Nazism was deeply rooted in German culture. From the fertile soil of German Romanticism sprang ideas of great significance for the genesis of the Third Reich ideology--notions of the individual as a mere part of the national collective, and of life as a ceaseless struggle between opposing forces.

This book traces the origins of the "political religion" of Nazism. Ultra-nationalism and totalitarianism, racial theory and anti-Semitism, nature mysticism and occultism, eugenics and social Darwinism, adoration of the Fuhrer and glorification of violence--all are explored. The book also depicts the dramatic development of the Nazi movement--and the explosive impact of its political faith, racing from its bloody birth in the trenches of World War I to its cataclysmic climax in the Holocaust and World War II.