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Seal of the 7 Archangels: divine protection Why Hitler used the swastika
I'm not telling you anything new when I say that the swastika was used as a symbol by the Nazis, Adolf Hitler and the National Socialist Party of German Workers in the 20th century.
The swastika, an ancient and universal symbol
But this swastika symbol is much older. It is in fact the Swastika which was taken over by Adolf Hitler.
The term swastika comes from the Sanskrit word swastikah, which means "auspicious". The first part of the word, swasti, can be divided into two parts: su (good; well), and asti (is). It is associated with all that is auspicious.
It symbolizes the revolution of the sun and the cosmic forces.
It is mainly a cosmic symbol showing the perpetual movement of rotation around a fixed point, that of the universe which undergoes all the evolutions, all the cycles, the transcendence. It represents several positive forces, like Ganesh in Hinduism, god that is invoked for any beginning as being the one who removes obstacles, sometimes represented on a bed of swastikas. In Buddhism it represents esoteric knowledge and the wheel of Dharma.
As a symbol, the swastika has been found in most cultures around the world for thousands of years. One of the oldest known examples was discovered on a fresco in a Paleolithic cave at least 10,000 years ago.
Traces of it can be found as early as the Neolithic period, on representations on pottery from Mesopotamia. Then it was probably exported to Greece, India and China. In India it appears on texts from the 3rd century BC.
The swastika is one of the most widespread and ancient symbols.
It consists of a cross with angled branches, found at all times and on all continents, in use in India from ancient times, spread in China by Buddhism, present in ancient Greece under the figure of Prometheus (who steals a piece of fire from the wheel of the Sun and brings it to men) and in other civilizations (among the Tuareg for example).
The term "swastika" (allusion to the 4 branches, each in the shape of the Greek letter gamma) comes from the Greek "gammadion". The Greeks also called the swastika a "tetrasceles" (four legs).
A favourable sign, symbol of peace and happiness, perhaps also of the Sun (Fire), the swastika spread to Europe, the Americas, the Far East and especially to India, where it still has a beneficial meaning.
Whatever its symbolic complexity, the swastika, by its very design, clearly indicates a movement of rotation around the immobile centre, which may be the self, or the pole. It is therefore a symbol of action, of cycle and of perpetual regeneration.
Is the direction of the Swastika important?
The question arises just as it does for the Triskel.
The Swastika is given two directions of rotation: the position of its branches gives it a rotating direction, from right to left or from left to right. For some civilizations, this direction is important and has a symbolic meaning; for others, it has no importance and, for others still, only one direction of rotation is acceptable.
If the branches face to the right, the swastika is said to be dextrogyric. If the branches are turned to the left, the swastika, which takes the name of sauvastika, is said to be senestrogyre or levogyre.
However, considering that it is originally the symbolic representation of a rotation (diurnal solar symbol or, conversely, nocturnal stellar symbol), some tend to consider that it is carried out in the opposite direction of that indicated by the points; the elbows of the cross, and not the point of the bars, thus indicate the direction of rotation (it can be represented in an imaginary way as if it were four small flags which are drawn backwards when the wheel turns).
So much for the history. But what does it mean exactly? It is a representation of the swastika, a "universal symbol". Its name comes from its shape, a Greek gamma in capital, hence the name swastika. But it is indeed a black swastika pointing to the right, which was taken up to become the emblem of Nazism during the Second World War, and according to Hitler in Mein Kampf represent the Aryan race.
In Asia in particular, it is now common to see it, either pointing to the right or pointing to the left, so inverted one might say, without it being a reference to the Nazis at all.
Particularly frequent in India, it has many sacred meanings in Hinduism, such as "well-being" or the god Ganesh.
It is also very frequently seen in statuary temples, as decorations or clothing motifs in all Buddhist countries. In this religion some consider it as the most favorable of all symbols. In China, it symbolizes eternity and the "Heart of Buddha".
It is used inverted on maps to indicate the presence of Buddhist temples. But it can also be used in the same direction as the Nazi swastika.
So the real difference with the swastika is not the direction, pointing to the right or to the left. Unlike the religious swastika, the Nazi sign is tilted at a 45° angle, is in a white disc surrounded by a circle or on a red background. The cross represents the fight, the white disc the "purity of the race", and the red circle the social thought of which the National Socialist party wanted to guarantee.
