London.
In my lecture before the Royal Asiatic Society on the Joseph story in the light of Egyptian monuments, I showed a slide depicting notables saluting the Vizier by raising the arm, in the same manner as the Fascists and Nazis salute today. I have since received several letters from correspondents eager to know whether there is a real connection between these two salutes.
The Nazis, it will be recalled, declare that this salute is one most appropriate for the scions of “True Aryan” nobility, as the raising of the arm is a symbol of manliness, courage and mastership. It may be of interest to reproduce here one of the many Egyptian pictures of soldiers and Royal officers saluting the pharaoh.
The Fascist salute is, consciously or unconsciously, an exact reproduction of the ancient Roman salute, which can be traced farther back to the Greeks.
Now, as the Greeks and Romans were for many centuries in close contact with the Egyptians, and took over from them many a custom and many an idea, it cannot be far off the mark to assume that this gesture of saluting also has been adopted by them from the Egyptians.
The raising of the arm was originally a gesture of defenselessness and unconditional submission. It was the first move of the defeated warrior before the vindictive and brutal conqueror, by which he showed his empty hands and implored his life. It became thereafter a gesture of adoration and acclamation of gods, kings and high personages.
Thus the Nazi-Fascist salute has nothing Nordic or “Aryan” in it, but is of Egyptian origin and has a negroid stamp. Nor is there anything virile or heroic about it. Actually it was a manifestation of abject and slavish submissiveness, imposed by tyrants.
The same confusion of mind arises in the case of the swastika, which is proclaimed today as the most sacred “Aryan” symbol.
The oldest traceable clue leads to Eastern Asia, whence the swastika probably spread to other Asiatic and African countries, and later to Europe. It appears as a decorative design in ancient Egypt and even figures on old Jewish ceremonial objects and in Palestinian synagogues of the first century of the Christian Era.
Nothing is more characteristic of the historical perversion found in the spirit and the tactics of Nazi leaders than the representation of a servile salute as an authentic gesture of lordship and racial supremacy belonging to the Germanic peoples, and the adoption of an ornament which was of common use among Jews and Christians, as the emblem of a power which proclaims its ideal to be the annihilation of the Jewish people.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
