This is one of many remarkable documents from the 20th century that are only now coming
to light.
Hitler usually had a formal dinner party every evening, to which he invited staff officers,
party officials and important guests. During these dinners der Fuehrer would hold forth on
various topics. He was so enamored of his own brilliance that he decided these pearls of
wisdom should be recorded for posterity. In those days, of course, recording equipment
was very elaborate and cumbersome, so he simply ordered a stenographer to write down
everything that was said. These notes were then turned over to Party Chief Martin
Bormann to type up, edit and lock away. Since the conversations were private and
unstructured, Hitler expressed himself freely, confident that no one else would even know of
their existence – his intention being to some day use them as notes for his final magnum
opus. But things didn’t work out quite as he had planned, and the files eventually fell into
the hands of collectors. In 1951 a radically edited version of these notes was published in
German by an admirer. In 1952, partial chronological versions were printed in both French
and English, but it wasn’t until 1980 that a complete German version was compiled, which
became the basis for the present English translation.
The book finally resolves one of the great enigmas of the last century: What was Hitler’s
true attitude about religion? As it turns out, the primary reason for this confusion was that
the dictator was a master of duplicity. In all his public statements Hitler always represented
himself as a devout Christian. He bragged about being born and raised a Catholic; he
was an altar boy; he attended parochial school; he claimed to have received his mission in
life through a vision of the Virgin Mary; he arranged a treaty with the Vatican which
provided many special privileges for the Catholic Church, including state funding,
compulsory religious indoctrination of all school children, and a ban on any criticism of
Christianity. All the Church had to do in return was to say prayers for Germany and the
Fuehrer at every Mass and public occasion, but most importantly it must not criticize any of
his policies. In general, both sides adhered to the terms of the treaty, although they
complained equally about violations by the other. In addition to his Concordat with the
Catholics, Hitler made similar arrangements with the (Lutheran) German Evangelical
Church to provide state funding for their activities. He used the Maltese Cross as a
symbol of the Wehrmacht, and embossed “Gott mit uns” (God with us) on the belt buckle of
every soldier. The swastika itself was an ancient religious symbol. He claimed that the
Holy Roman Empire was the first great Reich; the Bismarck Empire was the second
Reich, and his Third Reich would purify and restore Christian civilization to the decadent
continent. When he twice escaped assassination attempts, he announced that God had
saved him for the completion of his holy mission. His home was filled with religious
artifacts and, while it is true that he never attended Mass, he missed no photo-op to
appear with Church officials in full regalia. His speeches were filled with religious
references and, through the Ministry of Propaganda, movies and radio programs always
promoted “God and Country.”
Against all this, the Allies were highly motivated to depict him as an atheist, in order to
whip up religious fervor against him. All the evidence just cited was carefully suppressed
and false statements were constantly attributed to him, both during the war, and afterward.
So wherein lies the truth?
The truth is that Hitler despised Christianity, but he felt that it was a necessary evil in order
to keep the ignorant masses under control. He cites all the usual criticisms of Christian
doctrine with which we are familiar. But then he goes off on tangents that are just as loopy
as the racial theories with which he was obsessed. He thought of himself as ultra-scientific
and rigorously rational. But he had no higher education and no understanding of either
science or philosophy. In fact, he was highly anti-intellectual and hated professors as much
as priests. This kind of semi-educated person is often the source of crackpot ideas, and
Hitler had no shortage of them.
His one overriding assumption was that virtually every nationality constituted a separate
“race,” and that each race had instinctive behavioral characteristics: The French were
cowardly; the English were greedy; Russians were barbarians, etc. The German race
was, of course, superior in all respects to everyone else and therefore “destined by nature”
to rule the world. He undoubtedly would have denied it vigorously, but his attitude toward
the Jewish “race” was identical to the attitude toward Satan with which he had been
conditioned as a child, i.e., all the “evil” in the world is caused by Jews. Of course, anti-
Semitism had always been an aspect of Christian teaching, so most religious Germans
accepted this lunatic theory as axiomatic.
Hitler was certainly not an atheist. He believed in an anthropomorphic God who was
concerned with human affairs. He believed that this God designed the universe, and had
preplanned the “destiny” of humankind, but that current religious leaders were thwarting
“God’s Will.” He apparently accepted the New Testament as factual and the historicity of
“Jesus Christ.” But where he departs from orthodoxy is that he claimed Jesus was not a
Jew, but the Aryan offspring of a Roman soldier from Gaul. It was Saul the Jew who had
distorted the philosophy of Jesus and turned it into the horror that is the Church today.
Hitler would likely have identified himself as a deist, a non-denominational theist, or
perhaps even a heretical Christian. But he thought the only thing worse than traditional
Christianity was atheistic Communism. With a breathtaking leap of logic, he thought that
Jews created Christianity in order to discredit belief in God, so that people would then be
driven into the hands of Communism. Judaism, Christianity, and Communism were
therefore all part of Satan’s plot to destroy the world, and the True God had chosen Hitler
to save it.
