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The prevailing view among historians since World War II is that Martin Luther's writings on the Jews have been of major and persistent influence in the centuries since the Reformation. His 60,000 word treatise, On the Jews and their Lies (1543), is widely regarded by scholars as a significant work in the development of modern anti-Semitism.

In the pamphlet, he wrote that the Jews' synagogues and schools should be set on fire, prayer books destroyed, rabbis forbidden to preach, homes razed, and property and money confiscated. He argued that Jews should be shown no mercy or kindness, should have no legal protection, that these "poisonous envenomed worms" should be drafted into forced labor or expelled for all time, and that "e are at fault in not slaying them." Four centuries later, the Nazis used quotations from this pamphlet, which was cited by the publisher of the Nazi newspaper Der Stürmer during the Nuremberg trials, to justify the Holocaust.

A minority view states that Luther's anti-Jewish writings were largely ignored in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, before being embraced by anti-Semites in the twentieth century. Since the 1980s, some Lutheran church bodies and organizations have formally denounced these writings.

Evolution of his views

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Luther's attitude toward the Jews changed over his life. In his earlier period, until around 1536, he expresses concern for their situation and is enthusiastic at the prospect of converting them to Christianity. In his later period, he denounces them and urges their harsh persecution and even murder.

Michael Berenbaum writes that Luther's reliance on the Bible as the sole source of Christian authority fed his later fury toward Jews over their rejection of Jesus as the messiah. For Luther, salvation depended on the belief that Jesus was the son of God, a belief that Jews 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 Christians, 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.

Luther's first known comment on the Jews is in a letter written to Reverend Spalatin 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 says, for every one who is incorrigible is rendered worse rather than better by correction.

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.

In 1519, Luther challenged the doctrine "Servitus Judaeorum" ("Servitude of the Jews"), established in Corpus Juris Civilis by Justinian I in 529. 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 commentary on the Magnificat, Luther is critical of the emphasis Judaism places on God's Law. 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 descendents 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."

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 monkery...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 we 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.

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, Rabbi Josel of Rosheim, asked a reformer Wolfgang Capito 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 obstinacy by my own kind actions. You must find another intermediary with my good lord." Heiko Oberman 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."

On the Jews and Their Lies

Background and synopsis

In On the Jews and Their Lies, written in 1543 three years before his death, Luther recommends that Jews be deprived of money, civil rights, religious teaching, and education, and that they be forced to labor on the land, or else be expelled from Germany and possibly killed.

I had made up my mind to write no more either about the Jews or against them. But since I learned that these miserable and accursed people do not cease to lure to themselves even us, that is, the Christians, I have published this little book, so that I might be found among those who opposed such poisonous activities of the Jews who warned the Christians to be on their guard against them.

Luther stated in his introductory remarks that he was writing in response to a pamphlet, unidentified by historians, written by an unidentified Jew or Jews, sent to him by Count Wolfgang Schlick of Falkenau:

Dear sir and good friend, I have received a treatise in which a Jew engages in dialog with a Christian. He dares to pervert the scriptural passages which we cite in testimony to our faith, concerning our Lord Christ and Mary his mother, and to interpret them quite differently. With this argument he thinks he can destroy the basis of our faith.

He refers to Jews as "a brood of vipers and children of the devil" (from Matthew 12:34), "miserable, blind, and senseless", "truly stupid fools", "thieves and robbers", "lazy rogues", "daily murderers", and "vermin", likens them to "gangrene", and recommends that Jewish synagogues and schools be burned, their homes razed and destroyed, their writings confiscated, their rabbis forbidden to teach, their travel restricted, that lending money be outlawed for them, and that they be forced to earn their wages in farming. Luther advised "f we wish to wash our hands of the Jews' blasphemy and not share in their guilt, we have to part company with them. They must be driven from our country" and "we must drive them out like mad dogs."

