by Baron Otmar von Verschuer, M.D.
TRANSLATOR'S INTRODUCTION (Charles E. Weber, Ph.D.)
The following article was taken from Volume III (1938) of the very important series, Forschungen zur Judenfrage (Studies on the Jewish Problem), the first six volumes of which were published by the Hanseatische Verlagsanstalt in Hamburg during 1937 to 1941. The nearly fifty articles in these six volumes represent the thinking on the Jewish question by some of the best German minds of that time. The authors of the articles were specialists, in some cases internationally known specialists, in a variety of fields, including anthropology, demography, genealogy, genetics, history, law, literary scholarship, musicology, philosophy and theology. The earlier articles in the series were given as lectures before meetings of the Reichsinstitut für die Geschichte des neuen Deutschlands, Forschungsabteilung Judenfrage (National Institute for the History of the New Germany, Research Division for the Jewish Problem). It is not at all difficult to imagine that the research efforts which went into these articles cost the erstwhile German government hundreds of thousands, if not millions of Reichsmark.
Although the research was subsidized by the National Socialist government, the tone of the articles is by no means generally and uniformly hostile to Jews. Baron von Verschuer's article, for example, is nearly free of value judgments and it concedes in a number of passages that Jews have special strengths characteristic of their race.
By 1936 a number of circumstances had converged which made possible the publishing of this large body of research by non-Jews on the Jewish question. Such a constellation is highly unlikely ever to appear in the sky again, certainly not in our lifetime, and that is a fact which in itself gives these volumes a unique position and value in the serious study of the Jewish question. One circumstance was the importance which the German government attached at that time to the Jewish question and its willingness to allocate considerable economic resources to the study of the question in an attempt to find a constructive solution to it. This circumstance was combined with the willingness and ability of German scientists and scholars to come to grips with the Jewish problem as far as their areas of expertise were concerned. Perhaps most important, however, was the circumstance that there were individuals who had the vision and ability to organize such efforts. Especially noteworthy was Dr. Karl Alexander von Müller (1882-1964), who, was a history professor at the University of Munich from 1917 to 1945 and who also became President of the Bavarian Academy of Sciences. Not only did he publish a number of notable books between 1923 and 1949, but he also published the Historische Zeitschrift during the years 1933-1945. His student, Walter Frank (1905-1945), became President of the above-mentioned Reichsinstitut für die Geschichte des neuen Deutschlands. We encounter Frank's vivid and interesting exposition of the objectives of the Forschungsabteilung at the beginning of the first volume of the series. One need only read Frank's sixteen-page address to understand the attitude toward the Jewish problem held by many middle class Europeans in its historical perspective.
It would be difficult to imagine that the present generation of effete, career-oriented, intimidated American academic types could ever produce a series similar to the Forschungen zur Judenfrage. The American academic establishment has been far too seriously corrupted by funds from Washington and Jewish donors. Fortunately, not all American scholars kowtow. There are individual Americans in academic life who have shown the courage, vision, ability and integrity necessary to challenge some of the historical and anthropological myths which have been used with cynically evil calculation to manipulate American public opinion. Such scholars have been harassed and in some cases even dismissed from their hard-earned positions which required many years of professional preparation.
Even the most philo-Semitic of readers will have to concede the historical value, if nothing else, of the Forschungen zur Judenfrage because they throw penetrating light on the European attitudes toward Jews during the 1920s and 1930s and how they came about. Many Jews, but not all of them, would have us believe that they were just the convenient victims of a scapegoat mentality, prevalent especially in the defeated nations of Europe after 1918. However, this is a grossly oversimplified, self-serving explanation that disregards a number of strong historical forces, such as the great and justifiable fear which the European middle classes had of the barbarically cruel Communist government which had been installed over the former Russian Empire and which was correctly sensed as an essentially Jewish government.
As a result of the energetic book burning and intellectual intimidation on the part of officials of the powers which occupied Germany beginning in 1945 after the tragic, unnecessary and fratricidal Second World, War, these volumes are especially scarce. The number of known copies in the United States could very well be Ins than a dozen. I have learned that they are in strong demand and are being sold at high prices in the German book trade.
The first article I have chosen for translation is certainly one of the most important in the series and perhaps one of the most interesting ones for the American reader concerned with the Jewish question. It deals with genetically determined characteristics which, in their totality, differentiate Jews from other races Many Jews, but by no means all of them, have energetically sought to deny that such genetically determined differences exist, or at least they have sought to deny to non-Jews the existence of such differences, even if they themselves are consciously or subconsciously aware of them. Here we need only think of Franz Boas (1858-1942) and his all too influential school of anthropology.
The author of this incisive article, Otmar Freiherr von Verschuer (1896-1969), had a distinguished career in the study of human genetics. From 1927 to 1935 he was a division chief of the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Anthropology, Human Genetics and Eugenics in Berlin and during 1942 to 1945 he was its director. He published studies of tuberculosis in twins in 1933. His Eugenik was published in 1966. Baron von Verschuer also held professorial posts in Frankfurt am Main, Berlin and Münster. The second edition of his layman's manual on hereditary diseases and eugenic measures, Leitfaden der Rassenhygiene, was published in 1944.
