This is being written on December 25 in theUS. It is a quiet time here. The normal frenetic bustle of the street has evaporated. Nostalgic music fills the airwaves. Even Jews inAmerica particularly away from the major metropolitan areas enjoy the change of pace that this day offers: a welcome respite from daily routine a jolly time of smiles and good will.
Not so for our grandparents inEurope. This was a season of fear and trembling. The peasants would emerge from their churches and inflamed by the rhetoric of their priests would set out to hunt down Jews who had allegedly killed their deity. December pogroms were quite common and Jews went into hiding to avoid the angry mobs.
An old question: How is it possible for people to worship the god who supposedly brings peace on earth and good will toward men and then go out and murder Jews? In our time how could it be that the nation that gave us Kant and Goethe and Bach and Beethoven also gave us Hitler and Goering and Eichmann? How was it possible for a people that prided itself on its kultur and its leadership in science and music to become transmogrified into beasts?
It was possible because of the phenomenon of shifting ethical landscapes. It is for example wrong to kill another human being. But obviously if he threatens my life it is not wrong to kill him. Thus I may kill a murderer or my enemy in wartime. My act does not diminish my own humanity or my ethical principles for in effect this person I have just killed is not human .
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