Steve Hayes
2017-11-01 04:26:17 UTC
Berlin exhibit highlights how the Nazis exploited Martin Luther’s
legacy
By Emily McFarlan Miller and Tom Heneghan | October 19, 2017
BERLIN (RNS) — Martin Luther is such a towering figure in German
history that it’s no surprise Adolf Hitler’s Third Reich exploited his
name whenever it could.
Most visitors to events in Germany marking this year’s 500th
anniversary of the Reformation, however, probably didn’t expect to
find an exhibition setting out just how extensively the Nazis used
Luther to justify their anti-Semitism and nationalism.
To dramatize the connection, the exhibition “Luther’s words are
everywhere … ” is located in the Topography of Terror, a central
Berlin museum about Nazi repression methods that was built where the
headquarters of the Gestapo secret police and SS paramilitary force
once stood.
“Überall Luthers Worte … ” — “Luther’s Words are everywhere,” the
title of the exhibition highlighting how the Nazis exploited Martin
Luther’s legacy during the Third Reich. RNS photo by Emily McFarlan
Miller
The caption under a portrait of Luther in the Nazi propaganda weekly
Der Stürmer, reproduced on a panel at the exhibition, comes right to
the point. Calling him a “fighter against the Jewish spirit in the
Christian Church,” it says: “Dr. Luther is one of the greatest
anti-Semites in German history.”
Another panel shows a poster urging Berlin Lutherans to vote for the
pro-Nazi “German Christians” in local church elections in July 1933,
only months after Hitler came to power. At the top are both the
Christian cross and the swastika, which is called the “hooked cross”
(Hakenkreuz) in German.
Campaigning outside a Berlin church for elections on July 23, 1933.
The banner says “Vote for List 1, German Christians.” Photo courtesy
of Wikimedia Commons
“We merge Christ’s cross with the hooked cross,” it declares. Dripping
with Nazi terminology, it says Christianity should have nothing to do
with anything opposed to the German people and their race.
The title of the exhibition comes from a 1937 quote by the Lutheran
theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer: “Luther’s words are everywhere, but
twisted from truth into self-deception.” Bonhoeffer was executed as an
anti-Nazi conspirator one month before World War II ended in 1945.
Kurt Hendel, professor emeritus of Reformation history at the Lutheran
School of Theology in Chicago, said the Nazis saw Luther as a hero
because of his virulent 1543 treatise “On the Jews and Their Lies.”
“On the Jews and Their Lies” by Martin Luther, 1543. Photo courtesy of
Wikimedia Commons
“They very clearly used Luther’s writings that had all this
anti-Semitism in them to support their cause,” he told RNS, noting the
treatise called for Jews to be expelled from German cities, synagogues
to be burned down and rabbis forbidden to preach.
“Luther is particularly tragic in this sense” since he had rejected
anti-Semitism in earlier writings, Hendel said. But Luther always
believed Jews should be converted and he gradually lost patience when
they did not embrace Christianity.
The reformer’s 1543 treatise was all but forgotten for generations
until 19th-century German scholars included it in what is known as the
Erlangen edition of his complete works. “It’s through that reality
that Hitler and his supporters knew about it,” Hendel said.
The Nazis marked the 450th anniversary of Luther’s birthday in
November 1933 with a nationwide “German Luther Day,” in which the main
speaker praised Luther’s “ethno-nationalist mission” and called for
“the completion of the German Reformation in the Third Reich.”
The following year, they celebrated the 400th anniversary of his
groundbreaking translation of the Bible into German for, as they put
it, “a healthy people committed to their own kind.”
In 1938, Hitler’s propagandists highlighted the fact that the infamous
Kristallnacht (Night of Broken Glass) of Nov. 9-10 — when Nazis burned
synagogues and smashed the windows of Jewish-owned shops, leaving more
than 1,000 synagogues ablaze or smoldering — fell on the reformer’s
birthday.
“On November 10, 1938, on Luther’s birthday, the synagogues are
burning in Germany,” wrote Martin Sasse, the pro-Nazi Lutheran bishop
of Thuringia state. “The German people must hear the words of this
man, the greatest anti-Semite of his time, the warner of his people
against the Jews.”
Citing this pamphlet in its review of the exhibition, the Berlin
tabloid newspaper B.Z. said: “This instrumentalization must not be
ignored amid all the hero worship in this Luther year.”
The exhibition also documents the Third Reich’s crackdown on the
Confessing Church, the Protestant minority that opposed Nazism, and
the government’s hand in helping to build or renovate more than 1,000
Protestant church buildings during the Nazi period.
