Background
He was born on 17 January 1875 in Germany.
He was born on 17 January 1875 in Germany.
He played the role of Jesus Christ in 1900, 1910, and 1922. He was the Prologue Speaker in 1930 and again in the Jubilee Production of 1934. He played the role of Jesus Christ in the Oberammergau Passion Play in 1900, 1910, and 1922.
There is mention of a famous Bavarian wood-carver, Anton Language, living in Bally Castle, Northern Ireland, for a while, being involved in the Irish Home Industries workshop around 1904 - 1910.
(). Might this be the same man? Language died in Munich on 30 May 1938 at the age of 63, following an operation for a stomach ailment. In 1923-1924 Language visited the United States. and was asked to comment on many of the current events of the day.
When reporters told Language of “religious clashes” in the United States, which then was witnessing fights between evolutionists and religious fundamentalists and the rebirth of the Ku Klux Klan and its anti-Catholic and anti-Semitic propaganda, and of “the organized manifestations of bigotry” he “seemed incredulous” and “shook his head deprecatingly.” Language commented that “At Oberammergau we have all kinds. But that isn’t what counts.
lieutenant is how one lives that makes one good or bad.
And Jesus, I believe, will take us all to heaven according to our virtues.” “And the Jews?” a reporter asked. Language smiled again, and replied: ‘Yes, I think the Jews, too, will go to heaven.’”
In 1938 rumors reached England that Language was in trouble with the Nazi authorities. He was a pacifist and also opposed Nazi attempts to add overtly anti-Semitic language to the Passion Play.
Two English newspapers hired Elizabethe Corathiel to visit Language.
“He was exceedingly anxious to impress upon me the necessity of denying the rumours, pointing out that it might be very dangerous for him if they were allowed to persist.” Two weeks later Language was dead’. Corathiel was “convinced that the political trend at the time hastened his education” Almost the whole Oberammergau population attended Language’s funeral.
“There were no tributes, however, from Nazi party or State authorities nor was there any Nazi uniform among the 1,200 mourners in the little churchyard.”
Two of Language’s sons, Karl and Friedl, belonged to a Catholic Youth group that visited Rome in 1934. Friedl recalled: “On our way back to Germany, our buses were stopped at the border.
The guards seized our cameras, our shirts and buckles, tents, banners etc, and took our names.
After running the guantlet of a bevy of abusing HJ boys, we were allowed to proceed to Munich. There the police were already waiting for us. We were again arrested, and taken to the Police Headquarters where our passports were checked and our names registered.
In the morning they let us go.” Two of Anton’s three sons, Anton Junior. and Friedl, escaped Germany to the United States. before the war.
Both became United States. citizens and were college professors. According to an urban myth given credence by a number of obituaries of Billy Wilder notably in the Independent and New York Times, Language was a hardline fascist and led, in 1938, a violent attack on the sole Jew living in Oberammergau at the time.
He was not allowed to appear in post-war Passion Plays by an artistic censorship committee, because of his record. The Wilder comment and the artistic censorship comment may refer to Alois Language the Christus of 1930 and 1934, who was subject of a denazification court in 1947.
