Martin Luther
Martin Luther (; ; 10 November 1483 – 18 February 1546) was a German priest, theologian, author, hymnwriter, and professor, and Order of Saint Augustine, Augustinian friar. He is the seminal figure of the Reformation, Protestant Refo ...
(1483–1546) was a German professor of theology, priest and seminal leader of the
Reformation
The Reformation (alternatively named the Protestant Reformation or the European Reformation) was a major movement within Western Christianity in 16th-century Europe that posed a religious and political challenge to the Catholic Church and in ...
. His positions on Judaism continue to be controversial. These changed dramatically from his early career, where he showed concern for the plight of European Jews, to his later years, when embittered by his failure to convert them to
Christianity
Christianity is an Abrahamic monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth. It is the world's largest and most widespread religion with roughly 2.38 billion followers representing one-third of the global pop ...
, he became outspokenly
antisemitic
Antisemitism (also spelled anti-semitism or anti-Semitism) is hostility to, prejudice towards, or discrimination against Jews. A person who holds such positions is called an antisemite. Antisemitism is considered to be a form of racism.
Antis ...
in his statements and writings.
Evolution of his views
![Martin Luther by Cranach-restoration](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b7/Martin_Luther_by_Cranach-restoration.jpg)
Luther's attitude toward the Jews changed over the course of his life. At the beginning of his career, it was influenced by
Johann Reuchlin
Johann Reuchlin (; sometimes called Johannes; 29 January 1455 – 30 June 1522) was a German Catholic humanist and a scholar of Greek and Hebrew, whose work also took him to modern-day Austria, Switzerland, and Italy and France. Most of Reuchlin' ...
, who was the great-uncle of his friend
Philip Melanchthon
Philip Melanchthon. (born Philipp Schwartzerdt; 16 February 1497 – 19 April 1560) was a German Lutheran reformer, collaborator with Martin Luther, the first systematic theologian of the Protestant Reformation, intellectual leader of the Lu ...
. Luther relied on Reuchlin for answering questions about Hebrew and had used one of his
Cabalistic
Cabalist or Cabalistic may refer to:
*Cabal, a group of people united in some close design together, usually to promote their private views or interests in a church, state, or other community
*Christian Kabbalah, an incorporation of Jewish Kabbalah ...
books to help his argument in a debate. Reuchlin had successfully prevented the Holy Roman Empire from burning Jewish books, but was racked by heresy proceedings as a result. In the early phase of Luther's career—until around 1536—he expressed concern for their plight in Europe and was enthusiastic at the prospect of converting them to
Christianity
Christianity is an Abrahamic monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth. It is the world's largest and most widespread religion with roughly 2.38 billion followers representing one-third of the global pop ...
through his religious reforms. Being unsuccessful in that, in his later career, Luther denounced
Judaism
Judaism ( he, ''Yahăḏūṯ'') is an Abrahamic, monotheistic, and ethnic religion comprising the collective religious, cultural, and legal tradition and civilization of the Jewish people. It has its roots as an organized religion in the ...
and called for harsh persecution of its followers, so that they might not be allowed to teach. In a paragraph from his ''
On the Jews and Their Lies
''On the Jews and Their Lies'' (german: Von den Jüden und iren Lügen; in modern spelling ) is a 65,000-word anti-Judaic and antisemitic treatise written in 1543 by the German Reformation leader Martin Luther (1483–1546).
Luther's attitude t ...
'' he deplores
Christendom
Christendom historically refers to the Christian states, Christian-majority countries and the countries in which Christianity dominates, prevails,SeMerriam-Webster.com : dictionary, "Christendom"/ref> or is culturally or historically intertwine ...
's failure to expel them.
["Luther, Martin"]
''JewishEncyclopedia.com''; cf. ''Luther's Works'', American Edition, 55 vols., (St. Louis and Philadelphia: Concordia Publishing House and Fortress Press, 1955–86) 47:267. Moreover, he proposed "What shall we Christians do with this rejected and condemned people, the Jews":
*"First, to set fire to their synagogues or schools … This is to be done in honor of our Lord and of Christendom, so that God might see that we are Christians …"
*"Second, I advise that their houses also be razed and destroyed."
*"Third, I advise that all their prayer books and
Talmud
The Talmud (; he, , Talmūḏ) is the central text of Rabbinic Judaism and the primary source of Jewish religious law (''halakha'') and Jewish theology. Until the advent of modernity, in nearly all Jewish communities, the Talmud was the cente ...
ic writings, in which such idolatry, lies, cursing, and blasphemy are taught, be taken from them."
*"Fourth, I advise that their
rabbi
A rabbi () is a spiritual leader or religious teacher in Judaism. One becomes a rabbi by being ordained by another rabbi – known as ''semikha'' – following a course of study of Jewish history and texts such as the Talmud. The basic form of ...
s be forbidden to teach henceforth on pain of loss of life and limb …"
*"Fifth, I advise that safe-conduct on the highways be abolished completely for the Jews. For they have no business in the countryside …"
*"Sixth, I advise that
usury
Usury () is the practice of making unethical or immoral monetary loans that unfairly enrich the lender. The term may be used in a moral sense—condemning taking advantage of others' misfortunes—or in a legal sense, where an interest rate is ch ...
be prohibited to them, and that all cash and treasure of silver and gold be taken from them …"
*"Seventh, I recommend putting a flail, an ax, a hoe, a spade, a distaff, or a spindle into the hands of young, strong Jews and Jewesses and letting them earn their bread in the sweat of their brow … But if we are afraid that they might harm us or our wives, children, servants, cattle, etc., … then let us emulate the common sense of other nations such as France, Spain, Bohemia, etc., … then eject them forever from the country …"
Early years
Luther's first known comment on the Jews is in a letter written to
George Spalatin
Georg(e) Spalatin () was the pseudonym taken by Georg Burkhardt (; 17 January 1484 – 16 January 1545), a German humanist, theologian, reformer, secretary of the Saxon Elector Frederick the Wise, as well as an important figure in the histo ...
in 1514:
Conversion of the Jews will be the work of God alone operating from within, and not of man working — or rather playing — from without. If these offences be taken away, worse will follow. For they are thus given over by the wrath of God to reprobation, that they may become incorrigible, as Ecclesiastes
Ecclesiastes (; hbo, קֹהֶלֶת, Qōheleṯ, grc, Ἐκκλησιαστής, Ekklēsiastēs) is one of the Ketuvim ("Writings") of the Hebrew Bible and part of the Wisdom literature of the Christian Old Testament. The title commonly use ...
says, for every one who is incorrigible is rendered worse rather than better by correction.
In 1519, Luther challenged the doctrine ''Servitus Judaeorum'' ("Servitude of the Jews"), established in ''
Corpus Juris Civilis
The ''Corpus Juris'' (or ''Iuris'') ''Civilis'' ("Body of Civil Law") is the modern name for a collection of fundamental works in jurisprudence, issued from 529 to 534 by order of Justinian I, Byzantine Emperor. It is also sometimes referred ...
'' by
Justinian I
Justinian I (; la, Iustinianus, ; grc-gre, Ἰουστινιανός ; 48214 November 565), also known as Justinian the Great, was the Byzantine emperor from 527 to 565.
His reign is marked by the ambitious but only partly realized ''renovat ...
from 529 to 534. He wrote: "Absurd theologians defend hatred for the Jews. ... What Jew would consent to enter our ranks when he sees the cruelty and enmity we wreak on them—that in our behavior towards them we less resemble Christians than beasts?"
In his 1523 essay ''That Jesus Christ Was Born a Jew'', Luther condemned the inhuman treatment of the Jews and urged Christians to treat them kindly. Luther's fervent desire was that Jews would hear the Gospel proclaimed clearly and be moved to convert to Christianity. Thus he argued:
If I had been a Jew and had seen such dolts and blockheads govern and teach the Christian faith, I would sooner have become a hog than a Christian. They have dealt with the Jews as if they were dogs rather than human beings; they have done little else than deride them and seize their property. When they baptize them they show them nothing of Christian doctrine or life, but only subject them to popishness and mockery...If the apostles, who also were Jews, had dealt with us Gentiles as we Gentiles deal with the Jews, there would never have been a Christian among the Gentiles ... When we are inclined to boast of our position s Christianswe should remember that we are but Gentiles, while the Jews are of the lineage of Christ. We are aliens and in-laws; they are blood relatives, cousins, and brothers of our Lord. Therefore, if one is to boast of flesh and blood the Jews are actually nearer to Christ than we are...If we really want to help them, we must be guided in our dealings with them not by papal law but by the law of Christian love. We must receive them cordially, and permit them to trade and work with us, that they may have occasion and opportunity to associate with us, hear our Christian teaching, and witness our Christian life. If some of them should prove stiff-necked, what of it? After all, we ourselves are not all good Christians either.
Anti-Jewish agitation
Luther successfully campaigned against the Jews in Saxony, Brandenburg, and Silesia. In August 1536 Luther's prince,
Elector of Saxony John Frederick, issued a mandate that prohibited Jews from inhabiting, engaging in business in, or passing through his realm. An
Alsatian shtadlan
A ''shtadlan'' ( he, שַׁדְלָן, ; yi, שתּדלן, ) was an intercessor for a local European Jewish community. They represented the interests of the community, especially those of a town's ghetto, and worked as a "lobbyist" negotiating w ...
, Rabbi
Josel of Rosheim Josel of Rosheim (alternatively: Joselin, Joselmann, Yoselmann, german: Josel von Rosheim, he, יוסף בן גרשון מרוסהים ''Joseph ben Gershon mi-Rosheim'', or ''Joseph ben Gershon Loanz''; c. 1480 – March, 1554) was the great advoca ...
, asked a reformer
Wolfgang Capito
Wolfgang Fabricius Capito (also Koepfel) ( – November 1541) was a German Protestant reformer in the Calvinist tradition.
His life and revolutionary work
Capito was born circa 1478 to a smith at Hagenau in Alsace. He attended the famous Lat ...
to approach Luther in order to obtain an audience with the prince, but Luther refused every intercession. In response to Josel, Luther referred to his unsuccessful attempts to convert the Jews: "... I would willingly do my best for your people but I will not contribute to your
ewishobstinacy by my own kind actions. You must find another intermediary with my good lord."
