The real Luther

[Shibboleth]

First off this is a very old thread so some of my comments I may not stand by at this point as I have learned much since the day of this thread.

Second all of the quotes listed above have been addressed elsewhere. Do not be so foolish as to believe that Lutheran Theologians and Apologists are not aware of such things. All of these need to be understood. One important thing to note is that Luther did not want schism for all eternity nor did he really want it to occur in the first place. He saw problems and wished reform. He thought that the Bible should come first over the proclamations of the See of Rome.

He hated the works of the Anti-Baptists and other profaning what he had taught and what had started because of his battle to reform the Church. He hated more what groups like this had done more than the problems he saw in the Catholic Church.

Third, although the Protestants would hold that the number of Protestant Denominations are less than ideal, because of the concept of an invisible Church of all believers it is not terribly problematic to Protestants. On the other hand since the Catholic Church believes in a one united visible Church the steadily escalating number of schismatic Churches such as the Sedevacantists is highly problematic. I think that perhaps they need to fix the log in their eye before pointing out the slivers in others

 

[Philthy]

Shibboleth:

First off this is a very old thread so some of my comments I may not stand by at this point as I have learned much since the day of this thread.

Second all of the quotes listed above have been addressed elsewhere. Do not be so foolish as to believe that Lutheran Theologians and Apologists are not aware of such things. All of these need to be understood. One important thing to note is that Luther did not want schism for all eternity nor did he really want it to occur in the first place. He saw problems and wished reform. He thought that the Bible should come first over the proclamations of the See of Rome.

Hi shibboleth :tiphat:

Thank you for your post. I reread my own post as a result of it and wanted to say that I didn’t really intend to be pro or anti Luther - my personal opinion doesn’t matter that much because I don’t know very much of his story. I also wanted to say that the quotes I provided were not necessarily quotes meant to slant the picture of Luther one way or the other (alough I now recognize their bias). I simply had collected some quotes regarding Luther from other people on this form and kept them. I reprinted them in the thread (without reading each one) because I thought they were relevant and because the sources were listed.

Thanks again,

Phil

 

[amdg77478]

Hi all,

If anyone is interested, I started a long thread on the ELCA board of Beliefnet about my problems with Martin Luther about a year and a half ago. After reading Luther’s writings, I was disgusted with the man. I tried to get an acceptable explanation of Luther from the good folks at the Lutheran board, but none of their answers satisfied me.

beliefnet.com/boards/message_list.asp?boardID=3754&discussionID=297161

There is an essay (around 50 pages) about Luther written in the 1940’s, which is easily found on the Internet, entitled “Martin Luther: Hitler’s Spiritual Ancestor”. It mainly uses quotes from Luther, and much of what is quoted is absolutely sickening. You cannot take these quotes out of context.

I tell my Lutheran friends (since my wife is Lutheran and I am an “associate” member of an ELCA church) that our Lutheran church is a good church DESPITE Martin Luther and not because of him. My poor wife tries to steer me away from theological debates with my Lutheran friends and the Lutheran pastor, but to little avail. As a conservative, practicing Catholic, it just rubs me wrong to hear about the “arrogance of Rome” from the Lutheran pulpit, or to “celebrate” Reformation Sunday (also known to me as “Disaster Sunday”) - but that’s another story.

Peace be with you all,

AMDG

 

[TertiumQuid]

Philthy:

reread my own post as a result of it and wanted to say that I didn’t really intend to be pro or anti Luther - my personal opinion doesn’t matter that much because I don’t know very much of his story. I also wanted to say that the quotes I provided were not necessarily quotes meant to slant the picture of Luther one way or the other (alough I now recognize their bias). I simply had collected some quotes regarding Luther from other people on this form and kept them. I reprinted them in the thread (without reading each one) because I thought they were relevant and because the sources were listed.

Hi Phil,

A skimmed your Luther *mega-quote * post above. I’m fairly confident the large majority of the quotes have been taken from a secondary source: Patrick O’Hare’s Book, The Facts About Luther. I’m not sure why this book is still in print, as it is known by both Protestant scholars and Catholic scholars to be a “dubious” reference. O’Hare’s method of research and citation is dreadful.

I did an overview on O’Hare’s book here:

The Roman Catholic Perspective of Martin Luther (Part One)

see point VI.

