Talk:Martin Luther and antisemitism/Religious or Racial Antisemitism

This page is for gathering citations from scholars on the question of whether or not Luther's attacks on the Jews were relgious or racial in nature.

Quotations from Scholars Who Take the Position that Luther's Position was Not Racially Motivated
(see Martin Luther for full citations)


 * 1) Bainton, Here I Stand, 297:"His (Luther's) position was entirely religious and in no respect racial." --CTSWyneken 21:43, 26 May 2006 (UTC)
 * 2) Siemon-Netto, Lutheran Witness : "Anti-Semites are racists, and racists appeared on the scene much later in history — after the Enlightenment and the French Revolution. Luther did not think of Jews in ethnic terms; his bias was religious. Just before his death he admonished the princes to treat converts from Judaism as brethren." --CTSWyneken 21:48, 26 May 2006 (UTC)
 * 3) Richard Marius, Martin Luther, 377: "Roland Bainton in his effort to make the best of Luther declared that Luther's view of the Jews 'was entirely religious and by no means racial.' True: the crackpot version of social Darwinism that gave rise to 'racial' anti-Semitism was a creation of the ninetheenth and twentieth centuries. Luther hated the Jews because they rejected Christ."--CTSWyneken 21:54, 26 May 2006 (UTC)
 * 4) Gordon Rupp, Martin Luther, 75:"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." --CTSWyneken 22:02, 26 May 2006 (UTC)
 * 5) James M. Kittelson, Luther the Reformer, 274: after commenting on On the Jews , he says: "There was no anti-Semitism in this response. Moreover, Luther never became an anti-Semite in the modern, racial sense of the term."--CTSWyneken 22:05, 26 May 2006 (UTC)
 * 6) Heiko Oberman, The Roots of Anti-Semitism: In the Age of Renaissance and Reformation (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1984), 102:“One must realize that Luther does not see ‘a race’ when he looks at the Jews, nor are baptized and unbaptized Jews for Luther the exponents of an ethnic, racial unit. Baptized Jews belong unqualifiedly to the people of God, just as do baptized Germans, the Gentiles” --CTSWyneken 22:16, 26 May 2006 (UTC)
 * 7) Eric Gritsch, “Was Luther Anti-Semitic? ” 12 Christian History No. 3:39: “Luther was not an anti-Semite in the racist sense. His arguments against the Jews were theological, not biological.” --CTSWyneken 22:19, 26 May 2006 (UTC)
 * 8) Mark U. Edwards, Jr. Luther's Last Battles: Politics and Polemics 1531-46. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1983), 139: Luther identified a Jew by his religious beliefs, not by his race. (Identification of a Jew by his race is, in any case, a concept foreign to the sixteenth century.) If a Jew converted to Christianity, be because a fellow brother or sister in Christ." --CTSWyneken 13:10, 30 May 2006 (UTC)
 * 9) Russell Briese, "Martin Luther and the Jews," Lutheran Forum (Summer 2000):32: "We must be clear that Luther's complaints against the Jews were not against a race or ethnic group, but against a religion." --CTSWyneken 13:38, 30 May 2006 (UTC)
 * 10) Martin Brecht, Martin Luther ,3:351. After reporting on the final polemical writings of Luther, he says: "Luther, however, was not involved with later racial anti-Semitism. There is a world of difference between his belief in salvation and racial ideology. Nevertheless, his misguided agitation had the evil result that Luther fatefully because one of the "church fathers" of anti-Semitism and thus provided material for the modern hatred of Jews, cloaking it with the authority of the Reformer."--CTSWyneken 13:03, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

Quotations from Scholars who Assert that Luther's Position on the Jews was Racially Motivated

 * 1) Robert, Michael, "Christian racism, part 2", H-Net Discussions Networks, 2 Mar 2000: "Luther wrote of the Jews as if they were a race that could not truly convert to Christianity."