Heiko Oberman
Heiko Augustinus Oberman (1930–2001) was a Dutch historian and theologian who specialized in the study of the Reformation.
Life
Oberman was born in Utrecht on 15 October 1930. He earned his doctorate in theology from the University of Utrecht ...
notes this event as significant in Luther's attitude toward the Jews: "Even today this refusal is often judged to be the decisive turning point in Luther's career from friendliness to hostility toward the Jews."
Josel of Rosheim, who tried to help the Jews of Saxony, wrote in his memoir that their situation was "due to that priest whose name was Martin Luther — may his body and soul be bound up in hell!! — who wrote and issued many heretical books in which he said that whoever would help the Jews was doomed to
perdition
Perdition may refer to:
* Hell in Christianity
Music
* '' Perdition City'', an album by Norwegian band Ulver
* '' The Perdition EP'', an album by Norwegian band Enslavement of Beauty
* "Perdition", a song from the album ''In Consequence'' by Gree ...
." Robert Michael, Professor Emeritus of European History at the
University of Massachusetts Dartmouth
The University of Massachusetts Dartmouth (UMass Dartmouth or UMassD) is a public research university in Dartmouth, Massachusetts. It is the southernmost campus of the University of Massachusetts system. Formerly Southeastern Massachusetts Un ...
writes that Josel asked the city of Strasbourg to forbid the sale of Luther's anti-Jewish works; they refused initially, but relented when a Lutheran pastor in
Hochfelden argued in a sermon that his parishioners should murder Jews.
[Michael, Robert. ''Holy Hatred: Christianity, Antisemitism, and the Holocaust''. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2006, p. 117.]
Anti-Jewish works
Luther's main works on the Jews were his 65,000-word treatise ''Von den Juden und Ihren Lügen'' (''
On the Jews and Their Lies
''On the Jews and Their Lies'' (german: Von den Jüden und iren Lügen; in modern spelling ) is a 65,000-word anti-Judaic and antisemitic treatise written in 1543 by the German Reformation leader Martin Luther (1483–1546).
Luther's attitude t ...
'') and ''
Vom Schem Hamphoras
''Vom Schem Hamphoras'', full title: ''Vom Schem Hamphoras und vom Geschlecht Christi'' (''Of the Unknowable Name and the Generations of Christ''), was a book written by German Reformation leader Martin Luther in 1543, in which he equated Jews wit ...
und vom Geschlecht Christi'' (''Of the Unknowable Name and the Generations of Christ'') — reprinted five times within his lifetime — both written in 1543, three years before his death.
[Michael, Robert. ''Holy Hatred: Christianity, Antisemitism, and the Holocaust''. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2006, p. 110.] It is believed that Luther was influenced by
Anton Margaritha Anton Margaritha (also known as Antony Margaritha, Anthony Margaritha, Antonius Margarita, Antonius Margaritha) (born ca. 1500) was a sixteenth-century Jewish Hebraist and convert to Christianity. He was a possible source for some of Martin Luther ...
's book ''
Der gantze Jüdisch Glaub'' (''The Whole Jewish Belief''). Margaritha, a convert to Christianity who had become a
Lutheran
Lutheranism is one of the largest branches of Protestantism, identifying primarily with the theology of Martin Luther, the 16th-century German monk and reformer whose efforts to reform the theology and practice of the Catholic Church launched th ...
, published his antisemitic book in 1530 which was read by Luther in 1539. In 1539, Luther got his hands on the book and immediately fell in love with it. “The materials provided in this book confirmed for Luther that the Jews in their blindness wanted nothing to do with faith and justification through faith.” Margaritha's book was decisively discredited by
Josel of Rosheim Josel of Rosheim (alternatively: Joselin, Joselmann, Yoselmann, german: Josel von Rosheim, he, יוסף בן גרשון מרוסהים ''Joseph ben Gershon mi-Rosheim'', or ''Joseph ben Gershon Loanz''; c. 1480 – March, 1554) was the great advoca ...
in a public debate in 1530 before
Charles V Charles V may refer to:
* Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor (1500–1558)
* Charles V of Naples (1661–1700), better known as Charles II of Spain
* Charles V of France (1338–1380), called the Wise
* Charles V, Duke of Lorraine (1643–1690)
* Infan ...
and his court, resulting in Margaritha's expulsion from the Empire.
''Commentary on the Psalms''
''On the Jews and Their Lies''
In 1543 Luther published ''On the Jews and Their Lies'' in which he says that the
Jew
Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""Th ...
s are a "base, whoring people, that is, no people of God, and their boast of lineage, circumcision, and law must be accounted as filth." They are full of the "devil's feces ... which they wallow in like swine." The synagogue was a "defiled bride, yes, an incorrigible whore and an evil slut ..."
[Michael, Robert. ''Holy Hatred: Christianity, Antisemitism, and the Holocaust''. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2006, p. 112.] He argues that their synagogues and
schools
A school is an educational institution designed to provide learning spaces and learning environments for the teaching of students under the direction of teachers. Most countries have systems of formal education, which is sometimes compulsor ...
be set on fire, their
prayer book
A prayer book is a book containing prayers and perhaps devotional readings, for private or communal use, or in some cases, outlining the liturgy of religious services. Books containing mainly orders of religious services, or readings for them are ...
s destroyed,
rabbi
A rabbi () is a spiritual leader or religious teacher in Judaism. One becomes a rabbi by being ordained by another rabbi – known as ''semikha'' – following a course of study of Jewish history and texts such as the Talmud. The basic form of ...
s forbidden to preach, homes razed, and property and money confiscated. They should be shown no mercy or kindness, afforded no legal protection,
[Michael, Robert. "Luther, Luther Scholars, and the Jews," ''Encounter'' 46:4, (Autumn 1985), p. 343.] and these "poisonous envenomed worms" should be drafted into forced labor or expelled for all time.
[ Luther, Martin. ''On the Jews and Their Lies'', ''Luthers Werke''. 47:268–271; Trans. Martin H. Bertram, in ''Luther's Works''. (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1971).] He also seems to advocate their murder, writing "
are at fault in not slaying them". Luther claims that Jewish history was "assailed by much heresy", and that Christ swept away the Jewish heresy and goes on to do so, "as it still does daily before our eyes." He stigmatizes
Jewish Prayer as being "blasphemous" and a lie, and vilifies Jews in general as being spiritually "blind" and "surely possessed by all
devils
A devil is the personification of evil as it is conceived in many and various cultures and religious traditions.
Devil or Devils may also refer to:
* Satan
* Devil in Christianity
* Demon
* Folk devil
Art, entertainment, and media
Film an ...
." Luther has a special spiritual problem with Jewish
circumcision
Circumcision is a surgical procedure, procedure that removes the foreskin from the human penis. In the most common form of the operation, the foreskin is extended with forceps, then a circumcision device may be placed, after which the foreskin ...
.
The full context in which Martin Luther appears to advocate that Jews be slain in ''On the Jews and Their Lies'' is as follows in Luther's own words:
There is no other explanation for this than the one cited earlier from Moses - namely, that God has struck he Jews
He or HE may refer to:
Language
* He (pronoun), an English pronoun
* He (kana), the romanization of the Japanese kana へ
* He (letter), the fifth letter of many Semitic alphabets
* He (Cyrillic), a letter of the Cyrillic script called ''He'' ...
with 'madness and blindness and confusion of mind' euteronomy 28:28 So we are even at fault in not avenging all this innocent blood of our Lord and of the Christians which they shed for three hundred years after the destruction of Jerusalem, and the blood of the children they have shed since then (which still shines forth from their eyes and their skin). We are at fault in not slaying them.
''Vom Schem Hamphoras''
Several months after publishing ''On the Jews and Their Lies'', Luther wrote the 125-page ''
Vom Schem Hamphoras
''Vom Schem Hamphoras'', full title: ''Vom Schem Hamphoras und vom Geschlecht Christi'' (''Of the Unknowable Name and the Generations of Christ''), was a book written by German Reformation leader Martin Luther in 1543, in which he equated Jews wit ...
und vom Geschlecht Christi'' (''Of the Unknowable Name and the Generations of Christ''), in which he equated Jews with the
Devil
A devil is the personification of evil as it is conceived in various cultures and religious traditions. It is seen as the objectification of a hostile and destructive force. Jeffrey Burton Russell states that the different conceptions of t ...
:
Here in Wittenburg, in our parish church, there is a sow carved into the stone under which lie young pigs and Jews who are sucking; behind the sow stands a rabbi who is lifting up the right leg of the sow, raises behind the sow, bows down and looks with great effort into the Talmud under the sow, as if he wanted to read and see something most difficult and exceptional; no doubt they gained their Shem Hamphoras from that place.
The English translation of ''Vom Schem Hamphoras'' is contained in ''The Jew in Christian Theology'', by Gerhard Falk (1992).
''Warning against the Jews''
Shortly before his death on 18 February 1546, Luther preached four sermons in Eisleben. He appended to the second to the last what he called his "final warning" against the Jews. The main point of this short work is that authorities who could expel the Jews from their lands should do so if they would not convert to Christianity. Otherwise, Luther indicated, such authorities would make themselves "partners in another's sins".
Luther began by saying:
We want to deal with them in a Christian manner now. Offer them the Christian faith that they would accept the Messiah, who is even their cousin and has been born of their flesh and blood; and is rightly Abraham’s Seed, of which they boast. Even so, I am concerned hat
A hat is a head covering which is worn for various reasons, including protection against weather conditions, ceremonial reasons such as university graduation, religious reasons, safety, or as a fashion accessory. Hats which incorporate mecha ...
Jewish blood may no longer become watery and wild. First of all, you should propose to them that they be converted to the Messiah and allow themselves to be baptized, that one may see that this is a serious matter to them. If not, then we would not permit them o live among us
O, or o, is the fifteenth letter and the fourth vowel letter in the Latin alphabet, used in the modern English alphabet, the alphabets of other western European languages and others worldwide. Its name in English is ''o'' (pronounced ), pl ...
for Christ commands us to be baptized and believe in Him, even though we cannot now believe so strongly as we should, God is still patient with us.[''Weimar Ausgabe 51:194–196; J.G. Walch, Dr. Martin Luthers Sämmtliche Schriften, 23 vols. (St. Louis: Concordia, 1883), 12:1264–1267.'']
