In 1923, while still a doctoral student, Marcus was hired by the Ahmadi Muslim community in Berlin as editor of all its German-language publications. After two years in this role, Marcus converted to Islam in 1925 and adopted the name Hamid. The Ahmadi community of Berlin constructed the first mosque in the city, known as the Berlin Mosque, between 1923-1926 in Wilmersdorf. Despite his conversion to Islam, Marcus maintained ties to the Jewish community, as well as with his friends working for gay rights. Marcus was the chief editor and contributor to the Berlin Mosque’s primary magazine, the Moslemische Revue, as well as the editor for the Ahmadi German Qur’an translation and commentary that was published in 1939. He later became the chairman of the associated German Muslim Society from 1930 to 1935 and was a prominent lecturer during various programs held at the mosque that were open to the public. Foremost among these were “Islam Evenings,” which served not only as eclectic educational spaces for attendees but also would later serve as the intersection point for the very same imam, Catholic priest, and Protestant layperson who would advocate for Marcus’ release. The community of Muslims at the Berlin Mosque and the Ahmadi mission stressed interreligious tolerance, the unity of humanity, and the commonality of the God of Abraham. In this way, the community educated many and won some converts, especially from the local Jewish community4. Despite his conversion to Islam, Marcus maintained ties to his former faith as well as with his friends working for gay rights, suggesting that he upheld and practiced these teachings on unity and commonality.
The Rise of Nazi Germany and Its Impact on the Muslim Community of Berlin
As the Nazis came to power in 1933, the Muslim community, like many others, was forced to react. The Moslemische Revue featured articles, arguing for similarities between Islam and Nazism. Among these so-called consonances was a low-grade antisemitism. Indeed, public tours of the mosque began to feature only positive things about the Nazis and Hitler. During this time, Marcus remained chairman of the German Muslim Society, resigning only in 1935. Despite mosque members joining the party, increased surveillance, and the subsequent enacting of the Nuremberg Laws, Baer notes how the mosque leadership still advocated that Marcus be a lecturer for the “Islam Evenings” program5. Although Marcus’ public role and visibility in these positions with the community greatly diminished with the Nazis’ rise to power, this situation raises questions: what can resistance look like in what appear to be zero-sum situations? Can those with complicity remain close to those they are officially supposed to hate?
It was not, however, just the Nazi authorities whom the German Muslim Society and members of the Berlin Mosque community had to accommodate. Other non-Ahmadi Muslims sought control over Germany’s only mosque6. Among these included the Islamic Community of Berlin, a competing Sunni Muslim organization that was unapologetically pro-Nazi in its rhetoric and stances. To achieve their goal, they claimed that the Ahmadis were a “Jewish Communist organization,” as well as British agents, and thus were “unworthy of any claim to the mosque”7. Ultimately, surveillance increased.
Matters became more complicated upon the departure of the mosque’s founding imam, Sadr-ud-Din, whom Baer describes as “the architect of its tolerant interreligious and interracial message.” Sheikh Muhammad Abdullah followed him in this role8. Though we may recognize his name as the leader of the interfaith coalition who went to Sachsenhausen to free Marcus, the situation is more complex. Apart from providing internal lectures and mosque tours which integrated praise for various points of “connection” with Nazi principles, Abdullah was also proactive in reaching out to the Nazis. He was so successful that soon the Reich’s Foreign Ministry deemed him of no danger to the state9. Why take this tack? As Baer aptly puts it, “Abdullah’s overtures may reflect a change in philosophical orientation, or a strategy for survival in the face of a totalitarian regime that brooked no dissent”10. We don’t know. What we do know, however, is that some feature materials and rhetoric coming out of the mosque continued to advance complacent and harmful perspectives11. It is at this juncture in the Berlin Muslim community’s history that the Nazis initiated the November Pogroms and Hugo Marcus was imprisoned at Sachsenhausen, leading us back to the fateful encounter with which we began.
Muslim Resistance Inside Nazi Germany
“By the Glorious Morning Light, and by the Night when it is still,
Your Guardian-Lord hath not forsaken you, nor is He displeased with you.
And verily what will come after will be better for you than your present.
And soon your Guardian-Lord will give you so much that you will be pleased.
Did He not find you an orphan and give you shelter (and care)?
And He found you lost and gave you guidance.
And He found you in need and made you independent”12.
17
Photos from the Sachsenhausen concentration camp outside Berlin in Oranienburg. From top left going clockwise: main entrance and administrative building, foundation markers of former prisoner barracks, entrance gate to the camp reading “Work sets [you] free,” photo of an aerial photograph taken of Sachsenhausen. Barrack 18 is to the right of the main entrance underneath the triangular boundaries of the original camp before additional barracks were made. Photo credit: Usama Malik
5. Marc David Baer, “Muslim Encounters with Nazism and the Holocaust: The Ahmadi of Berlin and Jewish Convert to Islam Hugo Marcus,” The American Historical Review 120, no. 1 (January 2015): pp. 140-171, https://doi.org/10.1093/ahr/120.1.140. pg. 160.
6. Ibidem.
7. Ibidem.
8. Ibidem, page. 162.
9. Ibidem.
10. Ibidem, pg. 163.
11. Ibidem, see “The New Germany According to a Muslim: Hitler Is the Appointed One” by Dr. Zeki Kiram, an employee of the Nazi state, in the August 1938 edition of the Moslemische Revue http://www.berlin.ahmadiyya.org/m-rev/aug38.pdf
12. Qur’an 93:1-7.