Edith Stein (religious name Teresia Benedicta a Cruce ; also known as St. Teresa Benedicta
of the Cross; 12 October 1891 – 9 August 1942), was a German Jewish philosopher who
converted to Roman Catholicism and became a Discalced Carmelite nun.
She is canonized as a martyr and saint of the Catholic Church, and she is one of six
co-patron saints of Europe.
She was born into an observant Jewish family, but was an atheist by her teenage years.
Moved by the tragedies of World War I, in 1915 she took lessons to become a nursing
assistant and worked in an infectious diseases hospital.
After completing her doctoral thesis from the University of Göttingen in 1916, she
obtained an assistantship at the University of Freiburg.
From reading the works of the reformer of the Carmelite Order, Teresa of Ávila, she
was drawn to the Catholic faith.
She was baptized on 1 January 1922 into the Roman Catholic Church.
At that point, she wanted to become a Discalced Carmelite nun, but was dissuaded by her spiritual
mentors.
She then taught at a Catholic school of education in Speyer.
As a result of the requirement of an "Aryan certificate" for civil servants promulgated
by the Nazi government in April 1933 as part of its Law for the Restoration of the Professional
Civil Service, she had to quit her teaching position.
She was admitted to the Discalced Carmelite monastery in Cologne the following October.
She received the religious habit of the Order as a novice in April 1934, taking the religious
name Teresa Benedicta of the Cross.
In 1938, she and her sister Rosa, by then also a convert and an extern sister (tertiaries
of the Order, who would handle the community′s needs outside the monastery), were sent to
the Carmelite monastery in Echt, Netherlands, for their safety.
Despite the Nazi invasion of that state in 1940, they remained undisturbed until they
were arrested by the Nazis on 2 August 1942 and sent to the Auschwitz concentration camp,
where they died in the gas chamber on 9 August 1942.
== Early life == Stein was born in Breslau (now Wrocław, Poland),
Lower Silesia, into an observant Jewish family.
She was the youngest of 11 children and was born on Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the
Hebrew calendar, which combined to make her a favorite of her mother.
She was a very gifted child who enjoyed learning, in a home where her mother encouraged critical
thinking, and she greatly admired her mother's strong religious faith.
By her teenage years, however, Stein had become an atheist.
Though her father died while she was young, her widowed mother was determined to give
her children a thorough education and consequently sent Stein to study at the University of Breslau
(also known as "Schlesische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität").
== Academic career ==
In April 1913 Stein arrived in Göttingen in order to study for the summer semester
with Edmund Husserl.
By the end of the summer she had decided to pursue her degree as a philosopher under Husserl
and "Empathy" had been chosen as her thesis topic.
Her studies were interrupted in July 1914 because of the outbreak of World War I. She
then served as a volunteer wartime Red Cross nurse in an infectious diseases hospital at
Märisch-Weisskirchen in 1915.
In 1916, Stein moved to Freiburg in order to complete her dissertation on Empathy.
Shortly before receiving her degree she agreed to become Husserl's assistant.
After her dissertation entitled Zum Problem der Einfühlung (On the Problem of Empathy)
was awarded on August 3, 1916, which made her a doctor of philosophy with the summa
cum laude honor, she began working independently as Husserl's assistant.
In his 2007 thesis, "The Philosophical Contributions of Edith Stein", John C. Wilhelmsson argues
that Stein influenced the work of Husserl significantly during this period.
She then became a member of the faculty at the University of Freiburg, where she worked
as a teaching assistant to Husserl, who had transferred to that institution.
Because she was a woman, Husserl did not support her submitting her habilitational thesis (a
prerequisite for an academic chair) to the University of Freiburg in 1918.
Her other thesis, Psychische Kausalität (Sentient Causality), submitted at the University of
Göttingen the following year, was likewise rejected.
While Stein had earlier contacts with Roman Catholicism, it was her reading of the autobiography
of the mystic St. Teresa of Ávila during summer holidays in Bad Bergzabern in 1921
that prompted her conversion.