Luther continued, "However, if they are converted, abandon their usury, and receive Christ, then we will willingly regard them our brothers. Otherwise, nothing will come out of it, for they do it to excess."
Luther followed this with accusations:
They are our public enemies. They do not stop blaspheming our Lord Christ, calling the Virgin Mary a whore, Christ, a bastard, and us changelings or abortions (Mahlkälber: "meal calves"o). If they could kill us all, they would gladly do it. They do it often, especially those who pose as physicians—though sometimes they help—for the devil helps to finish it in the end. They can also practice medicine as in French Switzerland. They administer poison to someone from which he could die in an hour, a month, a year, ten or twenty years. They are able to practice this art.
He then said:
Yet, we will show them Christian love and pray for them that they may be converted to receive the Lord, whom they should honor properly before us. Whoever will not do this is no doubt a malicious Jew, who will not stop blaspheming Christ, draining you dry, and, if he can, killing ou
This work has been newly translated and published in volume 58 (Sermons V) of ''Luther's Works'', pages 458–459.
The influence of Luther's views
In 1543, Luther's prince,
John Frederick I, Elector of Saxony
John Frederick I (30 June 1503 in Torgau – 3 March 1554 in Weimar), called the Magnanimous, was the Elector of Saxony (1532–1547) and head of the Schmalkaldic League.
Early years
John Frederick was the eldest son of Elector John by his firs ...
, revoked concessions he had made to the Jews in 1539. Luther's influence persisted after his death.
John of Brandenburg
John is a common English name and surname:
* John (given name)
* John (surname)
John may also refer to:
New Testament
Works
* Gospel of John, a title often shortened to John
* First Epistle of John, often shortened to 1 John
* Second ...
-
Küstrin, Margrave of the
New March
The Neumark (), also known as the New March ( pl, Nowa Marchia) or as East Brandenburg (), was a region of the Margraviate of Brandenburg and its successors located east of the Oder, Oder River in territory which became part of History of Polan ...
, repealed the safe conduct of Jews in his territories.
Philip of Hesse
Philip I, Landgrave of Hesse (13 November 1504 – 31 March 1567), nicknamed (in English: "the Magnanimous"), was a German nobleman and champion of the Protestant Reformation, notable for being one of the most important of the early Protestan ...
added restrictions to his ''Order Concerning the Jews''. Luther's followers sacked the synagogue of
Berlin
Berlin ( , ) is the capital and largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's most populous city, according to population within city limits. One of Germany's sixteen constitue ...
in 1572 and in the following year the Jews were driven out of the entire
Margravate of Brandenburg
The Margraviate of Brandenburg (german: link=no, Markgrafschaft Brandenburg) was a major principality of the Holy Roman Empire from 1157 to 1806 that played a pivotal role in the history of Germany and Central Europe.
Brandenburg developed out o ...
.
[ In the 1580s riots led to expulsion of Jews from several German Lutheran states.][
Nevertheless, no ruler enacted all of Luther's anti-Jewish recommendations.
According to Michael, Luther's work acquired the status of Scripture within Germany, and he became the most widely read author of his generation, in part because of the coarse and passionate nature of the writing.][ In the 1570s Pastor Georg Nigrinus published ''Enemy Jew'', which reiterated Luther's program in '']On the Jews and Their Lies
''On the Jews and Their Lies'' (german: Von den Jüden und iren Lügen; in modern spelling ) is a 65,000-word anti-Judaic and antisemitic treatise written in 1543 by the German Reformation leader Martin Luther (1483–1546).
Luther's attitude t ...
'', and Nikolaus Selnecker
Nikolaus Selnecker (or Selneccer) (December 5, 1530 – May 24, 1592) was a German musician, theologian and Protestant reformer. He is now known mainly as a hymn writer. He is also known as one of the principal authors of the ''Formula of Conco ...
, one of the authors of the ''Formula of Concord
Formula of Concord (1577) (German, ''Konkordienformel''; Latin, ''Formula concordiae''; also the "''Bergic Book''" or the "''Bergen Book''") is an authoritative Lutheran statement of faith (called a confession, creed, or "symbol") that, in its tw ...
'', reprinted Luther's ''Against the Sabbatarians'', ''On the Jews and Their Lies'', and ''Vom Schem Hamphoras
''Vom Schem Hamphoras'', full title: ''Vom Schem Hamphoras und vom Geschlecht Christi'' (''Of the Unknowable Name and the Generations of Christ''), was a book written by German Reformation leader Martin Luther in 1543, in which he equated Jews wit ...
''.
Luther's treatises against the Jews were reprinted again early in the 17th century at Dortmund
Dortmund (; Westphalian nds, Düörpm ; la, Tremonia) is the third-largest city in North Rhine-Westphalia after Cologne and Düsseldorf, and the eighth-largest city of Germany, with a population of 588,250 inhabitants as of 2021. It is the la ...
, where they were seized by the Emperor. In 1613 and 1617 they were published in Frankfurt am Main
Frankfurt, officially Frankfurt am Main (; Hessian: , "Frank ford on the Main"), is the most populous city in the German state of Hesse. Its 791,000 inhabitants as of 2022 make it the fifth-most populous city in Germany. Located on its na ...
in support of the banishment of Jews from Frankfurt and Worms Worms may refer to:
*Worm, an invertebrate animal with a tube-like body and no limbs
Places
*Worms, Germany
Worms () is a city in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany, situated on the Upper Rhine about south-southwest of Frankfurt am Main. It had ...
. Vincenz Fettmilch
Vincenz Fettmilch (died 1616) was a grocer and gingerbread baker who led the Fettmilch uprising (1612–1616) of the guilds in Frankfurt-am-Main targeting the municipal council to determine the price of grain in an open market; disclose the ...
, a Calvinist
Calvinism (also called the Reformed Tradition, Reformed Protestantism, Reformed Christianity, or simply Reformed) is a major branch of Protestantism that follows the theological tradition and forms of Christian practice set down by John Ca ...
, reprinted ''On the Jews and Their Lies'' in 1612 to stir up hatred against the Jews of Frankfurt. Two years later, riots in Frankfurt saw the deaths of 3,000 Jews and the expulsion of the rest. Fettmilch was executed by the Lutheran city authorities, but Michael writes that his execution was for attempting to overthrow the authorities, not for his offenses against the Jews.
These reprints were the last popular publication of these works until they were revived in the 20th century.
Influence on modern antisemitism
The prevailing view["The assertion that Luther's expressions of anti-Jewish sentiment have been of major and persistent influence in the centuries after the Reformation, and that there exists a continuity between Protestant ]anti-Judaism
Anti-Judaism is the "total or partial opposition to Judaism as a religion—and the total or partial opposition to Jews as adherents of it—by persons who accept a competing system of beliefs and practices and consider certain genuine Judai ...
and modern racially oriented antisemitism, is at present wide-spread in the literature; since the Second World War it has understandably become the prevailing opinion." Johannes Wallmann, "The Reception of Luther's Writings on the Jews from the Reformation to the End of the 19th century", ''Lutheran Quarterly'', n.s. 1 (Spring 1987) 1:72–97. among historians is that Luther's anti-Jewish rhetoric contributed significantly to the development of antisemitism in Germany, and in the 1930s and 1940s provided an ideal foundation for the Nazi Party
The Nazi Party, officially the National Socialist German Workers' Party (german: Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei or NSDAP), was a far-right politics, far-right political party in Germany active between 1920 and 1945 that crea ...
's attacks on Jews. Reinhold Lewin writes that "whoever wrote against the Jews for whatever reason believed he had the right to justify himself by triumphantly referring to Luther." According to Michael, just about every anti-Jewish book printed in the Third Reich
Nazi Germany (lit. "National Socialist State"), ' (lit. "Nazi State") for short; also ' (lit. "National Socialist Germany") (officially known as the German Reich from 1933 until 1943, and the Greater German Reich from 1943 to 1945) was ...
contained references to and quotations from Luther. Diarmaid MacCulloch argues that Luther's 1543 pamphlet ''On the Jews and Their Lies
''On the Jews and Their Lies'' (german: Von den Jüden und iren Lügen; in modern spelling ) is a 65,000-word anti-Judaic and antisemitic treatise written in 1543 by the German Reformation leader Martin Luther (1483–1546).
Luther's attitude t ...
'' was a "blueprint" for the Kristallnacht
() or the Night of Broken Glass, also called the November pogrom(s) (german: Novemberpogrome, ), was a pogrom against Jews carried out by the Nazi Party's (SA) paramilitary and (SS) paramilitary forces along with some participation from ...
.[ Diarmaid MacCulloch, '' Reformation: Europe's House Divided, 1490–1700''. New York: Penguin Books Ltd, 2004, pp. 666–667.] Shortly after the Kristallnacht, Martin Sasse, Bishop of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Thuringia
The Evangelical Lutheran Church in Thuringia (''Evangelisch-Lutherische Kirche in Thüringen'') was a Lutheran member church of the umbrella Evangelical Church in Germany (EKD). The seat of the church was in Eisenach. The church covered those part ...
, published a compendium of Martin Luther
Martin Luther (; ; 10 November 1483 – 18 February 1546) was a German priest, theologian, author, hymnwriter, and professor, and Order of Saint Augustine, Augustinian friar. He is the seminal figure of the Reformation, Protestant Refo ...
's writings; Sasse "applauded the burning of the synagogues" and the coincidence of the day, writing in the introduction, "On November 10, 1938, on Luther's birthday, the synagogues are burning in Germany." The German people, he urged, ought to heed these words "of the greatest anti-Semite of his time, the warner of his people against the Jews."
