Hannah Arendt Eichmann In Jerusalem Analysis

Hannah Arendt’s work Eichmann in Jerusalem details the infamous trial of the Nazi bureaucrat Adolf Eichmann. Her work explores a number of different issues that pervaded Western Europe in the 20th century, but the notion of complicity is particularly elucidated. The complicity of Adolf Eichmann, or any German civil worker during the Nazi regime, is certainly a nebulous question. After a lengthy and frustrating trial, Eichmann is convicted of all fifteen counts of the indictment and sentenced to the gallows. The court’s verdict, which was based on facts and thorough examination, indicates that Eichmann was an active agent in the slaughtering of millions of Jews in Europe. Hannah Arendt displays how evil does not always come in the face of a

In his testimony Eichmann declares, “I mention this only to show that myself had no hatred for Jews, for my whole education through my mother and my father had been strictly Christian; my mother, because of her Jewish relatives, held different opinions from those current in S.S. circles” (Arendt 30). Eichmann possessed no ill-will towards Jews and even had Jewish relatives. Thus, an inherent and evil racism cannot explain the cause for the man to act the way he did. Additionally, when Eichmann receives the news that the Third Reich is shifting their approach to the Jewish question he is startled. He proclaims, “In the first moment, I was unable to grasp the significance of what he had said…For I had never thought of such a thing, such a solution through violence. I now lost everything, all joy in my work, all initiative, all interest; I was so to speak, blown out” (Arendt 83-84). The man who took so much pride in his work in an attempt to find a “political solution” to the question of Jews has the life sucked from him when he hears the change of plans. The former ardor for his occupation is washed away at the possibility of violence. Hearing this, why does Eichmann still carry out the orders of his superiors? Thus, the brainlessness and dependence on the thoughts of others of Eichmann again bubbles to the surface. He is a man that has wrapped himself in self-deception, lies, and