Thomas Bluger
Thomas has been researching his family's Jewish background for the last thirty years. Herein he investigates how his Jewish grandparents, and aunt-defined as a nonprivileged Mischling, survived the war while living in the heart of Nazi Germany. This led Thomas to research Hitler's fear of having partial Jewish ancestry and expanded into a full-blown study of following Christianity's understanding of the Jewish identity of Jesus of Nazareth throughout history. Not leaving matters here, Thomas outlines how Marian dogmatic theology, used at the time of the Shoah, brought to conclusion the Church's long journey in defining the "time" of ensoulment as articulated in the papal document Ineffabilis Deus, promulgated by Pius in 1854. This happened twenty-seven years after the discovery of the human ovum in 1827 by Karl Ernst von Baer. Years later, with the emergence of Nazi racial ideology, many anti-Christian Christians attempted to invert Christianity's core message of salvation through faith toward biological ends. This would not do. Roman authorities had consistently held throughout the centuries that faith is about salvation and not about biology. According to that same end, the "ideal" of ensoulment, since the time of the Church's renewed understanding of it-beginning in 1854-and indeed as it was first articulated through the writings of Aristotle and received into Christianity through the writings of Saint Augustine and later Thomas Aquinas-was newly preserved within the confines of Western civilization. This is the first book, the author knows of, that follows Augustine's concept of ensoulment, as well as Aquinas's thinking on the matter, while linking these to Karl Ernst von Baer's discovery of the human ovum in 1827, up until the events of Shoah and beyond. This study is phenomenological in nature in that it does "not" follow Jesus of Nazareth (the Virgin Mary) throughout history, but rather follows the "image" of Jesus of Nazareth (the Virgin Mary)-a monumental difference. This study supports the Second Vatican Council, the Church's latest and ongoing efforts in affirming the Jewish identities of both Jesus of Nazareth and the Virgin Mary, John Paul II's call for a purification of memory beginning in a year of Jubilee, as well as the many present efforts in Catholic-Jewish relations. This study builds upon the author's past article: "Following the Virgin Mary through Auschwitz: Marian Dogmatic Theology at the Time of the Shoah," published in Holocaust Studies: A Journal of Culture and History, Vol. 14, winter 2008, No. 3, pp. 1-24.
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With later advances in the field of embryology, Catholic authorities seized the opportunity to bring to closure any further speculations around Mary’s sinless state—now tied to the concept of “first instance” or immediate animation. With this new Marian dogma Ineffabilis Deus Aristotle’s theory of delayed animation was flatly rejected. At the same time, this new Marian dogma implicitly advanced and enhanced the role of women throughout the world—an anthropological certainty—affirming our present understanding of human conception. In this, the Church saw itself as standing on the right side of history—which, according to this interpretive framework, cannot be denied.
Coming to the Shoah: Moving Forward
Moving forward to the time of the Shoah, we see that the Blessed Virgin Mary’s possible sinless state had always been part of Catholic theology. We also noted that throughout history, Marian devotion became connected to Catholic piety through the recitation of the rosary, Marian prayers, Marian masses, the construction of Marian churches, Marian cathedrals, Marian pilgrimages, Marian encyclicals, consecration of one’s life to Mary, and much more. Today these realities are downplayed by historians. Yet these same Marian realties mark the importance in what Carl Jung called the importance of the feminine principle in a male-centered animus-driven world—outlined earlier in chapter 9. Seen in this light, Ineffabilis Deus signaled the intensification of Marian devotion in what later came to be known as the “hundred years of Mary,” ending with the promulgation of dogma of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary into Heaven—Munificentissimus Deus in 1950, outlined below.
Throughout this entire one-hundred-year period, the importance of Marian devotion took off exponentially among the Catholic faithful. Marian prayers—always centered and anchored in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus—became the plea on behalf of the faithful for God to raise up the lowly and scatter the proud in the imaginations of their hearts. We are dealing here with unquantifiable spiritual realities that can only be adequately understood with the help of psychological reference. By linking Mary’s conception to all human conceptions, while steering clear of any and all biological interpretations, Pius IX brought into harmony the Church’s theology with recent discoveries in the field of the biological sciences of his day. Mary, the immaculately conceived Mother of God, through the encyclical Ineffabilis Deus—later backed by papal infallibility—became a dogma enshrined in Catholic consciousness. Ineffabilis Deus became part and parcel of the new Catholic landscape—binding on all the faithful.