When reading von Verschuer's Rassenbiologie der Juden we must bear in mind that it was written nearly a half century ago. I have not chosen to modernize his vocabulary or use such fashionable euphemisms as "mental retardation" for "feeblemindedness" (Schwachsinn).
Lest it be thought that von Verschuer was simply summarizing his own subjective observations or was exclusively dependent on materials published after 1933, we need only note that nearly all of the literature cited in the valuable bibliography at the end of the article originated before 1933 and that many of its authors would seem to be Jewish.
Since the center of gravity of the Jewish problem has passed from Europe to North America, especially during the course of the twentieth century, it is now high time that some of the best non-Jewish research ever done on the Jewish problem be made available to English-speaking readers. Even just the titles and the names of the authors make exciting reading for those who wish to acquire a deeper knowledge of the roots of one of the gravest and most pressing of American national problems. In order to convey a hint of the breadth and depth of the articles in the Forschungen zur Judenfrage we shall list the original titles and their English equivalents after the conclusion of the article by Baron von Verschuer.
Finally let me recommend to Jews themselves that they read and reflect on the Forschungen zur Judenfrage, for these studies contain many astute observations and much valuable historical information as seen through the eyes of outstanding non-Jewish scholars. The Jews' persistence in blind hatred of their host populations, their insensitivity to or even total disregard of the sufferings of their victims, their ruthless use of the media which they now largely control, their insidious but shortsighted attempts to destroy the mores of their host populations, their disregard of the lessons of history and their arrogant presumption of their own moral superiority can only render impossible a constructive, nonviolent solution to the Jewish Problem.
RACIAL BIOLOGY OF THE JEWS
by Baron Otmar von Verschuer, M.D.
"Jewry was and is a religion -- but never a race" is the final conclusion at which the Jew M. Fishberg arrives in his book, Die Rassenmerkmale der Juden (The Racial Characteristics of Jews), Munich, 1913. A large number of similar opinions of Jewish authors could be quoted additionally. Among the opinions of Jewish authors, however, there are also opposing ones. Thus, we find in the book by F.A. Theilhaber, Der Untergang der deutschen Juden (The Decline of German Jews), Munich, 1911, the remarkable passage: "Inbreeding guarantees the only objective Jewish identification and maintains the racial nature of Jews while the adherence to the Jewish religion represents the subjective aspect of belonging to the Jewish group." Thus, within the Jews' own ranks there is not only to be found denial but also recognition of the racial aspect as their own identification and differentiation from their host populations.
Much confusion has been caused by the improper formulation of the question, "Are Jews a race?" The term "race," a systemic race [Systemrasse], as it has been established by scientific anthropology, cannot immediately be applied to Jews. As we heard in the lecture by Professor Fischer ["Rassenentstehung und äteste Rassengeschichte der Hebräer" (Racial Origin and Earliest Racial History of the Hebrews), Forschungen zur Judenfrage, Volume III, pp. 121-136], the Jews have developed from various racial roots. They consist of a number of races which are contrasted as a foreign element to the races of our nation. By means of this simple formulation we have not yet sufficiently grasped the racio-biological problem of the Jews as we encounter it today. The racial history of the Jews during the past 2,000 years must be taken into consideration. The inherently astonishing phenomenon that an ethnic group could preserve itself so long without a territory (the Teutons lost their ethnic identity in southeastern Europe and northern Africa within centuries -- the Nordic racial admixture which the Teutons imparted to those countries can be noticed even today) has been explained too unilaterally simply by the racial characteristics of Jews and their genetic isolation. The communality of religion, the special education through the Talmud and the idea of being a chosen people have maintained themselves with such force that during the course of history individuals and even groups of people could be absorbed into Jewry by marriage and conversion without their being any change in the characteristics of Jews. Taken as a whole, the Jews have remained racially isolated within the other nations.
Quite contradictory conclusions have been drawn from the history of the Jews for the judging of the racial question: Some emphasize the preservation of the original racial character while others speak of an "adaptation" of the Jews to the racial characteristics of their host populations. The attempt is made to substantiate this by individual pictures of "Nordic," "Ethiopian," "Indian" or even "Mongolian" Jews. Even the strictest laws cannot erect any absolute barriers between human beings when they live together, "Border crossings" cannot be avoided forever and the occurrence of persons of mixed race is the result. (I am grateful to Karl Georg Kuhn for pointing out that in some cases it also could be a matter of missionized Jews.)
In order not to encumber the investigation of the racial biology of modem Jews with any hypotheses, I shall first give a description of the Jews simply confined to those living in central Europe. The purpose of this description shall be to separate the genetic from the non-genetic characteristics in order to reach the objective of recognizing the genetic differences between Germans and Jews (I.e., persons of German extraction -- "of German or racially related heritage." [Translator's note: The phrase "deutschen oder arterwandten Blutes" is a formulation taken from the German racial laws of 1935].) From this position of hereditary biological makeup, which has its foundation in laws of nature that are generally recognized today, it will be easier to arrive at a clear insight into the racial-biological problem of the Jewish question.
