Adolf Eichmann: The Existential Failure

In her report of Nazi SS member Adolph Eichmann's trial in Jerusalem, first published as a series of articles in The New Yorker, Hannah Arendt managed to spark great controversy, both in the academy and among the general public. The primary attack on Arendt was that she seemed to “blame the victim”, in this case the Jews, for their role in their own extermination during the Holocaust. While by no means the focus of her book, this perceived accusation in combination with her portrayal of Eichmann as an apparently sane, ordinary man made readers uncomfortable at best and at worst vindictive and unforgiving in their critique. In assuming the objective, detached role she did, she risked ostracizing herself from both friends and colleagues as well as the Jewish community as a whole. That Arendt could insist Eichmann lacked the evil qualities he was accused of possessing, and was not the sadistic, inhuman monster the prosecution and everyone else wanted him to be was inconceivable. On the contrary, Arendt was disturbed by Eichmann, but instead by his obvious mediocrity. Were he the monster that he was expected to be, one could have easily judged and separated oneself from him, taking pride in the striking contrast between one and the accused. Instead, people were faced with a supposedly “evil” man who was, for the most part, not significantly different from the average man. It would go against the common sense of most to consider a man who facilitated such a great number of deaths “normal.” While commonplace in some ways, he represents a failed product of humanity; more specifically, he is an existential failure. The appearance of normalcy merely comes from how smoothly and effortlessly one can slip into that role. Eichmann proves himse...

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... up in the wave of “moral collapse” that struck all of European society. (Arendt 125) From the perspective of the existentialist, and indeed that of anyone with a shred of commonsensical morality, Adolf Eichmann acted irrationally and in a condemnable manner. The truth is, however, that it is easier than most would like to admit to understand the temptation of renouncing freedom and responsibility, and the demands of individuality and morality that accompany it. Arendt's work forces us to confront not the ugly chapters of human history or particular examples of ugly humans, but the tantalizing potentiality for ugliness and evil that can be found in us all.

Works Cited

Arendt, Hannah. Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil. New York:Penguin, 2006. Print.

Sartre, Jean-Paul. Existentialism and Human Emotions. New York:Carol Pub. Group, 1993. Print.