Baptized on 1 January 1922, and dissuaded by her spiritual advisers from immediately
seeking entry to the religious life, she obtained a position to teach at the Dominican nuns'
school in Speyer from 1923 to 1931.
While there, she translated Thomas Aquinas' De Veritate (Of Truth) into German, familiarized
herself with Roman Catholic philosophy in general, and tried to bridge the phenomenology
of her former teacher, Husserl, to Thomism.
She visited Husserl and Heidegger at Freiburg in April 1929, the same month that Heidegger
gave a speech to Husserl on his 70th birthday.
In 1932 she became a lecturer at the Catholic Church-affiliated Institute for Scientific
Pedagogy in Münster, but antisemitic legislation passed by the Nazi government forced her to
resign the post in 1933.
In a letter to Pope Pius XI, she denounced the Nazi regime and asked the Pope to openly
denounce the regime "to put a stop to this abuse of Christ's name."
As a child of the Jewish people who, by the grace of God, for the past eleven years has
also been a child of the Catholic Church, I dare to speak to the Father of Christianity
about that which oppresses millions of Germans.
For weeks we have seen deeds perpetrated in Germany which mock any sense of justice and
humanity, not to mention love of neighbor.
For years the leaders of National Socialism have been preaching hatred of the Jews....
But the responsibility must fall, after all, on those who brought them to this point and
it also falls on those who keep silent in the face of such happenings.
Everything that happened and continues to happen on a daily basis originates with a
government that calls itself 'Christian'.
For weeks not only Jews but also thousands of faithful Catholics in Germany, and, I believe,
all over the world, have been waiting and hoping for the Church of Christ to raise its
voice to put a stop to this abuse of Christ's name.
Is not this idolization of race and governmental power which is being pounded into the public
consciousness by the radio open heresy?
Isn't the effort to destroy Jewish blood an abuse of the holiest humanity of our Savior,
of the most blessed Virgin and the apostles?
Is not all this diametrically opposed to the conduct of our Lord and Savior, who, even
on the cross, still prayed for his persecutors?
And isn't this a black mark on the record of this Holy Year which was intended to be
a year of peace and reconciliation?
We all, who are faithful children of the Church and who see the conditions in Germany with
open eyes, fear the worst for the prestige of the Church, if the silence continues any
longer.
Her letter received no answer, and it is not known for certain whether the Pope ever read
it.
However, in 1937 the Pope issued an encyclical written in German, Mit brennender Sorge (With
Burning Anxiety), in which he criticized Nazism, listed violations of the Concordat between
Germany and the Church of 1933, and condemned antisemitism.
== Discalced Carmelite nun and martyr == Stein entered the Discalced Carmelite monastery
St. Maria vom Frieden (Our Lady of Peace) in Cologne in 1933 and took the religious
name of Teresa Benedicta of the Cross.
There she wrote her metaphysical book Endliches und ewiges Sein (Finite and Eternal Being),
which attempted to combine the philosophies of St. Thomas Aquinas, Duns Scotus and Husserl.
To avoid the growing Nazi threat, her Order transferred her and her sister, Rosa, who
was also a convert and an extern sister of the Carmel, to the Discalced Carmelite monastery
in Echt, Netherlands.
There she wrote Studie über Joannes a Cruce: Kreuzeswissenschaft ("Studies on John of the
Cross: The Science of the Cross").
In her testament of 6 June 1939 she wrote: "I beg the Lord to take my life and my death
… for all concerns of the sacred hearts of Jesus and Mary and the holy [C]hurch, especially
for the preservation of our holy [O]rder, in particular the Carmelite monasteries of
Cologne and Echt, as atonement for the unbelief of the Jewish People, and that the Lord will
be received by [H]is own people and [H]is kingdom shall come in glory, for the salvation
of Germany and the peace of the world, at last for my loved ones, living or dead, and
for all God gave to me: that none of them shall go astray."
Stein's move to Echt prompted her to be more devout and even more observant of the Carmelite
rule.
