From: kkniaz@eniac.seas.upenn.edu (Krzysztof W. Kniaz)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.polish
Subject: Re: On Polish Anti-semitism
Date: 13 Oct 92 20:20:14 GMT
Organization: University of Pennsylvania

It is good that the book of Lucy S. Dawidowicz "The Holocaust and the 
Historians" (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1981) was mentioned on 
the net. I have read it and can share my impressions about it:


Let us start from the end of the book. In the Afterword Ms. Dawidowicz 
makes some general remarks, including a quote from Polybius on the ethics 
of a historian:


`More than 2,000 years ago, Polybius conceded as a regrettable necessity 
"that historians must show some partiality to their own countries". 
Nevertheless, he cautioned against writing untruths in behalf of one's 
country.' (p. 142)

In chapter 6, Ms. Dawidowicz strongly criticizes Hannah Arendt's book 
"Eichmann in Jerusalem:"

`Instead of beginning with research and investigation and following with 
analysis and finally conclusions, Miss Arendt began with grand 
generalizations and sweeping moral judgements' (p.138)

One can only applaud Ms. Dawidowicz's ideas on a historian's ethics. 
However, let us see how she applies this ethics to herself. Below 
are a few fragments taken from the first three pages of chapter 5 
(Appropriating the Holocaust: Polish Historical Revisionism). These pages 
represent a brief summary of Poland's thousand years of history: 


`[The Jews] Invited by the Polish kings to a land of indolent nobility...'

`For centuries Poland had been unable to govern itself, to maintain 
political or economic stability. The nobility and the clergy feuded 
endlessly with the royal and ducal powers'

`[The Poles] alienated from other Slavic peoples because of their 
adherence to Rome'

`[In 1795] Poland as a nation disappeared from the map'

`[During the partition period] Attempted suppression of language and faith 
only intensified and politicized Polish nationalist passions and the 
appetite for independence. Indeed, their exaltation of martyrdom inclined 
the Poles to desperate, even suicidal, ventures to win their freedom.'



Ms. Dawidowicz was far too erudite a scholar not to know that the feuds 
between the nobility, royal and ducal powers were inherent to each and 
every European state, be it England, France or Germany and the reasons for 
Poland's decline and loss of independence (after eight centuries of 
existence - so much for the unability of governing herself) must be looked 
for elsewhere. Also, she must have known that some other Slavic peoples 
besides the Poles have traditionally recognized the pope, notably the 
Slovaks and Ukrainians. She must have realized, too, that a map usually 
shows *countries* and *states*, the term "Poland" meaning either one. The 
Polish *nation* did not disappear, to which I and my colleagues are living 
witnesses. I seriously doubt, too, if she would describe the unsuccessful 
Jewish revolts against Rome in the first two centuries A.D. as expressions 
of `politicized nationalist passions' and `appetite for independence'.

But she does not heed the wise advise of Polybius, thereby showing an 
ill-disguised contempt for the subject of her study, and in my eyes 
seriously compromising herself as a historian.

Yet despite such an unpromising introduction, her description of the 
Polish post-war historiography is by and large fair and accurate, 
notwithstanding some more lapses, like the one:

`The accusation comes with little grace from a Pole whose people offered 
no armed resistance to the Germans until August 1944' (p. 121)

(Sam Saal may be ignorant about the September 1939 campaign and its 
aftermath, but a historian like Ms. Dawidowicz should know better, I 
think).

Although I appreciate Ms. Dawidowicz's description of the Polish 
historiography in the years 1945-1981, I am deeply troubled by something 
else in her analysis of the above mentioned period: the use of the generic 
term "Poles" for describing party historians like Walichnowski, Madajczyk 
or Pilichowski, all of whom played a particularly infamous role in the 
1968-1969 period.

It worries me because if we agree that I and many of my colleagues, who 
feel little in common with the gentlemen mentioned above, have to be 
ashamed of what they wrote since all of us were "Poles", than I will start 
thinking about subscribing to Aleksander Mazur's theories of "Jews" being 
responsible for the actions of some UB (secret police) bosses about 15 
years earlier.

Seriously, both ideas are of course absurd to me: both groups of people 
did not represent the interests of any ethnic group, but solely those of 
the communist ideology which they represented, were totally loyal to, and 
tried to implement at any cost.

However, if somebody insists that I as a Pole should bear responsibility 
for a certain Mr. Walichnowski while Mr. Lustig for example should not 
feel the same about a certain Mr. Rozanski, then I feel it is *grossly* 
unfair and quite paranoidal.


To finish this posting, I would like to humbly suggest that if our Jewish 
colleagues really mean what they say, i.e. the aim of their contributions 
is to make us familiar with literature hitherto unknown to us (at least in 
my case they succeeded), then perhaps they try to reach to some literature 
worth reading and either unknown or ignored by them. Here I have to 
recommend practically all the publications of the Institute for Polish- 
Jewish Studies based in Oxford, under the direction of Antony Polonsky, 
and notably the yearly issues of "Polin". The Jewish and Polish historians 
writing there offer usually sincere and honest evaluations of certain 
historical problems, sometimes very critical of Poland and Poles, but 
usually fair and interesting (the article of Ezra Mendelsohn quoted in 
extenso by W. Dobosiewicz was an example of this). 

Which unfortunately cannot always be said about Ms. Dawidowicz whose 
emotions seem to negatively affect her vision.




--

Krzysztof Kniaz, University of Pennsylvania |Due to circumstances beyond
Lab for Research on the Structure of Matter |your control, you're master of 
Philadelphia, PA, 19104, USA                |your fate and captain of your soul
Newsgroups: soc.culture.polish