Swastika
The swastika is an ancient symbol, existing for 3,000 to 12,000 years, characterized by an equilateral cross with four bent arms. Historically, it has served as a symbol of good luck and religious significance across various cultures, including Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism, and ancient Roman traditions. Its name derives from Sanskrit, meaning well-being or good fortune. However, in the 1930s, the swastika was appropriated by the German Nazi Party, who transformed it into a symbol of Aryan supremacy and racial hatred, leading to its association with fascism and anti-Semitism. Following World War II, the swastika was banned in several European countries due to its connection with the Nazi regime. Despite its controversial modern connotations, the swastika still retains positive meanings in many Asian cultures, where it symbolizes prosperity and spirituality. Today, the symbol evokes strong emotional responses, embodying a complex history that spans from ancient auspiciousness to modern-day extremism.
On this Page
Swastika
The swastika is a 3,000-12,000-year-old symbol in the form of an equilateral cross with four legs bent at 90 degrees. It served as a religious and good luck symbol for many different people. It was appropriated by the German and Austrian Nazis in the 1930s as a symbol of Aryan fascism. Its display is outlawed in many European countries. It continues to be the favorite emblem of racists and anti-Semites because it is the fulmination of extreme hate. The Nazis adopted it for its tradition as a symbol of good luck and auspiciousness, characteristics with which the Nazis viewed their movement and ascension to power. Its origins are Greek, known as the gammadion cross, and as a religious symbol in Hinduism, Jainism, and Buddhism dating back to the second century BCE. The word has its origins in Sanskrit, meaning well-being, good health, luck, and good fortune. The origin of the swastika might be as an astrological symbol representing a geometrical pattern in the cosmos. The swastika made its way eastward from Asia, carried by European travelers.
Background
The swastika first appeared around 10,000 BCE on an ivory carved bird figurine thought to be a fertility symbol. The swastika is found on ancient African pottery, Neolithic carvings in England, ceramics in Bulgaria from 6,000 BCE, and iron designs in Koban culture and Chinese temples. For Zoroastrians in Persia, the swastika symbolized the revolving sun, infinity, and evolving creation. The swastika talisman achieved widest acceptance in Jainism with it drawn into their holy books and used in religious ceremonies fashioned out of rice around an altar.
The swastika moved across Europe with the spread of Christianity. It was used as a hooked cross symbolizing Christ’s victory over death. Churches were decorated with the swastika throughout the Romanesque and Gothic periods. There are swastikas in a mosaic in Kiev’s St. Sophia Church built in the twelfth century. A 1910 ceiling painting in St. Laurent Church of Grenoble, which has been converted to an archaeological museum, contains swastikas. Among some European theorists, the swastika represented a religious symbol linking ancestors in a Germanic, Greek, and Indo-Iranian culture. The swastika has been found as a motif in North American Native American art. It represented wanderings to the Hopis and as a symbol in healing rituals of the Navajo.
The swastika grew in popularity as a good luck symbol among Westerners. Companies, including Coca-Cola, used the shape of the swastika as a pendant key chain, it was imprinted on a deck of cards for good luck, and it was the name of the Girls Clubs of America’s magazine. US military units in World War I decorated their uniforms and equipment with a swastika, and the British Royal Air Force (RAF) and Finnish Air Force had it emblazoned on their planes.
Nazi proponents of an Aryan race distorted the idea of the swastika, adopting it for their own hateful purposes. The Nazi Party took the swastika in 1920 as the symbol for the party flag, badges, and armbands. Red, white, and black were the colors of the old German Empire that Hitler so admired; the swastika incorporated with those colors gave meaning for the party faithful and the Nazi ideology of Aryan victory over racial confusion.
Swastika Today
Embedding the swastika into every artifact and symbol of life, the Nazis turned the swastika into a symbol of death, racial hate, and fear. RAF Spitfire pilots had a swastika painted on their fuselage for each Luftwaffe plane they shot down. After Hitler’s defeat, the swastika was prohibited in Germany and classified criminal to display; some buildings with it were blown up, erasing every vestige of Nazi existence. Exceptions are Hindu, Buddhist, and Jain temples where the swastika remains a religious symbol. One fashion house destroyed 200,000 catalogues after a button’s design appeared to resemble a swastika. Hungary, Lithuania, and Poland have also outlawed the swastika.
The swastika appears from Nepal to India to Sri Lanka as a symbol of wealth and good fortune. In Asia, the Red Swastika Society has the swastika as its school emblem, where they teach Taoism, Confucianism, and Buddhism.
The importance of the Nazi swastika has taken added significance in the post-war age in which trademarks and logos often replace ad copy and verbiage. Think of the Nike swoosh and the Christian Cross, the Star of David, and other effective symbols. The swastika’s form and swirling appearance are graphically appealing. Its millennia-long use as a currency of luck and religious devotion was blackened forever in the minds of millions. The swastika evokes revulsion, as one graphic artist said, when it appears in public. But that is just the point for some groups using the swastika.
The swastika was revived as a symbol of hate in the 1960s with the emergence of Aryan, neo-Nazi, white power, white supremacist, anti-Semitic skinheads. Infamous leader of a group that slaughtered people in their California home, Charles Manson, carved a swastika into his forehead to symbolize his virulent racist ideology and make people sick to look at him. The new-age Nazi weltanschauung is fueled by music genre of the punk subculture called hate core. Lyrics express hatred for racial minorities, Jews, homosexuals, communists, and enemies of white people. Early punk rockers like Sid Vicious used the swastika to shock people, as a publicity prop some say. Other hate punk rockers like the Punk Front and Brutal Attack migrated between the punk and skinhead scene. The late Lemmy Kilmister, front man for Motorhead, among the most famous of the heavy metal bands, personified how accepting the public has become of the swastika and Nazi memorabilia. He wore it regularly in public appearances and flew the swastika-emblazoned Nazi flag from his window. The excuses made by some music reviewers that these popular musicians are strung out, effete, and drug- addled jesters are not universally accepted. One social theorist suggests acceptance reflects society’s numbness in the twenty-first century to symbolism—even when it represents evil.
Bibliography
Campion, Mukti Jain. "How the world loved the swastika – until Hitler stole it." BBC News Magazine. BBC, 23 Oct. 2014. Web. 27 May 2016.
Goad, Jim. "Rockin’ the Swastika." Taki’s Magazine. Takimag.com, 4 Jan. 2016. Web. 27 May 2016.
Elst, Koenraad. Return of the Swastika: Hate and Hysteria versus Hindu Society. United Kingdom: Arktos Media, 2015. Print.
Heller, Steven. The Swastika: Symbol Beyond Redemption? New York: Allworth Press, 2000. Print.
"Racist Skinheads: Understanding the Threat." SPLC Southern Poverty Law Center. Southern Poverty Law Center, 25 June 2015. Web. 27 May 2016.
Rosenberg, Jennifer. "The History of the Swastika." About Education. About.com, 14 July 2015. Web. 27 May 2016.
Simi, Pete, and Robert Futrell. American Swastika: Inside the White Power Movement’s Hidden Spaces of Hate. Maryland: Rowman & Littlefield, 2015. Print.
Simpson, Patricia Anne, and Helga Druxes, eds. Digital Media Strategies of the Far Right in Europe and the United States. Maryland: Lexington Books, 2015. Print.