In conclusion, he wrote:

There is no other explanation for this than the one cited earlier from Moses — namely, that God has struck with 'madness and blindness and confusion of mind.' 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. Rather we allow them to live freely in our midst despite all their murdering, cursing, blaspheming, lying, and defaming; we protect and shield their synagogues, houses, life, and property. In this way we make them lazy and secure and encourage them to fleece us boldly of our money and goods, as well as to mock and deride us, with a view to finally overcoming us, killing us all for such a great sin, and robbing us of all our property (as they daily pray and hope). Now tell me whether they do not have every reason to be the enemies of us accursed Goyim, to curse us and to strive for our final, complete, and eternal ruin!

Eight-point plan

In the pamphlet, Luther advocated an eight-point plan to get rid of the Jews either by religious conversion or by expulsion:

1. "First to set fire to their synagogues or schools and to bury and cover with dirt whatever will not burn, so that no man will ever again see a stone or cinder of them. ..."
2. "Second, I advise that their houses also be razed and destroyed. ..."
3. "Third, I advise that all their prayer books and Talmudic writings, in which such idolatry, lies, cursing and blasphemy are taught, be taken from them. ..."
4. "Fourth, I advise that their rabbis be forbidden to teach henceforth on pain of loss of life and limb. ..."
5. "Fifth, I advise that safe-conduct on the highways be abolished completely for the Jews. ..."
6. "Sixth, I advise that usury be prohibited to them, and that all cash and treasure of silver and gold be taken from them. ... Such money should now be used in ... the following ... Whenever a Jew is sincerely converted, he should be handed ..."
7. "Seventh, I commend 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... For it is not fitting that they should let us accursed Goyim toil in the sweat of our faces while they, the holy people, idle away their time behind the stove, feasting and farting, and on top of all, boasting blasphemously of their lordship over the Christians by means of our sweat. No, one should toss out these lazy rogues by the seat of their pants."
8. "If we wish to wash our hands of the Jews' blasphemy and not share in their guilt, we have to part company with them. They must be driven from our country" and "we must drive them out like mad dogs."

After On the Jews and their Lies

Several months after publishing On the Jews and Their Lies, Luther wrote Vom Schem Hamphoras, in which he equated Jews with the Devil:

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." and "When Judas hanged himself and his bowels gushed forth, and, as happens in such cases, his bladder also burst, the Jews were ready to catch the Judas-water and the other precious things, and then they gorged and swilled on the merd among themselves, and were thereby endowed with such a keenness of sight that they can perceive glosses in the Scriptures such as neither Matthew nor Isaiah himself . . .would be able to detect; or perhaps they looked into the loin of their God “Shed,” and found these things written in that smokehole ...

The Devil has eased himself and emptied his belly again — that is a real halidom for Jews and would-be Jews, to kiss, batten on, swill and adore; and then the Devil in his turn also devours and swills what these good pupils spue and eject from above and below ...

The Devil, with his angelic snout, devours what exudes from the oral and anal apertures of the Jews; this is indeed his favorite dish, on which he battens like a sow behind the hedge ...

In his final sermon shortly before his death, Luther preached "We want to treat them with Christian love and to pray for them, so that they might become converted and would receive the Lord."

The influence of Luther's views

16th and 17th century

Paul Johnson notes Luther's influence on the fate of German Jews: "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. His followers continued to agitate against Jews there: they sacked Berlin in 1572 and the following year finally got their way, the Jews being banned from the entire country."

In 1543, Luther's Prince, Elector John Frederick of Saxony, revoked some of the concessions he gave to Josel of Rosheim in 1539. Johann of Küstrin, Margrave of Neumark, repealed the safe conduct of Jews in his territories. Philip of Hesse added restrictions to his Order Concerning the Jews. No ruler attempted to enact all of Luther's recommendations.

During the twenty-five years following Luther's death, Luther's polemics had very little effect on the treatment of Jews. In the 1570s, however, Pastor Georg Nigrinus published a book, Enemy Jew, which reiterated Luther's anti-Jewish program of On the Jews and Their Lies, and Nikolaus Selnecker, one of the authors of the Formula of Concord, reprinted Luther's Against the Sabbatarians, On the Jews and Their Lies, and Vom Schem Hamphoras. Neither appear to have influenced either princes or the general population.