Hitler was a pompous gas-bag, which makes for very soporific reading, but the book is
essential for understanding 20th century history and our world today.
Hitler's Table Talk 1941-1944
Enigma Books, 2000, Second Printing
www.enigmabooks.com
Book Reviews by Milt Timmons
Published in Rational Alternative,
Sept. 2003
Like many others, I first heard of Madalyn Murray when she filed her lawsuit against the
Baltimore Board of Education in 1960, protesting their unconstitutional practice of
requiring students to participate in public prayer. I was thrilled when she appealed the
case to the Supreme Court – and won!
That legal decision triggered a chain reaction of further lawsuits and public debate about
the proper relationship between religion and government that has led directly to today’s
“culture wars” between “red states” and “blue states.”
After hearing her radio program in Los Angeles, sometime in the 1970s, I learned about
a local chapter of American Atheists and immediately joined. Over the years I began to
realize that Madalyn was more interested in advancing her own career than in advancing
the cause of atheism. But I continued to support her because she was the world’s only full-
time professional atheist, and she was the only one doing the kind of work that needed to
be done.
When she and her family disappeared in 1995, I avidly followed the investigation through
every news item and every newsletter from the AA staff. It was with some relief that we all
discovered, on January 28, 2001, that they had not simply absconded with corporation
funds, as had been widely speculated, but that the three chief executives of American
Atheists had indeed been kidnapped, robbed and murdered. Nevertheless, there were
many questions left unanswered.
Ann Seaman’s book finally answers all those nagging questions. This is not an anti-
atheist book; I think it is a well balanced and thoroughly researched biography of a very
complex woman. Seaman appears to have interviewed everyone who ever knew her, or
any of her family, as well as the killers and their families. She had complete access to the
records of the journalist and the private investigator who refused to give up on the case
even after local and federal law enforcement had abandoned it. She even had access to
Madalyn’s diaries, and the complete confession of David Waters, the mastermind of the
entire caper. But as part of his plea bargain, this confession was not available to the
public until after his death from cancer in 2003.
The book is structured like a movie thriller. Seaman opens with the funeral of Madalyn
Murray O’Hair, her son Jon Garth Murray, and the daughter of her other son, later adopted
by Madalyn, Robin Murray O’Hair. Then she flashes back briefly to the trial of Gary Karr,
who was part of the criminal conspiracy, and who fingered David Waters as the ring
leader.
At this point, Seaman begins the biography of Madalyn with histories of her
grandparents, her parents, and of Madalyn’s childhood. She was an unwanted baby, who
was born with a deformed chest, and her family life could charitably be called
dysfunctional. But Madalyn was a survivor; she had a genius level I.Q., and she was
determined to rise above the chaos and deprivations of her background, no matter what.
We follow her life through various jobs, affairs with the fathers of Bill and Jon Garth, her
lawsuit on behalf of Bill, leading to her win in the Supreme Court in 1963 – which was
then followed by so much public hostility that the family had to escape to Hawaii the
following year.
Finding, to their dismay, more Catholics than Buddhists in Hawaii, they would later
escape to Mexico, where she would meet and marry an ex-Marine named Richard O’
Hair. In the meantime, however, Robin made her appearance as the product of one of
Bill’s early marriages, and was then left in the care of Madalyn and Madalyn’s mother.
At this point, we flash back to the childhood of David Waters. His background was
somewhat similar to Madalyn’s, but he chose a criminal path early in life. He also had a
genius level I.Q., but it was accompanied with good looks and charm – which gave him a
sense of entitlement and a sociopathic personality. He was a natural gang leader.
Similarly, we go into the backgrounds of Gary Karr, another career criminal, and Danny
Fry, an alcoholic nebbish who was always looking for easy money.
As we follow Madalyn and Richard from the establishment of the Atheist Center in Austin,
Texas, through her many trials and tribulations, Seaman follows a time line, cutting back
and forth from what Madalyn was doing in a given year, to what Waters, Karr, and Fry
were doing at that time. And like any good movie director, she cuts back and forth more
and more quickly as we approach the climax.
Most of Madalyn’s problems were of her own making, because of her unscrupulous and
overweening ambition, her irascibility, and her abysmal lack of talent as a CEO. But she
was a hard worker, a prolific writer, and dynamic speaker. Ann Seaman details eighteen
of her most important lawsuits regarding the intrusion of religion into government, and her
announced plans for many more. She didn’t expect to win most of these suits; she called
them “educational litigation,” and indeed she succeeded in raising the consciousness of
all Americans regarding the church/state issues we are still fighting. In the history of
freethought, she will occupy a significant place.
What finally happened to the half-million dollars in gold coins that the robbers stole? Ah,
that’s the most satisfying twist of all! I’m sure screenplays are now being drafted. I just
wonder who will be cast to play the part of Madalyn.
America's Most Hated Woman
The Life and Gruesome Death of
Madalyn Murray O'Hair
by
Ann Rowe Seaman
Published in Secular Nation Magazine
Second Quarter, 2005