If two groups of human beings are compared with one another, it must first be observed that every characteristic within a group has a certain more or less wide-ranging variational latitude. A distinguishing difference in a characteristic is then present if the variational latitude of the one group does not overlap with that of the other group, i.e., characteristics of the one group do not occur in the other group. The observation of such a characteristic then clearly establishes the membership of a human being. Such characteristics that are absolutely typical of a race are, for example, the black skin color of the Negro races, the "fil-fil" or peppercorn hair of the Bushmen and the slanting upper eyelid fold of the Mongolians. These characteristics do not occur among persons of German extraction. By such characteristics one would immediately be able to recognize the strain of a foreign race. Such an individual characteristic by which a Jew could be recognized with absolute certainty is not known.
All individual characteristics of the German racial groups are also found in individual Jews and characteristics typical of Jews do not prove with certainty a Jewish strain in the ancestry of a person of German extraction when they occur isolated in him. The racial characteristics of the Jews (preponderantly Near Eastern-Oriental) can also have come to us through non-Jews in individual cases. Obviously, those are rare exceptions; as a rule we are correct in our racial diagnosis, which, however, is always based on the observation of typical combinations of characteristics.
Between a group of Germans and a group of Jews the differences can easily be observed because the distribution curve in many characteristics is a clearly different one. The mean values are different as well as characteristic types which occur with greatest frequency. Nevertheless the curves of distribution of characteristics overlap. It is thus a question of gradual differences as they are, in most cases, expressed in frequency differences. A decision from the characteristic as to the membership in one group or the other can then be made only with greater or lesser probability.
After these general preliminary remarks, we are going to discuss the characteristics, one by one, by which the Jews are differentiated from the persons of German extraction. As the first group of characteristics we shall observe the normal physical features, the racial characteristics in the narrower sense of the word. Thereafter the sicknesses and the psychological characteristics, will undergo a discussion.
As the medium height of the Jews, values between 161 cm and 164 cm [2.54 cm=1 inch] are found for the male sex. If we compare this measurement with the anthropological data which are recorded in Deutsche Rassenkunde ("German Anthropology"), published by Eugen Fischer and now comprising 16 volumes, we find that all German comparative groups have a higher average height, between 166 cm and 173 cm. Height of the body is, aside from certain environmental variations, a preponderantly genetically determined characteristic.
During the course of growth, differences occur by virtue of the fact that rather generally sexual maturity begins earlier in the case of the Jews. The beginning of menstruation in the case of Jewesses occurs 1/2 to 1 year earlier than in groups in comparable climatic and social circumstances. Even if the onset of puberty is changed by external influences such as climate, urban life and occupational activity, racial differences manifest themselves. The early maturity of Jewish children is manifested in the physical as well as psychological areas.
In the growth ratios of the body the Jew is characterized as follows: In relation to the length of the torso the length of the legs is not as great, frequently resulting in the impression of a squat build. The arms are also relatively short. Hands and feet are often narrow. On the legs, which are frequently crooked, a weak calf musculature is often quite noticeable. The musculature and connective tissue exhibit a flabbiness which is caused in part by a lack of use and bodily exercise, but also in part by a hereditary tendency. As a result of these factors, one often observes a flat chest, a round back, a limp posture and the so frequent tendency to flat feet. According to Salaman, among the enlisted men of the English army during the war flat feet were found in a frequency of 1 to 40 in the English soldiers and in a frequency of 1 to 6 in the Jewish soldiers. Of course, these body ratios have an effect on the gait, which is described as soft or slinking, or, as groping, dragging or shuffling.
The head of the Jew is of medium size. In the majority of cases it is short to medium. The comparable German groups show in part larger measurements, and some groups also narrower heads in the length-breadth ratio without the differences being particularly noticeable.
Pronounced differences can be seen in the soft parts of the face. In the case of Jews, to some extent (more commonly in the case of young people and the female sex), the "almond eye" characteristic of the oriental race is found. The inner comer of the eye is inclined to be round, while the outer comer is inclined to be pointed and turned up toward the outside. The upper lid is often described as thickened and of a heavy appearance.
In most cases the lips are somewhat fleshy, often puffed up, and above all the outward-hanging lower lip is noticeable, which is in conjunction with the high position of the furrow of the lower chin lip.
The "Jewish nose" has been described rather often. It is characterized by the fact that the tip of the nose is hook-shaped and beat downward and the sides of the nose are drawn upward. Viewed from the side, the shape of a "6" thus results with a stroke extended upwards. The sides of the nose are characterized by a special fleshiness, the cartilage of the tip of the nose is rather thick and the nasal septum sags downwards. Only a minority of Jews have this nasal form, which, for example, is not only characteristic of Jews but also the Near Eastern race. In addition to the course, thick and hooked "Jewish nose" there is also found the narrow, gently curved nose of the oriental race.
The ear is often described as especially "fleshy," relatively large and jughandle-like.
The skin of the Jews is often lacking in a ruddy color and of a light yellow, dull color, which often appears especially light in contrast to the dark color of the hair.
According to more recent investigations, the various human races are differentiated in the patterns of the side lines of the finger tips, and probably also of the surfaces of the hands and feet. From a table compiled by Fischer it is to be observed that the Jews occupy a special position among the European groups; they have more of the whorl pattern and less of the loop pattern. The pattern formation of the skin lines is essentially determined by special hereditary factors, it is completed after the first two to three months of the development of the embryo and it is not alterable by later environmental influences. Thus, a new proof of the distinct racial position of the Jews is to be seen in this observed difference from the European nations, which is greatest in contrast to the predominantly Nordic nations.
