Was Heidegger a National Socialist?

Why was Martin Heidegger a member of the National Socialist Party between 1933 and 1945? How could a great philosopher, a great scientist have fascist thoughts ? Many researchers have done research for many years to find an answer to the question. The solution is still not clear. Perhaps it is a subject as puzzling as Fermat's theory of numbers.

Heidegger worked on the ideas of "the nature of being" and "the dehumanizing effects of modern technology and, to a large extent, the modern philosophical tradition." His 1927 work Being and Time is among the masterpieces of philosophy.

Source: https://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/is-heidegger-contaminated-by-nazism

Heidegger had a great influence on the intellectual world of France through Jean-Paul Sartre and Jacques Derrida. In 1933, he was appointed rector of the University of Freiburg and fired all Jewish employees at the university. The university's previous rector, Möllendorff, had been dismissed for refusing to hang anti-Semitism posters in the university, and Heidegger took his place.

Heidegger's membership in the National Socialist Party began 10 days after his appointment, on May 1, 1933. Interestingly, Heidegger had a love affair with Hannah Arendt, a German and Jewish woman.

Heidegger's private notes are called "black notebooks" . Black is a qualification derived from the black coating of the notebooks he used. It does not carry any other meaning.

The first three published volumes cover notes taken between 1931 and 1941. They consist of approximately 1,200 pages. Publisher in Frankfurt. Name, Vittorio Klostermann . Before his death in 1976, Heidegger gave the publisher the order in which his works were to be published. The black notebooks coincide with volumes 94 to 96 of this order.

The black notebooks have been kept in the Heidegger archives in Marbach to this day and have never been seen by anyone outside the Heidegger family. The notes were edited by Peter Trawny, who is also director of the Martin Heidegger Institute at the University of Wuppertal.

Trawny emphasized that some circles in France, where he had a significant influence on the intellectual world, objected greatly to the publication of Heidegger's notes, but the Heidegger Family was willing to publish the notes.

The researchers are trying to catch anti-Semitic clues, that is, anti-Judaism or hostility, in the notes. The aim is to catch the ideological foundations of the question, "Why was Martin Heidegger a member of the National Socialist Party between 1933 and 1945?"

There are anti-Semitic elements in the lines of the notebooks and they are being revealed. The notebooks are actually full of thoughts on philosophy. The lines containing anti-Semitic expressions are few but still present.

From Trawny's assessments, we understand that Heidegger did not see the Jews as the inventors of modern technology, but as another and even the most damaging force of modernity.

Heidegger did not keep notebooks only between 1931-1941. There are other notebooks from 1945-1946 that have also come to light. The son of one of Heidegger's lovers sold these notes to the Heidegger archives in Marbach in March 2014. There is no anti-Semitic statement in these notebooks. By the way, no one knows whether Heidegger had notebooks between 1941-1945. Because no notebooks have been found from that period.

Heidegger never used any expressions supporting the Nazis after World War II. In fact, it is known that when he reunited with Hannah Arendt, with whom he had a brief separation, in 1950, he was influenced by Hannah Arendt in his ideas about Judaism and the Holocaust period and completely distanced himself from anti-Semitic discourse. However, Richard Polt from Xavier University in Cincinnati mentions student notes from seminars from 1933-34. The seminar notes of the students were published in Germany in 2009. It is determined in these notes that "Heidegger said that the Semitic nomads will never understand the nature or foundation of the German world."

As a result of research, it can be determined that Heidegger had been drawn closer to anti-Semitic ideas for a while. Beyond the possibility that he wanted to appear to be close to the ideas of the National Socialist Party in order to continue his working life uninterruptedly in the political and social atmosphere of the Hitler era, anti-Semitic ideas emerge as his own real ideas. However, it is seen that he completely abandoned these discourses after the war under the influence of Hannah Arendt.

It is shocking that a scientist could hold racially discriminatory views, or at least be influenced by them for a time. For example, the poet Ezra Pound also held fascist views. It is hard to understand how a literary figure could hold such views.

How can creators of science and art defend ideas based on racial discrimination throughout their lives or for a period of time?