Reason is a “Whore”?
"Reason should be destroyed in all Christians."
— Martin Luther
"Whoever wants to be a Christian should tear the eyes out of his reason."
— Martin Luther
"Reason is the greatest enemy that faith has; it never comes to the aid of spiritual things, but more frequently than not struggles against the divine Word, treating with contempt all that emanates from God."
— Martin Luther
"Reason is the Devil's greatest whore; by nature and manner of being she is a noxious whore; she is a prostitute, the Devil's appointed whore; whore eaten by scab and leprosy who ought to be trodden under foot and destroyed, she and her wisdom ... Throw dung in her face to make her ugly. She is and she ought to be drowned in baptism... She would deserve, the wretch, to be banished to the filthiest place in the house, to the closets."
— Martin Luther, Erlangen Edition v. 16, pp. 142-148
"Reason must be deluded, blinded, and destroyed. Faith must trample underfoot all reason, sense, and understanding, and whatever it sees must be put out of sight and ... know nothing but the word of God."
— Martin Luther
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4 comments:
logical fallacy - ad hominem
What do you think Luther meant by reason. Why did he say what he said? Rather than employing the use of bad logic you should ask why?
We live in a post enlightenment culture, Luther lived in a premodern culture prior to the enlightenment.
Don't you think the word reason meant something a bit different then than it does today?
Take the word Jew for instance. Do you think it carried different ideas before WWII and Hitler? Do you see my point?
Why don't you read those passages in context and define what he means by the word reason.
Are you reading Luther, or are you reading someone else who is irresponsibly quoiting Luther out of context? This is a very weak critique of something Christian.
I suppose pointing out his influence on the holocaust is an ad hominem attack? Luther was certainly pre-enlightenment-I will give you that.
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. I would not have believed that a Christian could be duped by the Jews into taking their exile and wretchedness upon himself. However, the devil is the god of the world, and wherever God's word is absent he has an easy task, not only with the weak but also with the strong. May God help us. Amen.
-Martin Luther (On the Jews and Their Lies)
He did not call them Abraham's children, but a "brood of vipers" [Matt. 3:7]. Oh, that was too insulting for the noble blood and race of Israel, and they declared, "He has a demon' [Matt 11:18]. Our Lord also calls them a "brood of vipers"; furthermore in John 8 [:39,44] he states: "If you were Abraham's children ye would do what Abraham did.... You are of your father the devil. It was intolerable to them to hear that they were not Abraham's but the devil's children, nor can they bear to hear this today.
-Martin Luther (On the Jews and Their Lies)
Therefore the blind Jews are truly stupid fools...
-Martin Luther (On the Jews and Their Lies)
Now just behold these miserable, blind, and senseless people.
-Martin Luther (On the Jews and Their Lies)
-Martin Luther (On the Jews and Their Lies
Moreover, they are nothing but thieves and robbers who daily eat no morsel and wear no thread of clothing which they have not stolen and pilfered from us by means of their accursed usury. Thus they live from day to day, together with wife and child, by theft and robbery, as arch-thieves and robbers, in the most impenitent security.
-Martin Luther (On the Jews and Their Lies)
However, they have not acquired a perfect mastery of the art of lying; they lie so clumsily and ineptly that anyone who is just a little observant can easily detect it.
But for us Christians they stand as a terrifying example of God's wrath.
-Martin Luther (On the Jews and Their Lies)
If I had to refute all the other articles of the Jewish faith, I should be obliged to write against them as much and for as long a time as they have used for inventing their lies-- that is, longer than two thousand years.
-Martin Luther (On the Jews and Their Lies)
...Christ and his word can hardly be recognized because of the great vermin of human ordinances. However, let this suffice for the time being on their lies against doctrine or faith.
-Martin Luther (On the Jews and Their Lies)
Did I not tell you earlier that a Jew is such a noble, precious jewel that God and all the angels dance when he farts?
-Martin Luther (On the Jews and Their Lies)
No, one should toss out these lazy rogues by the seat of their pants.
-Martin Luther (On the Jews and Their Lies)
...but then eject them forever from this country. For, as we have heard, God's anger with them is so intense that gentle mercy will only tend to make them worse and worse, while sharp mercy will reform them but little. Therefore, in any case, away with them!
-Martin Luther (On the Jews and Their Lies)
Are you intentionally not answering the question or do you not have an answer to my questions about how Luther understood the word reason?
Your blatant, myopic disregard for historical context is incredulous.
I don't understand how anybody with any intellectual credibility could make such a fallacious argument.
Do you really believe Luther influenced to the Holocaust with this work? Does this brilliance come from your own biased, hate filled mind or do you have source?
Do you have any idea what Luther was responding to with this work?
Have you compared this work with other 16C German literature?
This is a no-brainer. There is nothing more powerful than an idea and the idea that Jews were wicked can be traced right back to your “holy” book.
Long before Hitler, a seed of hatred was planted in the mind of humanity. Planted by the writers of Christian scriptures, it declared that Jews were responsible for the murder of God. In those writings Jesus demonizes unbelieving Jews, calling them “evil,” “serpents,” and children of the “devil.”
Following in Jesus’ footsteps, Paul demonized Elymas, calling him a “child of the devil,” and then blinded him (Acts 13:6-12). During the council of Nicaea—when Christianity was made the official religion of Rome—Jews were referred to as “mad”... “utterly depraved”...“murderers of our Lord.” Early fathers of the Christian church continued the demonizing of Jews inspiring nearly 2,000 years of persecution. Like Jesus, Saint Jerome denounced them as Judaic “serpents.” Saint John Chrysotom said “It is incumbent upon all Christians to hate the Jews.” Saint Fulgentius echos the violent words of Jesus by saying Jews who die outside the Catholic Church, will “go into eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.” Pope Pius IX saw Jews as "dogs who bark in the street." In a precursor of Nazi Germany, Pope Innocent III summoned The Fourth Council of the Lateran which stripped Jews of their civil rights and compelled them to wear a special mark to identify themselves in public. And leader of the Protestant Reformation, Martin Luther, called Jews “desperate, thoroughly evil, poisonous, and devilish” and said “We ought to take revenge … and kill them.”
The long history of demonizing Jews begun by Jesus led to Hitler’s “Final Solution.” Hitler said “the personification of the devil as the symbol of all evil assumes the living shape of the Jew” and exterminated some six million people while believing he was “acting in accordance with the will of the Almighty Creator” and was “fighting for the work of the Lord.” Hitler is rightly condemned for the Nazi holocaust, yet Jesus promises an eternal holocaust which will torture countless more men, women and children forever and always and is praised.
Calling Jesus, “The Prince of Peace” is like calling Hitler, “The Lord of Love”.
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