If I have a chance, i’ll demonstrate that many of the citations are from O’Hare’s book. I don’t have the time right now. A few similar quotes to these were posted on another forum some months ago, and i spent a lot of time proving that O’Hare’s book should be avoided:

christianforums.com/t1167326-martin-luther-quotes.html

I could probably do the same with many of those you provided.

Regards,
James Swan

 

[Eden]

amdg77478:

Hi all,

There is an essay (around 50 pages) about Luther written in the 1940’s, which is easily found on the Internet, entitled “Martin Luther: Hitler’s Spiritual Ancestor”. It mainly uses quotes from Luther, and much of what is quoted is absolutely sickening. You cannot take these quotes out of context.

I found a link to the article that you mentioned, “Martin Luther: Hitler’s Spiritual Ancestor”:

tentmaker.org/books/MartinLuther-HitlersSpiritualAncestor.html

 

[Contarini]

amdg77478:

There is an essay (around 50 pages) about Luther written in the 1940’s, which is easily found on the Internet, entitled “Martin Luther: Hitler’s Spiritual Ancestor”. It mainly uses quotes from Luther, and much of what is quoted is absolutely sickening. You cannot take these quotes out of context.

Don’t be ridiculous. You can take anything out of context. In this case, you can for instance ignore the fact that what Luther was saying was more moderate than what some respected Catholic theologians were saying. John Eck, for instance, maintained the “blood libel”–that Jews killed Christian children. (In fact, this was being maintained in articles in the Vatican newspapers as late as the beginning of the 20th century.) I have yet to hear that Luther perpetuated that libel.

To claim that Luther was “Hitler’s spiritual ancestor” in any sense that late medieval Christians generally were not, you must compare what Luther was saying about the Jews to what leading Catholic theologians of his day were saying. If the article in question does not do that, then it’s nothing but slanderous trash.

Edwin

 

[amdg77478]

Then Edwin, you obviously have not read the article, nor does it appear that you intend to read it. It is easy for you to decry something as “slanderous trash” without taking the time to investigate it.

The fact is, that there are serious historians who come right out and say that without Luther, there would have been no Holocaust. One such historian is William Shirer, author of “Rise and Fall of the Third Reich”. At our Lutheran church, a professor of theology from a Lutheran university discussed this point, and while he disagreed with Mr. Shirer, he acknowledged that some historians, with no apparent axe to grind, acknowledge this.

The Nazis encased Luther’s book “On the Jews and Their Lies” and paraded it around at some of their rallies. This is historical fact. It is also historical fact that Hitler has referred to Luther in speeches and said that if Luther had been alive then (the 1930’s and 1940’s), he would be with us. And there is a strong case to be made that he would. It is historical fact that Lutherans were twice as likely to vote for Hitler as Catholics during the 1932 election. I know, because I’ve seen the voting statistics broken down by region of Germany. The only apparent explanation for this is Luther’s “raising the bar” of anti-Semitism among the faithful.

This theology professor (his name was Grislar, or something like that I think) also mentioned that the U.S. Postal Service was set to issue a postage stamp in 1983 honoring the 500th anniversary of the birthdate of Marin Luther, but there was such an outcry from the Jewish community that the USPS scrapped the plans.

Martin Luther was a man who raised hatred of Jews in Germany to a new and horrific level, he justified the fascist state, he bragged about the massacre of over 100,000 peasants during the peasant revolt (which he encouraged), stating that their blood was on his hands,…I could go on. Did some members of the Catholic Church have entrenched anti-Semitism as well? Yes, no doubt. But we don’t idolize those people and hold them up as great examples of the Christian life. Unfortunately, Luther is held up as the great man of conscience, the “liberator” of Christianity from the “superstition of Roman Catholicism”. By the end of his life, Luther had become downright evil. If you don’t believe me, I challenge you to read some of his sermons before he died. They were disgusting.

Why don’t you take the time to read LUTHER’S OWN WORDS as quoted ad nauseum in this article before you start throwing around phrases like “slanderous trash”?

AMDG

 

[Eden]

Contarini:

Don’t be ridiculous. You can take anything out of context. In this case, you can for instance ignore the fact that what Luther was saying was more moderate than what some respected Catholic theologians were saying. John Eck, for instance, maintained the “blood libel”–that Jews killed Christian children. (In fact, this was being maintained in articles in the Vatican newspapers as late as the beginning of the 20th century.) I have yet to hear that Luther perpetuated that libel.