Christopher J. Probst, in his book ''Demonizing the Jews: Luther and the Protestant Church in Nazi Germany'' (2012), shows that a large number of German Protestant clergy and theologians during the Nazi Third Reich used Luther's hostile publications towards the Jews and their Jewish religion to justify at least in part the anti-Semitic policies of the National Socialists. Published In 1940, Heinrich Himmler
Heinrich Luitpold Himmler (; 7 October 1900 – 23 May 1945) was of the (Protection Squadron; SS), and a leading member of the Nazi Party of Germany. Himmler was one of the most powerful men in Nazi Germany and a main architect of th ...
wrote admiringly of Luther's writings and sermons on the Jews. The city of Nuremberg presented a first edition of ''On the Jews and their Lies'' to Julius Streicher
Julius Streicher (12 February 1885 – 16 October 1946) was a member of the Nazi Party, the ''Gauleiter'' (regional leader) of Franconia and a member of the '' Reichstag'', the national legislature. He was the founder and publisher of the virul ...
, editor of the Nazi newspaper ''Der Stürmer
''Der Stürmer'' (, literally "The Stormer / Attacker / Striker") was a weekly German tabloid-format newspaper published from 1923 to the end of the Second World War by Julius Streicher, the ''Gauleiter'' of Franconia, with brief suspensions ...
'', on his birthday in 1937; the newspaper described it as the most radically antisemitic tract ever published. It was publicly exhibited in a glass case at the Nuremberg rallies
The Nuremberg Rallies (officially ', meaning ''Reich Party Congress'') refer to a series of celebratory events coordinated by the Nazi Party in Germany. The first rally held took place in 1923. This rally was not particularly large or impactful; ...
and quoted in a 54-page explanation of the Aryan Law by Dr. E.H. Schulz and Dr. R. Frercks.[ On December 17, 1941, seven Lutheran regional church confederations issued a statement agreeing with the policy of forcing Jews to wear the yellow badge, "since after his bitter experience Luther had tronglysuggested preventive measures against the Jews and their expulsion from German territory."
Michael states "Luther wrote of the Jews as if they were a race that could not truly convert to Christianity. Indeed, like so many Christian writers before him, Luther, by making the Jews the devil's people, put them beyond conversion." He notes that in a sermon of September 25, 1539, "Luther tried to demonstrate through several examples that individual Jews could not convert permanently, and in several passages of ''The Jews and Their Lies'', Luther appeared to reject the possibility that the Jews would or could convert."
Franklin Sherman, editor of volume 47 of the American Edition of ''Luther's Works'' in which ''On the Jews and Their Lies'' appears, responds to the claim that "Luther's antipathy towards the Jews was religious rather than racial in nature," Luther's writings against the Jews, he explains, are not "merely a set of cool, calm and collected theological judgments. His writings are full of rage, and indeed hatred, against ''an identifiable human group'', not just against a religious point of view; it is against that group that his action proposals are directed." Sherman argues that Luther "cannot be distanced completely from modern antisemites". Regarding Luther's treatise, ''On the Jews and Their Lies'', the German philosopher ]Karl Jaspers
Karl Theodor Jaspers (, ; 23 February 1883 – 26 February 1969) was a German-Swiss psychiatrist and philosopher who had a strong influence on modern theology, psychiatry, and philosophy. After being trained in and practicing psychiatry, Jasper ...
wrote: "There you already have the whole Nazi program".
Other scholars assert that Luther's antisemitism as expressed in ''On the Jews and Their Lies'' is based on religion. Bainton asserts that Luther's position was "entirely religious and in no respect racial. The supreme sin for him was the persistent rejection of God's revelation of himself in Christ. The centuries of Jewish suffering were themselves a mark of the divine displeasure. They should be compelled to leave and go to a land of their own. This was a program of enforced Zionism. But if it were not feasible, then Luther would recommend that the Jews be compelled to live from the soil. He was unwittingly proposing a return to the condition of the early Middle Ages, when the Jews had been in agriculture. Forced off the land, they had gone into commerce and, having been expelled from commerce, into money lending. Luther wished to reverse the process and thereby inadvertently would accord the Jews a more secure position than they enjoyed in his day."[Bainton, Roland. ''Here I Stand: A Life of Martin Luther'', (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1978), 299.]
Paul Halsall argues that Luther's views had a part in laying the groundwork for the racial European antisemitism of the nineteenth century. He writes that "although Luther's comments seem to be proto-Nazi, they are better seen as part of tradition icof Medieval Christian anti-semitism. While there is little doubt that Christian anti-semitism laid the social and cultural basis for modern anti-semitism, modern anti-semitism does differ in being based on pseudo-scientific notions of race. The Nazis imprisoned and killed even those ethnic Jews who had converted to Christianity: Luther would have welcomed their conversions."
In his ''Lutheran Quarterly'' article, Wallmann argued that Luther's ''On the Jews and Their Lies'', ''Against the Sabbabitarians'', and ''Vom Schem Hamphoras'' were largely ignored by antisemites of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. He contended that Johann Andreas Eisenmenger
Johann Andreas Eisenmenger (1654 in Mannheim – 20 December 1704 in Heidelberg) was a German Orientalist from the Electorate of the Palatinate, now best known as the author of ''Entdecktes Judenthum'' (''Judaism Unmasked''), which was published i ...
and his ''Judaism Unmasked'', published posthumously in 1711, was "a major source of evidence for the anti-Semites of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries" and "cast Luther's anti-Jewish writings into obscurity". In this 2000 page tome Eisenmenger makes no mention of Luther at all.[
The Lutheran court chaplain to Kaiser Wilhelm I, ]Adolf Stoecker
Adolf Stoecker (December 11, 1835 – February 2, 1909) was a German court chaplain to Kaiser Wilhelm I, a politician, leading antisemite, and a Lutheran theologian who founded the Christian Social Party to lure members away from the S ...
, founded in 1878 an antisemitic and antiliberal party called the Christian Social Party (Germany)
The Christian Social Party (german: Christlich–soziale Partei, CSP) was a right-wing political party in the German Empire founded in 1878 by Adolf Stoecker as the Christian Social Workers' Party (german: Christlichsoziale Arbeiterpartei, CSPA).
...
. However, this party did not enjoy the mass support which the Nazis received during the 1930s, when the Great Depression hit Germany especially hard.
Debate about Luther's influence on the Nazis
At the heart of the debate about Luther's influence is whether or not it is anachronistic
An anachronism (from the Greek , 'against' and , 'time') is a chronological inconsistency in some arrangement, especially a juxtaposition of people, events, objects, language terms and customs from different time periods. The most common type ...
to view his work as a precursor of the racial antisemitism
Racial antisemitism is prejudice against Jews based on a belief or assertion that Jews constitute a distinct race that has inherent traits or characteristics that appear in some way abhorrent or inherently inferior or otherwise different from ...
of the Nazis
Nazism ( ; german: Nazismus), the common name in English for National Socialism (german: Nationalsozialismus, ), is the far-right totalitarian political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in Na ...
. Some scholars believe that Luther's influence is limited, and they believe that the Nazis' use of his work was opportunistic.
The prevailing scholarly view since the Second World War
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
is that the treatise exercised a major and persistent influence on Germany's attitude toward its Jewish citizens in the centuries between the Reformation
The Reformation (alternatively named the Protestant Reformation or the European Reformation) was a major movement within Western Christianity in 16th-century Europe that posed a religious and political challenge to the Catholic Church and in ...
and the Holocaust
The Holocaust, also known as the Shoah, was the genocide of European Jews during World War II. Between 1941 and 1945, Nazi Germany and its collaborators systematically murdered some six million Jews across German-occupied Europe; a ...
. Four hundred years after it was written, the Nazi Party
The Nazi Party, officially the National Socialist German Workers' Party (german: Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei or NSDAP), was a far-right politics, far-right political party in Germany active between 1920 and 1945 that crea ...
displayed ''On the Jews and Their Lies'' during Nuremberg rallies
The Nuremberg Rallies (officially ', meaning ''Reich Party Congress'') refer to a series of celebratory events coordinated by the Nazi Party in Germany. The first rally held took place in 1923. This rally was not particularly large or impactful; ...
, and the city of Nuremberg presented a first edition to Julius Streicher
Julius Streicher (12 February 1885 – 16 October 1946) was a member of the Nazi Party, the ''Gauleiter'' (regional leader) of Franconia and a member of the '' Reichstag'', the national legislature. He was the founder and publisher of the virul ...
, editor of the Nazi newspaper ''Der Stürmer
''Der Stürmer'' (, literally "The Stormer / Attacker / Striker") was a weekly German tabloid-format newspaper published from 1923 to the end of the Second World War by Julius Streicher, the ''Gauleiter'' of Franconia, with brief suspensions ...
'', the newspaper describing it as the most radically antisemitic
Antisemitism (also spelled anti-semitism or anti-Semitism) is hostility to, prejudice towards, or discrimination against Jews. A person who holds such positions is called an antisemite. Antisemitism is considered to be a form of racism.
Antis ...
tract ever published. Against this view, theologian Johannes Wallmann writes that the treatise had no continuity of influence in Germany, and was in fact largely ignored during the 18th and 19th centuries.[Wallmann, Johannes. "The Reception of Luther's Writings on the Jews from the Reformation to the End of the 19th Century", ''Lutheran Quarterly'', n.s. 1, Spring 1987, 1:72–97.] Hans Hillerbrand argues that to focus on Luther's role in the development of German antisemitism
Antisemitism (also spelled anti-semitism or anti-Semitism) is hostility to, prejudice towards, or discrimination against Jews. A person who holds such positions is called an antisemite. Antisemitism is considered to be a form of racism.
Antis ...
is to underestimate the "larger peculiarities of German history."
Martin Brecht Martin Brecht (born 6 March 1932) is a Church historian, professor emeritus of the University of Münster, Westphalia, Germany. Until his retirement in 1997 at age 65, he served as head of the Department of Medieval and Modern Church History of the ...
argues that there is a world of difference between Luther's belief in salvation, which depended on the belief that Jesus was the messiah — a belief which Luther criticized the Jews for rejecting — and the Nazis' ideology of racial antisemitism. Johannes Wallmann argues that Luther's writings against the Jews were largely ignored in the 18th and 19th century, and he also argues that there is no continuity between Luther's thought and Nazi ideology
Nazism ( ; german: Nazismus), the common name in English for National Socialism (german: Nationalsozialismus, ), is the far-right totalitarian political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in Na ...
