Martin Niemöller
“First, they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a socialist.
Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a trade unionist.
Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.”
It is one of the most haunting quotes to have ever been uttered, made even more terrifying when it is realized the words were said by someone who survived the Holocaust— not as a Jew, but as a regular German citizen.
A man of faith, Martin Niemöller was a well-known German pastor who said some variation of these words in several speeches following the fall of Hitler’s Germany. His powerful words of guilt, shame, and accountability still pierce the heart, and his famous quote is on display at the United States Holocaust Museum in Washington, D.C., where it has been an integral and permanent fixture of the museum’s exhibition since its opening in 1933.
Often mistaken for poetry, Niemöller’s words resonant because he lived them.
In the beginning, he supported the Nazi regime. He saw the regime under Hitler as standing up against the threat of communism and did not become disillusioned with the new government until officials started coming for the churches.
Born January 14, 1892, in Lippstadt, Germany, Niemöller grew up with an initial interest in the military— even signing up to serve as a naval officer and commander of a U-Boat during WWI. Following his service in the war, the young man decided he was not cut out for military life after all and decided instead to follow in the footsteps of his father, a Lutheran pastor, and attend the University of Münster, completing theology training and becoming a pastor in 1924.
By 1934, Niemöller was co-founding the opening of the Confessing Church whose stated goal was in direct conflict with that of the German Government. Becoming increasingly bolder and more daring, the young pastor assisted in establishing the Pastor’s Emergency League, an organization created to aid Christians of Jewish descent.
Because of his increased opposition efforts, Niemöller was arrested by the Gestapo in 1937 and sent to the Sachsenhausen concentration camp. Later, he was imprisoned inside Dachau concentration camp until 1945.
Upon his release, the Christian world viewed him as a symbol of Christian resistance, while he felt guilty for his initial fear and a niggling sense he had not done enough.
Seeing the German people themselves as largely to blame for the same reasons he held against himself, Pastor Niemöller began touring the western areas of Allied-occupied Germany in 1946 and giving lectures on his experience.
While speaking to Germans about his own failings, the pastor tried to give voice to the reasons he initially stayed silent, saying he did not speak up in the beginning because the Nazis were only going after the fellow countrymen he did not agree with— those belonging to leftist political groups.
A common theme in the pastor’s lectures was that of failed responsibility.
Pastor Niemöller strongly believed the German people failed to accept accountability for the horrors the Nazi regime was allowed to unleash on the world. Through his lectures, Niemöller aimed to teach his people, and the world, how to take personal responsibility for the Nazi regime in hopes of preventing another murderous government from instilling global terror through unchecked power.