Volume II – The Seeds of Hate
Chapter 5 – The Birth of German Nationalism
The revolutions of 1848 had promised a new Germany: free, united, and equal. On barricades from Berlin to Frankfurt, students, workers, and intellectuals fought for a constitution that would sweep away the old order of princes and kings. Among them were Jews, who carried stones and rifles beside Christians, believing the dream of liberty belonged to all.
But the dream collapsed. Soldiers crushed uprisings. Kings reasserted their thrones. And though Jews had bled for freedom, many nationalists now muttered that the revolution had failed because of them. The new Germany, they decided, must be pure, rooted in blood, language, and faith, and the Jew could not belong.
The Failure of 1848
In Frankfurt, where the short-lived Parliament convened, Jewish delegates had taken their seats for the first time in German history. They spoke passionately of equality, of building a Germany for all its sons. Yet when the Parliament dissolved in defeat, pamphlets circulated accusing Jews of undermining the cause.
In Munich, Matthias Keller sat in a tavern, listening to men complain of betrayal. "The Jew was there, whispering in the ears of liberals," one declared. "He turned brother against brother."
Matthias, now a father with grown sons, repeated these words at home. His eldest, Johann Keller, absorbed them eagerly. For Johann, born into a world of sermons against Jews, the failure of 1848 added a new conviction: Jews were not merely cursed by God, they were enemies of the German nation itself.
The Unification of Germany
Two decades later, Prussia forged unity through blood and iron. Otto von Bismarck defeated Austria, then France, and in 1871 proclaimed the German Empire at Versailles. Crowds in Berlin roared with pride as the Kaiser declared a new age for Germans.
Nationalism swept the land like a tide. Songs, flags, and schools all preached the same message: one people, one language, one destiny. The idea of a German Volk; a national community took root. But it was a community built not only on inclusion but on exclusion.
To be German meant to share blood and faith. Catholics and Protestants quarreled over which tradition defined the nation, but both agreed on one thing: Jews were not part of the Volk. They might carry German passports, but they carried foreign souls.
The Rothschilds and the Fear of Power
In Frankfurt, the Rothschild banking family financed railroads and industrial ventures that knit the empire together. Their wealth made them indispensable to kings and ministers. Yet in nationalist newspapers, they were depicted as parasites, leeching on German labor.
Cartoons showed Jewish bankers seated on sacks of gold while German workers starved. Sermons declared that the Jew, no matter how German he appeared, was a conspirator against the nation.
For young Johann Keller, these images were irresistible. When he saw a Rothschild carriage pass through Munich, he muttered to his friends, "There goes the spider. Always spinning webs over honest folk." His words were a mirror of the newspapers he read, the sermons he heard, the tavern talk he repeated.
Eastern Shadows: The Pogroms
While Germany unified, violence spread in the East. In Russia and Poland, pogroms against Jews became regular eruptions. Entire shtetls were burned; families scattered. Refugees streamed westward, some arriving in Germany.
The Asimov family, fleeing violence in Warsaw, reached Leipzig. They hoped the new Germany would offer security. Instead, they found suspicion. "They bring their poverty," muttered locals, "and their foreign ways." For the Kellers, the sight of bearded Jews from the East reinforced stereotypes preached from pulpits: the Jew was alien, unclean, a perpetual outsider.
Religion and Nationalism Unite
By the 1870s, Church and state had found common ground. Catholic priests warned that Jewish emancipation threatened Christian identity. Protestant pastors declared that Jews were undermining the moral fiber of Germany. Together, religion and nationalism forged a sharper weapon than either had wielded alone.
In Bavaria, the parish priest told his congregation: "God has chosen Germany to be His sword against corruption. But beware, the eternal Jew seeks to pollute our people. Guard your sons, guard your daughters."
Matthias Keller, old and gray, nodded from his pew. His son Johann, sitting beside him, squeezed his own son's shoulder. "Remember this, Karl," he whispered. "It is our duty to protect the Fatherland from them."
Thus hatred was no longer just faith or politics, it became family legacy, carried like an heirloom from grandfather to son, from father to grandson.
The Jewish Struggle for Belonging
Yet many Jews longed to belong. In Berlin, Jewish intellectuals wrote essays proclaiming their love for the Fatherland. They spoke perfect German, wore German clothes, and celebrated German victories. Some even converted to Christianity, hoping baptism would erase suspicion.
But suspicion endured. Converts were derided as hypocrites, their faith dismissed as opportunism. The ghetto walls had fallen, but invisible barriers remained, reinforced by nationalist pride.
Isaac Abramovich, now a lawyer in Strasbourg, faced this wall daily. "We have fought for France and for Germany," he told his wife. "Yet in both lands, we remain strangers. How long before we are permitted to be what we already are citizens?"
His question hung unanswered, even as his children studied Goethe and Schiller in school, even as they waved the German flag.
The Keller Line and the Gathering Tide
By the time the German Empire celebrated its first decade, the Keller family had fully absorbed the creed of nationalism. Matthias passed in 1879, buried with prayers of gratitude for a life of faith and patriotism. His son Johann took his place at the head of the family, repeating the prejudices he had learned in taverns and churches.
Karl Keller, Johann's son, grew into a soldier in the Kaiser's army, proud of his uniform and suspicious of every Jew he encountered. By the 1890s, the family's prejudice was no longer couched in biblical terms alone, it was now dressed in the colors of nationalism.
And it was Karl's own son, Friedrich Keller, born in those very years, who would inherit the full weight of this legacy. Raised on the prayers of his great-grandfather, the warnings of his grandfather, and the nationalism of his father, Friedrich was prepared, though he did not yet know it, for the man he would meet one day: Adolf Hitler.
The birth of German nationalism promised unity and greatness. But for Jews, it marked a narrowing horizon. Every celebration of German pride was shadowed by whispers that they did not belong. Every flag waved in victory cast a shadow over their homes.
For the Kellers, nationalism was a creed as holy as their catechism. For Jewish families; Abramovich in Strasbourg, Asimov in Leipzig, Rothschild in Frankfurt; it was a wall against which their longing for belonging crashed again and again.
By the end of the century, the lines were drawn. Germany had found its nationhood but in defining who was German, it had also declared who was not.
Fused with Darwinian ideas in the late 19th century and how the Keller family, along with young Jewish intellectuals, reacted to this new "scientific" antisemitism?