The black swastika of the Nazis
The red flag, with a white circle containing a black dextrorotatory swastika (swastika) inclined at 45°, was adopted as the emblem of the Nazi party by Hitler in the spring of 1920.
The Völkischer Beobachter (People's Observer), the official press organ of the National Socialist German Workers' Party, founded in 1920, features the swastika.
Hitler considered the swastika to be an Aryan symbol dating back to the early Indo-Europeans, the "symbol of the Aryan's fight for victory.
On September 15, 1935, the Reichstag (German Parliament), meeting in Nuremberg and presided over by Hermann Goering, voted unanimously to adopt the swastika flag as the national flag of Germany.
From 1897 to 1900, Hitler was a pupil and altar boy at the Benedictine abbey in Lambach, Austria. There he could admire dextrogyratory swastikas engraved on the walls, woodwork and even on objects of worship. This symbol would have been chosen by Father Hagn (Hagen), administrator of the abbey and a great lover of esotericism, after his numerous trips to the Middle East. The coat of arms of Theoderich Hagn, abbot from 1859 to 1872, bears "a swastika Or with branches bent at right angles on a field of Azure". The year 1860 and a swastika are carved above a vault in the courtyard of the abbey.
In his book Oberdonau, die Heimat des Führers (The Upper Danube, the Führer's Homeland), Robert Lenk writes (Page 12), "Adolf Hitler, as an altar boy, first saw the angular symbol of the sun disk on the shield adorning the Lambach vault. ”
"It was here [à l'abbaye de Lambach, ndlr] that Hitler first saw a swastika (...) It may be that later he was driven by quite different motives to adopt this emblem, but it cannot be denied that he spent part of his childhood under the sign of the swastika.”
What you need to know is that Hitler had a mystical side. He was a vegetarian and had a knowledge of esotericism. Except that he favored the dark side of the force (as who would say in a famous movie!).
The swastika was used by the Nazis with a rotation in the direction of right to left, therefore counterclockwise. It is called the negative direction, that is to say the direction of materialization of energy. The other direction, from left to right, is positive and symbolizes the sublimation of energy
This is a well known process in alchemy called solve/coagula. So the project of the 3rd Reich, which wanted to materialize the cosmic energy to create an earthly empire, obviously chose the negative meaning (coagula).
This double meaning symbol has existed in India for thousands of years. Most of the Indian merchants in all the bazaars, from north to south of the country, have business cards with a logo where there is a negative swastika. For all these people, this symbol means materialization and therefore increase in wealth. He thinks that this will promote good business.
This example of Indian merchants is important to understand that symbols are only neutral tools and only humans are responsible for the way they use them.
Today, the symbol has been so misused that its origin and meaning have been forgotten.
In Japan for example (see France info article at the bottom of the page), swastikas, mistaken for swastikas by tourists, could disappear from the maps. The Japanese authorities in charge of promoting tourism have even proposed to abandon these symbols.
Finally, in this article, Makoto Watanabe, a communications expert at Hokkaido Bunkyo University, says that Westerners' lack of knowledge about the country they are visiting should not be condoned. "I think it would be a good thing for foreigners to see this symbol and wonder what it means and where it comes from. It would also get rid of some of the negative impressions associated with the symbol."
This is a message full of wisdom it seems to me! To meditate on.
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Sources:
- Le pouvoir des symboles, Éditions Trajectoires
- Article"Japan: mistaken for swastikas by tourists, swastikas could disappear from maps"
- Wikipedia: the Nazi swastika
- Wikipedia: swastika
- History of the swastika (article in English)
- History of the swastika (Italian article)
Mandalashop - 11/03/2020 11:18:10
Bonjour Jaëlle, je comprends votre interrogation. Cela peut paraître troublant. Cependant, la sagesse de la nature nous enseigne que là où on met notre attention, les choses existent et prennent de l’importance. Vous pouvez parcourir 100 fois le même chemin et ne pas voir ce qui vous entoure et le jour où vous le voyez vous ne voyez plus que ça. Tout dépend de l’importance et de la force qu’on accorde aux choses. Et parfois on voit des choses là où d'autres n’y verront qu’un détail. C’est uniquement vous qui pouvez savoir au plus profond de vous-même si cela est important ou pas.
Jaëlle - 11/02/2020 16:47:59
J'ai une marque de naissance en bas de l'épaule et qui ressemble à svastika.j e comprends pas