf. Jorn Riisen, "Trauer als historische zur
Kategorie: Uberlegungen
an den Holocaust in der Geschichtskultur der Gegenwart," inHanno
Erinnerung
Erinnerung (Frankfurt/Main, 1996), 57-78; also idem, "Uber den Umgang mit
den Orten des Schreckens."
144