Why Destroy a Synagogue? A Reflection on Hitler’s Metaphysical Antisemitism

Abstract This article explores the possible metaphysical aspects of Hitler’s antisemitism by asking a basic question: Why did the Nazis, if motivated solely or at least largely by racial hatred, attack and destroy Jewish religious sites, above all synagogues? The answer the article gives, a speculative one, is that Hitler’s antisemitism expresses a hatred of life and death that has deep roots in Western history, roots that can be traced most directly to the hatred of life and death expressed by Christianity and, specifically, to the hatred expressed by one of Christianity’s most hate-filled theologians, Martin Luther. Hence, the article offers a comparative interpretation of Hitler and Luther’s antisemitism in two main sections. A final section reflects on the difficulty of understanding antisemitism, hatred and violence and thus concludes with Primo Levi’s claim that in Auschwitz there is no answer, there is no why (Hier ist kein Warum).