Overview:

From its inception, the Third Reich sought to turn the Jews into the “Other.”  Laws were passed, such as the Nuremberg Laws, to identify and define who was a Jew.  The Nazis moved to isolate the Jews from German society and in the process expropriate all Jewish money and assets. They passed over 400 different laws between 1933-1939 which impacted their private and public lives. DIfferent approaches were used for those who did not obey these laws. Some of these included being fined, imprisoned, shot, and murdered. The soldiers achieved this by keeping the Jews under close watch and only allowing them to participate in certain activities. These actions served to prepare the German public for the Final Solution.  The Nazis turned the Jews into non-people and then into ash.

 

Connection to Train:

Since the timeline for novel Train takes place in 1943, the majority of Jews in Berlin have already been deported to the East.  All that still remains in Germany are a few thousand Jews who have German relatives. The Nazis have made a decision to deport these few remaining Jews.

 

Vocabulary:

Book burning: the ritual destruction by fire of books or other written materials. Usually carried out in a public context, the burning of books represents an element of censorship and usually proceeds from a cultural, religious, or political opposition to the materials in question. In Germany there was a mass burning of Jewish books.

Legislation: Laws that are considered collectively.

Reich: Meaning empire, Hitler considered Nazism to be the third one.

Mischling: Someone with mixed Aryan and Jewish blood.

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Timeline:

 

- May 10, 1933,

• students at a university in berlin burn  25,000 “un-German” books in Berlin’s Opera Square.  About 40,000 people gather to watch it.

• They did it to align German arts and Nazi ideas.

• It started an era of Nazi censorship and cultural control

• The students wanted to purify German literature of foreign (jews) and other “immoral” influences

• Helen Keller's work was burned because she was championing the disabled and stood up for women's voting rights.

1933-

• Suspends Jewish doctors from service

• Jews removed from government service

• Jews not allowed to be admitted to the bar

• The number of Jews who go to public school is limited

• Revoked the citizenship of Jews and other “undesirables”

• Jews banned from editorial posts

 

1935-

• Jewish officers expelled from the army

• Reich citizenship law- Only people of “German” blood could be citizens

• the Law for the Protection of German Blood and German Honor, banned marriage between Jews and non-Jewish Germans. It also criminalized sexual relations between them.

1936-

• Jews forbidden to serve as tax consultants

• Jewish teachers cannot teach in public schools

1937-

• Public schools would not admit Jewish children

1938-

• Jews forbidden from changing their names

• Forbids changing the names of Jewish-owned businesses.

• Jews to report all property in excess of 5,000 Reichsmarks.

• Jews to adopt an additional name on identification papers: "Sara” for women and “Israel” for men.

• Jews must surrender their German passports, which will become valid only after the letter “J” had been stamped on them

• All Jewish-owned businesses were closed

• Expelled all Jewish children from public schools.

• Work cancelled on all state contracts held with Jewish-owned firms.

• Jews not allowed to serve as midwives

1939-

• Jews had to give up their precious metal, and stones.

• German Lottery forbids the sale of lottery tickets to Jews.

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