chapter 18–22 outlines how the concept of ensoulment developed throughout the centuries starting with Aristotle (384–322 BCE) and his hypothesis of delayed animation as advanced in his theory of three types of souls. Aristotle discerned that human embryonic development came through a secession of souls. First, the vegetative soul followed by the animal soul and finally the rational soul. The third or rational soul was believed to come into existence roughly forty days for a male and eighty to ninety days for a female, after the time of conception. For Aristotle, ensoulment did not happen until the third or rational soul manifested—hence, his theory of delayed (or mediate) animation. From here, we follow Aristotle’s concept of delayed animation into Christianity by way of the Greek Septuagint Bible and later legislations beginning in 380 CE—the time when Christianity became the state religion. Chapter 19 follows Augustine and others, showing how the church wrestled with the concept of ensoulment and how it came to be linked with original sin and the ensoulment of the Blessed Virgin Mary—central to this presentation.
Chapter 20 brings us to a shipwreck in the eleventh century when a fellow by the name of Constantinus Africanus salvaged and later translated medical texts from Arabic into Latin. Through Africanus’s translations, the concept of delayed animation was appropriated anew for Western civilization. From here, we follow Aristotle’s concept of delayed animation through the writings of Saint Albertus, Saint Thomas Aquinas, Duns Scotus, the Council of Basel (1493), the Council of Trent (1545–1563 CE), up until the time of Benedict XIV.
Chapter 21 introduces and reviews various discoveries in the field of the embryological sciences beginning with William C. Harvey and his publication of De generationer animalism in 1651, at which time he postulated the reality of a mammalian ovule. One hundred and seventy-six years later, in 1827, Karl Ernst von Baer actually discovers what Harvey predicted—the human ovule. With von Baer’s discovery came a profound paradigm shift in Western civilization. Twenty-seven years later, in 1854, the document Ineffabilis Deus is promulgated by Pius IX. With von Baer’s discovery—after more than fourteen hundred years of theological speculation—church authorities feel sufficiently confident in their new scientifically based knowledge to abandon (or, better put, to update) Aristotle’s theory of delayed animation. Chapter 22 illustrates the effects of von Baer’s discovery on Catholic theology. Here we convey to you the reader that delayed animation, as it had always been speculatively applied to the conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary (not Jesus), was, for the first time in human history, rejected in the document Ineffabilis Deus. Mary’s ensoulment is defined as happening at the “first instance”—of her conception—immediate animation. Part 3, chapter 23 considers our third trajectory as outlined in the document Apostolical Sedis written in 1869—dealing with specific laws and censures.
Chapter 24 addresses the effects of von Baer’s discovery on Catholic thinking. The Dominican priest Cletus Wessels recounts that with the discovery of the human ovum in 1827, all the old understandings about human fertility based upon the physiology of the ancients was displaced.8 This marked a shift in consciousness not only in Catholic teaching but for Western civilization as well. Women were suddenly and newly perceived as equal contributors in the genetic and biological makeup of their children. No more were they to be understood as simply “supplying the nurturing force” or as living “receptacles” for their offspring. They are now seen as full and equal partners in contributing to the biological makeup of their offspring. The whole worldview of male-female relations was forever changed. The pernicious animus-driven ideology of a war-torn Europe must now reconfigure itself to accommodate the fact that women should have equal partnership in the realities that affected their lives. This did not happen. Why? The male-centered European culture could not integrate the significance of von Baer’s discovery. These matters remained repressed.
Shortly after von Baer’s discovery in 1854 came the papal encyclical Ineffabilis Deus—on Mary’s Immaculate Conception. Millions of Catholics throughout the world intensify their devotion to Mary while, on a psychological level, they collectively elevate the feminine principle. Although Catholics had always offered devotion through the intercession of Mary, Marian devotion intensified and increased exponentially for the next hundred years, and beyond. It would seem that intuitively, Roman Catholics “grasped” the importance of the document Ineffabilis Deus on levels other than intellectual.