Thomas Albert Howard, professor of humanities and history at
Valparaiso University in Indiana, said the first two Reformation
centennials were strictly religious, but interpretations of Luther
changed in the 19th century.
“This is where you get the two major strands,” he said. “One is the
liberal Luther, whose reforms are seen as leading to progress and the
modern age, and the other the nationalist Luther, whose Bible
translation helped shape the modern German language and identity.”
By the 400th anniversary of his birth in 1883, the ceremonies exuded
“a worrisome and pungent nationalism” that continued when Imperial
Germany marked the 1917 Reformation centennial during World War I.
Although many German Protestants supported the Nazis, Howard recalled
that not all church leaders agreed.
“The German Protestant church was split in two between the ‘German
Christians,’ who were more sympathetic to National Socialist ideals,
and the Confessing Church — typified by people like Dietrich
Bonhoeffer — who were very critical of the marriage of Christianity
and Nazism,” he said.
“The Nazis wanted to instrumentalize the church — they weren’t gung-ho
about Martin Luther per se.”
Despite his anti-Semitic writings, Luther couldn’t be called a Nazi
either, Hendel insisted.
“He was not a Nazi anti-Semite, he was a religious anti-Semite,” he
said, explaining that Luther opposed Jews not as an ethnic group but
because they refused to convert.
Hendel stressed that Lutheran churches have since firmly rejected
Luther’s anti-Semitic writings and asked for Jews’ forgiveness.
“However, anti-Semitism is still well and alive, as we see in our own
time now with the neo-Nazi stuff and Charlottesville and all those
kinds of reality,” he added. “We have to be very critical.”
(Emily McFarlan Miller is a national reporter for RNS based in
Chicago. She covers evangelical and mainline Protestant Christianity.
Tom Heneghan in Paris contributed to this article. Reporting from
Germany on the 500th anniversary of the Reformation was made possible
in part by funding from the German National Tourist Board.)
Emily McFarlan Miller
Emily McFarlan Miller is a national reporter for RNS based in Chicago.
She covers evangelical and mainline Protestant Christianity.
About Tom Heneghan
Tom Heneghan is a Paris-based correspondent
legacy
By Emily McFarlan Miller and Tom Heneghan | October 19, 2017
BERLIN (RNS) — Martin Luther is such a towering figure in German
history that it’s no surprise Adolf Hitler’s Third Reich exploited his
name whenever it could.
Most visitors to events in Germany marking this year’s 500th
anniversary of the Reformation, however, probably didn’t expect to
find an exhibition setting out just how extensively the Nazis used
Luther to justify their anti-Semitism and nationalism.
To dramatize the connection, the exhibition “Luther’s words are
everywhere … ” is located in the Topography of Terror, a central
Berlin museum about Nazi repression methods that was built where the
headquarters of the Gestapo secret police and SS paramilitary force
once stood.
“Überall Luthers Worte … ” — “Luther’s Words are everywhere,” the
title of the exhibition highlighting how the Nazis exploited Martin
Luther’s legacy during the Third Reich. RNS photo by Emily McFarlan
Miller
The caption under a portrait of Luther in the Nazi propaganda weekly
Der Stürmer, reproduced on a panel at the exhibition, comes right to
the point. Calling him a “fighter against the Jewish spirit in the
Christian Church,” it says: “Dr. Luther is one of the greatest
anti-Semites in German history.”
Another panel shows a poster urging Berlin Lutherans to vote for the
pro-Nazi “German Christians” in local church elections in July 1933,
only months after Hitler came to power. At the top are both the
Christian cross and the swastika, which is called the “hooked cross”
(Hakenkreuz) in German.
Campaigning outside a Berlin church for elections on July 23, 1933.
The banner says “Vote for List 1, German Christians.” Photo courtesy
of Wikimedia Commons
“We merge Christ’s cross with the hooked cross,” it declares. Dripping
with Nazi terminology, it says Christianity should have nothing to do
with anything opposed to the German people and their race.
The title of the exhibition comes from a 1937 quote by the Lutheran
theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer: “Luther’s words are everywhere, but
twisted from truth into self-deception.” Bonhoeffer was executed as an
anti-Nazi conspirator one month before World War II ended in 1945.
Kurt Hendel, professor emeritus of Reformation history at the Lutheran
School of Theology in Chicago, said the Nazis saw Luther as a hero
because of his virulent 1543 treatise “On the Jews and Their Lies.”
“On the Jews and Their Lies” by Martin Luther, 1543. Photo courtesy of
Wikimedia Commons
“They very clearly used Luther’s writings that had all this
anti-Semitism in them to support their cause,” he told RNS, noting the
treatise called for Jews to be expelled from German cities, synagogues
to be burned down and rabbis forbidden to preach.
