Essay --

REVIEW OF DANIEL GOLDHAGENS A MORAL RECKONING THE ROLE OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH IN THE HOLOCAUST AND ITS UNFULLFILLED DUTY OF REPAIRThis essay will review Daniel Goldhagens debatable moral inquiry, A honorable Reckoning The Role of the Catholic Church in the Holocaust and Its Unfulfilled Duty of Repair, create in 2002. Goldhagen attended Harvard University as a graduate, undergraduate and assistant professor until he was denied tenure in 2003 this possibly indicates his limited status as an academic. Goldhagen notes that he is indebted to his father, a Holocaust survivor, for some of his findings on the Holocaust. This individualised connection to the Holocaust on the one hand allows Goldhagen to write more than than passionately. On the other hand, it obscures his ability to view evidence objectively, unvarnished in this book under review. Goldhagen status rose to notoriety due to the disputed temper of his first book, Hitlers Willing Executioners published in 1996. Thi s receive much criticism and perhaps more importantly to Goldhagen, plenty of publicity. The contentious assertions of the book, whether academically valid or not, established the relative novice amongst historians. This is evident in the abundance of secondary literature that comments on Goldhagens acetify including that edited by F. Littell and F. Kautz. Goldhagens credentials as a controversial author explain the extremist content of his second book, A Moral Reckoning. Goldhagens academic background in political in stoolation is evident in the books emphasis on the church as a political institution and the pope as a political attracter (p. 184). . This limits his work as a historian as he fails to to the full examine the role of the individual. Goldhagens ... ...es are manipulated for his argument. Goldhagens controversial and affect study encourages research to continue and in 2013 Jewish leaders pressured pope Francis to open the Vatican archives from 1939-1947. The opening of these archives will instigate more investigations in this field and until these archives are opened the historical magnetic disk will not be clarified. The importance of these archives illustrates the interesting nature of historical literature. The study of history focuses predominantly around primary materials, so far these materials do not provide a definitive depiction of the past. Historians dismember primary sources to deduce an interpretation of the past. The discrepancies between historians interpretations form historiographical debate. It would be interesting to examine the extent to which historians are perhaps yet academic storytellers.