The strong emphasis on obedience in Rudolf Höss's early upbringing left its indelible mark on him, too. Certainly his father did not intend to raise him to be a commandant at Auschwitz; on the contrary, as a strict Catholic, he had a missionary career in mind for his son. But he had instilled in him at an early age the principle that the authorities must always be obeyed, no matter what their demands. Höss writes:

Our guests were mostly priests of every sort. As the years passed, my father's religious fervor increased. Whenever time permitted, he would take me on pilgrimages to all the holy places in our own country, as well as to Einsiedeln in Switzerland and to Lourdes in France. He prayed passionately that the grace of God might be bestowed on me, so that I might one day become a priest blessed by God. I, too, was as deeply religious as was possible for a boy of my age, and I took my religious duties very seriously. I prayed with true, childlike gravity and performed my duties as acolyte with great earnestness. I had been brought up by my parents to be respectful and obedient toward all adults, and especially the elderly, regardless of their social status. I was taught that my highest duty was to help those in need. It was constantly impressed upon me in forceful terms that I must obey promptly the wishes and commands of my parents, teachers, and priests, and indeed of all adults, including servants, and that nothing must distract me from I this duty. Whatever they said was always right. These basic principles by which I was brought up became second nature to me.

When the authorities later required Höss to run the machinery of death in Auschwitz, how could he have refused? And later, after his arrest, when he was given the assignment of writing an account of his life, he not only performed this task faithfully and conscientiously but politely expressed gratitude for the fact that the time in prison passed more quickly because of "this interesting occupation." His account has provided the world with deep insight into the background of a multitude of otherwise incomprehensible crimes.

People with any sensitivity cannot be turned into mass murderers overnight. But the men and women who carried out "the final solution" did not let their feelings stand in their way for the simple reason that they had been raised from infancy not to have any feelings of their own but to experience their parents' wishes as their own. These were people who, as children, had been proud of being tough and not crying, of carrying out all their duties "gladly," of not being afraid--that is, at bottom, of not having an inner life at all.