“Who is our neighbour?” A German Mennonite Reflection on Blood, Race and the Limits of Love, 1934

Jesus' parable of the Good Samaritan is prefaced by a discussion eternal life and the question, "Who is my neighbour?" (cf. Luke 10:25–29).

In the 1920s and 30s, the Mennonite denominational papers in Germany always, always highlighted the plight and need of their Russian Mennonite co-religionists languishing under Stalin. These were “their” neighbours, “their” refugees or “their” hungry and imprisoned. And that is good.

But our life stories are always complex—aspects later generations will praise, aspects they will reject, and some things they will abhor deeply. So it is with this story—of the Mennonites in Germany who embraced Russian Mennonites.

In 1934 Dirk Cattepoel (b. 1912; note 1) was a young German Mennonite doctoral student and soon-to-be pastor of the Krefeld Mennonite Church in Germany. He answered that biblical question in the Mennonitische Blätter with a longer article that denominational leaders would point to and cite favourably over the next years.

For Germans—including German Mennonites—the neighbour “is the one who shares his being, whose own blood flows through him, whose soul is his soul. … Because he must love and help his neighbor, he will have to destroy the one who threatens the development of that life. … Love necessarily implies guilt, which is the tragedy of human life. … We are members of the German Volk [ethnic peoplehood]. But because we are Christians who affirm this earthly life, it seems to us to be our highest duty before God, to love our Volk and our Volk colleagues, to help them with all of our strength … . The German is our neighbor, to whom we are committed with our love and strength. Our neighbour cannot be a Negro, Japanese, or Jew. … Our limited strengths are claimed by the neighbor and cannot take the others into consideration.”

Cattepoel cites Hitler’s book Mein Kampf affirmatively: "What we have to fight for is the necessary security for the existence and increase of our race and Volk, the subsistence of its members and keeping pure its blood, the freedom and independence of the Fatherland; so that our Volk may be enabled to fulfil the mission assigned to it by the Creator of the universe.”

To this Cattepoel adds that “as Christians we stand—fully conscious of our Christian duty—behind the government, which with a Christian sense of responsibility represents the interests of the whole Volk to the world.” (Note 2)

For Cattepoel—like Prussian Mennonite doctoral student and pastor Horst Quiring (son-in-law to Benjamin Unruh) and others (note 3)—Christian ethical bearings should be oriented by the “created orders” (e.g., race). Whereas Mennonites have sometimes pointed to the “image of God” or the Sermon on the Mount as starting points for ethics, Cattepoel and Quiring elevated blood, Volk and race as the decisive categories for Mennonite faith and moral obligation.

In the months prior to the publication of this article in the Mennonite press, new laws had already excluded Jews from the civil service. The Nazi Party and its affiliated organizations had also organized nationwide boycotts of Jewish-owned businesses in Germany, and in October 1933 a new German law forbid all non-“Aryans” from working in journalism.

A decade later Russian Mennonites “resettlers” were embraced by this loving, caring and deeply racist Mennonite fold in Warthegau—German annexed Poland. Mennonites in Prussia had done all the archival genealogical work needed to ensure all Russian Mennonites would have Aryan identity cards that would be given the same privileges in Nazi Germany as they had and official recognition, with a particular pure line and high percentage of Nordic, Frisian blood. They ensured that Mennonite resettlers could practice their faith. For example, Prussian Mennonites helped set up the legal articles of incorporation for the new “Conference of Mennonite Congregations of German Nationality in the Province of Wartheland” (Mennonitische Gemeindekirche Deutscher Nationalität im Reichsgau Wartheland). Accordingly, their statutes limited membership to those of “German nationality,” strictly defined in Nazi Germany by blood and Volk.

After the war in 1948, Pastor Dirk Cattepoel was one of two official German representatives at the Fourth Mennonite World Conference sessions held at Goshen, IN, and North Newton, KS.

Here Cattepoel asked Dutch and French Mennonites for forgiveness (see note 4).