To claim that Luther was “Hitler’s spiritual ancestor” in any sense that late medieval Christians generally were not, you must compare what Luther was saying about the Jews to what leading Catholic theologians of his day were saying. If the article in question does not do that, then it’s nothing but slanderous trash.

Edwin

Edwin, please read the article. The link is above. If you still disagree with the premise, so be it. I don’t know how one can refer to an article as “slanderous trash” without reading it. The author is German and was educated as a Lutheran as he states below:

**"I myself went to a Lutheran school in Berlin. We had Lutheran teachers, and 99 per cent of the boys were Lutheran. We celebrated every year “Luther Day”. Throughout my school life in Germany Luther was shown to us as a great man fighting for freedom, tolerance, independence—the man who exclaimed, “Here I stand, I cannot do otherwise, May God help me, Amen!” Luther, the honest, cheerful, decent German who fought a corrupted, immoral Rome. Luther, who proclaimed the advent of the modern world; Luther, honoured by Protestants everywhere—the hero of Germany and the Protestant world. **

This view was maintained by all scholars, as I said, until the end of last century. Every Protestant saw in Martin Luther almost a demigod, and any views to the contrary were put forward by Catholics who were guided more by emotion and dislike than by any substantial facts."

Source: tentmaker.org/books/MartinLuther-HitlersSpiritualAncestor.html

 

[Mickey]

amdg77478:

This theology professor (his name was Grislar, or something like that I think) also mentioned that the U.S. Postal Service was set to issue a postage stamp in 1983 honoring the 500th anniversary of the birthdate of Marin Luther, but there was such an outcry from the Jewish community that the USPS scrapped the plans.

Hello amdg77478!

He was a jesuit named Hartmann Grisar and you have just opened yourself up to the wrath of our resident Martin Luther expert TertiumQuid. TQ has an article dedicated to the marginalization of Grisar’s research. In fact, be very cautious. TertiumQuid will give you lengthy refutations any time you mention or quote an author or researcher that has presented Martin Luther in a negative light. So brace yourself!

 

[Shibboleth]

amdg77478:

Then Edwin, you obviously have not read the article, nor does it appear that you intend to read it. It is easy for you to decry something as “slanderous trash” without taking the time to investigate it.

The fact is, that there are serious historians who come right out and say that without Luther, there would have been no Holocaust. One such historian is William Shirer, author of “Rise and Fall of the Third Reich”. At our Lutheran church, a professor of theology from a Lutheran university discussed this point, and while he disagreed with Mr. Shirer, he acknowledged that some historians, with no apparent axe to grind, acknowledge this.

The Nazis encased Luther’s book “On the Jews and Their Lies” and paraded it around at some of their rallies. This is historical fact. It is also historical fact that Hitler has referred to Luther in speeches and said that if Luther had been alive then (the 1930’s and 1940’s), he would be with us. And there is a strong case to be made that he would. It is historical fact that Lutherans were twice as likely to vote for Hitler as Catholics during the 1932 election. I know, because I’ve seen the voting statistics broken down by region of Germany. The only apparent explanation for this is Luther’s “raising the bar” of anti-Semitism among the faithful.

This theology professor (his name was Grislar, or something like that I think) also mentioned that the U.S. Postal Service was set to issue a postage stamp in 1983 honoring the 500th anniversary of the birthdate of Marin Luther, but there was such an outcry from the Jewish community that the USPS scrapped the plans.

Martin Luther was a man who raised hatred of Jews in Germany to a new and horrific level, he justified the fascist state, he bragged about the massacre of over 100,000 peasants during the peasant revolt (which he encouraged), stating that their blood was on his hands,…I could go on. Did some members of the Catholic Church have entrenched anti-Semitism as well? Yes, no doubt. But we don’t idolize those people and hold them up as great examples of the Christian life. Unfortunately, Luther is held up as the great man of conscience, the “liberator” of Christianity from the “superstition of Roman Catholicism”. By the end of his life, Luther had become downright evil. If you don’t believe me, I challenge you to read some of his sermons before he died. They were disgusting.