Luther's treatises against the Jews were reprinted early in the 17th century at Dortmund, where they were seized by the Emperor. In 1613 and 1617, they were again published at Frankfurt am Main in support of the banishment of Jews from Frankfurt and Worms. These editions were the last popular publication of these works prior to the 20th Century.

Influence on modern antisemitism

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The prevailing sentiment among historians is that this and other antisemitic writings by Luther laid the groundwork for the modern "racial" form of antisemitism — that is, the persecution, deportation, or even genocide of Jews because of their ethnic traits (and not merely their religious views).

Writing in 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.

Robert Michael, Professor Emeritus of European History at the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth, has observed that "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". Michael noted 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, states in response to the claim that "Luther's antipathy towards the Jews was religious rather than racial in nature" that Luther's writings against the Jews 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 wrote: "There you already have the whole Nazi program").

Other scholars assert that Luther's anti-Semitism 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."

Paul Halsall argues that Luther's views had a part in laying the groundwork for the racial European anti-Semitism of the nineteenth century. He writes that "although Luther's comments seem to be proto-Nazi, they are better seen as part of tradition of 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 pseud-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 anti-Semites of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. He contended that Johann Andreas Eisenmenger 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 Nazis

The line of "anti-Semitic descent" from Luther to Hitler is "easy to draw," according to American historian Lucy Dawidowicz. In her The War Against the Jews, 1933-1945, she writes that both Luther and Hitler were obsessed by the "demonologized universe" 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 anti-Semitism are no cooincidence, because they derived from a common history of Judenhass, which can be traced to Haman's advice to Ahasuerus, although modern German anti-Semitism also has its roots in German nationalism and Christian anti-Semitism, a foundation she says was laid by the Roman Catholic Church and "upon which Luther built."

Professor Robert Michael, Professor Emeritus of European History at the University of Massachusetts, Dartmouth, 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 anti-Semitism of most German Lutherans throughout the Holocaust. Like the Nazis, Luther mythologized the Jews as evil, he writes. They could be saved only 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, was quoted by the Völkischer Beobachter 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 ".

Hans Hinkel, leader of the Luther League's magazine Deutsche Kultur-Wacht, and 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, nationalism 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, Bishop Martin Sasse, a leading Protestant churchman, published a compendium Luther's writings shortly after Kristallnacht — which Diarmaid MacCulloch, Professor of the History of the Church in the University of Oxford argued Luther's writing was a "blueprint" for — in which 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, the notorious Nazi propagandist, editor of the scurrilous antisemitic weekly, Der Stürmer, argued that if he should be standing there arraigned on such charges, so should Martin Luther. Reading such passages, it is hard not to agree with him. Luther's proposals read like a program for the Nazis." It was Luther's expression "The Jews are our misfortune" that centuries later would be repeated by Heinrich von Treitschke and appear as motto on the front page of Julius Streicher's Der Stürmer.

Some scholars have attributed the Nazi "Final Solution" directly to Martin Luther.. Others refute this point of view, pointedly taking issue with the thesis advanced by Shirer 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 "he German Volk are united not only in loyalty and love for the Fatherland, but also once more in the old German beliefs of Luther ; a new epoch of strong, conscious religious life has dawned in Germany." Richard Steigmann-Gall wrote 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" 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 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 correspondence, Fahrenhorst again 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."

Lutheran Church response in the 20th century

The anti-Semitic content of this book and other writings has been repudiated by various Lutheran churches throughout the world.

In 1983, The Lutheran Church - Missouri Synod denounced Luther's "hostile attitude" toward the Jews. In 1994, the Church Council of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America publicly rejected Luther's anti-Semitic writings, 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 made similar statements, as did the Austrian Evangelical Church in 1998. In the same year, the Land Synod of the Lutheran Church of Bavaria issued a declaration 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."

Luther's words and scholarship

Anglican Luther scholar Gordon Rupp wrote:

Luther's antagonism to the Jews was poles apart from the Nazi doctrine of "Race". It was based on medieval Catholic anti-semitism towards the people who crucified the Redeemer, turned their back on the way of Life, and whose very existence in the midst of a Christian society was considered a reproach and blasphemy. Luther is a small chapter in the large volume of Christian inhumanities toward the Jewish people.