He also told the global gathering that German Mennonites were in effect naïve or blind to the evils National Socialism and certainly not complicit. National Socialism approached them “with the motto, ‘Freedom and Bread!’ with a program for political and economical reconstruction, with social measures for the working classes, with a splendid welfare organization, and with a youth work doing justice to all the idealism of youth. Everything else—the black and the terrible—was kept in the background … I myself learned the names of the concentration camps … for the first time from an American soldier’s magazine in an American prisoner of war camp.” (Note 4)

Cattepoel had forgotten that the opening of Dachau Concentration camp in 1933, for example, was well publicized (see pic); he had forgotten his own acclaimed public recommendations to fellow Mennonites to exclude Blacks, Jews and Asians from the obligations of neighbourly love—precisely as Jews and others were being systematically excluded from public life and from protection and equality under the law. In 1940, his published “War Sermon” boldly proclaimed that Hitler’s triumph over France—the “enemy”—was nothing less than God at work (note 5).

Who is my neighbour? My people—the Russian Mennonites under Stalin--were always the “neighbour” for the German Mennonites, and we benefitted from their real generosity and brotherly love. But faith and blood were horribly intertwined. By 1948 Cattepoel had rediscovered the bonds of responsibility and love to French, Dutch and American Mennonites, but remained silent on the "Negro, Japanese or Jew."

---Arnold Neufeldt-Fast

---Notes---

Pic: Vincent Van Gogh, Good Samaritan, 1890, Kröller-Müller Museum, Otterlo, NL (US public domain, https://nsjonline.com/article/2020/10/the-word-love-thy-neighbor/).

Note 1: For a short biography, cf. Hans Adolf Hertzler, “Cattepoel, Dirk,” MennLex V, http://www.mennlex.de/doku.php?id=art:cattepoel_dirk. See also my essay, “German Mennonite Theology in the Era of National Socialism,” in European Mennonites and the Holocaust, edited by Mark Jantzen and John D. Thiesen, 125–152 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2020).

Note 2: Dirk Cattepoel, “Mennonit und Wehrwille (Fortsetzung 3),” Mennonitische Blätter 81, no. 5 (1934) 43f. https://mla.bethelks.edu/gmsources/newspapers/Mennonitische%20Blaetter/1933-1941/DSCF0916.JPG; https://mla.bethelks.edu/gmsources/newspapers/Mennonitische%20Blaetter/1933-1941/DSCF0917.JPG; https://mla.bethelks.edu/gmsources/newspapers/Mennonitische%20Blaetter/1933-1941/DSCF0918.JPG.

Note 3: Ibid; see also Horst Quiring, “The Anthropology of Pilgram Marbeck,” Mennonite Quarterly Review 9, no. 4 (October 1935), 155–164.

Note 4: Dirk Cattepoel, “The Mennonites of Germany, 1936-1948, and the Present Outlook,” in Fourth Mennonite World Conference Proceedings, August 3–10, 1948, edited by P. C. Hiebert 14-22 (Akron, PA: Mennonite Central Committee, 1950), https://archive.org/details/FourthMWCProceedings1948/page/n31/mode/2up.

Note 5: Cattepoel, “Gottes Schritt im Weltgeschehen,” Mennonitische Blätter 87, no. 4 (July 1940), 25, https://mla.bethelks.edu/gmsources/newspapers/Mennonitische%20Blaetter/1933-1941/DSCF1399.JPG.

Comments

Swiss and Palatinate Connections

Sometime after 1850 Andreas Plennert and his family immigrated to South Russia from the Culm Region of West Prussia. Though there was at least one Mennonite “Plehnert” who had already immigrated to Russia in 1793, it is not a very common Prussian-Russian Mennonite name. As such, however, it is easier to trace than many and offers a minority narrative and identity within the longer and broader Russian Mennonite story. The account below is adapted largely from information in Horst Penner, Die ost- und westpreußischen Mennoniten , vol. 1, though I have expanded upon his work to offer a slightly different narrative. In 1724 there was a group of Mennonites forced out of the Memel region in East Prussia for political and religious reasons and were given assistance to resettle back to West Prussia in areas populated by Mennonites. Among the 23 households that went to the Stuhm region there is one Plenert listed, namely Christian Plenert. We know that Mennonites entered the Memel region ...

