• Krüger Oliver

• Krüger Oliver

In the context of the Corona crisis, it became obvious that anti-Semitism is not a historical phenomenon, but proves to be persistent even beyond extreme right-wing groups. With the rise of right-wing populism in the U.S., France, Italy, Germany and many other countries, it is evident that anti-Semitic sentiments are widespread. However, it was astonishing that in connection with the vaccination debate some anti-semitic ideas appeared, which were based on anti-judaic conspiracy narratives of the Middle Ages and the 19th century. From the perspective of the sociology of knowledge, we will explore in the seminar the question of how the millennial persistence of anti-Judaism or anti-Semitism can be explained.

We will first look at the origins of anti-Judaism in the Roman Empire, beginning as early as the 2nd century with accusations of the collective murder of God. The discrimination and persecution of Jews continued in the Middle Ages with extensive occupational bans, ghettoization and progroms, which were justified with the suspicion of sacrilege, the poinoning of wells and ritual murders. The Reformation also continued this anti-Judaism policy. With the Enlightenment, the legal and social emancipation of the Jews began, but immediately new conspiracy narratives emerged: namely, that the French Revolution (driven by Freemasonry) was nothing but a Jewish conspiracy (as were the Napoleonic wars).

At the end of the 19th century, the previous anti-Judaism was now combined with racist and eugenic theories and transformed into modern anti-Semitism. The so-called Protocols of the Elders of Zion of 1903 played a major role in this and were the subject of the 1934-35 Bern Trial. National Socialist ideology also diffused the established medieval and modern conspiracy narratives. The Corona Crisis is now the first moment after World War II when these anti-Semitic theses were popularized again in wide circles in Western and Eastern European as well as Arab countries.

The seminar will examine the genesis of historical anti-Judaism and modern anti-Semitism. A focus will be on Germany, France and Switzerland, the role of the churches and today's right-wing populism. Furthermore, we will also shed light on the role of religious studies (especially Mircea Eliade, who was a member of the fascist Iron Guard, and Jakob Wilhelm Hauer, who drafted a National Socialist history of religion).

The first session will be held on Thursday, 22.09.22.

1. Gaining knowledge on the persistence of anti-judaic and anti-semitic (conspiracy) narratives from the Middle Ages to our current time.

2. Methodological approaches on how to bridge historical research with analysis of currents in different medial contexts (texts, iconography, videos).

Specific literature will be provided for each session.