Matthes Ziegler

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Matthes Ziegler - before 1933 "Johannes Matthäus Ziegler" and after 1945 "Matthäus Ziegler" - (born June 11, 1911 in Nuremberg ; † August 12, 1992 in Penzberg ) was a German theologian and a leading employee in office during the Nazi era Rosenberg .

biography

Matthäus Ziegler was the son of a foreman in Nuremberg and attended the Reform Realgymnasium there, where he graduated from high school in 1930. As a schoolboy he joined the völkisch youth league eagles and falcons in 1929 . From 1930 he studied German and Protestant theology in Erlangen . On November 1, 1930 he joined the National Socialist German Student Union and on March 1, 1931, the NSDAP ( membership number 786.463) and the SA (member until September 30, 1933). During his studies in 1930 he became a member of the Germania Erlangen fraternity .

In the winter semester of 1931/1932 Ziegler moved to the University of Greifswald , where he became a student of folklorist Lutz Mackensen . Under his care, he began in the summer of 1932 with preparatory work on his philological dissertation "The moral position of women in German and Scandinavian fairy tales" , with which he received his doctorate in 1936 at the University of Greifswald. When Mackensen was appointed to the Herder Institute in Riga in autumn 1932 , he continued his studies of German and Nordic philology and folklore at the German-Baltic University. It was there that he met his future wife, Lilli Freiin von Hoyningen-Huene , whom he married in 1934. This marriage had six children.

In the summer of 1933, Ziegler spent three months in Copenhagen and Lund to collect material for his dissertation, but did not return to Riga.In the autumn of 1933 he moved to the Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität in Berlin and lived in Potsdam. On October 1, 1933, he joined the SS , where he made it to Obersturmbannführer (1944). With his writing Kirche und Reich he recommended himself to various party leaders in 1933 and from then on called himself by the first name Matthes. First, Reich Minister Walther Darré appointed him in his staff office as head of department for Nordic customs .

On the occasion of a tour of an exhibition directed by Ziegler, he met Reichsleiter Alfred Rosenberg in January 1934 . Shortly thereafter, Rosenberg appointed him Reichsamtsleiter in the Rosenberg office , where he took over the management of the archive department for ecclesiastical issues , which was renamed the Office of Philosophical Information in 1937 and the Main Office of Supranational Powers in 1942 . The Department of Folklore and Celebration was subordinate to him. He belonged to the security service of the Reichsführer SS (SD) and was the liaison to all SS and police stations in church matters . In addition, Rosenberg appointed him on May 1, 1934 as chief editor of the National Socialist monthly . He left this position due to an internal dispute in autumn 1939.

The ideological struggle against the churches was one of Ziegler's most important tasks. In September 1934 he resigned from the church and was part of the leadership council of Jakob Wilhelm Hauer's German religious movement. In 1938 Ziegler was involved in a campaign against leading representatives of the Confessing Church , who were subsequently suspended from their church offices and subjected to disciplinary proceedings.

Ziegler was a member of various clubs and associations, such as the Nordic Society and the Lebensborn . In 1937 he became managing director of a working group for German folklore , which emerged from the Rosenberg office and to which, in addition to Ziegler, Walther Darré, Konstantin Hierl , Baldur von Schirach and Heinrich Himmler belonged. He began his military service in 1939 in a propaganda company of the SS and from 1941 had been the party's chief service officer. In October 1944 he was certified as having an exemplary SS attitude and an unconditional National Socialist worldview .

From May 1945 to October 1946 Ziegler was a British prisoner of war. He was also interned for a year as a considerably burdened person, most recently in the Neuengamme internment camp . In November 1947 he was sentenced to four months in prison as a "knowledge criminal".

After his release from prison in 1947, Ziegler called himself again by the first name Matthäus. He initially tried to find accommodation in the Bavarian regional church, but was turned away there. Through an intermediary, Ziegler met Martin Niemöller on January 5, 1948 , who opened up further opportunities for him. He continued his theology studies, which he broke off in 1932, at the Wiesbaden Consistory, where he passed the second exam in October 1949. In November 1949 he was appointed parish assistant in Mörlenbach / Rimbach and had also been pastor there since 1953. In 1955 he had to leave the community after a conflict and went to the denominational institute in Bensheim , where tensions also arose. In 1956 Ziegler was briefly a religion teacher at the Leibniz Realgymnasium in Frankfurt-Höchst . In the same year he became pastor in Langen and remained so until his retirement in 1976. Ziegler then moved to Upper Bavaria and died in Penzberg in 1992 at the age of 81.