Mennonite-Designed Mosque on the Molotschna

The “Peter J. Braun Archive" is a mammoth 78 reel microfilm collection of Russian Mennonite materials from 1803 to 1920 -- and largely still untapped by researchers ( note 1 ). In the files of Philipp Wiebe, son-in-law and heir to Johann Cornies, is a blueprint for a mosque ( pic ) as well as another file entitled “Akkerman Mosque Construction Accounts, 1850-1859” ( note 2 ). The Molotschna Mennonites were settlers on traditional Nogai lands; their Nogai neighbours were a nomadic, Muslim Tartar group. In 1825, Cornies wrote a significant anthropological report on the Nogai at the request of the Guardianship Committee, based largely on his engagements with these neighbours on Molotschna’s southern border ( note 3 ). Building upon these experiences and relationships, in 1835 Cornies founded the Nogai agricultural colony “Akkerman” outside the southern border of the Molotschna Colony. Akkerman was a projection of Cornies’ ideal Mennonite village outlined in exacting detail, with un...

Polish-Prussia? Royal Prussia? West Prussia? Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth? Notes for Clarification

The historical jurisdictions, names and political powers under which Mennonites lived since their arrival in lands that are today Poland are difficult to keep straight. However they are important for telling the story right. This post simply provides some notes for orientation with reference to the late sixteenth-century map below. Polish- or Royal Prussia comes into being with the defeat of Teutonic Knights by the Polish Crown in 1466. See the pink-shaded area of the map below. Ducal Prussia is a fiefdom of the Kingdom of Poland after 1525 (see stiped on map). In 1618, this duchy (voivodeship) is inherited by Hohenzollerns of Brandenburg, who separated it from the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth in 1657. After 1701, the Elector of Brandenburg is the “King of Prussia” when in that territory. With the First Partition of Poland in 1772, it becomes East Prussia . By 1569 Polish- or Royal Prussia was fully integrated into Kingdom of Poland and part of the larger Polish-Lithuanian...

Fraktur (or Gothic) font and Kurrent- (or Sütterlin) handwriting: Nazi ban, 1941

In the middle of the war on January 1, 1942, the Winnipeg-based Mennonitische Rundschau published a new issue without the familiar Fraktur script masthead ( note 1 ). One might speculate on the reasons, but a year earlier Hitler banned the use of the font in the Reich . The Rundschau did not exactly follow all orders from Berlin—the rest of the paper was in Fraktur (sometimes referred to as "Gothic"); when the war ended in 1945, the Rundschau reintroduced the Fraktur font for its masthead. It wasn’t until the 1960s that an issue might have a page or title here or there with the “normal” or Latin font, even though post-war Germany was no longer using Fraktur . By 1973 only the Rundschau masthead is left in Fraktur , and that is only removed in December 1992. Attached is a copy of Nazi Party Secretary Martin Bormann's official letter dated January 3, 1941, which prohibited the use of Fraktur fonts "by order of the Führer. " Why? It was a Jewish invention, apparent...

Snapshots of Danzig Mennonites, late 1600s & early 1700s

A picture can be worth a thousand words. We do not have photographs, but we have a few colour paintings of life in and around Danzig in the late 1600s and early 1700s, as well as maps. We also have a limited number of "textual snapshots" of Mennonites at this time and place, which offer an instructive window into that foreign world. These snapshots of work, worship, health, education, community relationships, smaller repressions, and security can contribute to the creation of a larger collage of Mennonite life in Danzig and Polish Prussia. Snapshot 1 : In 1681 there were approximately 180 Mennonite families who lived in the “gardens” or villages outside Danzig, with 113 of those families within the jurisdiction of the city. At this time Mennonites were barred from owning houses within the walls of the city. Of these 113 family heads, we know: 43 were retailers of spirits, 24 merchants, 9 lacemakers, 7 dyers, 3 silk dyers, 3 pressers, 2 brokers, 2 treasurers, 2 waitresses, et...

Jews and Mennonites Together in Danzig's Suburbs

There has been very little reflection on the relationship of Jews and Mennonites in the suburb of Schottland (or Alt-Schottland or Stare Szkoty) where Mennonites first settled in the mid-1500s. Here Mennonites and Jews lived in the small community together for two centuries, quite literally on the margins outside the gates of the city of Danzig. Many historic maps that include Alt Schottland have become available in recent years ( note 1; pic ). H.G. Mannhardt’s book on the Danzig Mennonite church community plus some archival membership lists are our best sources for the Mennonite experience, while illustrations from the day bring many of those episodes of prosperity, repressions, war, plague, emigration, flooding etc. in an urban environment to life ( note 2 ). Peter J. Klassen’s writings on Mennonites in Poland and Prussia also present newer research on Mennonite life in and around Danzig in helpful ways ( note 3 ). There is one small sentence in Klassen’s larger volume that sugg...

