'Blood and Soil' for Me, But Not For Thee?
Is 'Blood and Soil' really a "fascist definition" for what makes a nation?
One would be hard-pressed to argue that a slogan fitting for Israel would be a ‘Nazi’ one. After all, so much of the Zionist (someone who supports the establishment of an independent Jewish state in Israel) movement since 1896 have insisted that nations are - definitionally - blood and soil.
BLOOD AND SAND
Theodore Herzl is largely credited with the invention of modern Zionism, when he published his pamphlet, Der Judenstaat. The pamplet, the title of which means, “The Jewish State,” held the original title, “An Address to the Rothschilds” (because it was intended as an address to Baron Edmond de Rothschild), but has since been renamed. In it, Herzl envisioned the founding of a Jewish state in Palestine, or secondarily, in Argentina. Rothschild ultimately rejected Herzl’s appeal, because he felt it would bring more persecution upon the Jews than they were already suffering. You can find a copy in English here.
Herzl argued in the pamphlet that the Jewish peoples could not be considered a proper nation without soil. It was already a given, of course, that they would share a blood line going back to Abraham.
Herzl wrote, “It is a national question, which can only be solved by making it a political world-question to be discussed and settled by the civilized nations of the world in council. We are a people—one people.”
A nation, Herzl, thought, was a unified, singular people. This idea was not controversial in the slightest, at the time he wrote it. But Herzl realized that his greatest critics for this scheme would be Jews themselves, who argued that advocating for a nation of blood and soil would impact those who’ve successfully assimilated into other countries.
He wrote of Jews who were content with assimilation, “They would certainly be credited with being assimilated to the very depths of their souls, if they stayed where they were after the new Jewish State, with its superior institutions, had become a reality. The ‘assimilated’ would profit even more than Christian citizens by the departure of faithful Jews; for they would be rid of the disquieting, incalculable, and unavoidable rivalry of a Jewish proletariat, driven by poverty and political pressure from place to place, from land to land.”
The idea of a nation outside of their homeland, he claimed, was absurd. Herzl wrote, “No human being is wealthy or powerful enough to transplant a nation from one habitation to another… ‘Next year in Jerusalem’ is our old phrase.”
As the New York Times put it in a 2007 article, Herzl was of the impression that Israel has always been and must always be, a “nation of blood and sand.”
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NO UNIQUELY NAZI THING
Of course, it’s not false to allege that Blut und Boden (Blood and Soil) was a belief of the Third Reich as to what comprised a nation. It was, after all, a slogan of the Nazi Party. And it’s interesting that Blut and Boden predated the Nazi party by half a century, and it contemporaneously evolved with Herzl’s view of Israel being one of blood and sand.
Blood and Soil is not uniquely Nazi, but uniquely Nationalist. No doubt, some - like James Lindsay - would prefer to blend the two ideas as forever linked; such is the nature of propaganda. But after the rise of the Weimar Republic, which was seen by the German and Prussian people as a foreign, occupying force (and one largely run by Jews, which is an inconvenient historic fact that even Google’s AI reluctantly admits to), what it meant to be uniquely German was a question of contentious debate.
We look at this with a certain degree of exasperation, wondering how such a question could even be asked if it wasn’t asked in the heart of racism. But keep in mind that the boundaries of nations ebbed and flowed in those days. It was only in 1871 that Prussia joined to form the German Empire, and only in 1917 that Prussia ceased to exist at all. Who are Germans was a question the German people were asking, and for completely understandable reasons.
The concept of ethnic belonging was one of hot contention back then, but also was the question of whether Germany could control its own borders and direct its own laws, or if it would have to submit to other nations and international bodies. Also a controversy of the day was whether Germany had to maintain the practice placed upon it by the Weimar Republic, to make Germany into a sanctuary for any migrants who desired to come.
Simply put, what made Germany Germany was a hotbed of contention. The Germans - especially those who might just as well have identified as Prussians - believed that whatever Germany was becoming, wasn’t Germany at all. Many of those migrating to Germany were Jews, fleeing persecution in the rest of Europe. As crazy as it seems today, Germany was not viewed as hostile to Jews, but largely favorable to them, until Germans looked around and so that the nation no longer resembled Germany.
Some Jews came to Germany fleeing from the Russian Revolution beginning from 1904-1905. In World War I, Germany took in hundreds of thousands of Jews from Poland, when it became a war zone. Jews were largely not wanted in Western Europe or even the United States, so Berlin became a major center for the Jewish diaspora. Germany was nothing, in the beginning, if not accommodating to the Jews. In fact, it’s not a stretch to say, Germany was likely the least anti-Semitic place on earth.