. Uwe Siemon-Netto
Uwe Siemon-Netto (born October 25, 1936), the former religion editor of United Press International, is a German international columnist and a Lutheran lay (non-ordained) theologian. He is a Senior Distinguished Fellow of 1517 The Legacy Project, a ...
agrees, arguing that the Nazis republished Luther's writings because they were already antisemites.[ Siemon-Netto, "Luther and the Jews," '']The Lutheran Witness
Concordia Publishing House (CPH), founded in 1869, is the official publishing arm of the Lutheran Church–Missouri Synod (LCMS). Headquartered in St Louis, Missouri, at 3558 S. Jefferson Avenue, CPH publishes the synod's official monthly magaz ...
'' 123 (2004) No. 4:19, 21. Hans J. Hillerbrand states that the view that "Luther significantly encouraged the development of German anti-Semitism... puts far too much emphasis on Luther and not enough on the larger peculiarities of German history".[Hillerbrand, Hans J. "Martin Luther," ''Encyclopædia Britannica'', 2007. Hillerbrand writes: "His strident pronouncements against the Jews, especially toward the end of his life, have raised the question of whether Luther significantly encouraged the development of German anti-Semitism. Although many scholars have taken this view, this perspective puts far too much emphasis on Luther and not enough on the larger peculiarities of German history."] Other scholars argue that, even if his views were merely anti-Judaic, their violence lent a new element to the standard Christian suspicion of Judaism. Ronald Berger writes that Luther is credited with "Germanizing the Christian critique of Judaism and establishing anti-Semitism as a key element of German culture and national identity."[Berger, Ronald. Fathoming the Holocaust: A Social Problems Approach (New York: Aldine De Gruyter, 2002), 28.] Paul Rose argues that he caused a "hysterical and demonizing mentality" about Jews to enter German thought and discourse, a mentality that might otherwise have been absent.
The line of "anti-semitic descent" from Luther to Hitler is "easy to draw",Lucy Dawidowicz
Lucy Dawidowicz ( Schildkret; June 16, 1915 – December 5, 1990) was an American historian and writer. She wrote books about modern Jewish history, in particular, she wrote books about the Holocaust.
Life
Dawidowicz was born in New York City a ...
. ''The War Against the Jews, 1933–1945''. First published 1975; this Bantam edition 1986, p.23. according to American historian Lucy Dawidowicz
Lucy Dawidowicz ( Schildkret; June 16, 1915 – December 5, 1990) was an American historian and writer. She wrote books about modern Jewish history, in particular, she wrote books about the Holocaust.
Life
Dawidowicz was born in New York City a ...
. In her book ''The War Against the Jews, 1933–1945'', she writes that both Luther and Hitler were obsessed with the "demonologized universe" which they believed was inhabited by Jews, with Hitler asserting that the later Luther, the author of ''On the Jews and Their Lies'' was the real Luther.[
Dawidowicz writes that the similarities between Luther's anti-Jewish writings and modern antisemitism are no coincidence, because they derived from a common history of '' Judenhass'', which can be traced back to Haman's advice to ]Ahasuerus
Ahasuerus ( ; , commonly ''Achashverosh'';; fa, اخشورش, Axšoreš; fa, label=New Persian, خشایار, Xašāyār; grc, Ξέρξης, Xérxēs. grc, label=Koine Greek, Ἀσουήρος, Asouḗros, in the Septuagint; la, Assuerus ...
. Although modern German antisemitism also has its roots in German nationalism
German nationalism () is an ideological notion that promotes the unity of Germans and German-speakers into one unified nation state. German nationalism also emphasizes and takes pride in the patriotism and national identity of Germans as one na ...
and Christian antisemitism
Antisemitism in Christianity, a form of religious antisemitism, is the feeling of hostility which some Christian Churches, Christian groups, and ordinary Christians have towards the Jewish religion and the Jewish people.
Antisemitic Christian rh ...
, she argues that another foundation of it was laid by the Roman Catholic Church
The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...
, "upon which Luther built".[
Michael has argued that Luther scholars who try to tone down Luther's views on the Jews ignore the murderous implications of his antisemitism. Michael argues that there is a "strong parallel" between Luther's ideas and the antisemitism of most German Lutherans throughout ]the Holocaust
The Holocaust, also known as the Shoah, was the genocide of European Jews during World War II. Between 1941 and 1945, Nazi Germany and its collaborators systematically murdered some six million Jews across German-occupied Europe; a ...
.[Robert Michael, "Luther, Luther Scholars, and the Jews", ''Encounter'' 46:4 (Autumn 1985), pp. 339–56.] He writes that Like the Nazis, Luther mythologized the Jews as evil. They could only be saved if they converted to Christianity, but their hostility to the idea made it inconceivable.[
Luther's sentiments were widely echoed in the Germany of the 1930s, particularly within the Nazi party. Hitler's Education Minister, ]Bernhard Rust
Bernhard Rust (30 September 1883 – 8 May 1945) was Minister of Science, Education and National Culture ( Reichserziehungsminister) in Nazi Germany.Claudia Koonz, ''The Nazi Conscience'', p 134 A combination of school administrator and zealou ...
, was quoted by the ''Völkischer Beobachter
The ''Völkischer Beobachter'' (; "'' Völkisch'' Observer") was the newspaper of the Nazi Party (NSDAP) from 25 December 1920. It first appeared weekly, then daily from 8 February 1923. For twenty-four years it formed part of the official pub ...
'' as saying that: "Since Martin Luther closed his eyes, no such son of our people has appeared again. It has been decided that we shall be the first to witness his reappearance ... I think the time is past when one may not say the names of Hitler and Luther in the same breath. They belong together; they are of the same old stamp 'Schrot und Korn''.
Hans Hinkel
Hans Hinkel (22 June 1901 – 8 February 1960) was a German journalist and ministerial official in Nazi Germany. He studied at the University of Bonn, where he was a member of the academic fencing fraternity ''Sugambria''. Hinkel had served in t ...
, the editor of the Luther League
The Luther League is a Lutheran religious association for young people in the United States of America. It began with a local society founded by delegates of six Lutheran church societies in New York City in 1888. The first national convention w ...
's magazine ''Deutsche Kultur-Wacht'', and the leader of the Berlin chapter of the '' Kampfbund'', paid tribute to Luther in his acceptance speech as head of both the Jewish section and the film department of Goebbel's Chamber of Culture and Propaganda Ministry. "Through his acts and his spiritual attitude, he began the fight which we will wage today; with Luther, the revolution of German blood and feeling against alien elements of the Volk was begun. To continue and complete his Protestantism
Protestantism is a branch of Christianity that follows the theological tenets of the Protestant Reformation, a movement that began seeking to reform the Catholic Church from within in the 16th century against what its followers perceived to b ...
, nationalism
Nationalism is an idea and movement that holds that the nation should be congruent with the State (polity), state. As a movement, nationalism tends to promote the interests of a particular nation (as in a in-group and out-group, group of peo ...
must make the picture of Luther, of a German fighter, live as an example 'above the barriers of confession' for all German blood comrades."
According to Daniel Goldhagen
Daniel Jonah Goldhagen (born June 30, 1959) is an American author, and former associate professor of government and social studies at Harvard University. Goldhagen reached international attention and broad criticism as the author of two controver ...
, Bishop Martin Sasse, a leading Protestant churchman, published a compendium of Luther's writings shortly after ''Kristallnacht
() or the Night of Broken Glass, also called the November pogrom(s) (german: Novemberpogrome, ), was a pogrom against Jews carried out by the Nazi Party's (SA) paramilitary and (SS) paramilitary forces along with some participation from ...
'', for which Diarmaid MacCulloch, Professor of the History of the Church in the University of Oxford
, mottoeng = The Lord is my light
, established =
, endowment = £6.1 billion (including colleges) (2019)
, budget = £2.145 billion (2019–20)
, chancellor ...
argued that Luther's writings were a "blueprint". Sasse "applauded the burning of the synagogues and the coincidence of the day, writing in the introduction, "On November 10, 1938, on Luther's birthday, the synagogues are burning in Germany." The German people, he urged, ought to heed these words "of the greatest antisemite of his time, the warner of his people against the Jews."
William Nichols, Professor of Religious Studies, recounts, "At his trial in Nuremberg after the Second World War, Julius Streicher
Julius Streicher (12 February 1885 – 16 October 1946) was a member of the Nazi Party, the ''Gauleiter'' (regional leader) of Franconia and a member of the '' Reichstag'', the national legislature. He was the founder and publisher of the virul ...
, the notorious Nazi propagandist, editor of the scurrilous antisemitic weekly ''Der Stürmer'', argued that if he should stand there and be arraigned on such charges, so should Martin Luther. After reading such passages, it is not hard to agree with him. Luther's proposals read like a program for the Nazis."[William Nichols, ''Christian Antisemitism: A History of Hate'' (Northvale, NJ: Jason Aronson, 1995), p. 271.] It was Luther's expression "The Jews are our misfortune" that centuries later would be repeated by Heinrich von Treitschke
Heinrich Gotthard Freiherr von Treitschke (; 15 September 1834 – 28 April 1896) was a German historian, political writer and National Liberal member of the Reichstag during the time of the German Empire. He was an extreme nationalist, who favo ...
and appear as a motto on the front page of Julius Streicher's ''Der Stürmer''.
Some scholars have directly attributed the Nazi "Final Solution
The Final Solution (german: die Endlösung, ) or the Final Solution to the Jewish Question (german: Endlösung der Judenfrage, ) was a Nazi plan for the genocide of individuals they defined as Jews during World War II. The "Final Solution to th ...
" to Martin Luther. Others dispute this point of view, pointedly taking issue with the thesis which was advanced by William Shirer
William Lawrence Shirer (; February 23, 1904 – December 28, 1993) was an American journalist and war correspondent. He wrote ''The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich'', a history of Nazi Germany that has been read by many and cited in scholarly w ...
and others.