Looking at how Ineffabilis Deus supported the science behind von Baer’s discovery, we come to a deeper understanding of Pius IX’s actions, when in 1847 he reinstated the Pontifical Academy of Sciences, which had its roots in the Academy of the Lynxes (Accademia die Lance), founded in Rome in 1603, now named the “Pontifical Academy of the New Lynxes.”9 Also was Pius’s excommunication of the priest Jakob Frodsham in 1857, who wrote On the Generation of Human Souls, published in 1854, which contradicted Ineffabilis Deus—covered below.10
Books by Thomas Bluger
This paper brings us to the world-famous theologian, Karl Adam and his 1943 Marian statement used to support his anti-Semitic position as mentioned at the onset of this study. Here we investigate Adam’s use of Marian dogmatic theology asking whether his approach was symptomatic of the wider dogmatic theology of the Catholic Church at that time. We expand our research to consider the theology of Father Richard Kleine—a brown priest known openly for trying to build a bridge between the Catholic Church and the Nazi regime. Finally, we investigate other clerics who thought toward similar ends. Included in this presentation is a brief examination of the positions of Lucia Scherzberg’s, Hans Küng and Robert Krieg and how they misrepresent the position of Karl Adam at the time of the Shoah, reflecting their lack of comprehension behind the history of the dogma of the Immaculate Conception. This paper supports the German Catholic bishops at the time of the Shoah and lauds the bravery of Father Bernard Lichtenberg—now a Saint within the Catholic Church—who spoke out against Adam.
This paper is part of a larger study: The De-Judaization of the Image of Jesus of Nazareth (the Virgin Mary) at the Time of the Holocaust: Ensoulment and the Human Ovum by Thomas Bluger (Xlibris, 2021).
With later advances in the field of embryology, Catholic authorities seized the opportunity to bring to closure any further speculations around Mary’s sinless state—now tied to the concept of “first instance” or immediate animation. With this new Marian dogma Ineffabilis Deus Aristotle’s theory of delayed animation was flatly rejected. At the same time, this new Marian dogma implicitly advanced and enhanced the role of women throughout the world—an anthropological certainty—affirming our present understanding of human conception. In this, the Church saw itself as standing on the right side of history—which, according to this interpretive framework, cannot be denied.
Coming to the Shoah: Moving Forward
Moving forward to the time of the Shoah, we see that the Blessed Virgin Mary’s possible sinless state had always been part of Catholic theology. We also noted that throughout history, Marian devotion became connected to Catholic piety through the recitation of the rosary, Marian prayers, Marian masses, the construction of Marian churches, Marian cathedrals, Marian pilgrimages, Marian encyclicals, consecration of one’s life to Mary, and much more. Today these realities are downplayed by historians. Yet these same Marian realties mark the importance in what Carl Jung called the importance of the feminine principle in a male-centered animus-driven world—outlined earlier in chapter 9. Seen in this light, Ineffabilis Deus signaled the intensification of Marian devotion in what later came to be known as the “hundred years of Mary,” ending with the promulgation of dogma of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary into Heaven—Munificentissimus Deus in 1950, outlined below.
Throughout this entire one-hundred-year period, the importance of Marian devotion took off exponentially among the Catholic faithful. Marian prayers—always centered and anchored in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus—became the plea on behalf of the faithful for God to raise up the lowly and scatter the proud in the imaginations of their hearts. We are dealing here with unquantifiable spiritual realities that can only be adequately understood with the help of psychological reference. By linking Mary’s conception to all human conceptions, while steering clear of any and all biological interpretations, Pius IX brought into harmony the Church’s theology with recent discoveries in the field of the biological sciences of his day. Mary, the immaculately conceived Mother of God, through the encyclical Ineffabilis Deus—later backed by papal infallibility—became a dogma enshrined in Catholic consciousness. Ineffabilis Deus became part and parcel of the new Catholic landscape—binding on all the faithful.
chapter 18–22 outlines how the concept of ensoulment developed throughout the centuries starting with Aristotle (384–322 BCE) and his hypothesis of delayed animation as advanced in his theory of three types of souls. Aristotle discerned that human embryonic development came through a secession of souls. First, the vegetative soul followed by the animal soul and finally the rational soul. The third or rational soul was believed to come into existence roughly forty days for a male and eighty to ninety days for a female, after the time of conception. For Aristotle, ensoulment did not happen until the third or rational soul manifested—hence, his theory of delayed (or mediate) animation. From here, we follow Aristotle’s concept of delayed animation into Christianity by way of the Greek Septuagint Bible and later legislations beginning in 380 CE—the time when Christianity became the state religion. Chapter 19 follows Augustine and others, showing how the church wrestled with the concept of ensoulment and how it came to be linked with original sin and the ensoulment of the Blessed Virgin Mary—central to this presentation.
Chapter 20 brings us to a shipwreck in the eleventh century when a fellow by the name of Constantinus Africanus salvaged and later translated medical texts from Arabic into Latin. Through Africanus’s translations, the concept of delayed animation was appropriated anew for Western civilization. From here, we follow Aristotle’s concept of delayed animation through the writings of Saint Albertus, Saint Thomas Aquinas, Duns Scotus, the Council of Basel (1493), the Council of Trent (1545–1563 CE), up until the time of Benedict XIV.
