Thule Italia estate2006.indd - thule-italia.org

Book review by
Prof. Manuel Sarkisyanz
Hitler,Buddha, Krishna
12) Bhagavad Gita, V, 18f; XVI; 12-17; XIII, 29: translation by
R Garbe (Leipzig, 1905), pp. 94, 140f, 132
13) W. Roland Scott, Social ethics of modern Hinduism
(Calcutta, 1953), p. 109: “Gandhi maintained that nonviolence
was... a central teaching of the Gita” (sic); “the
Gita ... does not teach, according to his opinions, violence”:
Wilhelm Mahlmann, Mahatma Gandhi, der Mann, sein
Werk und seine Wirkung (Tabingen, 1950), p. 140
14) H.S. Sinha, Communism and Gita, A philosophicoethical
study (Delhi, 1979), pp. 264, 262: “The Gita would
always ... shake hand [sic] with communism and bring out
a workable synthesis...”, “a valuational synthesis of these
two systems can save humanity...”
15) There was no Nazi Leningrad that held out against
a siege lasting nine hundred days of near starvation
(in 19411944). On the Fascist side there was no Madrid
that withstood more than two years of almost daily
bombardments by aviation and artillery (in 1936/8); no
[Basque] fishery launch !hat resisted an enemy battleship
during an entire hour (on 5. March 1931) before sinking
itself (having received about 200 impacts of naval cannon):
It was but the Ocean that extinguished the fire of its last
machine gun. (Sarria, De arrantzales a gudaris del Mar
[Bermeo, Vizcaya, n.n.], p. 108)
Manuel Sarkisyanz (born 1923) had been a subject of
the Shah of Iran. He studied at the University of Tehran
and then at the University of Chicago. There, he wrote his
first book, “Russia and the Messianism of the Orient”. Upon
its publication in German he was immediately invited to
Germany – initially as visiting professor in Freiburg und
then in Kiel. Hs main interests lie in the comparative history
of independence movements. Among his dozen of books
are “History of the Oriental Peoples of the Russian Empire”
(in German), “Rizal (national hero of the Philippines)
and Republican Spain”, “Buddhist background of the
Burmese Revolution”. His publication on historiography as
apology for British rule in Burma (Ohio University Press)
has also appeared in the Burmese language. The books
of Sarkisyanz on the “American Resurgence in Peru” and
on “Felipe Carrillo, the ‘Red’ Apostle of the Mayas” were
published in both German and Spanish. The latter is now
being translated into the language of Mayas of Yucatán
(Mexico) where the author now lives most of the year.
in lingua