Synonyms
Definition
The term “Righteous Among the Nations” (Chasidei Umot HaOlam) is an honorific bestowed by Israel’s Holocaust memorial and museum, Yad Vashem, on non-Jewish opponents of Adolf Hitler’s National Socialist regime, who risked their lives to save Jews during the Holocaust (Sho’ah).
The concept of a “righteous Gentile” (ger toshav) has been an established aspect of the halakha – that is, the totality of Jewish civil, criminal, and religious law – of rabbinic Judaism for centuries. The term was originally intended to denote the legal status of those non-Jews living within the community of Israel who did not wish to convert to Judaism, but who – at least according to the medieval Jewish scholar Moses Maimonides (1138–1204) – nonetheless agreed to abide by the Seven Laws of Noah. In the aftermath of the Sho’ah, however, the concept and term have taken on a more focused meaning, denoting now not simply the nonreligious...
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
References
Berenbaum, M., and A.J. Peck. 1998. The holocaust and history: The known, the unknown, the disputed and the re-examined. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.
Crowe, D. 2004. Oskar Schindler: The untold account of his life, wartime activities, and the true story behind the list. Cambridge: Westview Press.
Fackenheim, E. 1989. To mend the World: Foundations of post-holocaust Jewish thought. New York: Schocken Books.
Gilbert, M. 2003. The righteous: The unsung heroes of the Holocaust. New York: Henry Holt.
Geras, N. 1995. Richard Rorty and the righteous among the nations. Journal of Applied Philosophy 12 (2): 151–173.
Gushee, D. 1994. The righteous gentiles of the Holocaust: A Christian interpretation. Minneapolis: Fortress Press.
Haynes, S. 2007. Bonhoeffer, the Jewish people, ad post-holocaust theology: eight perspectives; Eight theses. Studies in Jewish-Christian Relations, 2.1, 36–52.
Kohen, A., and G.J. Steinacher. 2019. Unlikely heroes: The place of Holocaust rescuers in research and teaching. University of Nebraska Press: Lincoln.
Lindsay, M. 2006. The righteous of the nations. Bonhoeffer and the beatitudes: Beyond Yad Vashem and the Church. Toronto Journal of Theology 22 (1): 23–38.
Marchione, M. 2007. Righteous among the nations. New Oxford Review 74 (9): 26–30.
Paldiel, M. 2000. Saving the Jews: Amazing stories of men and women who defied the ‘Final Solution’. Rockville: Schreiber Publishing.
———. 2001. The face of the other: Reflections on the motivations of gentile rescuers of Jews. Remembering for the future: The Holocaust in an age of genocide, 2. Houndmills. Palgrave. 334–346.
———. 2007. The righteous among the nations: Rescuers of Jews during the Holocaust. New York: HarperCollins.
———. 2017. Righteous gentiles: Israel’s honoring of rescuers of Jews. Createspace.
Steinfeldt, I. 2013. Commemorating the righteous among the nations at Yad Vashem. The history of a unique program. Diasporas 21: 82–90.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Section Editor information
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2023 Springer Nature Switzerland AG
About this entry
Cite this entry
Lindsay, M.R. (2023). Righteous Among the Nations. In: Encyclopedia of Heroism Studies. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-17125-3_401-1
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-17125-3_401-1
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-031-17125-3
Online ISBN: 978-3-031-17125-3
eBook Packages: Springer Reference Behavioral Science and PsychologyReference Module Humanities and Social SciencesReference Module Business, Economics and Social Sciences