After having her teaching position revoked by the implementation of the Law for the Restoration
of the Professional Civil Service, Stein quickly eased back into the role of instructor at
the convent in Echt, teaching both fellow sisters and students within the community
Latin and philosophy.Even prior to the Nazi occupation of the Netherlands, Stein believed
she would not survive the war, going as far to write the Prioress to request her permission
to "allow [Stein] to offer [her]self to the heart of Jesus as a sacrifice of atonement
for true peace" and made a will.
Her fellow sisters would later recount how Stein began "quietly training herself for
life in a concentration camp, by enduring cold and hunger" after the Nazi invasion of
the Netherlands in May 1940.Ultimately, she was not safe in the Netherlands.
The Dutch Bishops' Conference had a public statement read in all the churches of the
nation on 20 July 1942 condemning Nazi racism.
In a retaliatory response on 26 July 1942 the Reichskommissar of the Netherlands, Arthur
Seyss-Inquart ordered the arrest of all Jewish converts who had previously been spared.
Along with two hundred and forty-three baptized Jews living in the Netherlands, Stein was
arrested by the SS on 2 August 1942.
Stein and her sister Rosa were imprisoned at the concentration camps of Amersfoort and
Westerbork before being deported to Auschwitz.
A Dutch official at Westerbork was so impressed by her sense of faith and calm, he offered
her an escape plan.
Stein vehemently refused his assistance, stating, "If somebody intervened at this point and
took away her chance to share in the fate of her brothers and sisters, that would be
utter annihilation."On 7 August 1942, early in the morning, 987 Jews were deported to
the Auschwitz concentration camp.
It was probably on 9 August that Sister Teresa Benedicta of the Cross, her sister, and many
more of her people were killed in a mass gas chamber.
== Legacy and veneration == Stein was beatified as a martyr on 1 May 1987
in Cologne, Germany by Pope John Paul II and then canonized by him 11 years later on 11
October 1998 in Vatican City.
The miracle that was the basis for her canonization was the cure of Benedicta McCarthy, a little
girl who had swallowed a large amount of paracetamol (acetaminophen), which causes hepatic necrosis.
The young girl's father, Rev. Emmanuel Charles McCarthy, a priest of the Melkite Greek Catholic
Church, immediately called together relatives and prayed for St. Teresa's intercession.
Shortly thereafter the nurses in the intensive care unit saw her sit up completely healthy.
Dr. Ronald Kleinman, a pediatric specialist at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston
who treated the girl, testified about her recovery to Church tribunals, stating: "I
was willing to say that it was miraculous."
McCarthy would later attend St. Teresa's canonization.
St. Teresa Benedicta of the Cross is one of the six patron saints of Europe, together
with Sts.
Benedict of Nursia, Cyril and Methodius, Bridget of Sweden, and Catherine of Siena.
Today there are many schools named in tribute to her, for example in Darmstadt, Germany,
Hengelo, Netherlands, and Mississauga, Ontario, Canada.
Also named for her are a women's dormitory at the University of Tübingen and a classroom
building at The College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, Massachusetts.
The philosopher Alasdair MacIntyre published a book in 2006 titled Edith Stein: A Philosophical
Prologue, 1913–1922, in which he contrasted her living of her own personal philosophy
with Martin Heidegger, whose actions during the Nazi era, according to MacIntyre, suggested
a "bifurcation of personality."Playwright Arthur Giron wrote Edith Stein, a play that
was inspired by Stein's life.
It was produced at the Pittsburgh Public Theater in 1988.In 1995, Hungarian film director,
Márta Mészáros made a movie about the life and death of Edith Stein with the title A
hetedik szoba (The Seventh Room/Chamber), starring Maia Morgenstern.
In 2008, a memorial Stolperstein (Polish: kamienie pamięci) was placed near Stein's
childhood home at 38 ul.
Nowowiejska (formerly the Michaelisstrasse) in Wrocław.
In 2009 her bust was installed at the Walhalla Memorial near Regensburg, Germany.
In June 2009 the International Association for the Study of the Philosophy of Edith Stein
(IASPES) was founded, and held its first international conference at Maynooth University, Ireland
in order to advance the philosophical writings of Stein.On 6 June 2014, the 70th anniversary
of D-Day, a bell dedicated to her was named by Prince Charles at Bayeux Cathedral.