“Luther is particularly tragic in this sense” since he had rejected
anti-Semitism in earlier writings, Hendel said. But Luther always
believed Jews should be converted and he gradually lost patience when
they did not embrace Christianity.
The reformer’s 1543 treatise was all but forgotten for generations
until 19th-century German scholars included it in what is known as the
Erlangen edition of his complete works. “It’s through that reality
that Hitler and his supporters knew about it,” Hendel said.
The Nazis marked the 450th anniversary of Luther’s birthday in
November 1933 with a nationwide “German Luther Day,” in which the main
speaker praised Luther’s “ethno-nationalist mission” and called for
“the completion of the German Reformation in the Third Reich.”
The following year, they celebrated the 400th anniversary of his
groundbreaking translation of the Bible into German for, as they put
it, “a healthy people committed to their own kind.”
In 1938, Hitler’s propagandists highlighted the fact that the infamous
Kristallnacht (Night of Broken Glass) of Nov. 9-10 — when Nazis burned
synagogues and smashed the windows of Jewish-owned shops, leaving more
than 1,000 synagogues ablaze or smoldering — fell on the reformer’s
birthday.
“On November 10, 1938, on Luther’s birthday, the synagogues are
burning in Germany,” wrote Martin Sasse, the pro-Nazi Lutheran bishop
of Thuringia state. “The German people must hear the words of this
man, the greatest anti-Semite of his time, the warner of his people
against the Jews.”
Citing this pamphlet in its review of the exhibition, the Berlin
tabloid newspaper B.Z. said: “This instrumentalization must not be
ignored amid all the hero worship in this Luther year.”
The exhibition also documents the Third Reich’s crackdown on the
Confessing Church, the Protestant minority that opposed Nazism, and
the government’s hand in helping to build or renovate more than 1,000
Protestant church buildings during the Nazi period.
Thomas Albert Howard, professor of humanities and history at
Valparaiso University in Indiana, said the first two Reformation
centennials were strictly religious, but interpretations of Luther
changed in the 19th century.
“This is where you get the two major strands,” he said. “One is the
liberal Luther, whose reforms are seen as leading to progress and the
modern age, and the other the nationalist Luther, whose Bible
translation helped shape the modern German language and identity.”
By the 400th anniversary of his birth in 1883, the ceremonies exuded
“a worrisome and pungent nationalism” that continued when Imperial
Germany marked the 1917 Reformation centennial during World War I.
Although many German Protestants supported the Nazis, Howard recalled
that not all church leaders agreed.
“The German Protestant church was split in two between the ‘German
Christians,’ who were more sympathetic to National Socialist ideals,
and the Confessing Church — typified by people like Dietrich
Bonhoeffer — who were very critical of the marriage of Christianity
and Nazism,” he said.
“The Nazis wanted to instrumentalize the church — they weren’t gung-ho
about Martin Luther per se.”
Despite his anti-Semitic writings, Luther couldn’t be called a Nazi
either, Hendel insisted.
“He was not a Nazi anti-Semite, he was a religious anti-Semite,” he
said, explaining that Luther opposed Jews not as an ethnic group but
because they refused to convert.
Hendel stressed that Lutheran churches have since firmly rejected
Luther’s anti-Semitic writings and asked for Jews’ forgiveness.
“However, anti-Semitism is still well and alive, as we see in our own
time now with the neo-Nazi stuff and Charlottesville and all those
kinds of reality,” he added. “We have to be very critical.”
(Emily McFarlan Miller is a national reporter for RNS based in
Chicago. She covers evangelical and mainline Protestant Christianity.
Tom Heneghan in Paris contributed to this article. Reporting from
Germany on the 500th anniversary of the Reformation was made possible
in part by funding from the German National Tourist Board.)
Emily McFarlan Miller
Emily McFarlan Miller is a national reporter for RNS based in Chicago.
She covers evangelical and mainline Protestant Christianity.
About Tom Heneghan
Tom Heneghan is a Paris-based correspondent
--
Steve Hayes from Tshwane, South Africa
Web: http://www.khanya.org.za/stevesig.htm
Blog: http://khanya.wordpress.com
For information about why crossposting is (usually) good, and multiposting (nearly always) bad, see:
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Steve Hayes from Tshwane, South Africa
Web: http://www.khanya.org.za/stevesig.htm
Blog: http://khanya.wordpress.com
For information about why crossposting is (usually) good, and multiposting (nearly always) bad, see:
http://oakroadsystems.com/genl/unice.htm#xpost