The color of the hair and of the eyes is darker on the average than in our case. Hair colors between brown and black and brown eyes are encountered most frequently. For many Jewish groups, a relatively large portion of red-haired persons is alleged (between 3% and 6% according to Martin), while in the case of Virchow's investigation of school children only 0.5% of Jewish children were observed to be red-haired. Redness of hair is often associated with strikingly white skin and an increased formation of freckles. Blond hair and blue eyes are not a rarity amongst Jews, however. In the case of the investigation of school children during the years 1874-1877 initiated by Virchow, amongst all school children in the German Empire, including the Jewish children, there were found 31.8% with light skin, blond hair and blue eyes, and amongst the Jewish children alone there were 11.17%. Altogether, children with dark skin, dark hair and dark eyes were found at a ratio of 14.35%, while the ratio was 42% amongst the Jewish school children.
The question does not have to be discussed here in detail as to whether the blond people and the people with light eyes were to be found with a similar frequency amongst the Jews even of ancient times or whether they were absorbed by the Jews at a later time. I concur with Günther's view that a strain of the Nordic race must not be seen as a primary factor in the light pigments amongst the Jews, but that it is mostly a matter of strains of the East Baltic race. Fischer also thinks of a mutational new origin of the hereditary makeup.
The form of the head hair in the case of Jews is less frequently straight and more frequently twisted in a spiral manner than is the case with German ethnic groups. The black head hair, which is twisted in a closely spiral manner and which is still occasionally encountered amongst Jews, is viewed as a result of an earlier Negroid admixture.
The body hair cover and the beard growth are often especially strong amongst Jews. Occasionally the border of the head hair ends in a downward point over the middle of the forehead.
The differences in characteristics of movement and gestures are more difficult to set forth in an objective, scientific manner than the differences in morphological characteristics, although the former, in particular, are especially strongly noticeable as a pure impression and are also striking to the layman. The fact that the Jews are different from us in typical movements and gestures is not doubted by Jews themselves. I quote two statements by Walther Rathenau: "A strange vision! In the midst of German life a separate, foreign kind of human beings, brilliantly and strikingly attired, with a hot-blooded, mobile behavior! An Asiatic horde on the sand of the March [i.e., Brandenburg]!" In another passage he says of the Jew: "It is difficult for him to find the happy mean between tail-wagging subordination and nasty arrogance." We have already spoken of the general lax body stance. Günther describes [the following] as characteristic: "The movements of the head often have a rocking aspect, just as the movements of the shoulder area, which gives the impression of something padded in the case of many Jews. In the case of many Jews the head appears pushed forward along with the neck, so that the collar is at some distance from the neck." "The arm movements of many Jews are characterized by the fact that the upper arm is closer to the thorax down to the elbow, while the lower arm gives a lively accompaniment to speaking with its movements." An alert observer will recognize the Jew amongst people on the street by his gait and by movements, even in the case of actors. The fact that in the kind of movement of a human being there is much which is hereditary, and thus of racial origin, has been demonstrated by observations of families and twins as well as comparative racial studies.
It is difficult to answer the question as to what extent the peculiar manner of speaking of many Jews, the "jabbering," must be viewed as an hereditary tendency or as something which has originated through education and other environmental influences.
It has also been claimed by various sources that the Jews are characterized by a particular "racial scent." It is difficult to judge what is attributable in this regard to environmental influences, such as living quarters, clothing, occupational activity, cleaning of the body and the composition of food; one need only think of the consumption of garlic, which the Jews like. The secretion of odorous substances takes place through the so-called apocrine glands, which form part of the sweat glands and are differentiated from the sweat glands by several features. They are to be found only at particular places on the body. They are supposed to be present to a greater extent among the colored races and the Jews, especially of the female sex (Leven, according to Schubert).
It has thus far been impossible to distinguish between Jews and non-Jews on the basis of the characteristics of their blood. In 1925 Manoiloff published an article, according to which he believes he can distinguish between the blood of Jews and that of Russians on the basis of a different coloration with cresol violet. Further data on the process have not been published. Subsequent investigations appear to have been without success. The investigation of blood groups, which was all the rage for a while, has not furnished us with any new method for differentiating human races. Only the proportion of the blood group hereditary characteristics is different in the racial groups. In this incidence the Jews occupy a position between Near Eastern and oriental groups, which is quite in keeping with our conception of the racial origin of Jews. The Jews are differentiated from the German population only by a somewhat higher proportion of blood group B.
On the whole, from the comparison of physical racial characteristics it is clear that the Jews living in Germany are quite distinct from the German population. Since it is a question of characteristics which are quite essentially genetically determined, the observed difference cannot be caused by external influences of any kind; the difference can only be explained by the different racial origin of the Germans on the one hand and of the Jews on the other hand. The characteristics which are considered typical of the present-day Jew and by which we can recognize him in his outward appearance, point to the Near Eastern and oriental-Mediterranean races. Hence, the results of research on racial history and those of the racial-biological examination of the Jews of the present time are in keeping with each other. The racial types of the Near Eastern and oriental races, known as Ashkenazim and Sephardim are still found today amongst the European Jews. The Ashkenazic type is the predominant one amongst the Jews in Germany.
