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Dr. Joseph Norden und seine Braut Emilie, geb. Meseritz
© Sammlung Hochfeldt-Renning, Alte Synagoge Wuppertal

Dr. Joseph Norden * 1870

Brahmsallee 8 (Eimsbüttel, Harvestehude)

1942 Theresienstadt
ermordet 07.02.1943

• http://www.dasjuedischehamburg.de/inhalt/norden-joseph
  (Kurzbiographie in "Das jüdische Hamburg")

further stumbling stones in Brahmsallee 8:
Johanna Bernstein, Victor Cohn, Thekla Cohn, Else Levy, Louis Nathan Levy, Anna Rothenberg

Dr. Joseph Norden, b. 6.17.1870 in Hamburg, deported 7.19.1942 to Theresienstadt, dying there on 2.7.1943

Kielortallee 13 / Brahmsallee 8, Harvestehude

Rabbi Joseph Norden was born in Hamburg, the son of Moses and Bertha Norden, née Levy. He attended the Talmud Torah school (which in his childhood was still at Kohlhöfen 19–20), and in 1890 the Johanneum. After his high school graduation, he studied philosophy at the Friedrich-Wilhelm University in Berlin and concurrently trained at the Orthodox Rabbinic Seminar. In 1895 he completed his doctoral dissertation at Halle on the ethics of Henry Homes. The dissertation is dedicated to "his beloved parents in filial gratitude."

Joseph Norden was brought up in an educated and religiously Orthodox family; the Hildesheim Rabbinic Seminar in Berlin was also Orthodox. Nonetheless, he developed into a representative of liberal Reform Judaism. After standing for the rabbinate examinations, he began in 1897 as a rabbi in Neustettin (Szcecinek) in Pomerania, then from 1899 to 1907 in Myslowitz, Upper Silesia, and from 1907 until his retirement on 31 March 1935 in Elberfeld, where on 6 September 1907, he had succeeded Zacharias Auerbach as rabbi of the congregation there. Elberfeld was certainly the decisive stage of his life. In 1929, after the amalgamation of the congregations of Barmen and Elberfeld with those of Cronenberg, Ronsdorf, and Vohwinkel, his congregation grew to more than 3,000 members.

When Joseph Norden came to Elberfeld, he already had a large family. He was married to Emilie, née Meseritz (b. 1876, d. 1931), and four children had already been born: Bertha (b. 1898), Hans (b. 1899), Elfriede (b. 1901), and Albert (b. 1904). In 1919, a daughter, Hanna, was added. The son Hans, at seventeen years of age, had become a soldier and suffered severe bullet wounds, which, among other things, destroyed his nose. His horrible infirmity lasted until 1926. Hans Norden was buried in the Jewish cemetery at Weinberg in Wuppertal.

The Nordens lived in Elberfeld in the house next door to the synagogue at Genügsamkeitsstrass 7. At the end of the 1920s, when their older daughter was already married, they moved to Zietenstrasse 11, and shortly thereafter into the neighboring house at no. 9 (today Stephanstrasse).

Joseph Norden’s son Albert wrote in his memoirs: "In my parents’ house there ruled an atmosphere of liberal monarchism; its chief article of faith derived from the weekly essays laid down by Theodor Wolff, chief editor of the ‘Berliner Tageblatt,’ the tone-setting newspaper of the ‘left-leaning’ bourgeoisie in the first decades of our century. His was a monarchism – but one tempered by the constitution, universal and equal suffrage, enlightenment and tolerance, elimination of antisemitism and limitation of the influence of the Prussian nobility. Liberalism – within the monarchy, certainly no longer rule by the grace of God, but rather within constitutionally appropriate limits." Joseph Norden’s veneration of Kaiser Wilhelm II prompted him to publish a brochure, "Our Peace-loving Kaiser." His son described him as being completely blind and oblivious to any political-economic context.

As far as the Jewish religion was concerned, however, Joseph Norden was a progressive; he belonged to the World Union for Progressive Judaism and translated the books of Claude Montefiore (1858–1938), among the leaders of Reform Judaism in England. In the course of his professional life, Norden held many honorary positions and received genuine honors and distinctions. He remained distant from Zionism. In connection with his work he became interested in the New Testament and Christianity. He disposed of a profound knowledge of Jewish and Christian literature and published many writings.

On 1 April 1935, Joseph Norden retired. That month he returned to his native city of Hamburg, joined the German-Israelite Congregation on 17 April 1935, and moved into a five room dwelling at Brahmsallee 8. His two brothers, the twins Alexander and Carl (b. 10.10.1875) already were living in Hamburg with their families. Joseph Norden received a pension, but it was substantially reduced. In 1937 he became a member of the rabbinic court of the Israelite Temple Association; in 1939 he took over the rabbi’s position of the Hamburg temple, succeeding Bruno Italiener, who fled to England following the Night of Broken Glass. The outside of the temple on Oberstrasse remained unscathed during the night of pogroms, but the interior was destroyed. Afterwards the sanctuary of the Temple Association was confiscated and could no longer be used as a Jewish gathering place. Joseph Norden held reformed services in the former lodge hall of the B’nai B’rith on Hartungstrasse. His son Albert wrote that influential Englishmen, whose works he had translated, had offered him a visa and the possibility of work in England. Joseph Norden refused them because he did not want to leave his congregation in the lurch.

