Northern Star (Lismore, NSW : 1876 - 1954), Tuesday 22 May 1945, page 4


Allies Capture Nazi Pagan Philosopher

BY "THE ONLOOKER."

The Allies made one of their biggest catches of the war this week when they caught up with Dr. Alfred Rosenberg, pagan philosopher and self-styled author of the "Nazi religion."

Although he has considerable personal charm, is handsome and intelligent—for a Nazi—Rosenberg earned for himself the well-de served name of being one of the most hated men in Germany be cause of his abiliity to tread on other people's corns.

Prudish and suspicious, he is in tensely narrow-minded and arro gant when Nazi theories are in volved. He was always the mystic 'dreamer who seldom put his theories in practice. When he did so it was often with disastrous re sults.

When the Nazis came to power one of his first actions was to make a goodwill tour to Britain. His first major blunder 0n arriving in Lon don was to lay a Swastika flag on the Cenotaph—an action that

brought so much criticism on hisj

head that he scurried back to Germany.

RUSSIAN ORIGIN

Although he was born in 1894 at Reval—then part of Russia—and served in the Russian Army in the Great War Rosenberg was one of

the chief Russia-haters of the Nazi Party.

Bearing a Jewish name and

speaking German with a bad ac cent he is also a noted Jew-baiter and exponent of the glories of the German "master race."

In propagating the myth of the Nordic race he urged the exter mination of the "inferior" races such as the Poles, Slavs, Czechs and Russians. The downfall of Europe he traces from the time of the French Revolution, which, he says removed the (Nordic) French aristocracy and substituted rule by the inferior mob. Liberalism, the -product of the French Revolution,

is as abhorrent to him as Soviet

Communism.

Rosenberg claims to have first inspired Hitler with the idea of a German empire in the east, and he was certainly the chief propa gandist for a war on Soviet Russia.

During the period of the Ger man-Russian pact in the early days of the war he went out of favour because of his anti-Soviet ravings, but with the attack on Russia in 1941 he came back into full status in the Nazi Party.

Rosenberg got little credit for his expansionist theories because Hit ler had taken them over and pro pounded them effectively in Mein Kampf. It was the religious ideas of Rosenberg that gained him such notoriety in pre-war Berlin.

DIRECTOR OF PHILOSOPHY

As "Director of Philosophical Outlook" in the Reich and editor of Hitlers newspaper, "Volkische Seobaehter," he managed to propa gate his pagan philosophy in no uncertain manner.

A grlie to Rosenberg's outlook can be secured from the titles of some of his books : "The Myth oi the Twentieth Century," "The .Trace of the Jews down the Chang ins; Ages,"' "The Crime of Free masonry," "The Basle Congress oi World Conspirators," "Pest in Russia" and "The Immortality oi the Talmud."

The Christian churches, as they stood when the Nazis came to power, represented to Rosenberg an jbstacie m the way of the intro duction of the new system of eugenics, the exposition of the Aryan myth and the new Nordic "culture."

To meet this he conceived the idea of a new Germanic religion, sailed by him the new Germanic Christian Faith. It was, however, a creed that had little Christianity in it and even less faith—unless it was faith in the Nazis.

"JHURCHES ATTACKED

Rosenberg in his various works Jitterly assailed all the Christian churches whose outlook was not oased on a nationalism that couid be made to fit into the new Nazi scheme of things.

He went to great lengths to "prove" that this or that religion was based on false origins, and did not' hesitate to invent new inter pretations of history to suit his own ends. For. example, he wrote : "The great personality of Christ— whatsver His real character may have been—was, immediately after His death, burdened with and amalgamated into all the filth of Asiatic, Jewish and African life. ... As to the origin of Jesus, there is no reason—as already Chamberlain and Delitzsch have pointed out—to assume that He was of Jewish origin, although He grew up in Jewish ideas. ... It is His ul'FP: which counts for Germanic people, not His death, which was glorified by Alpine and Mediter

ranean races."

It wr; Rosenberg's plan to sub stitute the Fuhrer for the Deity of the present Christian churches. He says, "The so-called Old Testa ment must once and for all be abolished as a book of religious in struction. . . . The necessary Fifth Gospel ccannot be decided on by any Synod. It vill be created by one MAN, who longs as deeply for the purification of the New Testa ment as he has studied it scienti fically. . . A Gei map charch bv and :.y, will abolish the Crucifix and replace it by adoration of the hero in all his highest mani

festations."

It was Rosenberg who postulated the theory that to undermine the churches they must not be perse puied—thus making thF.ni marg

in the eyes of the'people—but dis credited and challenged by rival organisations set up by th£ State. NEW STATE RELIGION

TLj new State religion woulf nave a special placo in the Naz sun. Thus : "A genuine Germar blav\ although in favour of ful. iel<?rance towards the existing church confessions, can only grant them a right of political and finan cial support in so far as their doc trines and their-political work are likely to strengthen the soul."

In other words those religions that did not fall into line with the pagan Nazi philosophy were to be j eradicated.

| The extent to which many of the

sniall denominations and individual members of the clergy of the larger sects in Germany fell into line must remain a source of regret to the rest of Christianity. The doc trines of Rosenberg found an all tco-ready ear in many parts of Christendom, and in purging them selves the Christian churches face as momentous a task as do the Allies in freeing Germany of the Nazi political, racial and economic philosophies.

The pagan philosopher has been brought to book,, but his ideas live on, to the everlasting, shame of the German- race.