Why don’t you take the time to read LUTHER’S OWN WORDS as quoted ad nauseum in this article before you start throwing around phrases like “slanderous trash”?

AMDG

You do realize that the NAZI’s also used the The Encyclical A Quo Primum by Pope Benedict XIV.

This work essentially contains the same message in Luther’s book “The Jews and Their Lies.”

It must be noted that Luther was anti-Judaism not anti-Jewish or anti-Semitic. He was against Rabbis leading thousands of people to hell and by that logic it was OK to carry out capitol punishment on them.

The second thing that Luther protests against in his work is the ridiculous interest that the Jewish bankers were charging on land and loans. He considered it to be theft and because of this he felt there should be ramifications. This is exactly what Pope Benedict XVI condemned and condoned the use of forceful measures to end.

Do I agree with Luther on these issues? No, but all must be taken in proper context.

The Nazi grabbed onto anything that they could to gain popularity and legitimacy. They latched onto not only Luther but as noted works of Catholicism. Hitler claimed to have the spearhead of the Holy Roman Emperor and by that right he was leader… etc. His reign of terror would have happened with or without Luther. If Hitler was in the country of Transylvania he would have been toting around works of Vlad the Impaler.

In regards to the Peasant Riots he was always against extreme violent behavior towards the Catholic Church. He supported the peasants standing up for their rights but he never supported mass killings. He still supported the peasants that peacefully fought for their rights and condemned those that he thought were behaving as criminals as made evident by his work.

Against the Murderous, Thieving Hordes of Peasants

Which he aptly named so that it is not to be confused with those peasants that are not murderous and thieving.

 

[amdg77478]

Hi Mickey!

No, this man was not a Jesuit. This man was a Lutheran theology teacher. I think his name is Eric Grislar, or something like that. I will try to find out more about him.

AMDG

 

[Eden]

The ultimate goal of the Third Reich was to replace *all *Christianity in Germany with Nazism. But the Nazis were able to use Luther’s influence and belief system to entrance the population. Were the Nazis Christian? By definition, they were not. But there is no getting around the fact that the Nazis successfully used Luther for their cause.

Here is the link to an interview with the author of "**The Holy Reich: Nazi Conceptions of Christianity" by Richard Steigmann-Gall, chair of Jewish studies at Kent State which I had posted on a different thread:

theturning.org/folder/nazis.html

By the way, it was a Lutheran online source that first introduced me to the idea that Luther’s “Orders of Creation” was the inspiration for the Nazi idea of “the Volk.”

 

[Contarini]

amdg77478:

Then Edwin, you obviously have not read the article, nor does it appear that you intend to read it.

I made a conditional statement: if the article does not discuss the attitudes of Luther’s contemporaries toward Jews, but nonetheless claims that Luther has some sort of unique guilt, then it is slanderous trash. That was a perfectly fair statement and I stand by it.

I have in fact glanced through the article, and it was the usual chain of out-of-context quotes. I saw no reason to read it further, nor have you given me any reason to change my opinion.

Edwin

 

[Eden]

Mickey is correct, Hartmann Grisar is a German Jesuit. The author of the article “Martin Luther: Hitler’s Spiritual Successor” is Peter F. Wiener, a German Lutheran.

 

[amdg77478]

Contarini:

I made a conditional statement: if the article does not discuss the attitudes of Luther’s contemporaries toward Jews, but nonetheless claims that Luther has some sort of unique guilt, then it is slanderous trash. That was a perfectly fair statement and I stand by it.

I have in fact glanced through the article, and it was the usual chain of out-of-context quotes. I saw no reason to read it further, nor have you given me any reason to change my opinion.

Edwin

Please tell me Edwin, which Luther quotes were taken out of context in that article? Let’s start with Luther’s 128 page book “On the Jews and Their Lies”. Which quotes of that book in Wiener’s essay were “taken out of context”?

Then we can go through Luther’s “Against the Thieving, Murderous Hordes of Peasants”, and you can tell us which of Wiener’s quotes from that Luther tract were “taken out of context”.

Since you claim that they are taken out of context, please tell us what the proper context was, since obviously Mr. Wiener and the rest of us appear to have it all wrong.