Mennonites in Danzig's Suburbs: Maps and Illustrations

Mennonites first settled in the Danzig suburb of Schottland (lit: "Scotland"; “Stare-Szkoty”; also “Alt-Schottland”) in the mid-1500s. “Danzig” is the oldest and most important Mennonite congregation in Prussia. Menno Simons visited Schottland and Dirk Phillips was its first elder and lived here for a time. Two centuries later the number of families from the suburbs of Danzig that immigrated to Russia was not large: Stolzenberg 5, Schidlitz 3, Alt-Schottland 2, Ohra 1, Langfuhr 1, Emaus 1, Nobel 1, and Krampetz 2 ( map 1 ). However most Russian Mennonites had at least some connection to the Danzig church—whether Frisian or Flemish—if not in the 1700s, then in 1600s. Map 2 is from 1615; a larger number of Mennonites had been in Schottland at this point for more than four decades. Its buildings are not rural but look very Dutch urban/suburban in style. These were weavers, merchants and craftsmen, and since the 17th century they lived side-by-side with a larger number of Jews a...

Invitation to the Russian Consulate, Danzig, January 19, 1788

B elow is one of the most important original Mennonite artifacts I have seen. It concerns January 19. The two land scouts Jacob Höppner and Johann Bartsch had returned to Danzig from Russia on November 10, 1787 with the Russian Immigration Agent, Georg von Trappe. Soon thereafter, Trappe had copies of the royal decree and agreement (Gnadenbrief) printed for distribution in the Flemish and Frisian Mennonite congregations in Danzig and other locations, dated December 29, 1787 ( see pic ; note 1 ). After the flyer was handed out to congregants in Danzig after worship on January 13, 1788, city councilors made the most bitter accusations against church elders for allowing Trappe and the Russian Consulate to do this; something similar had happened before ( note 2 ). In the flyer Trappe boasted that land scouts Höppner and Bartsch met not only with Gregory Potemkin, Catherine the Great’s vice-regent and administrator of New Russia, but also with “the Most Gracious Russian Monarch” herse...

Plague and Pestilence in Danzig, 1709

Russian and Prussian Mennonites trace at least 200 years of their story through Danzig and Royal Prussia, where episodes of plague and pestilence were not unfamiliar ( note 1 ). Mennonites arrived primarily from the Low Countries and in large numbers in the middle of the 16th century—approximately 750 families or 3,000 refugees and settlers between 1527 and 1578 to Danzig and Royal Prussia ( note 2 ). At this time Danzig was undergoing tremendous demographic, cultural and economic transformation, almost tripling in population in less than 100 years. With 80% of Poland’s foreign trade handled through this port city ( note 3 ), Danzig saw the arrival of new people from across Europe, many looking to find work in the crammed and bustling city ( note 4 ). Maria Bogucka’s research on Danzig in this era brings the streets of the maritime city to life: “Sanitation facilities were inadequate … The level of personal hygiene was low. Most people lived close together: five or six to a room, sle...

Why Danzig and Poland?

In the late 16th century, Poland became a haven for a variety of non-conformists which included Jews, Anti-Trinitarians from Italy and Bohemia, Quakers and Calvinists from Great Britain, south German Schwenkfelders, Eastern Orthodox, Armenian, and Greek Catholic Christians, some Muslim Tatars, as well as other peaceful sectarians like the Dutch and Flemish Anabaptists. Unlike the Low Countries and most of western Europe, the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth was a “state without stakes,” and as such fittingly described as “God’s playground” ( note 1 ). In the view of 17th-century Dutch dramatist Joost van den Vondel, it was “the ‘Promised Land,’ where the refugee could forget all his sorrow and enjoy the richness of the land” ( note 2 ). Over the next two centuries an important strand of Mennonite life and spirituality evolved into a mature tradition in this relatively hospitable context ( note 3 ). Anabaptists from the Low Countries began to arrive in Danzig and region as early as 15...

History of the Russian Mennonites

Search This Blog