"Paradigm shift"
Last Thurs I gave a talk at the AACI, a review of the book "The Bielsky Brothers," by Peter Duffy, "the true story of three men who defied the Nazis, built a village in the forest and saved 1,200 Jews." This story has been made into the movie "Defiance" starring Daniel Craig, the latest James Bond.
After the talk there was a discussion, and the natural question arose, why were they able to resist and why so many other Jews were not, and we agreed that it was because they were familiar with the dense forest (their father owned a lumber mill) and it gave them a place to separate themselves from the Nazis and survive. But we also agreed that it was largely cultural. In other words, the Bielskis were tough, they knew how to survive in the forest, they took no anti-Semitic insults and they were ruthless. If a peasant gave their men away to the Germans or the Byelorussian police, they came back later and murdered him and his whole family, and they let it be known that this is what would happen to anyone who informed on them.
Also, although Tuvia Bielski joined his group to the Soviet partisan organization, in order to obtain arms and logistical support, his main aim unlike them was not killing Germans,. His main aim was to ensure the survival of the Jews . So while other partisan groups prevented the accretion of civilians, especially Jews,who could not fight, Bielski did the opposite, he took in any Jews who came, old, lame children, anybody. He knew that for the Jews it was a matter of survival. At one point, when a group of Jewish Communists were trying to undermine his control, he arrested then executed the leader.
Most Jews were culturally disinclined to fight for their survival, partly because of the effects of hundreds of years of persecution, and partly because they thought in abstractions and intellectualized every question, rather than facing the facts for what they were. It's easy for me to say this in much later hindsight, but that is probably the crux of the matter.
Although Zionism had existed for many years, since the 1880's, and Jews had been making aliyah to form a Jewish State for decades, this was still a minority view among Jews. Most Jews were prepared to continue to live where they did and accept the hatred as a fact of life, just as Negroes lived in the Southern US and had no choice but to accept their mistreatement by whites. But, in both cases it took a sudden change in the situation to being about a change in the general viewpoint of the group. In the case of the Blacks it was the development and actions of the Civil Right's movement during the 1950s and for the Jews it was the Holocaust and the realization that Jewish existence was no longer possible as a minority among others. The catastrophe of the Holocaust awoke the surviving Jews up to the fact that a "paradigm shift" had occurred in Jewish history, and henceforth most Jews became Zionists, in fact or in principle. Today nearly half the world's Jews live in Israel.
The term "paradigm shift" was popularized by Thomas Kuhn in his book "The Structure of Scientific Revolutions," written in 1962. The classic case he describes was the change in our view of the world from a mechanistic Newtonian structure to a probability Einsteinian universe. Another example is the change in perception from belief in divine creationism to evolution by natural selection produced by the publication of "The origin of species" by Charles Darwin in 1859.
So the experience of the Holocaust, even to those Jews who were distant from it, produced a paradigm shift, in thought that caused them to support the formation of a Jewish State that would be sovereign and independent, and would have an armed force to defend itself. There is a straight line from the fight of the Jewish partisans in the forests of Eastern Europe to Operation Cast Lead against Hamas in Gaza. Those Jews who have become very sophisticated and think in abstractions and who are very ready to criticize the actions of the Jewish State might bear this history in mind. The resurgence of anti-Semitism is not a consequence of the existence of Israel, nor the actions of the IDF (actions that are ignored for the rest of the world), but are engendered by a deep and abiding cultural antagonism to Jews and anything Jewish that continues to exist in Western (and Islamic) culture.
After the talk there was a discussion, and the natural question arose, why were they able to resist and why so many other Jews were not, and we agreed that it was because they were familiar with the dense forest (their father owned a lumber mill) and it gave them a place to separate themselves from the Nazis and survive. But we also agreed that it was largely cultural. In other words, the Bielskis were tough, they knew how to survive in the forest, they took no anti-Semitic insults and they were ruthless. If a peasant gave their men away to the Germans or the Byelorussian police, they came back later and murdered him and his whole family, and they let it be known that this is what would happen to anyone who informed on them.
Also, although Tuvia Bielski joined his group to the Soviet partisan organization, in order to obtain arms and logistical support, his main aim unlike them was not killing Germans,. His main aim was to ensure the survival of the Jews . So while other partisan groups prevented the accretion of civilians, especially Jews,who could not fight, Bielski did the opposite, he took in any Jews who came, old, lame children, anybody. He knew that for the Jews it was a matter of survival. At one point, when a group of Jewish Communists were trying to undermine his control, he arrested then executed the leader.
Most Jews were culturally disinclined to fight for their survival, partly because of the effects of hundreds of years of persecution, and partly because they thought in abstractions and intellectualized every question, rather than facing the facts for what they were. It's easy for me to say this in much later hindsight, but that is probably the crux of the matter.
Although Zionism had existed for many years, since the 1880's, and Jews had been making aliyah to form a Jewish State for decades, this was still a minority view among Jews. Most Jews were prepared to continue to live where they did and accept the hatred as a fact of life, just as Negroes lived in the Southern US and had no choice but to accept their mistreatement by whites. But, in both cases it took a sudden change in the situation to being about a change in the general viewpoint of the group. In the case of the Blacks it was the development and actions of the Civil Right's movement during the 1950s and for the Jews it was the Holocaust and the realization that Jewish existence was no longer possible as a minority among others. The catastrophe of the Holocaust awoke the surviving Jews up to the fact that a "paradigm shift" had occurred in Jewish history, and henceforth most Jews became Zionists, in fact or in principle. Today nearly half the world's Jews live in Israel.
The term "paradigm shift" was popularized by Thomas Kuhn in his book "The Structure of Scientific Revolutions," written in 1962. The classic case he describes was the change in our view of the world from a mechanistic Newtonian structure to a probability Einsteinian universe. Another example is the change in perception from belief in divine creationism to evolution by natural selection produced by the publication of "The origin of species" by Charles Darwin in 1859.
So the experience of the Holocaust, even to those Jews who were distant from it, produced a paradigm shift, in thought that caused them to support the formation of a Jewish State that would be sovereign and independent, and would have an armed force to defend itself. There is a straight line from the fight of the Jewish partisans in the forests of Eastern Europe to Operation Cast Lead against Hamas in Gaza. Those Jews who have become very sophisticated and think in abstractions and who are very ready to criticize the actions of the Jewish State might bear this history in mind. The resurgence of anti-Semitism is not a consequence of the existence of Israel, nor the actions of the IDF (actions that are ignored for the rest of the world), but are engendered by a deep and abiding cultural antagonism to Jews and anything Jewish that continues to exist in Western (and Islamic) culture.
posted by Jack Cohen at 4:16 PM
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