In the summer of 1939 in Hamburg, Joseph Norden came to know and love the much younger Regina Jonas (b. 1902), who was active in Berlin and was the first woman to hold the title of rabbi. She was ordained in December 1935 and taught religion in the schools of the Berlin Jewish congregation. In August, Joseph Norden wrote to Regina Jonas: "From the first hour that I got to know you last summer, I loved you. A shame, that I am a man of 70. For if I were 20 years younger, I would have sought to make you my wife." This love affair was problematical for Regina Jonas, for she held her self to high moral standards and wanted to live a chaste life without marriage. At the very least, however, she probably preferred marriage to a relationship out of wedlock, and at the end of 1941 it might have come to a formal engagement. However, political conditions made this union impossible.

Max Plaut, a distant relative of Joseph Norden, stated: "During the war, he had to vacate his home by order of the regulatory authorities and was installed by the congregation in the congregation house on Kielortallee. My mother lived on the first floor of this house with two other women. Since Dr. Norden once again functioned as the rabbi of the Temple Association, he was permitted to take his library with him. However, because of the anticipated further measures, he had to sell off most of his establishment. As a consequence of his deportation, his remaining estate was confiscated and his dwelling was sealed."

On 15 July 1942, Dr. Joseph Norden was deported to Theresienstadt. At this point, he was 72 years old. He died in Theresienstadt on 7. February 1943. His brother Carl also was in Theresienstadt at that time. He died there a little less than a year after Joseph Norden. Regina Jonas was deported from Berlin to Theresienstadt in November 1942 and sent on from there to Auschwitz in 1944, where she was murdered in December of that year. Might Joseph Norden and Regina have seen each other in Theresienstadt? A plaque memorializes Regina Jonas in an exhibition at the Berlin Wannsee Conference House.

Joseph Norden’s children survived the Nazi era in exile – with the exception of Hans who died early. His son Albert, a well-known functionary of the German Democratic Republic (East Germany), had already as a student, become a Communist in response to the political unrest of the Weimar Republic. For political reasons, he had to leave secondary school in Elberfeld, took an apprenticeship in carpentry, and later carved out a career as a journalist in the service of the Communist Party. He worked for the party press in Hamburg and other places between 1925 and 1928. He spent his exile in Denmark, Czechoslovakia, France, and in the USA. He was jailed frequently. In 1946 he returned to East Germany and in 1953 became a professor specializing in the history of German-Soviet relations at the Berlin Humboldt University. From 1955 until 1981, he was a member and secretary of the Central Committee and from 1958 until 1981, a member of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the SED [Socialist Unity Party]. He was married to Hertha, née Fischer, who came from Hamburg. They had one son.

Joseph Norden’s daughters emigrated. Bertha married Professor Werner Rohnstedt and in 1944 lived in Ohio. Elfriede Mainrath, née Norden, lived in Tel Aviv as of 1944. Of daughter Hanna we know that in 1935 she moved with her father to Hamburg after being expelled from school in Wuppertal. In 1939 she married the pharmacist Josef Hochfeld in Hamburg; they emigrated to Tientsin, China and then relocated to the USA in 1948. She died, well advanced in years, in February 2011.

Joseph Norden’s two brothers and their very large families were also victims of the persecution. Alexander Norden emigrated with his second wife, Caroline, née Mindus, in December 1938 to the Netherlands. They had five children: Max Moses (b. 1907), Leo Alexander (b. 1912), Bertha Victoria (b. 1914), Carl (b. 1921) and Siegfried (b. 1924). Commemorative stones have been laid at Grindelallee 73 for Alexander, Caroline, Max Moses, Carl, and Siegfried. All were deported from the Netherlands. Brother Carl Norden was married to Betty, née Jaffé. The couple had four children: Erica (b. 1906), Manfred (b. 1907), Martin (b. 1911), and Josef (b. 1913). For Carl, Betty, Manfred, and Josef commemorative stones are at Amelungstrasse 6. Like Joseph Norden, they were deported to Theresienstadt.

In 1982 in Hamburg a street was named in memory of Joseph Norden, the Joseph Norden Way in Niendorf.


Translator: Richard Levy

Kindly supported by the Hermann Reemtsma Stiftung, Hamburg.

Stand: November 2017
© Susanne Lohmeyer

Quellen: 1; 3; 5; StaH 214-1 Gerichtsvollzieherwesen, 542; StaH 351-11 AfW, AZ 070119 und AZ170670; StaH 522-1 Jüd. Gemeinden 992e 2 Band 5 (Deportationslisten); StaH 622-1, Familie Plaut; Wegweiser zu ehemaligen jüdischen Stätten, Heft 2; Ulrike Schrader, Rabbiner Dr. Joseph Norden; Ulrike Schrader, Tora und Textilien, S. 87ff.; Peter Offenborn, Jüdische Jugend; E. G. Lowenthal, Bewährung im Untergang, S. 138/139; Biographisches Handbuch der Rabbiner Teil 2, S. 463ff.; Joseph Norden, Die Ethik Henry Homes; Elisa Klapheck, Fräulein Rabbiner Jonas; Katrin Nele Jansen, "Norden, Joseph", in: Das jüdische Hamburg, S. 199; www.ns-gedenkstaetten.de; www.musenblaetter.de; Manuskript Rundfunksendung "Gott und die Welt" über Regina Jonas, Autor Michael Hollenbach, Sendetermin 2.1.2011; Todesanzeige im "Aufbau" am 24.11.1944.
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