Obviously, it must not be expected that every Jew can be classified as one of these types; this is possible only for a minority of them. Quite incorrectly there has been a tendency to see in this circumstance an "adaptation" to the environment or the host populations!
The distribution of racial characteristics and the divergence from typical combinations of characteristics in the present-day populations is a rather general phenomenon. Let us simply consider our own nation: How many exhibit in their physical appearance, for example (not to mention at all the psychological characteristics), the "pure" type of the Nordic race, which, after all, forms the basic component of our entire nation? If a group of people of another race is absorbed in another population (let us assume of an originally uniform race) and if finally a state of being completely mixed comes about, then the correlation between the characteristics of the two races is dissolved, that is, for example, the characteristic of blue eyes of the first race as well as the characteristics of dolichocephalism and smooth hair of the first race can be combined just as with the characteristics of brachycephalism and wavy hair of the second race. The frequency with which such "harmonic" or "unharmonic" combinations occur is then determined only by the frequency of the characteristics. In the case of the individual person, then, (in a state of being completely mixed) the presence of other characteristics of this race cannot be ascertained off hand from the one characteristic. For this reason the heritage of the Nordic race must not be sought in special "purity" only in those who conform to the racial pattern in the characteristics of the external physical type. Someone can display "defects" in comparison with this racial pattern (such as a round head or brown eyes) and still be quite preponderantly of the Nordic race; and vice versa a good Nordic type can exhibit in one instance a complete lack of Nordic characteristics in his psychological behavior.
On the basis of these general racial-biological investigations we understand the lack of uniformity in the physical racial pattern of the Jews. Various racial springs have flowed together in them. For that reason "pure" types of the Near Eastern race or oriental race are now only seldom to be found amongst them. Most Jews can indeed be recognized as to their racial origin and type by several physical characteristics. [Being a member of a foreign race cannot be circumvented by "assimilation." For that reason Jews who favor assimilation (Assimilationsjuden) are especially inclined to admit the possibility of the change of racial characteristics by the environment.] However, there are also Jews who cannot be recognized as such by their external appearance. Mind you, those are not, for instance, especially well "adapted" and especially slightly "Jewish" Jews! They are types of combinations which have simply remained free of the physical characteristics by which we recognize the Jew externally. There are not any indications of the other Jewish characteristics, especially the psychological ones, which can be inferred from them. It is therefore of little consequence whether prominent persons of intellectual Jewry can be recognized as Jews also in their purely physical characteristics or not. [There are rare cases of Jews by religion who are not Jews by race; under those circumstances, however, the conversion of the parents or grandparents, illegitimate origin or, if not those, adoption must be proved.]
We cannot cover the racial-biological problem of the Jews completely until we have examined the sicknesses and the normal psychological characteristics of Jews.
The different ways in which two human races are afflicted by diseases can be caused by three different groups of factors:
1. Pathological racial traits. Just as there are normal traits which characterize a race and differentiate it from the other human races, a racial difference can also be defined in terms of pathological hereditary traits. Up to the present there is no pathological hereditary trait known which occurs only in one race and in no other races. For that reason all differences of pathological racial traits can only be expressed in the different frequency of pathological hereditary traits.
2. Racial predisposition. A human race is characterized by the common possession of hereditary characteristics by which it differentiates itself from other races. A certain constitution of the whole body as well as of individual organs is necessarily concomitant with a particular susceptibility or, also, resistance in the presence of certain pathogenic influences. As a result of this the statistics give a varied frequency of diseases; the course of the disease and the kind of clinical picture can also bear a particular stamp in accordance with the racial predisposition.
3. Externally caused differences. Differences of two races in contracting illnesses can also be only apparently racially caused: Makeup of the soil, climatic conditions, exposure to infection, habitation, clothing, nutrition and occupational activity are seldom the same in the case of two races. However, in the evaluation of racial-pathological data they require extremely great attention.
In the following section only such observations are listed which have been confirmed by repeated investigations and which cannot find their explanation in various environmental influences.
The special need for physicians and the fear of disease on the part of Jews is confirmed by nearly all observers. Weissenburg speaks of nosophilia and nosophobia of Jews. Psychopathic and in nervous persons go to their physicians more frequently, even on account of imagined illnesses, and, on the other hand, just the fear of sickness rather frequently leads to actually becoming sick. There is thus a close, alternating relationship of cause and effect. The especially strong sensitivity to pain on the part of Jews has also been noted.
The average life expectancy is a somewhat longer one in the case of Jews and correspondingly the mortality rate is lower, From this circumstance, we cannot conclude that Jews have a greater vitality, for instance. The statistical averages are strongly influenced by the mortality rates of infants and small children, which are lower in the case of Jews. However, this is essentially concomitant with the social milieu and the lower numbers of children of the Jews. Quite generally there exists a close connection between the number of children and the mortality ratios of infants and small children. A comparison of the age distribution, however, also shows a somewhat greater proportion of the highest age groups amongst the Jews. The cause of this must probably be seen in the fact that the Jews go to their physicians more frequently and sooner. Furthermore, they are afflicted by occupational injuries to a smaller extent.