But following World War I, the Weimar Republic - which emancipated Jews in Germany, was filled with Jewish leadership, and enjoyed high favorability with German Jews - grew very unpopular with the rest of Germany. Largely, this is because Germans viewed the Treaties of Versailles to have subjugated German interests to the interests of Europe, that it was morally corrupt, and that it was fracturing the German people and causing a cultural crisis and schism. And that makes sense, because the Weimar Republic was all of those things, and showed nothing but contempt for the customs of Germany or the traditional German way of life.
Borrowing explicitly from Jewish Zionism, which argued that a nation is only a nation with “blood and soil,” Blut and Boden became a rallying cry to unite the German people against those who controlled them without what they believed was without respect for their national interests.
THE POST-WAR CONSENSUS
I explained some about the Post-War Consensus from my X account, which I’ll copy/paste here. My remarks are in the context of the debate over H1B (worker) visas:
The notion of Open Society - which is the greatest product of the Post-War Consensus ( or “Received accounts” as Doug Wilson calls it) promoted the globe as one giant economic opportunity zone, with nations abandoning the idea of favoritism to the interests of their own citizens. Those affirming the Post-War Consensus are open to H1B and ultimately, unlimited legal immigration no matter the negative impact on American workers. This is the sacrifice post-war societies must make to remain open and free.
Those insisting “America First” means “Americans First” and who want to limit global colonizing of America, are (whether they know it or not) questioning the Post-War Consensus. As you see with Elon and Vivek, the incentive for the oligarchical establishment to capitalize on globalist pilfering of America’s resources is high, and this is why even “conservatives” are so hesitant to question Open $ociety.” When Elon said earlier today “Fu*k yourself in the face. I will go to war with you on this issue the likes of which you cannot comprehend,” understand he wasn’t just quoting Tropic Thunder to express passion over hiring immigrants. It was the rage of a man whose global empire is threatened by noticers and questioners who - unbeknownst to most of them - are threatening to topple the established tenets of the Post War Consensus…the idea that nations must sacrifice the needs of their citizens to keep the Open Society.
Whether or not the Open Society actually helps establish world peace is speculative, but in the meantime, it’s a hell of way to make money for those with a global reach. The Post-War Consensus has very little to do with Holocaust conspiracies. It has far more to do with the economics of mass migration, free trade, and dismantling the nation state.
Let me summarize.
After WWII, the Allied forces - particularly the United States and Great Britain - set about to prevent anything similar occurring again. They struggled with the question of “why did this war happen?” They viewed the context of why Germany followed Hitler (or for Italy, Mussolini or for Japan, Hirohito) to be besides the point.
Historians (including and especially Winston Churchill, who resigned from politics to become a historian), considered the reasons for the war to be unnecessary details. Rather, they focused on the means of war, which they believed were (1) strong nations that fight for their own interests and (2) powerful leaders of strong nations.
The Allied nations ruled with certain definitiveness that society must remain “open and free” so as to never again tempt a nation to engage in warfare in their own self-interests.
As a part of this effort to de-strengthen all nations, in favor of an international coalition of powerful special interests, the argument in pre-WWII Germany had to be settled. What is a nation? From WWII onward, a nation could not defined as Blut und Boden. So long as a nation is only an abstract idea, its national interests cannot be defined by what is best for the nation.
If a nation is blood and soil, and if it is a singular people and not a group of plural peoples, then a nation is less inclined to engage in warfare to protect itself because itself only exists in abstraction. And people don’t wage war for abstractions, they wage war to protect their homeland and their families.
IS BLOOD AND SOIL FASCIST?
We have to wrestle with whether or not everything Germany believed was indeed fascist. Of course, Lindsay’s claim that JD Vance’s ‘blood and soil adjacent’ definition is fascist, is utter hogwash if for no other reason, it wasn’t unique to fascists. Before the Post-War Consensus, most of the nations in the world held to a ‘blood and soil’ definition of nation.
At a certain point, we need to - on intellectual grounds - cease playing this semantical game that anything Hitler promoted can be called ‘Nazi’ or ‘fascist’ in any meaningful way. While it’s true that belief x, y, or z might have been held by Nazis, unless it is uniquely Nazi, then brushing your teeth and wiping after you go potty are both Nazi practices.