Luthertag
In the course of the ''Luthertag'' (Luther Day) festivities, the Nazis emphasized their connection to Luther as being both nationalist revolutionaries and the heirs of the German traditionalist past. An article in the ''Chemnitzer Tageblatt'' stated that " e German Volk are united not only in loyalty and love for the Fatherland, but also once more in the old German beliefs of Luther 'Lutherglauben'' a new epoch of strong, conscious religious life has dawned in Germany."
Richard Steigmann-Gall
Richard Steigmann-Gall (Born October 3, 1965) is an Associate Professor of History at Kent State University, and the former Director of the Jewish Studies Program from 2004 to 2010.
Education
He received his BA in history in 1989 and MA ...
writes in his 2003 book ''The Holy Reich: Nazi Conceptions of Christianity, 1919–1945'':
The leadership of the Protestant League espoused a similar view. Fahrenhorst, who was on the planning committee of the Luthertag, called Luther "the first German spiritual Führer
( ; , spelled or ''Fuhrer'' when the Umlaut (diacritic), umlaut is not available) is a German word meaning "leader" or "guide". As a political title, it is strongly associated with the Nazi Germany, Nazi dictator Adolf Hitler.
Nazi Germany ...
" who spoke to all Germans regardless of clan or confession. In a letter to Hitler, Fahrenhorst reminded him that his "Old Fighters" were mostly Protestants and he also wrote that it was precisely in the Protestant regions of our Fatherland" in which Nazism found its greatest strength. Promising that the celebration of Luther's birthday would not turn into a confessional affair, Fahrenhorst invited Hitler to become the official patron of the Luthertag. In subsequent correspondences, Fahrenhorst repeatedly voiced the notion that reverence for Luther could somehow cross confessional boundaries: "Luther is truly not only the founder of a Christian confession; much more, his ideas had a fruitful impact on all Christianity in Germany." Precisely because of Luther's political as well as religious significance, the Luthertag would serve as a confession both "to church and Volk."
Fahrenhorst's claim that the Nazis found their greatest strength in the Protestant areas of Germany has been corroborated by scholars who have studied the voting patterns of Germany from 1928–1933. Richard (Dick) Geary, Professor of Modern History at the University of Nottingham in England and the author of ''Hitler and Nazism'' (Routledge 1993) wrote an article about the people who voted for the Nazis in ''History Today'', in which he pointed out that the Nazis gained disproportionately more votes in Protestant than Catholic areas of Germany.
Luther's words and scholarship
In his book ''The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich
''The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich: A History of Nazi Germany'' is a book by American journalist William L. Shirer in which the author chronicles the rise and fall of Nazi Germany from the birth of Adolf Hitler in 1889 to the end of World Wa ...
'', William L. Shirer
William Lawrence Shirer (; February 23, 1904 – December 28, 1993) was an American journalist and war correspondent. He wrote ''The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich'', a history of Nazi Germany that has been read by many and cited in scholarly w ...
wrote:
It is difficult to understand the behavior of most German Protestants in the first Nazi years unless one is aware of two things: their history and the influence of Martin Luther. The great founder of Protestantism was both a passionate anti-Semite and a ferocious believer in absolute obedience to political authority. He wanted Germany rid of the Jews. Luther's advice was literally followed four centuries later by Hitler, Goering and Himmler.
Roland Bainton
Roland Herbert Bainton (March 30, 1894 – February 13, 1984) was a British-born American Protestant church historian.
Life
Bainton was born in Ilkeston, Derbyshire, England, and came to the United States in 1902. He received an AB degree f ...
, noted church historian and Luther biographer, wrote with reference to ''On the Jews and Their Lies'': "One could wish that Luther had died before ever this tract was written. His position was entirely religious and in no respect racial." Richard Marius contends that in making this "declaration," "Roland Bainton's effort is directed towards trying 'to make the best of Luther,' and 'Luther's view of the Jews.'"
Bainton's view is later echoed by James M. Kittelson writing about Luther's correspondence with Jewish scholar Josel of Rosheim: "There was no anti-Semitism in this response. Moreover, Luther never became an anti-Semite in the modern, racial sense of the term."
Paul Halsall states,[Halsall, Paul, ed.]
Internet History Sourcebooks Project
(Retrieved April 25, 2006) "In his Letters to Spalatin, we can already see that Luther's hatred of Jews, best seen in this 1543 letter On the Jews and Their Lies, was not some affectation of old age, but was present very early on. Luther expected Jews to convert to his purified Christianity. When they did not, he turned violently against them."
Gordon Rupp
Ernest Gordon Rupp (1910–1986) was a Methodist preacher, historian and Luther scholar.
Early life and education
Rupp was born on 7 January 1910 in London and attended Owen's School in Islington. He studied history at King's College London ...
gives this evaluation of ''On the Jews and Their Lies'': "I confess that I am ashamed as I am ashamed of some letters of St. Jerome, some paragraphs in Sir Thomas More, and some chapters in the Book of Revelation, and, must say, as of a deal else in Christian history, that their authors had not so learned Christ."
According to Heiko Oberman
Heiko Augustinus Oberman (1930–2001) was a Dutch historian and theologian who specialized in the study of the Reformation.
Life
Oberman was born in Utrecht on 15 October 1930. He earned his doctorate in theology from the University of Utrecht ...
, " e basis of Luther's anti-Judaism was the conviction that ever since Christ's appearance on earth, the Jews have had no more future as Jews."
Richard Marius
Richard Curry Marius (July 29, 1933 – November 5, 1999) was an American academic and writer.
He was a scholar of the Reformation, novelist of the American South, speechwriter, and teacher of writing and English literature at Harvard Universi ...
views Luther's remarks as part of a pattern of similar statements about various groups Luther viewed as enemies of Christianity. He states:
Although the Jews for him were only one among many enemies he castigated with equal fervor, although he did not sink to the horrors of the Spanish Inquisition against Jews, and although he was certainly not to blame for Adolf Hitler, Luther's hatred of the Jews is a sad and dishonorable part of his legacy, and it is not a fringe issue. It lay at the center of his concept of religion. He saw in the Jews a continuing moral depravity he did not see in Catholics. He did not accuse papists of the crimes that he laid at the feet of Jews.
Robert Waite, in his psychohistory
Psychohistory is an amalgam of psychology, history, and related social sciences and the humanities. Its proponents claim to examine the "why" of history, especially the difference between stated intention and actual behavior. Psychobiography, chil ...
of Hitler and Nazi Germany, devoted an entire section to Luther's influence on Hitler and Nazi ideology
An ideology is a set of beliefs or philosophies attributed to a person or group of persons, especially those held for reasons that are not purely epistemic, in which "practical elements are as prominent as theoretical ones." Formerly applied pri ...
. He noted that in his Mein Kampf
(; ''My Struggle'' or ''My Battle'') is a 1925 autobiographical manifesto by Nazi Party leader Adolf Hitler. The work describes the process by which Hitler became antisemitic and outlines his political ideology and future plans for Germ ...
, Hitler referred to Martin Luther as a great warrior, a true statesmen, and a great reformer, alongside Richard Wagner
Wilhelm Richard Wagner ( ; ; 22 May 181313 February 1883) was a German composer, theatre director, polemicist, and conductor who is chiefly known for his operas (or, as some of his mature works were later known, "music dramas"). Unlike most op ...
and Frederick the Great
Frederick II (german: Friedrich II.; 24 January 171217 August 1786) was King in Prussia from 1740 until 1772, and King of Prussia from 1772 until his death in 1786. His most significant accomplishments include his military successes in the Sil ...
. Waite cites Wilhelm Röpke
Wilhelm Röpke (October 10, 1899 – February 12, 1966) was a German economist and social critic, best known as one of the spiritual fathers of the social market economy. A Professor of Economics, first in Jena, then in Graz, Marburg, Ist ...
, writing after Hitler's Holocaust, who concluded that "without any question, Lutheranism influenced the political, spiritual and social history of Germany in a way that, after careful consideration of everything, can be described only as fateful."
Waite also compared his psychoanalysis with Erik Erikson
Erik Homburger Erikson (born Erik Salomonsen; 15 June 1902 – 12 May 1994) was a German-American developmental psychologist and psychoanalyst known for his theory on psychological development of human beings. He coined the phrase identity cr ...
's own psychohistory of Luther, ''Young Man Luther'', and concluded that, had Luther been alive during the 1930s, he most likely would have spoken out against Nazi persecution of Jews, even if this placed his life in danger, as Dietrich Bonhoeffer
Dietrich Bonhoeffer (; 4 February 1906 – 9 April 1945) was a German Lutheran pastor, theologian and anti-Nazi dissident who was a key founding member of the Confessing Church. His writings on Christianity's role in the secular world have ...
(a Lutheran pastor) did.
Martin Brecht Martin Brecht (born 6 March 1932) is a Church historian, professor emeritus of the University of Münster, Westphalia, Germany. Until his retirement in 1997 at age 65, he served as head of the Department of Medieval and Modern Church History of the ...
in his extensive three-volume biography of Luther writes that "an evaluation of Luther's relationship with the Jews must be made." He observes,
uther'sopposition to the Jews, which ultimately was regarded as irreconcilable, was in its nucleus of a religious and theological nature that had to do with belief in Christ and justification, and it was associated with the understanding of the people of God and the interpretation of the Old Testament. Economic and social motives played only a subordinate role. Luther's animosity toward the Jews cannot be interpreted either in a psychological way as a pathological hatred or in a political way as an extension of the anti-Judaism of the territorial princes. But he certainly demanded that measures provided in the laws against heretics be employed to expel the Jews—similarly to their use against the Anabaptists—because, in view of the Jewish polemics against Christ, he saw no possibilities for religious coexistence. In advising the use of force, he advocated means that were essentially incompatible with his faith in Christ. In addition, his criticism of the rabbinic interpretation of the Scriptures in part violated his own exegetical principles. Therefore, his attitude toward the Jews can appropriately be criticized both for his methods and also from the center of his theology.
Brecht ends his evaluation: Luther, however, was not involved with later racial anti-Semitism. There is a world of difference between his belief in salvation and a racial ideology. Nevertheless, his misguided agitation had the evil result that Luther fatefully became one of the "church fathers" of anti-Semitism and thus provided material for the modern hatred of the Jews, cloaking it with the authority of the Reformer.
