Abstract

Comments on Arendt's views on the link between politics and history, referring to her work on antisemitism and on the "Jewish question" (pp. 44-51). Defines Arendt's historiographical method as non-temporal - she focuses on individualized experiences which express a historical conflict; she prefers biographies, portraits, and chronicles. Arendt's non-temporal approach is expressed in the assertion that the tragedy of the Jews in Europe was rooted in the paradox that the political powers granted them rights and privileges, but excluded them, in differing degrees, from political participation. This fact made the Jews a strange implant in European society. Pp. 84-92 present Arendt's definition of evil, based on her experience in the Eichmann trial. While the Christian philosophical tradition defines evil as a deficiency in character, Arendt considered it to be a banal component of the human personality. The deeds of the Nazis were, consequently, the result of Philistinism and lack of moral judgment.