D. James Kennedy's "Darwin's Deadly Legacy" Corrected & why he missed it.

[NAO]

D. James Kennedy Corrected: Luther’s Deadly Legacy

Last week Talibangelist Radical Cleric Dr. D. James Kennedy – founder of the Theocratic PAC “Reclaiming America For Christ” - produced a stunningly bad program titled “Darwin’s Deadly Legacy” in which he propounded the idea that the theories of Charles Darwin somehow led to Hitler’s Nazi Regime and the Holocaust against the Jews.

Actually, Dr. Kennedy was on the right track, sort of...there WAS a Western thinker whose writings did in fact play a significant role in inspiring Hitler and creating the Nazi Holocaust.

I am referring of course to the "Father of the Protestant Reformation”, Martin Luther. Luther’s treatise "On The Jews and Their Lies" advocated a program very similar to what the Nazi party did in fact implement in the Holocaust. The Nazis even gave Luther a special "birthday tribute" on November 9-10, 1938, in what became known as "Krystalnacht." That is the night the Nazi Stormtroopers began carrying out the work Luther had specified in his book “On the Jews”.

Now while Luther was fulminating about the Jews, John Calvin, the founder of Dr. Kennedy's brand of Christianity – Presbyterianism - was busy “Reclaiming Geneva for Christ”; apparently he was too occupied with burning heretics and administering his little theocracy to be worried about the Jewish question that was consuming Luther. This may explain why Dr. Kennedy missed the correct historical reference for the thinker who inspired the Holocaust and caused his blunder in blaming Charles Darwin rather than Martin Luther.

Lest anyone think I am merely being overly imaginative in attributing the Holocaust to Luther, I will provide some verbatim quotes from the Great Reformer’s little book. I apologize for the graphic nature of the imagery, but remember, this is the writing of a one of the greatest Christians who ever lived, not some mere atheistic scientist like Charles Darwin. Readers can decide whose ideas are dangerous...

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DIRECT QUOTATIONS FROM MARTIN LUTHER, THE LEADER OF THE PROTESTANT REFORMATION:

"...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. In Deuteronomy 13:12 Moses writes that any city that is given to idolatry shall be totally destroyed by fire, and nothing of it shall be preserved. If he were alive today, he would be the first to set fire to the synagogues and houses of the Jews. For in Deuteronomy 4:2 and 12:32 he commanded very explicitly that nothing is to be added to or subtracted from his law."

"...I advise that their houses also be razed and destroyed. For they pursue in them the same aims as in their synagogues. Instead they might be lodged under a roof or in a barn, like the gypsies. This will bring home to them the fact that they are not masters in our country, as they boast, but that they are living in exile and in captivity, as they incessantly wail and lament about us before God."

"...I advise that their rabbis be forbidden to teach henceforth on pain of loss of life and limb. For they have justly forfeited the right to such an office by holding the poor Jews captive with the saying of Moses (Deuteronomy 17:10) in which he commands them to obey their teachers on penalty of death..."

"...I advise that safe-conduct on the highways be abolished completely for the Jews. For they have no business in the countryside, since they are not lords, officials, tradesmen, or the like...If you great lords and princes will not forbid such usurers the highway legally, some day a troop may gather against them, having learned from this booklet the true nature of the Jews and how one should deal with them and not protect their activities."

"...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, as was imposed on the children of Adam (Gen. 3 <:19>). For it is not fitting that they should let us accursed ***** 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."

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Martin Luther's Little Book - "On the Jews and Their Lies"
http://www.humanitas-international.org/showcase/chronography/documents/luther-jews.htm

(See Part 11 for Luther's Specific Recommendations which were LITERALLY the Blueprint for the Holocaust)

[donco6]

1. I'm sure Luther "took responsibility" for his writing at some point.

So that means it's all OK, right?

(sorry, playing off another thread).

Good points. Luther has a much closer connection to the culture of Germany than Darwin, seeing that the German princes actually unified in their objection to Catholicism which led to the unified empire of the Hapsburgs. This led to the connections between Germany, Austria, Hungary, and all the other German-speaking portions of France, Switzerland, etc.

But in D. James' sad little world, it's all due to evolution. Pfaw.

[neoblues]

2. It's not too late...

That's right, even now D. James Kennedy could go ahead and "take responsibility" for Luther, and it would make him a "bigger" man... having taken all that responsbility (amazing the presumed exculpatory effect of just saying the words "I take full responsibility..." in politics (and presumably religion), but just try that in a Court of Law sometime...).

Anyway, the other big error in ol' Kennedy's (and his newly favored "expert" Ann Coulter) take on "Darwinism" was summed up in the following response in another thread:

Failure to distinguish social Darwinism from Darwinism

[donco6]

3. Thanks for the link.

Good thread. Yes, I see what Kennedy is doing now, linking social darwinism with Darwin (who surely would have abhorred that ridiculous stretch.) As if the scientist is responsible for whatever some aberrant mind does to his work after it's released. But then, a lot of Christians don't seem to care about truth or logic. If the pastor said it, it must be true.

[Jim__]

4. I agree that Kennedy is wrong, but, then, I believe you are too.

Did german anti-semitism originate with Martin Luther? I don't know the answer, but, I doubt it. My suspicion is that German anti-semitism preceded Luther, and could be said to stem from Christianity which believed that the Jews had killed the Messiah. But, my guess is that even without Christianity, there would have been anti-Semitism in Germany. The Jews were a large group of people that stayed largely segregated from the main society - I believe Jewish culture requires this. As a separate culture within a society, they probably would have been targets for hatred in just about any culture - there seems to be a human desire for homogeneity within a society.

Hitler arose to power largely because of the German loss in WWI and the brutal treaty that followed. Many Germans did not accept the loss of WWI as legitimate - after all, the Russians had just sued for peace and withdrawn millions of enemy soldiers from the front. Then, given the chaos that the treaty caused in Germany, radicalization and a seeking of scape goats was a predictable course.

In Mein Kampf, Hitler does base some of his anti-Semitic rantings on his understanding of evolution. He probably also based some of them on Christianity. I believe both of these were rationalizations for an anti-Semiticism that Hitler inherited from his social and cultural background.

We all need to learn from the mistakes of the past. But, we don't learn if we over-simplify. Kennedy's claims are an over-simplification. I believe that yours are too.