...

"Needless to say, there is no trace of such a relation between Luther and Hitler. I suppose Hitler never once read a page by Luther. The fact that he and other Nazis claimed Luther on their side proves no more than the fact that they also numbered Almighty God among their supporters. Hitler mentions Luther once in Mein Kampf in a harmless context.

In his book The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, William L. Shirer 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, 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, "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 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, "he basis of Luthers anti-Judaism was the conviction that ever since Christ's appearance on earth, the Jews have had no more future as Jews."

Richard Marius 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 of Hitler and Nazi Germany, devoted an entire section to Luther's influence on Hitler and Nazi ideology. He noted that Hitler kept a list of quotes from many prominent Germans (including Immanuel Kant, Friedrich Nietzsche, and Frederick the Great), as well as Luther, often using them out-of-context, and in a manner to make himself appear more well-read than he actually was.

Waite also compared his psychoanalysis with Erik Erikson's own psychoshistory of Luther, Young Man Luther and concluded that, had Luther been alive during the 1930s, he most likely would have spoke out against Nazi persecution of Jews, even if this placed his life in danger, as Dietrich Bonhoeffer (a Lutheran pastor) did. Waite, Robert G.L. The Psychopathic God: Adolf Hitler. New York: First DaCapo Press Edition, 1993 (orig. pub. 1977). ISBN 0-306-80514-6.

In 1988, Lutheran 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 Pauline critique of Phariseism as legalistic and hypocritical to the Catholic Church. Westerholm rejects Luther's interpretation of Judaism and his apparent anti-Semitism 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.

