Jacques Martin

Jacques Martin (; 1906–2001) was a French pacifist, one of the first conscientious objectors in France, and a Protestant pastor. His commitment to French Resistance and to the protection of persecuted Jews earned him the recognition of Yad Vashem as a "Righteous Among the Nations." He died in Die on 23 July 2001. There he became friends with André Trocmé, who was a few years older than him. He also met another student, Henri Roser, whose militant pacifist and internationalist ideas shook French Protestant society of that time. Jacques Martin then became a pacifist himself, and wished to contribute personally to international reconciliation, starting with France and Germany. His failing health ensured his definitive exemption from military service before the start of WWII.

Jacques Martin turned each of his trials into a platform to advertise for conscience objection. His defence counsel was solicitor and socialist MP André Philip, who called upon leading intellectuals like Jean Guéhenno or Marc Sangnier and upon representatives of the French Human Rights League. As early as 1928, Martin had temporarily given up on his career in church ministry because of the staunch opposition of institutional protestantism towards his pacifist and anti-militaristic positions. In 1938, still unable to become a pastor, he accepted a position of administrative and human resources director in a silk stockings manufacturing plant in Ganges, Hérault.

War years

In the wake of the first Vichy anti-Jewish legislation by Marshall Pétain's government on 3 October 1940, Jacques Martin decided jointly with Ganges' pastor Élie Gounelle to call for a regional meeting of all Protestant pastors in the area, in order to pray and reflect on the new situation, including the apparent support apparently extended to the Vichy government by the church authorities – including, at that early stage, by the president of the Protestant Federation of France, pastor Marc Boegner. According to Jacques Martin's own account, the day was "dedicated to the problem of anti-Semitism or rather to anti-Semitism and the Bible". In a context where justifications of antisemitism abound, sometimes even from protestants, Jacques Martin published in August 1939 an article entitled "Pagan ... and Christian anti-Semitism" ("L'Antisémitisme païen... et chrétien"). In its first part, the article gives a detailed list, country by country, of antisemitic persecutions in Europe, while the second part deals with the Christians' attitude and sometimes responsibility. Referring to the traditional Christian accusation of Jewish deicide, he asks: "Who does not reject Christ ? Does Christianity not bear the same responsibility than the Jews for the crucifixion of its Master ? Is our own so-called Christian civilisation not bearing more witness of a deeper and more serious rejection and blasphemy than the shouts of a versatile crowd or the calculations of a sanhedrin lost in its clericalism and its pride?"

Preparation for anti-Nazi resistance With their two pastoral meeting held in Ganges, Jacques Martin and Elie Gounelle prepared their colleagues to exert solidarity towards the persecuted Jews. "We had gathered all the pastors of this area of the Cevennes to study this question. These were necessary preliminaries. Caring for the Jews didn't happen spontaneously, not even from the camisards' memory! A long preparation phase, a reflection were needed first, often in opposition with certain Protestant theological concepts, where Judaism was regarded as a mere preamble to Christianity, whereas there was a real spiritual problem, alongside a humanitarian situation from 1942 onwards." For these meetings, Jacques Martin had gathered very significant documentation, first on the events on the ground which he had ample information about through the Cimade network and through other pastors operating on the ground like Henri Manen, then on the Vichy antisemitic laws through articles found in the Swiss Protestant Press and in internal French Protestant churches texts, like the Pomeyrol theses.

Forerunner of conscientious objection in France With a few of his fellow Protestant theology students, Jacques Martin was a pionnier of pacifism in France; in 1923, he was the first editor of the review of Mouvement international de la réconciliation (MIR), the French branch of the International Fellowship of Reconciliation. At his two trials, Jacques Martin was defended by solicitor André Philip, who also defended Camille Rombault and Philippe Vernier. All these trials for draft dodging made big headlines in 1932 and 1933. André Philip used them as platforms for conscientious objectors, developing his arguments further at each trial. He called upon pastors such as Marc Boegner, Henri Nick, André Trocmé and Charles Westphal and leading intellectuals such as Marc Sangnier, Jean Guehenno and Julien Benda.