Holokaustas ir lietuvių istorinė sąmonė

Abstract

Studies of the Holocaust in Lithuania and general cognition of the catastrophe of Europe’s Jews are important factors for refusal of nationalism and national and cultural oneness and for formation of a democratic society by the power of individuals’ minds and actions. The article includes 4 parts: 1) historiographic problems; 2) historiography of Lithuanian expatriation; 3) “Sąjūdis”, democratization of Lithuania and relations between Lithuanians and Jews; 4) mass consciousness of Lithuanians and the Holocaust. The article deals with Lithuania’s historiographic position and Lithuanians’ view of the Holocaust in Lithuania. The following three historiographic directions are distinguished: the Soviet, conservative and liberal historiography of Lithuanian expatriates and the post-Communist historiography, which has been developing since the times of “Sąjūdis”. Due to an uneven view of the events in Lithuania during 1941-1944, different interpretations of the events, i. e. the genesis of Lithuanian nationalism and anti-Semitism is presented. The article states that the confrontation between the Lithuanian nation and the Soviet and Nazi ideology and politics, postures of different Lithuanian political powers, collaboration with the Nazis during the war, annexation of Lithuania by the USSR and the geopolitical confrontation during the cold war resulted in a peculiar reaction of Lithuanians’ consciousness to the Holocaust. When characterizing the view of the Jewish catastrophe by the mass consciousness of Lithuanians, one can note he position on the responsibility of two geopolitical powers and ideologies, i. e. Nazism and Bolshevism for killings of people according to racial, ideological or social motives, thus the individual responsibility of Lithuanians, which has no common denominator, is submerged into oblivion.