Notes

1. ^ Johannes Wallmann, "The Reception of Luther's Writings on the Jews from the Reformation to the End of the nineteenth Century", Lutheran Quarterly n.s. 1 (Spring 1987) 1:72–97.
2. Richard Steigmann-Gall, The Holy Reich: Nazi Conceptions of Christianity, 1919–1945 (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2003.), 33. "On the Jews and Their Lies is one of the most notorious antisemitic tracts ever written, especially for someone of Luther's esteem."
3. Michael, Robert. "Luther, Luther Scholars, and the Jews," Encounter 46:4, (Autumn 1985), p. 342.
4. ^ Michael, Robert. "Luther, Luther Scholars, and the Jews," Encounter 46:4, (Autumn 1985), p. 343.
5. Luther, Martin. On the Jews and Their Lies, Trans. Martin H. Bertram, in Luther's Works. (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1971).
6. Luther, Martin. On the Jews and Their Lies, cited in Robert Michael, "Luther, Luther Scholars, and the Jews," Encounter 46 (Autumn 1985) No. 4:343-344.
7. Nuremberg Trial Proceedings, Vol. 12, p. 318, Avalon Project, Yale Law School, April 19, 1946)
8. Uwe Siemon-Netto, "Luther and the Jews," Lutheran Witness 123 (2004) No. 4:19, 21.
9. "Q&A: Luther's Anti-Semitism", Lutheran Church - Missouri Synod. (Retrieved December 15, 2005); http://www.elca.org/ecumenical/interfaithrelations/jewish/declaration.html "Declaration of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America to the Jewish Community]", ELCA, April 18, 1994. (Retrieved December 15, 2005);"Statement by the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Canada to the Jewish Communities in Canada", ELCIC, July 12 - 16, 1995. (Retrieved December 20, 2005); Time to Turn. The Evangelical Churches in Austria and the Jews. Declaration of the General Synod of the Evangelical Church A.B. and H.B., October 28, 1998. (Retrieved December 18, 2005); "Christians and Jews: A Declaration of the Lutheran Church of Bavaria", November 24, 1998. (Retrieved December 18, 2005) Also printed in Freiburger Rundbrief 6:3 (1999), pp.191-197.
10. "Luther, Martin", JewishEncyclopedia.com.
11. ^ [[Michael Berenbaum|Berenbaum, Michael. The World Must Know, United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, pp. 8-9.
12. Martin Luther, "Luther to George Spalatin," in Luther's Correspondence and Other Contemporaneous Letters, trans. Henry Preserved Smith (Philadelphia: Lutheran Publication Society, 1913), 1:29.
13. Michael, Robert. "Luther, Luther Scholars, and the Jews," Encounter 46 (Autumn 1985) No. 4:343-344.)
14. Luther quoted in Elliot Rosenberg, But Were They Good for the Jews? (New York: Birch Lane Press, 1997), p.65.
15. Martin Luther, The Magnificat, Trans. A. T. W. Steinhaeuser, in Luther's Works (St. Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 1956), 21:354.
16. Russell Briese, "Martin Luther and the Jews," Lutheran Forum 34 (2000) No. 2:32.
17. Luther, Magnificat, 21:354f.
18. Martin Luther, "That Jesus Christ was Born a Jew," Trans. Walter I. Brandt, in Luther's Works (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1962), pp. 200-201, 229.
19. Martin Brecht, Martin Luther (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1985-1993), 3:336.
20. Luther’s letter to Rabbi Josel as cited by Gordon Rupp, Martin Luther and the Jews (London: The Council of Christians and Jews, 1972), 14. According to , this paragraph is not available in the English edition of Luther’s works.
21. Heiko Oberman, Luther: Man Between God and the Devil (New York: Image Books, 1989), p.293.
22. Luther's Works, Martin Bertram, trans., Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1971, 47:137
23. Luther’s correspondent Count Schlick
24. Luther's Works, Martin Bertram, trans., Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1971, 47:137.
25. Martin Luther, On the Jews and Their Lies, Trans. Martin H. Bertram, in Luther's Works (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1971), 47:267.
26. Luther, On the Jews, 47:268-288, 292.
27. ", Florida Holocaust Museum. The English translation of Vom Schem Hamphoras is contained in The Jew in Christian Theology, by Gerhard Falk (McFarland & Co., 1992).
28. Martin Luther, D. Martin Luthers Werke: kritische Gesamtausgabe, Weimar: Hermann Böhlaus Nachfolger, 1920),51:195. Hereafter cited WA.
29. Cite error: The named reference Johnson242 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
30. Mark U. Edwards, Jr. Luther's Last Battles: Politics and Polemics, 1531-46 (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1983), pp. 135-136.
31. Johannes Wallmann, "The Reception of Luther's Writings on the Jews from the Reformation to the End of the 19th Century." Lutheran Quarterly ns 1 (1987) No. 1:72-78.
32. Wallman, p. 78.
33. Michael, Robert, "Christian racism, part 2", H-Net Discussions Networks, 2 Mar 2000.
34. Helmut T. Lehmann, gen. ed., Luther's Works, Vol. 47: The Christian in Society IV, edited by Franklin Sherman, (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1971), iii.
35. cited in Franklin Sherman, Faith Transformed: Christian Encounters with Jews and Judaism, edited by John C Merkle, (Collegeville, Minnesota: Liturgical Press, 2003), 63-64.
36. Bainton, Roland. Here I Stand: A Life of Martin Luther, (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1978), 299.
37. Paul Halsall's introduction of excerpts of On the Jews and Their Lies
38. Lucy Dawidowicz. The War Against the Jews, 1933-1945. First published 1975; this Bantam edition 1986, p.23. ISBN 0-553-34532-X
39. ^ Cite error: The named reference Dawidowicz was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
40. ^ Robert Michael, "Luther, Luther Scholars, and the Jews," Encounter 46:4 (Autumn 1985), pp. 339-56.
41. Volkischer Beobachter, August 25, 1933 cited in Steigmann-Gall, Richard. The Holy Reich: Nazi Conceptions of Christianity, 1991-1945. Cambridge University Press, 2003, pp. 136-7. ISBN 0-521-82371-4
42. Steigmann-Gall 2003, p. 137.
43. Diarmaid MacCulloch, Reformation: Europe's House Divided, 1490-1700. New York: Penguin Books Ltd, 2004, pp. 666-667.
44. Bernd Nellessen, "Die schweigende Kirche: Katholiken und Judenverfolgung," in Büttner (ed), Die Deutchschen und die Jugendverfolg im Dritten Reich, p. 265, cited in Daniel Goldhagen, Hitler's Willing Executioners (Vintage, 1997).
45. William Nichols, Christian Antisemitism: A History of Hate (Northvale, NJ: Jason Aronson, 1995), p. 271.
46. William Shirer, The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1990), 91, 236
47. Uwe Siemon-Netto, The Fabricated Luther: The Rise and Fall of the Shirer Myth, (St. Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 1995), 17-20.
48. Richard Steigmann-Gall, The Holy Reich: Nazi Conceptions of Christianity, 1919-1945, (Cambridge University Press, 2003), p.138.
49. Declaration of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America to the Jewish Community, April 18 1994. Retrieved December 15 2005.
50. 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.
51. 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.
52. Gordon Rupp, Martin Luther: Hitler's Cause or Cure? (London: Lutterworth Press, 1945), p. 75.
53. Rupp, p. 84.
54. William L. Shirer, The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1990), p.236.
55. Roland Bainton, Here I Stand: A Life of Martin Luther (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1978), p. 297.
56. Richard Marius. Martin Luther: The Christian Between God and Death, (Harvard University Press, 1999), 377.
57. James M. Kittelson, Luther the Reformer: The Story of the Man and His Career, (Minneapolis: Augsburg Publishing House, 1986), p. 274.
58. Halsall, Paul, ed., Internet History Sourcebooks Project. (Retrieved April 25, 2006)
59. Halsall, Paul, Medieval Sourcebook: Martin Luther (1483-1546), Internet History Sourcebooks Project, Fordham University. (Retrieved January 4, 2005)
60. Rupp, p. 76.
61. Heiko Oberman, The Roots of Anti-Semitism in the Age of Renaissance and Reformation (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1984), p.46.
62. Richard Marius, Martin Luther: The Christian Between God and Death (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1999), p.482.