What Lindsay is attacking is not Nazi ideology, but Nationalism in general. Calling Nationalism “fascist” because some fascists were nationalists, is like calling democracy “fascist” because Hitler was elected chancellor in 1933.
Globalism, the high doctrine of the Post-War Consensus, passionately wants Americans to believe that nations are only an idea. Ideas are nebulous and intangible. Ideas can change, evolve, or die out. Simply saying that America is founded on the idea of liberty, or the American dream, or any other idea (like diversity, inclusion, or equity) is the best way to ensure that no one is willing to die for their national interest. Ideas don’t have interests. People do.
To overcome the historic reality that Israel was given nationhood in 1948, explicitly under the conviction that blood and soil is required for nationhood, should be evidence enough that the belief is not antisemitic.
BLOOD AND SOIL
It’s certainly interesting that Lindsay, a pro-Israel supporter who believes they are entitled to the land, somehow ontologically, posts material supportive of ‘blood and soil’ when it comes to Israel.
It’s bizarre indeed to think that there is at least one - and seemingly, only one - nation on Earth that is a nation because it’s entitled to soil, but for every other nation, nationhood is only an abstraction.
If you - as a Covenant Theologian - claim that Israel is only an idea, and not a people united in blood and soil, you’ll be accused of Replacement Theology. And yet, many of these people call Replacement Theory (the idea that a nation can be replaced by those with no connection to its blood and soil), racist. This is a sort of “blood and soil for thee, but not for me.”
HEALTHY BLOOD, HEALTHY SOIL
If the blood and soil definition of nationhood is a claim of a genetic superiority of one race over another, it’s indeed a racist concept. But most realize that there is a very low bar for ‘blood’ in this context. It simply means, “Someone who is from here, and someone who is for here.”
A nation shares religion, shares culture, shares traditions, and shares a place. Migrants may certainly come, and indeed be considered Americans when they share the things nations share. But without that melting pot that America used to believe in, it’s no nation at all; it’s a collection of nations that share a place. But not even then, is nationhood only an idea.
Religion, culture, traditions, and places cannot be changed like an idea. They do not evolve, like an idea. They are not abstract, but quite literal. And that’s why globalists who reject the Post-War Consensus need so badly for nationhood to be defined independently of religion, culture, traditions, and places. They need nations that can bend to the will of global special interests. You cannot plunder a united people, but only a disjointed one that views their nation as a mere concept.
There are consequences to this belief, however. One of those concepts is that migration can never be used in such a way that what it means to be an American is nothing but a fluid concept. It also means that whatever migrants come, must assimilate.
THE BOOT
The picture at the top of this article is my boot. You can see that it’s placed upon a fence post, and you might’ve noticed boots on fence posts when you drive through rural America. It stands for something.
The “boot on a fence post” is a farmer or rancher’s way of saying, “You see this boot? I wore it out. And, I wore it out working this land that you see. Everything you’re looking at is a product of my intensive personal labor. I’m the type of man to wear out boots.” It’s a statement of pride.
I’ve only worked this farm a few years, but before me, it was worked for at least 125 years. I’m not naive enough to think this land has claimed me, but I’ve claimed this land. I’ve claimed it by my sweat and worn out boots. I am attached to this place because it’s where I’ve bleed and slept and ate and worked. I never understood watching the old Hollywood motif of an old codger saying, “I’ll die before you take my farm” until I became a farmer. But it’s literally an “over my dead body” situation.
My farm is not an idea. It’s a place, and there are people who live here. We are creatures, and this is our ecosystem. It is ours because we work it. There is nothing metaphoric about that.
One of my best friends is a Native American, who was raised in Southern California in rodeo culture, who came back to North Dakota to claim the land he was entitled to as a tribal member. And let me tell you, that is some of the coldest, hardest, least hospitable acres I’ve ever seen. But the thing about the Hidatsa is, they always come back. They might live anywhere else in the country, but there is something drawing them, pulling them, dragging them back to those hills near Lake Sakakawea. They might have even been born somewhere else, but that’s their land, and they feel it in their guts.
This isn’t just true for those whose blood goes back a thousand years, but for those whose blood goes back only a hundred, or perhaps even less. I’m a few years older than my Indian friend, which means I’ve been a “native” longer than he has. Denying the tie between people and land is a foolish endeavor, as the Israelis have shown us.
Blood and soil is indeed a nation.
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