The lower frequency of various infectious diseases amongst Jews must be explained as a result of the same factors, with the exception of tuberculosis, in the case of which a more profound cause is to be assumed. According to consistent statistical data concerning the occurrence of tuberculosis in Jews and non-Jews in various countries with various non-Jewish populations, and also taking into account the given social conditions, the results are consistent: In the case of Jews, the mortality from tuberculosis is a lower one, the course of the disease is slower and more favorable, less frequently do there come about exudative decomposition processes and more frequently there are found benign forms contained by the formation of connective tissue. It is well known that for the contracting of tuberculosis in a human being, and in particular for the course of the disease, an hereditary predisposition is of significantly contributing importance. On the basis of general epidemiological experiences, tuberculosis exhibits the character of an acute epidemic with a preponderantly rapid and grave course in the case of ethnic groups which come in contact with it for the first time. During the course of generations the sickness takes on more and more the character of a chronic, insidious ethnic epidemic. Those who are predisposed are killed off by the disease with an increased incidence, in large part before the end of their reproductive age. For that reason the number of those who are resistant increases more and more in the population. There comes about that which is called a selective resistance. The Jews are now the race which has been exposed longest of all the races to the conditions of urban life. For that reason this race has been subjected longest to the selection process just described. The result is a genuine racial characteristic.
From the field of internal illnesses the frequency of diabetes in Jews is best known. For that reason diabetes has even been designated as the "Jewish disease." Having diabetes and dying from it are about four times as frequent in the case of Jews as in non-Jews. Nutritional factors are of significance in the occurrence of diabetes. The decline of the disease during the famine years of the war and the postwar period is well known. A sufficient explanation for the difference between Jews and non-Jews is not furnished by that circumstance. The greater frequency of marriage of related persons in the case of Jews has been pointed out, by which recessive hereditary diseases appear more frequently. There is no doubt about the fact that bearers of rare recessive hereditary diseases are especially frequently the products of marriages between related persons. In this connection, however, diabetes is not a rare hereditary disease. In addition to the recessive hereditary process there is also the dominant one. For that reason I am inclined to assume that the hereditary tendency to diabetes occurs more frequently amongst Jews than amongst non-Jews.
Two further grave metabolic diseases, Gaucher's disease and Niemann-Pick's disease, in the case of which the metabolism of fatty substances is impaired, occur with greater frequency in Jews. A special form of grave feeble-mindedness, amaurotic idiocy, also belongs in the group of disturbances of the lipoid metabolism. The infantile form of this disease occurs predominantly in Jews from the East.
Diseases of the blood vessels, especially arteriosclerosis, are said to occur more frequently in Jews. As a result of the arteriosclerosis of certain leg vessels there occurs a disease which is known as intermittent limping. It has been observed especially frequently in Jews. Spontaneous gangrene, a gangrene of the limbs resulting from disturbances of the vessels, is also especially common in Jews.
The problem of race and cancer has frequently been worked on. A number of things which were originally viewed as racial difference have been explained differently when subjected to critical examination. Thus, much which was reported about differences between Jews and non-Jews should not be considered. No differences exist in the frequency of cancer. On the other hand, the places attacked by it are perhaps not the same in the case of individual races. There are consistent reports from numerous observers concerning the low frequency of cancer of the uterus in Jewesses.
In the national census of handicapped people of 1925 more blind and deaf-mute persons were enumerated amongst Jews than in the rest of the population. This difference is to be attributed principally to a greater frequency of hereditary blindness and deafness amongst Jews. A more exact differentiation on the basis of the particular causative hereditary diseases is not yet possible. The only certain observation is the more frequent occurrence of glaucoma in Jews. Astigmatism is also reputed to be more frequent in Jews.
All investigators agree on a greater frequency of nervous and mental diseases in the case of the Jews. The organic nervous diseases are quite scarce and a statistical comparison is difficult for that reason. According to various reports Parkinson's disease (paralysis agitans) is especially common in Jews, while hereditary St. Vitus' dance is supposed to occur less commonly. Organic tics and bilateral athetoses, as well as hemicranic and neuralgic diseases, appear more frequently in Jews. Special investigations have been concerned with the shaping of the clinical picture of paralysis. During these it was noticed that in the case of the Jews the cheerfully excited, manic conditions occurred more commonly. More frequent were also sensory delusions, hypochondria imaginations and symptoms of a sexual-erotic nature (Gutmann).
Schizophrenia is strikingly more frequent among Jews. According to statistics from Polish insane asylums, among insane Jews schizophrenia is twice as common as among insane Poles (Becker). Atypical patterns are quite frequently found amongst the Jewish schizophrenics. Several observers have found hysterical reactions in schizophrenics. According to another observation the schizophrenic form of the disease is supposed to be more common amongst Jews. Since it is a matter of a hereditary disease in the case of schizophrenia which comes about rather independently of external influences, the more frequent occurrence of the disease in Jews must be viewed as a racial characteristic.