For example, when Luther says that we should burn down all the Jewish synagogues, you can explain to us that Luther was merely telling an off-color joke, or what he was saying was that synagogues are fire hazards, or something like that. You get the idea. Please enlighten us.

Thanks and good luck!

AMDG.

 

[Shibboleth]

amdg77478:

For example, when Luther says that we should burn down all the Jewish synagogues, you can explain to us that Luther was merely telling an off-color joke, or what he was saying was that synagogues are fire hazards, or something like that. You get the idea. Please enlighten us.

Thanks and good luck!

AMDG.

Luther spoke of burning down synagogues becuase he felt that they were places that caused individuals to be driven away from Christ and hence led to their damnation. He did not wish to see people being led to eternity in Hell.

He may have gotten this idea from a letter of Pope Innocent to St. Louis, “Since We strive with all Our heart for the salvation of souls, we grant you full power by the authority of the letter to expel the Jews.”

 

[Contarini]

amdg77478:

Please tell me Edwin, which Luther quotes were taken out of context in that article? Let’s start with Luther’s 128 page book “On the Jews and Their Lies”. Which quotes of that book in Wiener’s essay were “taken out of context”?

Then we can go through Luther’s “Against the Thieving, Murderous Hordes of Peasants”, and you can tell us which of Wiener’s quotes from that Luther tract were “taken out of context”.

Since you claim that they are taken out of context, please tell us what the proper context was, since obviously Mr. Wiener and the rest of us appear to have it all wrong.

For example, when Luther says that we should burn down all the Jewish synagogues, you can explain to us that Luther was merely telling an off-color joke, or what he was saying was that synagogues are fire hazards, or something like that. You get the idea. Please enlighten us.

Thanks and good luck!

AMDG.

I’ve said this several times, and you’re deliberately ignoring it. The context is a context of vicious anti-Judaism on the part of late medieval Christians. Singling out Luther as if he came up with these ideas is a sure sign of either bias or ignorance or (more likely) both. Any discussion of Luther’s anti-Jewish writing that is not a comparative discussion is dishonest. Catholics are living in a very fragile greenhouse here.

Edwin

 

[Eden]

We are talking about Luther’s anti-Semitism. Here are some excerpts from an article about the Medieval Catholic Church and the Jews:

Source: falange.us/churchjw.htm

**1) Pope Gregory I (590-604) spelled out Church policy toward the Jews in his decree Sicut Iudaeis Non. As might be expected, it was a synthesis of Roman law and the philosophies of St. Paul and St. Augustine. Gregory wrote, “Just as the Jews should not in their synagogues be free to do anything not permitted by law, so also in those things granted them they should have no infringement of their rights.” During his pontificate, he put these words into practice, intervening to protect Jews from violence and insisting that Jewish rituals be tolerated. Yet he had no power to force faraway barbarian lords, many of whom were not Catholic, to heed his commands. In his own domains, however, Gregory rigorously defended the Jews. Indeed, throughout the thousand years of the Middle Ages, Rome and the papal states were the only places in western Europe where the Jews were at all times free from attacks or expulsions. The medieval papacy’s unfailing defense of the Jews was not lost on the Jews themselves, who frequently came to the throne of St. Peter for justice and support against their enemies.
**Despite papal pronouncements to the contrary, secular rulers and local communities in Europe were at times quite willing to persecute Jews. Jewish merchants living in towns along the Mediterranean had effectively established themselves in commerce, particularly in the slave trade. This had a way of inflaming the righteous indignation of barbarians, especially those recent converts to Catholicism. In 612 Sisebut, the Visigothic ruler of Spain, ordered the Jews in his kingdom to release their slaves and accept baptism or be expelled. Similarly, King Dagobert of the Franks ordered the expulsion of the Jews in his lands in 629. **

**2) It was St. Augustine who laid the second foundation of the medieval Church’s attitude toward the Jews. Writing in the late fourth and early fifth centuries, Augustine rejected the claims of some Christians that the Jews were the servants of the devil. At the core of Augustine’s philosophy on the Jews were the words of Psalm 59: “Slay them not, lest my people forget: scatter them by thy power; and bring them down, O Lord our shield.” The Jews, Augustine wrote, were clearly wrong. The course of history had shown that their faith and rituals had been supplanted. But they served as a constant reminder of the antiquity of the Christian faith and the glorious gift of salvation that Christ had poured out on the Gentiles. Clinging to their scriptures, the Jews were a witness for the veracity of the Old Testament and its prophecies of Christ’s coming. Augustine insisted that Jews should be treated with respect because they belonged to God, who would bring them one day to the fullness of salvation.

