5 Feet of Fury

David Cole on Holocaust-ianity

David Cole writes:

For a quarter century, I’ve been warning about “Holocaust sacredness,” the desire to turn the Holocaust into a quasi-religion, complete with state-sponsored anti-blasphemy laws. Whenever I attempt to argue against Holocaust sacredness, I’m inevitably called a “denier.” But this has nothing to do with denial. It doesn’t even have anything to do with revisionism. It’s merely about not turning an episode of human history into religious dogma.

Initially, Holocaust sacredness was intended to be by Jews for Jews, a tool to maintain tribal identity and cohesion in a secular society (according to a recent Pew poll, 73% of all Jews believe that the single most essential thing about being Jewish is “remembering the Holocaust”)

And that is idolatry.

And considering the fact that the first two commandments — the ones Moses brought down from Sinai — condemn idolatry, that is also… irony.