In 1988, theologian Stephen Westerholm argued that Luther's attacks on Jews were part and parcel of his attack on the Catholic Church—that Luther was applying a Paul
Paul may refer to:
*Paul (given name), a given name (includes a list of people with that name)
*Paul (surname), a list of people
People
Christianity
*Paul the Apostle (AD c.5–c.64/65), also known as Saul of Tarsus or Saint Paul, early Chris ...
ine critique of Phariseism as legalistic and hypocritical to the Catholic Church. Westerholm rejects Luther's interpretation of Judaism and his apparent antisemitism but points out that whatever problems exist in Paul's and Luther's arguments against Jews, what Paul, and later, Luther, were arguing ''for'' was and continues to be an important vision of Christianity.
Michael Berenbaum
Michael Berenbaum (born July 31, 1945, in Newark, New Jersey) is an American scholar, professor, rabbi, writer, and filmmaker, who specializes in the study of the Holocaust. He served as deputy director of the President's Commission on the Holo ...
writes that Luther's reliance on the Bible
The Bible (from Koine Greek , , 'the books') is a collection of religious texts or scriptures that are held to be sacred in Christianity, Judaism, Samaritanism, and many other religions. The Bible is an anthologya compilation of texts of a ...
as the sole source of Christian authority fed his later fury toward Jews over their rejection of Jesus as the messiah.[ Berenbaum, Michael. ''The World Must Know'', ]United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum (USHMM) is the United States' official memorial to the Holocaust. Adjacent to the National Mall in Washington, D.C., the USHMM provides for the documentation, study, and interpretation of Holocaust hi ...
, pp. 8–9. For Luther, salvation depended on the belief that Jesus was the son of God, a belief that adherents of Judaism do not share. Early in his life, Luther had argued that the Jews had been prevented from converting to Christianity by the proclamation of what he believed to be an impure gospel by the Catholic Church
The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...
, and he believed they would respond favorably to the evangelical message if it were presented to them gently. He expressed concern for the poor conditions in which they were forced to live, and insisted that anyone denying that Jesus was born a Jew was committing heresy
Heresy is any belief or theory that is strongly at variance with established beliefs or customs, in particular the accepted beliefs of a church or religious organization. The term is usually used in reference to violations of important religi ...
.[
Graham Noble writes that Luther wanted to save Jews, in his own terms, not exterminate them, but beneath his apparent reasonableness toward them, there was a "biting intolerance", which produced "ever more furious demands for their conversion to his own brand of Christianity" (Noble, 1–2). When they failed to convert, he turned on them.][Michael, Robert. "Luther, Luther Scholars, and the Jews," ''Encounter'' 46 (Autumn 1985) No. 4:343–344.)]
In his commentary on the ''Magnificat
The Magnificat (Latin for "y soul
Y, or y, is the twenty-fifth and penultimate letter of the Latin alphabet, used in the modern English alphabet, the alphabets of other western European languages and others worldwide. According to some authorities, it is the sixth (or sevent ...
magnifies he Lord
He or HE may refer to:
Language
* He (pronoun), an English pronoun
* He (kana), the romanization of the Japanese kana へ
* He (letter), the fifth letter of many Semitic alphabets
* He (Cyrillic), a letter of the Cyrillic script called ''He'' ...
) is a canticle, also known as the Song of Mary, the Canticle of Mary and, in the Eastern Christianity, Byzantine tradition, the Ode of the Theotokos (). It is traditionally incorporated ...
'', Luther is critical of the emphasis Judaism places on the Torah
The Torah (; hbo, ''Tōrā'', "Instruction", "Teaching" or "Law") is the compilation of the first five books of the Hebrew Bible, namely the books of Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy. In that sense, Torah means the s ...
, the first five books of the Old Testament
The Old Testament (often abbreviated OT) is the first division of the Christian biblical canon, which is based primarily upon the 24 books of the Hebrew Bible or Tanakh, a collection of ancient religious Hebrew writings by the Israelites. The ...
. He states that they "undertook to keep the law by their own strength, and failed to learn from it their needy and cursed state." Yet, he concludes that God's grace will continue for Jews as Abraham's descendants for all time, since they may always become Christians. "We ought...not to treat the Jews in so unkindly a spirit, for there are future Christians among them."
Paul Johnson writes that "Luther was not content with verbal abuse. Even before he wrote his anti-Semitic pamphlet, he got Jews expelled from Saxony in 1537, and in the 1540s he drove them from many German towns; he tried unsuccessfully to get the elector to expel them from Brandenburg in 1543."[ Johnson, Paul. ''A History of the Jews'', p. 242.]
Michael writes that Luther was concerned with the Jewish question all his life, despite devoting only a small proportion of his work to it. As a Christian pastor and theologian Luther was concerned that people have faith in Jesus as the messiah for salvation. In rejecting that view of Jesus, the Jews became the "quintessential ''other''," a model of the opposition to the Christian view of God. In an early work, ''That Jesus Christ was born a Jew'', Luther advocated kindness toward the Jews, but only with the aim of converting them to Christianity: what was called ''Judenmission''.[Michael, Robert. ''Holy Hatred: Christianity, Antisemitism, and the Holocaust''. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2006, p. 109.] When his efforts at conversion failed, he became increasingly bitter toward them.[Noble, Graham. "Martin Luther and German anti-Semitism," ''History Review'' (2002) No. 42:1–2.]
Repudiation by Lutheran Churches
Along with antisemitism as a whole, ''On the Jews and Their Lies
''On the Jews and Their Lies'' (german: Von den Jüden und iren Lügen; in modern spelling ) is a 65,000-word anti-Judaic and antisemitic treatise written in 1543 by the German Reformation leader Martin Luther (1483–1546).
Luther's attitude t ...
'' and Luther's other antisemitic writings have all been repudiated by various Lutheran churches throughout the world.
Strommen et al.'s 1970 survey of 4,745 North American Lutherans aged 15–65 found that, compared to the other minority groups which were under consideration, Lutherans were the least prejudiced towards Jews.
Since the 1980s, some Lutheran church
Lutheranism is one of the largest branches of Protestantism, identifying primarily with the theology of Martin Luther, the 16th-century German monk and reformer whose efforts to reform the theology and practice of the Catholic Church launched th ...
bodies have formally denounced Luther's writings on the Jews and they have also disassociated themselves from them.
In 1982, the Lutheran World Federation
The Lutheran World Federation (LWF; german: Lutherischer Weltbund) is a global communion of national and regional Lutheran denominations headquartered in the Ecumenical Centre in Geneva, Switzerland. The federation was founded in the Swedish ...
issued a consultation which stated that "we Christians must purge ourselves of any hatred of the Jews
Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...
and any sort of teaching of contempt for Judaism
Judaism ( he, ''Yahăḏūṯ'') is an Abrahamic, monotheistic, and ethnic religion comprising the collective religious, cultural, and legal tradition and civilization of the Jewish people. It has its roots as an organized religion in the ...
."
In 1983, The Lutheran Church–Missouri Synod
The Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod (LCMS), also known as the Missouri Synod, is a traditional, confessional Lutheran denomination in the United States. With 1.8 million members, it is the second-largest Lutheran body in the United States. The LC ...
denounced Luther's "hostile attitude" towards the Jews. At the same time, the LCMS in convention also rejected the use of Luther's statements to incite "anti-Lutheran sentiment".
The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America
The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) is a mainline Protestant Lutheran church headquartered in Chicago, Illinois. The ELCA was officially formed on January 1, 1988, by the merging of three Lutheran church bodies. , it has approxim ...
, in an essay on Lutheran-Jewish relations, observed that "Over the years, Luther's anti-Jewish writings have continued to be reproduced in pamphlets and other works by neo-Nazi
Neo-Nazism comprises the post–World War II militant, social, and political movements that seek to revive and reinstate Nazism, Nazi ideology. Neo-Nazis employ their ideology to promote hatred and Supremacism#Racial, racial supremacy (ofte ...
and antisemitic
Antisemitism (also spelled anti-semitism or anti-Semitism) is hostility to, prejudice towards, or discrimination against Jews. A person who holds such positions is called an antisemite. Antisemitism is considered to be a form of racism.
Antis ...
groups, such as the Ku Klux Klan
The Ku Klux Klan (), commonly shortened to the KKK or the Klan, is an American white supremacist, right-wing terrorist, and hate group whose primary targets are African Americans, Jews, Latinos, Asian Americans, Native Americans, and ...
."
Writing in the ''Lutheran Quarterly'' in 1987, Dr. Johannes Wallmann stated:
The assertion that Luther's expressions of anti-Jewish sentiment have been of major and persistent influence in the centuries after the Reformation, and that there exists a continuity between Protestant anti-Judaism and modern racially oriented anti-Semitism, is at present wide-spread in the literature; since the Second World War it has understandably become the prevailing opinion.
In 1994, the Church Council of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America publicly rejected Luther's antisemitic writings,
Declaration of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America to the Jewish Community
'', April 18, 1994. Retrieved December 15, 2005. saying "We who bear his name and heritage must acknowledge with pain the anti-Judaic diatribes contained in Luther's later writings. We reject this violent invective as did many of his companions in the sixteenth century, and we are moved to deep and abiding sorrow at its tragic effects on later generations of Jews."
In 1995 the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Canada
The Evangelical Lutheran Church in Canada (ELCIC; french: Église évangélique luthérienne au Canada) is Canada's largest Lutheran denomination, with 95,000 baptized members in 519 congregations, with the second largest, the Lutheran Church–C ...
[Statement by the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Canada]
to the Jewish Communities in Canada. 5th Biannual Convention of the ELCIC, July 12–July 16, 1995. Retrieved December 20, 2005. made similar statements, as did the Austrian Evangelical Church in 1998. In the same year, the Land Synod of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Bavaria The Evangelical Lutheran Church in Bavaria (german: Evangelisch-Lutherische Kirche in Bayern) is a Lutheran member church of the Evangelical Church in Germany in the German state of Bavaria.
The seat of the church is in Munich. The ''Landesbischof' ...