Bibliography

• Bainton, Roland. Here I Stand: A Life of Martin Luther. Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1978. ISBN 0-687-16894-5.
• Brecht, Martin. Martin Luther, 3 vols. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1985-1993. ISBN 0-8006-0738-4, ISBN 0-8006-2463-7, ISBN 0-8006-2704-0.
• 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. ISBN 0-679-77268-5.
• 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. ISBN 0-06-091533-1.
• Kaennel, Lucie. Luther était-il antisémite? (Luther: Was He an Antisemite?). Entrée Libre N° 38. Geneva: Labor et Fides, 1997. ISBN 2-8309-0869-4.
• Kittelson, James M. Luther the Reformer: The Story of the Man and His Career. Minneapolis: Augsburg Publishing House, 1986. ISBN 0-8066-2240-7.
• 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. ISBN 0-8006-0709-0.
• Rosenberg, Elliot, But Were They Good for the Jews? (New York: Birch Lane Press, 1997). ISBN 1-55972-436-6.
• 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, Foreward. St. Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 1995. ISBN 0-570-04800-1.
• Siemon-Netto, Uwe. "Luther and the Jews". Lutheran Witness 123 (2004)No. 4:16-19. (PDF)
• Steigmann-Gall, Richard. The Holy Reich: Nazi Conceptions of Christianity, 1919-1945. Cambridge University Press, 2003. ISBN 0-521-82371-4.
• Tjernagel, Neelak S. Martin Luther and the Jewish People. Milwaukee: Northwestern Publishing House, 1985. ISBN 0-8100-0213-2.
• 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.

External links

• Complete public domain English translation of On the Jews and Their Lies
• On the Jews and their Lies (excerpts) at Medieval Sourcebook
• Antisemitism - Reformation from the Florida Holocaust Museum.
• Luther and the Jews (PDF) by Siemon-Netto, Uwe. Lutheran Witness 123 (2004) No. 4:16-19.
• Martin Luther article in Jewish Encyclopedia (1906 ed.) by Gotthard Deutsch
• Martin Luther’s Attitude Toward The Jews by James Swan
• Martin Luther And The Jews by Mark Albrecht
• Luther's Letter to Bernhard, a Converted Jew (1523)

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• Christian and Jewish interfaith topics
• Martin Luther
• Anti-Judaism
• Jews and Judaism-related controversies
• 1543 books
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