Also in 2014, the book Edith Stein and Regina Jonas: Religious Visionaries in the Time of
the Death Camps, by Emily Leah Silverman, was published.
== Controversy as to the cause of her murder ==
The beatification of St. Teresa Benedicta as a martyr generated criticism.
Critics argued that she was murdered because she was Jewish by birth, rather than for her
Catholic faith, and that, in the words of Daniel Polish, the beatification seemed to
"carry the tacit message encouraging conversionary activities" because "official discussion of
the beatification seemed to make a point of conjoining Stein's Catholic faith with her
death with 'fellow Jews' in Auschwitz".
The position of the Catholic Church is that St. Teresa Benedicta also died because of
the Dutch episcopacy's public condemnation of Nazi racism in 1942; in other words, that
she died because of the moral teaching of the Church and is thus a true martyr.
== Gallery ==
== Writings in English translation == Life in a Jewish Family: Her Unfinished Autobiographical
Account, translated by Sister Josephine Koeppel, O.C.D., from The Collected Works of Edith
Stein, Volume 1, ICS Publications, 1986 On the Problem of Empathy, translated by Waltraut
Stein, from The Collected Works of Edith Stein, Volume 3, ICS Publications, 1989
Essays on Woman, translated by Freda Mary Oben, 1996
The Hidden Life, translated by Sister Josephine Koeppel, O.C.D., 1993
The Science of the Cross, translated by Sister Josephine Koeppel, O.C.D.
The Collected Works of Edith Stein, Volume Six, 1983, 2002, 2011, ICS Publications
Knowledge and Faith Finite and Eternal Being: An Attempt to an
Ascent to the Meaning of Being Philosophy of Psychology and the Humanities,
translated by Mary Catharine Baseheart, S.C.N., and Marianne Sawicki, 2000
An Investigation Concerning the State, translated by Marianne Sawicki, 2006, ICS Publications
Martin Heidegger's Existential Philosophy Self-Portrait in Letters, 1916–1942
Spirituality of the Christian Woman Potency and Act, Studies Toward a Philosophy
of Being Translated by Walter Redmond, from The Collected Works of Edith Stein, Volume
Eleven, 1998, 2005, 2009, ICS Publications
== See also ==
Book of the First Monks Carmelite Rule of St. Albert
Constitutions of the Carmelite Order Emmanuel Charles McCarthy
Phenomenology
== References ==
== Further reading == Berkman, Joyce A., ed. (2006).
Contemplating Edith Stein.
University of Notre Dame Press.
Borden, Sarah R. (2003).
Edith Stein (Outstanding Christian Thinkers).
Continuum.
Calcagno, Antonio (2007).
The Philosophy of Edith Stein.
Duquesne University Press.
Lebech, Mette (Winter 2011).
"Why Do We Need the Philosophy of Edith Stein?"
(PDF).
Communio. 38: 682–727.
Archived (PDF) from the original on July 1, 2016.
Lebech, Mette (2015).
The Philosophy of Edith Stein: From Phenomenology to Metaphysics.
Peter Lang.
MacIntyre, Alasdair C. (2006).
Edith Stein: A Philosophical Prologue, 1913–1922.
Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield.
Maskulak, Marian, ed. 2016.
Edith Stein: Selected Writings.
New York: Paulist Press.
Posselt, Teresia Renata (1952).
Edith Stein: The Life of a Philosopher and Carmelite.
Sheed and Ward.
Sawicki, Marianne (1997).
Body, Text and Science: The Literacy of Investigative Practices and the Phenomenology of Edith Stein.
Dordrecht: Kluwer.
== External links == Index of Saints
Edith-Stein homepage of the Diocese of Speyer Institute of Philosophy Edith Stein
Associazione Italiana Edith Stein onlus Essays by Edith Stein at Quotidiana.org
Edith Stein at Find a Grave Letter of St. Teresia Benedicta of the Cross
to Pope Pius XI of 1933 Official Edith Stein foundation in The Netherlands