, on the 60th anniversary of Kristallnacht
() or the Night of Broken Glass, also called the November pogrom(s) (german: Novemberpogrome, ), was a pogrom against Jews carried out by the Nazi Party's (SA) paramilitary and (SS) paramilitary forces along with some participation from ...
, issued a declaration[Christians and Jews]
A Declaration of the Lutheran Church of Bavaria (November 24, 1998). Retrieved December 18, 2005. Also printed in ''Freiburger Rundbrief'', vol. 6, no. 3 (1999), pp. 191–197. saying: "It is imperative for the Lutheran Church, which knows itself to be indebted to the work and tradition of Martin Luther, to take seriously also his anti-Jewish utterances, to acknowledge their theological function, and to reflect on their consequences. It has to distance itself from every xpression ofanti-Judaism in Lutheran theology."
A strong position statement was issued by The Lutheran Evangelical Protestant Church
The Evangelical Protestant Church (GCEPC) or The Lutheran Evangelical Protestant Church (LEPC) is a mainline Protestant denomination under the General Conference of Evangelical Protestant Churches headquartered in Cayce-West Columbia, South Caroli ...
(LEPC) (GCEPC) saying, "The Jewish people are God's chosen people. Believers should bless them as scripture says that God will bless those who bless Israel and curse those who curse Israel. The LEPC/EPC/GCEPC recant and renounce the works and words of Martin Luther concerning the Jewish people. Prayer is offered for the healing of the Jewish people, their peace and their prosperity. Prayer is offered for the peace of Jerusalem. With deep sorrow and regret repentance is offered to the Jewish People for the harm that Martin Luther caused and any contribution to their harm. Forgiveness is requested of the Jewish People for these actions. The Gospel is to the Jew first and then the Gentile. Gentiles (believers in Christ other than Jews) have been grafted into the vine. In Christ there is neither Jew nor Gentile but the Lord's desire is that there be one new man from the two for Christ broke down the wall of separation with His own body (Ephesians 2:14–15). The LEPC/EPC/GCEPC blesses Israel and the Jewish people."
The European Lutheran Commission on the Church and the Jewish People (''Lutherische Europäische Kommission Kirche und Judentum''), an umbrella organization
An umbrella organization is an association of (often related, industry-specific) institutions who work together formally to coordinate activities and/or pool resources. In business, political, and other environments, it provides resources and ofte ...
representing twenty-five Lutheran
Lutheranism is one of the largest branches of Protestantism, identifying primarily with the theology of Martin Luther, the 16th-century German monk and reformer whose efforts to reform the theology and practice of the Catholic Church launched th ...
church bodies in Europe, issued on May 12, 2003 ''A Response to Dabru Emet'':
:In its Driebergen Declaration (1991), the European Lutheran Commission on the Church and the Jewish People...rejected the traditional Christian “teaching of contempt” towards Jews and Judaism, and in particular, the anti-Jewish writings of Martin Luther
Martin Luther (; ; 10 November 1483 – 18 February 1546) was a German priest, theologian, author, hymnwriter, and professor, and Order of Saint Augustine, Augustinian friar. He is the seminal figure of the Reformation, Protestant Refo ...
, and it called for the reformation of church practice in the light of these insights. Against this background, LEKKJ welcomes the issuance of Dabru Emet: A Jewish Statement on Christians and Christianity. We see in this statement a confirmation of our own work of these past years....We know that we must reexamine themes in Lutheran theology that in the past have repeatedly given rise to enmity towards Jews....Fully aware that Dabru Emet is in the first instance an intra-Jewish invitation to conversation, we see in this statement also an aid to us in expressing and living out our faith in such a way that we do not denigrate Jews, but rather respect them in their otherness, and are enabled to give an account of our own identity more clearly as we scrutinize it in the light of how others see us.
On January 6, 2004, the Consultative Panel on Lutheran-Jewish Relations of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America
The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) is a mainline Protestant Lutheran church headquartered in Chicago, Illinois. The ELCA was officially formed on January 1, 1988, by the merging of three Lutheran church bodies. , it has approxim ...
issued a statement urging any Lutheran church presenting a Passion Play to adhere to their ''Guidelines for Lutheran-Jewish Relations'', stating that "the New Testament . . . must not be used as justification for hostility towards present-day Jews," and that "blame for the death of Jesus should not be attributed to Judaism or the Jewish people."["Lutheran Statement on The Passion of the Christ"]
January 6, 2004
See also
* Antisemitism in Christianity
Antisemitism in Christianity, a form of religious antisemitism, is the feeling of hostility which some Christian Churches, Christian groups, and ordinary Christians have towards the Jewish religion and the Jewish people.
Antisemitic Christian r ...
* Christian–Jewish reconciliation
Christian−Jewish reconciliation refers to the efforts that are being made to improve understanding and acceptance between Christians and Jews. There has been significant progress in reconciliation in recent years, in particular by the Catholic C ...
* Christianity and Judaism
Christianity began as a movement within Second Temple Judaism, but the two religions gradually diverged over the first few centuries of the Christian Era. Differences of opinion vary between denominations in both religions, but the most import ...
* '' On War Against the Turk''
* Religious antisemitism
* Supersessionism
Supersessionism, also called replacement theology or fulfillment theology, is a Christian theology which asserts that the New Covenant through Jesus in Christianity, Jesus Christ has superseded or replaced the Mosaic covenant exclusive to the Jews ...
, also known as "Replacement Theology"
* Liber Vagatorum, with preface by Luther
References and notes
Bibliography
* Bainton, Roland. ''Here I Stand: A Life of Martin Luther''. Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1978. .
* Brecht, Martin. ''Martin Luther'', 3 vols. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1985–1993. , , .
* Gavriel, Mardell J. ''The Anti-Semitism of Martin Luther: A Psychohistorical Exploration''. Ph.D. diss., Chicago School of Professional Psychology, 1996.
* Goldhagen, Daniel. ''Hitler's Willing Executioners''. Vintage, 1997. .
* Halpérin, Jean, and Arne Sovik, eds. ''Luther, Lutheranism and the Jews: A Record of the Second Consultation between Representatives of The International Jewish Committee for Interreligious Consultation and the Lutheran World Federation Held in Stockholm, Sweden, 11–13 July 1983''. Geneva: LWF, 1984.
* Johnson, Paul. ''A History of the Jews''. New York: HarperCollins Publishers, 1987. .
* Kaennel, Lucie. ''Luther était-il antisémite?'' (''Luther: Was He an Antisemite?''). Entrée Libre N° 38. Geneva: Labor et Fides, 1997. .
* Kittelson, James M. ''Luther the Reformer: The Story of the Man and His Career''. Minneapolis: Augsburg Publishing House, 1986. .
* Luther, Martin. "On the Jews and Their Lies, 1543". Martin H. Bertram, trans. In ''Luther's Works''. Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1971. 47:137–306.
*
* Oberman, Heiko A. ''The Roots of Anti-Semitism in the Age of Renaissance and Reformation''. James I. Porter, trans. Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1984. .
* Probst, Christopher J. "Demonizing the Jews: Luther and the Protestant Church in Nazi Germany", Indiana University Press in association with the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, 2012, .
* Rosenberg, Elliot, ''But Were They Good for the Jews?'' (New York: Birch Lane Press, 1997). .
* Roynesdal, Olaf. ''Martin Luther and the Jews''. Ph.D. diss., Marquette University, 1986.
* Rupp, Gordon. ''Martin Luther: Hitler's Cause or Cure? In Reply to Peter F. Wiener''. London: Lutterworth Press, 1945.
* Siemon-Netto, Uwe. ''The Fabricated Luther: the Rise and Fall of the Shirer Myth''. Peter L. Berger, Foreword. St. Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 1995. .
* Siemon-Netto, Uwe
"Luther and the Jews"
''The Lutheran Witness
Concordia Publishing House (CPH), founded in 1869, is the official publishing arm of the Lutheran Church–Missouri Synod (LCMS). Headquartered in St Louis, Missouri, at 3558 S. Jefferson Avenue, CPH publishes the synod's official monthly magaz ...
'' 123 (2004)No. 4:16–19. (PDF)
* Steigmann-Gall, Richard. ''The Holy Reich: Nazi Conceptions of Christianity, 1919–1945''. Cambridge University Press, 2003. .
* Tjernagel, Neelak S. ''Martin Luther and the Jewish People''. Milwaukee: Northwestern Publishing House, 1985. .
* Wallmann, Johannes. "The Reception of Luther's Writings on the Jews from the Reformation to the End of the 19th Century." ''Lutheran Quarterly'' 1 (Spring 1987) 1:72–97.
* Westerholm, Stephen. ''Israel's Law and the Church's Faith: Paul and His Recent Interpreters''. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1988.
* Wiener, Peter F. ''Martin Luther: Hitler's Spiritual Ancestor'', Hutchinson & Co. (Publishers) Ltd., 194
External links
Antisemitism – Reformation
from the Florida Holocaust Museum.
Martin Luther
article in ''Jewish Encyclopedia
''The Jewish Encyclopedia: A Descriptive Record of the History, Religion, Literature, and Customs of the Jewish People from the Earliest Times to the Present Day'' is an English-language encyclopedia containing over 15,000 articles on th ...
'' (1906 ed.) by Gotthard Deutsch
Gotthard Deutsch (; 31 January 1859 – 14 October 1921) was a scholar of Jewish history.
Education
Deutsch was born in Dolní Kounice, Moravia, Austria, as Eliezer Deutsch, the son of Bernhard L. Deutsch, a merchant, and Elise Wiener. He alwa ...
Martin Luther’s Attitude Toward The Jews
by James Swan
Martin Luther And The Jews by Mark Albrecht
''The Jews and Their Lies'' (abridged English version published by CPA Book Publisher, Boring, Oregon at archive.org)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Luther and antisemitism
Lutheranism and antisemitism
Early Modern Christian anti-Judaism
Antisemitism
Antisemitism (also spelled anti-semitism or anti-Semitism) is hostility to, prejudice towards, or discrimination against Jews. A person who holds such positions is called an antisemite. Antisemitism is considered to be a form of racism.
Antis ...
Views of Judaism by individual