Manic-depressive insanity is also found to be more frequent amongst Jews, but the difference between Jews and non-Jews is not as great as in the case of schizophrenia. Here, too, atypical clinical pictures with hysterical admixtures are more frequent. From the Munich clinic, Lange reports that the disease occurs more frequently in Jews before the twentieth year of life and that it takes a graver course. In the case of the melancholy disorders, hypochondriac illusions are of great importance, a grumbling, gross and dissatisfied behavior is more frequent and ideas of persecution and impoverishment play a considerable rôle, while guilt complexes play a lesser rôle. Frequent were self-reproaches about the family, the business and personal assets; ideas of religious shortcomings were completely lacking. In the case of the manic disorders, which relatively frequently occur amongst Jews, the disturbance of thinking very often went as far as a case of disintegration. There was often lacking the actually happy phase, in place of which there occurred vexed, gross dissatisfaction, with slander, quarreling, arrogant behavior and frequent paranoid ideas. Lange sees in his observations a relation to the normal dispositional characteristics of Jews: Their need for medical attention, anxiety, insufficient physical skill, preoccupation with profit, their lack of imagination (monotony of the clinical pictures), their critical attitude toward everything, the preference for extremes, the exaggerated expressive movements and, with regard to the lack of guilt complexes, the fact that the Jews are either orthodox or, indifferent with regard to religion.
From numerous statistics there are consistent reports about the scarcity of epilepsy amongst the European Jews. The attempt has been made to explain this fact by the likewise seldom occurrence of alcoholism in Jews. It was believed that alcoholism was an important factor in epilepsy. Today we view the connections between alcoholism and epilepsy differently inasmuch as we know that the most important cause of true epilepsy is a pathological hereditary predisposition. In most cases, too, serious and chronic alcoholism comes about on the basis of a hereditary psychopathic constitution. The concomitance of alcoholism and epilepsy in one family must therefore be sought, essentially, in an at least partial, equal or similar pathological hereditary predisposition. Hence, there appears to me to exist a connection between the less frequent occurrence of epilepsy and alcoholism in Jews. The causative pathological hereditary tendencies appear to be scarcer amongst them.
A comparison of the incidence of feeble-mindedness in two groups of human beings involves great difficulties. Very careful investigations were necessary in order to obtain usable statistics for the German ethnic groups. Various observers assume a greater frequency of congenital feeble-mindedness in the case of Jews in comparison with non-Jews. In particular, grave forms of feeble-mindedness appear to be more frequent in Jews. It is possibly a question of particular hereditary types (Schottky).
In general there are reports concerning the special frequency of psychopathy and neurasthenia in Jews. Buschan is of the opinion that the majority of Jews are neurasthenics and Ziemssen is of the opinion that "there is a neurotic character through the whole Jewish ethnic group" (according to Schottky). It is certainly no coincidence, but rather a result of a racial characteristic that psychoanalysis originates, in essence, with Jewish authors and that Freud has made sexuality, and Adler has made the drive for prestige and power the central aspect of their doctrines on neuroses. Hysterical phenomena are also supposed to be especially common in Jews.
Even if we observed a lower proportion of Jews amongst alcoholics, addiction to morphine and cocaine is found more frequently amongst them than in the case of non-Jews. In choice of the narcotic the psychological makeup is of considerable importance and its inheritability is quite characteristic: In families of alcoholics only alcoholism, and in the families of morphine addicts only morphinism is found to be clustered.
From 1849 to 1907 the frequency of suicide in Jews increased by sevenfold. While suicides were formerly less frequent amongst Jews than non-Jews, they are more frequent today. There has been an inclination to make emancipation, with its decline of religious restrictions, responsible for that fact. However, only persons with psychopathic and neurotic tendencies will react in such a manner to such a change in their external condition.
A typical difference betweens Jews and non-Jews is manifested in the kinds of criminal behavior. According to earlier statistics, the Jews in Germany were less frequently involved in punishable acts than the remaining population. Lenz views in this circumstance a confirmation of the rule that intelligence prevents a person from transgressions to a certain extent. He adds "that it keeps a person from getting caught to an even greater extent." A considerably lower incidence of crime is found amongst Jews in the case of bodily injury and larceny but they are sentenced far more than average for slander, fraud and forgery. In addition to social position and occupation, racial psychological differences are certainly of considerable importance here.
The characteristics which have just been discussed already lie on the border between the pathological and normal. In themselves, they throw light on the problem of intellectual traits and traits of character of Jews. If I were to give a detailed discussion of this topic I would be going beyond the limits of this paper. I am able to forego this all the more inasmuch as the intellectual nature of Jews, especially as it is manifested in outstanding representatives of Jewry, is the theme and content of numerous papers which were given, at our working meetings and are published in the two volumes [I and II] of the Forschungen zur Judenfrage (Studies on the Jewish Problem). I also refer to the exposition by Lenz in Menschliche Erblehre (Human Genetics) by Baur, Fischer and Lenz (4th edition, 1936, pp. 746 ff.).
This general and basic observation can be made: The Jews have preserved a rather high degree of uniformity, particularly in their intellectual traits and traits of character, and have not only kept a distance from their host populations at all times, but have accented their differences. The fact that they have maintained themselves as an ethnic group without a country and as a community in spite of dispersion throughout the world through two-millennia must be ascribed to their psychological nature in particular. The attempt has been made to portray the psychological characteristics of the Jews as a result of the milieu in which they live, grow up and are educated. Numerous Jewish authors are especially energetic in trying to deny the connection between race and culture. The basic resolution of this question has been made on the basis of modern genetic research on man: It can no longer be contested that the psychological characteristics in man, just as the physical ones, are essentially determined in their development by hereditary tendencies. The results of research on twins in particular have had in this case an elucidating and clarifying effect. [This, however, could not prevent a series of Jewish speakers at the last international congress for demographics in Paris in 1937 from ignoring these research results in order to stay in line with the prejudiced hypothesis of the environmental causation of all cultural achievements. The manner of delivery which characterized the German and Jewish speakers gave the best demonstration of the subject of "race and culture" to every attentive and objective observer!] The psychological differences between Germans and Jews are caused by a different hereditary makeup, i.e., by a different racial origin.