Chapter 21 introduces and reviews various discoveries in the field of the embryological sciences beginning with William C. Harvey and his publication of De generationer animalism in 1651, at which time he postulated the reality of a mammalian ovule. One hundred and seventy-six years later, in 1827, Karl Ernst von Baer actually discovers what Harvey predicted—the human ovule. With von Baer’s discovery came a profound paradigm shift in Western civilization. Twenty-seven years later, in 1854, the document Ineffabilis Deus is promulgated by Pius IX. With von Baer’s discovery—after more than fourteen hundred years of theological speculation—church authorities feel sufficiently confident in their new scientifically based knowledge to abandon (or, better put, to update) Aristotle’s theory of delayed animation. Chapter 22 illustrates the effects of von Baer’s discovery on Catholic theology. Here we convey to you the reader that delayed animation, as it had always been speculatively applied to the conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary (not Jesus), was, for the first time in human history, rejected in the document Ineffabilis Deus. Mary’s ensoulment is defined as happening at the “first instance”—of her conception—immediate animation. Part 3, chapter 23 considers our third trajectory as outlined in the document Apostolical Sedis written in 1869—dealing with specific laws and censures.
Chapter 24 addresses the effects of von Baer’s discovery on Catholic thinking. The Dominican priest Cletus Wessels recounts that with the discovery of the human ovum in 1827, all the old understandings about human fertility based upon the physiology of the ancients was displaced.8 This marked a shift in consciousness not only in Catholic teaching but for Western civilization as well. Women were suddenly and newly perceived as equal contributors in the genetic and biological makeup of their children. No more were they to be understood as simply “supplying the nurturing force” or as living “receptacles” for their offspring. They are now seen as full and equal partners in contributing to the biological makeup of their offspring. The whole worldview of male-female relations was forever changed. The pernicious animus-driven ideology of a war-torn Europe must now reconfigure itself to accommodate the fact that women should have equal partnership in the realities that affected their lives. This did not happen. Why? The male-centered European culture could not integrate the significance of von Baer’s discovery. These matters remained repressed.
Shortly after von Baer’s discovery in 1854 came the papal encyclical Ineffabilis Deus—on Mary’s Immaculate Conception. Millions of Catholics throughout the world intensify their devotion to Mary while, on a psychological level, they collectively elevate the feminine principle. Although Catholics had always offered devotion through the intercession of Mary, Marian devotion intensified and increased exponentially for the next hundred years, and beyond. It would seem that intuitively, Roman Catholics “grasped” the importance of the document Ineffabilis Deus on levels other than intellectual.
Looking at how Ineffabilis Deus supported the science behind von Baer’s discovery, we come to a deeper understanding of Pius IX’s actions, when in 1847 he reinstated the Pontifical Academy of Sciences, which had its roots in the Academy of the Lynxes (Accademia die Lance), founded in Rome in 1603, now named the “Pontifical Academy of the New Lynxes.”9 Also was Pius’s excommunication of the priest Jakob Frodsham in 1857, who wrote On the Generation of Human Souls, published in 1854, which contradicted Ineffabilis Deus—covered below.10
This paper brings us to the world-famous theologian, Karl Adam and his 1943 Marian statement used to support his anti-Semitic position as mentioned at the onset of this study. Here we investigate Adam’s use of Marian dogmatic theology asking whether his approach was symptomatic of the wider dogmatic theology of the Catholic Church at that time. We expand our research to consider the theology of Father Richard Kleine—a brown priest known openly for trying to build a bridge between the Catholic Church and the Nazi regime. Finally, we investigate other clerics who thought toward similar ends. Included in this presentation is a brief examination of the positions of Lucia Scherzberg’s, Hans Küng and Robert Krieg and how they misrepresent the position of Karl Adam at the time of the Shoah, reflecting their lack of comprehension behind the history of the dogma of the Immaculate Conception. This paper supports the German Catholic bishops at the time of the Shoah and lauds the bravery of Father Bernard Lichtenberg—now a Saint within the Catholic Church—who spoke out against Adam.
This paper is part of a larger study: The De-Judaization of the Image of Jesus of Nazareth (the Virgin Mary) at the Time of the Holocaust: Ensoulment and the Human Ovum by Thomas Bluger (Xlibris, 2021).