Fonts

  • Church and Empire in the Struggle of the Young Generation , Leipzig: Klein 1933 (speeches and essays on the Nordic thought; 6).
  • The German in the Baltic States: compiled for the youth , Langensalza [u. a.]: Beltz 1934 (The German Abroad; 2).
  • Folklore on a racial basis: requirements and tasks , Munich: Zentralverlag der NSDAP, Rather [approx. 1935] (National Socialist Science; 4).
  • Protestantism between Rome and Moscow , Munich: Hoheneichen-Verlag 1937.
  • The woman in fairy tales , Leipzig: Koehler & Amelang, 1937 (German Ahnenerbe, series B, scientific studies; 2).
  • Illusion or reality? Revelation thinking and mythical belief , Munich: Hoheneichen-Verl. 1939.
  • Ed .: Soldiers' faith soldiers honor: a German breviary for Hitler soldiers , Berlin: Nordland-Verlag 1939 (Nordland-Bücherei; 10).
  • Ethnology on a racial basis: requirements and tasks , Munich: Hoheneichen-Verl. 1939.
  • The tasks of the Working Group for German Folklore . In: Ernst Otto Thiele (arrangement): The Germanic heritage in German folk culture. The lectures of the 1st German Folklore Day in Braunschweig , autumn 1938, Munich: Hoheneichen 1939, pp. 7–9.
  • Superstition: a folklore definition of values ​​and terms , Berlin: Stubenrauch 1940 (Stubenrauch's German floor plans. The Black Series = German culture; 2/3).
  • Ed .: As duty ordered: words of our world war poets. Feldpost-Ausgabe , Berlin: Nordland Verlag 1940 (Nordland-Bücherei; 15).
  • What do the world churches say about this war? Certificates and judgments , Berlin: Stollberg [1941].
  • Validity and appropriateness of the Reich Concordat , Darmstadt: voice of the municipality 1956.
  • Angel and demon in the light of the Bible: including non-canonical literature , Zurich: Origo-Verlag 1957 (Doctrine and Symbol; 7).

literature

  • Helge Dvorak: Biographical Lexicon of the German Burschenschaft. Volume I: Politicians. Volume 8: Supplement L – Z. Winter, Heidelberg 2014, ISBN 978-3-8253-6051-1 , pp. 391-393.
  • Manfred Gailus : From Rosenberg's "believing in God" church fighter to Pastor Niemöller's "believing in Christ": Matthes Ziegler's wonderful changes in the 20th century . In: Zeitschrift für Geschichtswwissenschaft , 54, 2006, pp. 937–973.
  • Michael Grüttner : Biographical Lexicon on National Socialist Science Policy (= Studies on Science and University History. Volume 6). Synchron, Heidelberg 2004, ISBN 3-935025-68-8 , pp. 188-189.
  • Ernst Klee : Personal Lexicon Third Reich. Who was what before and after 1945. Fischer Taschenbuch, Frankfurt am Main 2005, ISBN 3-596-16048-0 .
  • Hannjost Lixfeld: The ideological folklore of the office Rosenberg and their science theorist Matthes Ziegler. In: Wolfgang Jacobeit u. a. (Ed.): Völkische Wissenschaft: Forms and tendencies of German and Austrian folklore in the first half of the 20th century, Vienna a. a .: Böhlau 1994, ISBN 9783205982081 , pp. 192-204.
  • Hannjost Lixfeld : Matthes Ziegler and the narrative research of the Rosenberg office. A contribution to the ideology of National Socialist folklore . Rheinisches Jahrbuch für Volkskunde , 26, 1985, pp. 37–59.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ A b Ernst Piper : Alfred Rosenberg. Hitler's chief ideologist. Munich 2005, p. 338, ISBN 3-89667-148-0 ; the name form before 1933 is documented by Wolfgang Jacobeit : Völkische Wissenschaft. Forms and tendencies of German and Austrian folklore in the first half of the 20th century. Dedicated to Helmut Paul Fielhauer. Böhlau, Wien 1994, p. 299, note 417, with reference to the man's SS files in the BDC , there self-written curriculum vitae.
  2. ↑ Manfred Gailus, Hartmut Lehmann (eds.), National Protestant Mentalities in Germany , Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht , Göttingen 2005, p. 249
  3. ↑ often also "Special staff ideological information in Berlin"
  4. ^ Ulrich Hunger: Runenkunde in National Socialism . In: Uwe Puschner, G. Ulrich Großmann: Völkisch und national . Darmstadt 2009, p. 316
  5. ^ Ernst Piper: Alfred Rosenberg , Pantheon Verlag 2007, p. 407
  6. ↑ Manfred Gailus, Brother Ziegler , DIE ZEIT No. 8, February 15, 2007, p. 92
  7. ^ Michael H. Kater , The "Ahnenerbe" of the SS, 1935–1945: a contribution to the cultural policy of the Third Reich . Oldenbourg, Munich 2006, p. 141
  8. ↑ His writings Church and Empire in the Struggle of the Young Generation (Klein, Leipzig 1933), Protestantism between Rome and Moscow ( Hoheneichen-Verlag , Munich 1937), Illusion or Reality? (Hoheneichen-Verlag, Munich 1939), ethnography on a racial basis (Hoheneichen-Verlag, Munich 1939), soldier belief, soldier honor ( Nordland-Verlag , Berlin 1940) and what do the world churches say about this war? (Stollberg, Berlin 1941) were placed on the list of literature to be sorted out in the Soviet occupation zone . See literature list 1946 and literature list 1947
personal data
SURNAME Ziegler, Matthes
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Ziegler, Johannes Matthäus (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German theologian and National Socialist
DATE OF BIRTH June 11, 1911
PLACE OF BIRTH Nuremberg
DATE OF DEATH August 12, 1992
Place of death Penzberg