**Nevertheless, despite his many criticisms, Agobard, like the popes, never supported persecution of the Jews. **

St. Bernard of Clairvaux, preaching the Second Crusade, told the soldiers of Christ, “The Jews are not to be persecuted, killed, or even put to flight.” When a fellow Cistercian monk began exhorting Germans to destroy the Jews before waging war on the Moslems, St. Bernard went personally to put a stop to it.

**The Talmud was brought most forcefully to the papacy’s attention in 1239, when a former Jew, Nicholas Donin, informed Pope Gregory IX that it was filled with errors, blasphemies, and heresies. Gregory sent a letter ordering secular lords to confiscate Jewish literature and turn it over to the ecclesiastical authorities for study. The following year, St. Louis IX of France summoned to his court a council of rabbis to defend the Talmud. They failed to convince the Church’s scholars, who concluded that the Talmud had supplanted the Torah, leading the Jewish people to abandon Mosaic Law. Louis ordered the confiscation of all copies of the Talmud in Paris. A few years later, Pope Innocent IV, acting in response to Jewish complaints, ordered a new investigation of the Talmud. But the new commission came to the same conclusion: The Talmud was filled with blasphemies against God and the Christian faith. **

 

[Eden]

(Cont’d)

In response to these findings, Innocent IV enshrined in canon law the right of the pope to act to preserve Judaism from heresy. On the face of it, this may seem absurd. But it was entirely consistent with the Church’s long-standing defense of the Jews. St. Paul and St. Augustine agreed that the Jews must be respected, not out of some anachronistic appreciation of religious diversity, but because they were both a witness to the truth of the Old Testament and the chosen people who would one day come to salvation through Christ. The Talmud struck at the heart of both of these rationales. Henceforth, for the popes, defending the Jews meant not only defending Jewish rights and persons but also the purity of the Jewish faith. In practice, though, Church-sponsored confiscations of the Talmud were rare.

**The 13th century also brought the expansion of the Inquisition. The medieval Inquisition is a big topic, but very little of it is related to the Jews. Dominican inquisitors were generally careful not to tread on Jewish rights. When they did, Jews were quick to bring their grievances to Rome and the popes were just as quick to admonish the inquisitors. **

Of all medieval institutions, the Church stood alone in Europe in its consistent condemnation of Jewish persecutions. Yet they happened anyway.

When the Black Death arrived in the 14th century, the Jews were accused of polluting the wells or incurring divine disfavor through their rituals. Pope Clement VI issued bulls in 1348 repudiating these widely held beliefs, insisting that the Jews’ lives and property be respected. But his words, and those of his successors in the 14th century, were ignored. By the beginning of the 15th century, the only safe place in Europe to be a Jew was in the lands of the pope.

**We might well wish that the relationship between the medieval Catholic Church and the Jews had been better, friendlier, more modern. But it was not modern, nor should we expect it to be. It was, however, a relationship marked by mutual respect and a remarkable degree of tolerance in an age that knew little of either. **

 

[Philthy]

TertiumQuid:

Hi Phil,

A skimmed your Luther *mega-quote *post above. I’m fairly confident the large majority of the quotes have been taken from a secondary source: Patrick O’Hare’s Book, The Facts About Luther. I’m not sure why this book is still in print, as it is known by both Protestant scholars and Catholic scholars to be a “dubious” reference. O’Hare’s method of research and citation is dreadful.

I did an overview on O’Hare’s book here:

The Roman Catholic Perspective of Martin Luther (Part One)

see point VI.

If I have a chance, i’ll demonstrate that many of the citations are from O’Hare’s book. I don’t have the time right now. A few similar quotes to these were posted on another forum some months ago, and i spent a lot of time proving that O’Hare’s book should be avoided:

christianforums.com/t1167326-martin-luther-quotes.html

I could probably do the same with many of those you provided.

Regards,
James Swan

thank you for taking the time to educate me. I will review the articles and hopefully edit the quotes I posted - I certainly won’t use them again otherwise. Is the first quote even valid???

Phil