Walter Grundmann
Encyclopedia
Walter Grundmann was a German Protestant theologian during the Third Reich and GDR. He was a member of the Nazi party from 1930 onwards, and from 1933 onwards an active member of the German Christians
. He was made head of the newly-founded Instituts zur Erforschung jüdischen Einflusses auf das deutsche kirchliche Leben in Jena
, which was meant to serve state anti-semitism by the "Entjudung" (dejudifying) of the Bible and giving anti-Semitic theological training. Despite his past Nazi activities, Grundmann regained some prestige as a theologian in East Germany; in 1959 he published his comments on the Gospels, which by the 1980s had become standard popular literature.
German Christians
The Deutsche Christen were a pressure group and movement within German Protestantism aligned towards the antisemitic and Führerprinzip ideological principles of Nazism with the goal to align German Protestantism as a whole towards those principles...
. He was made head of the newly-founded Instituts zur Erforschung jüdischen Einflusses auf das deutsche kirchliche Leben in Jena
Jena
Jena is a university city in central Germany on the river Saale. It has a population of approx. 103,000 and is the second largest city in the federal state of Thuringia, after Erfurt.-History:Jena was first mentioned in an 1182 document...
, which was meant to serve state anti-semitism by the "Entjudung" (dejudifying) of the Bible and giving anti-Semitic theological training. Despite his past Nazi activities, Grundmann regained some prestige as a theologian in East Germany; in 1959 he published his comments on the Gospels, which by the 1980s had become standard popular literature.
Sources
- Susannah Heschel: The theological Faculty at the university of Jena as a Stronghold of national Socialism. In: Feingold, Mordechai: History of Universities, Oxford 2003, S. 143–169. Susannah Heschel: Deutsche Theologen für Hitler. Walter Grundmann und das Eisenacher „Institut zur Erforschung und Beseitigung des jüdischen Einflusses auf das deutsche kirchliche Leben“. In: Jahrbuch 1998/99 zur Geschichte und Wirkung des Holocaust, Darmstadt 1999, S. 147–167. Matthias WolfesMatthias WolfesMatthias Wolfes is a German Protestant theologian.- Biography and activities :...
: Protestantische Theologie und moderne Welt – Studien zur Geschichte der liberalen Theologie nach 1918, Berlin/New York 1999 (Theologische Bibliothek Töpelmann, Band 102), S. 366–380. Roland Deines, Volker Leppin, Karl-Wilhelm Niebuhr (Hrsg.): Walter Grundmann – ein Neutestamentler im Dritten Reich. Leipzig 2007 - Max Weinreich: Hitler's Professors: The Part of Scholarship in Germany's Crimes against the Jewish People. 1. Auflage, New York 1946 Kurt Meier: Kreuz und Hakenkreuz: Die evangelische Kirche im Dritten Reich. DTB, München 1992 Birgit Jerke: Wie wurde das Neue Testament zu einem sogenannten Volkstestament „entjudet“? – Aus der Arbeit des Eisenacher „Instituts zur Erforschung und Beseitung des jüdischen Einflusses auf das deutsche kirchliche Leben“. In: Leonore Siegele-Wenschkewitz (Hg.): Christlicher Antijudaismus und Antisemitismus. Theologische und kirchliche Programme Deutscher Christen, Frankfurt am Main 1994, S. 201–234 Leonore Siegele-WenschkewitzLeonore Siegele-WenschkewitzLeonore Siegele-Wenschkewitz was a German church historian and director of the Evangelische Akademie Arnoldshain. She was co-editor of the journal Kirche und Israel and of the issue Arbeiten zur kirchlichen Zeitgeschichte...
(Hrsg.): Christlicher Antijudaismus und Antisemitismus. Theologische und kirchliche Programme Deutscher Christen. Arnoldshainer Texte, Band 85, Haag + Herchen Verlag, ISBN 3861371871