The racial characteristics (physical and mental) of the Jews of the present day are probably explainable to a considerable extent on the basis of the origin of the Jews from the geographical area of the Near Eastern and Oriental races. However, the present-day Jews are different from the ethnic groups now living in this area. The profound contrast between Arabs and Jews in Palestine also has a racial root! Jewry possesses a distinct racial nature which is found in no other groups of people and which therefore appears to justify our speaking of Jews as a race. Of course, we must keep clearly in mind that the Jews are not one of the races which we designate as "systemic races" because they form a group in the genetic system of mankind. Humanity, however, is in a constant state of development which leads to the formation of new races, i.e., to reproductive groups which are differentiated from other people by the common possession of certain genetic traits.
The Jews have "bred" their race themselves. This particular objective might have been a conscious one only amongst a few of their leaders. We can forego the discussion of that here. However, it is a fact that in most cases the Jews have reproduced themselves by strong inbreeding. The absorption of rather large groups of people of other races into Jewry has been a rare occurrence. Individual conversions to Judaism, for example as a result of marriage, have certainly occurred more frequently than is generally supposed. The absorption of individuals into Judaism did not take place haphazardly but were guided by a selective process. One need only think, for example, of how the choice of a marital partner was determined by social and occupational objectives in the peasantry, nobility and middle class and how the formation of groups of people is determined as a result of intellectual objectives by which people of a certain makeup are attracted. The occupational types are the best example of this. As a result, I believe that only people of a certain type feel attracted by Judaism and could decide on conversion to it, people in particular who felt related to Judaism on the basis of their intellectual and psychological makeup. (It may only seldom have been physical reasons.) in this sense, the element which was absorbed into Jewry was not "foreign."
In addition to this selection of admissions into Jewry, there are selective processes, perhaps even more important ones, to which Jewry has been subject for more than 2,000 years. The following environmental circumstances appear to me to be of special importance in the determining of the direction of the selective process:
1. For over 2,000 years Jews have been living far from the natural attachments to a certain region. Perhaps there were specific racial traits which led the Jews into the diaspora even in ancient times and caused them to live in cities. Even at that time the Jews must have been especially well adapted to urban life; otherwise he would not have been able to preserve himself and increase his numbers. Other races perish in the city, they cannot live without a close attachment to nature and they need a home, a piece of soil to which they feel attached.
2. The Jews prefer to be active in the commercial occupations, not as a result of an external compulsion but as a result of an inner nature; that has frequently been demonstrated. By selection of marital partners and the selective process involving life and reproduction tied in with occupation selection, an "enrichment" of such traits comes about and thus a stronger emphasis of the original character.
3. As a result of their Talmudic education, the Jews were kept at a purely formal, logical intellectual activity. A certain direction of education not only leaves its stamp on people because certain attributes develop while others are repressed, but it also influences the choice of an occupation and the social stratification. The kind of person who corresponds to the educational ideal is the more successful in life. With this, in turn, there is a reproductive selection.
4. A specific religious-ethnic idea of being a chosen people has constantly given Jewry an intellectual exclusivity, which reinforced the isolation from other peoples and favored the preservation of their own racial peculiarity.
By means of such selection processes, the intellectual type of the Jew in particular has been preserved and constantly shaped anew, while the physical type has remained less uniform. The effect of these selective processes has also become clear through the investigation of the sicknesses of the Jews: The selective resistance of the Jews to tuberculosis is a result of urban life, likewise the pathological hereditary tendencies to metabolic disturbances, blindness, deaf-muteness and above all nervous and mental diseases, since such hereditary tendencies are more frequently eradicated under the conditions of a natural rural life. The specific mentality of Jews has as its result the concentration of hereditary traits which, in turn, lead to the more frequent manifestation of psychopathic and neuropathic conditions and endogenous psychoses.
The Jew is the specific type of the urban human being, that is, of a human being who no longer has an inner connection with the natural foundations of life and who no longer lives from instinct or the subconscious, but rather only believes and views as his world that which he can grasp with his reason. In such a despiritualized world there is no room for faith, for genuine, unselfish, devoted love and for respect. There are also urban people of other races. However, do we not readily sense them as "Jewish?" It is not a coincidence that the people who have entered into marriages with Jews are quite preponderantly urban people.
The danger which Jewry meant for the German population was a double one:
1. By excessive racially foreign influence the preservation of the character of our people was threatened. The complete racial separation of Germans and Jews was an absolute necessity for that reason.
2. The excessive intellectually Jewish foreign influence sought to introduce principles of living and selection which were favorable for the preservation of Jewry, but would have meant the decline of our people. For that reason the racial separation of Germans and Jews has the national separation as a requisite.