Martin Luther Warning: You are not logged in. Your IP address will be publicly visible if you make any edits. If you log in or create an account, your edits will be attributed to your username, along with other benefits.Anti-spam check. Do not fill this in! ===Anti-Jewish polemics and antisemitism: 1543–1544=== {{Main|Martin Luther and antisemitism}} {{see also|Christianity and antisemitism}} [[File:1543 On the Jews and Their Lies by Martin Luther.jpg|thumb|upright|The original title page of ''[[On the Jews and Their Lies]]'', written by Martin Luther in 1543]] Luther wrote negatively about [[Jews]] throughout his career.<ref name=":2">Michael, Robert. ''Holy Hatred: Christianity, Antisemitism, and the Holocaust''. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2006, 109; Mullett, 242.</ref> Though Luther rarely encountered Jews during his life, his attitudes reflected a theological and cultural tradition which saw Jews as a rejected people guilty of the murder of Christ, and he lived in a locality which had expelled Jews roughly 90 years earlier.<ref>Edwards, Mark. ''Luther's Last Battles''. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1983, 121.</ref> He considered the Jews blasphemers and liars because they rejected the divinity of Jesus.<ref>[[Martin Brecht|Brecht]], 3:341–343; Mullett, 241; Marty, 172.</ref> In 1523, Luther advised kindness toward the Jews in ''That Jesus Christ was Born a Jew'' and also aimed to convert them to Christianity.<ref>Brecht, 3:334; Marty, 169; Marius, 235.</ref> When his efforts at conversion failed, he grew increasingly bitter toward them.<ref>Noble, Graham. "Martin Luther and German anti-Semitism," ''History Review'' (2002) No. 42:1–2; Mullett, 246.</ref> Luther's major works on the Jews were his 60,000-word treatise ''Von den Juden und Ihren Lügen'' (''[[On the Jews and Their Lies]]''), and ''Vom Schem Hamphoras und vom Geschlecht Christi'' (''[[Vom Schem Hamphoras|On the Holy Name and the Lineage of Christ]]''), both published in 1543, three years before his death.<ref>Brecht, 3:341–347.</ref> Luther argued that the Jews were no longer the chosen people but "the devil's people", and referred to them with violent language.<ref>Luther, ''On the Jews and their Lies'', quoted in Michael, 112.</ref><ref>Luther, ''Vom Schem Hamphoras'', quoted in Michael, 113.</ref> Citing Deuteronomy 13, wherein [[Moses]] commands the killing of idolaters and the burning of their cities and property as an offering to God, Luther called for a "''scharfe Barmherzigkeit''" ("sharp mercy") against the Jews "to see whether we might save at least a few from the glowing flames."<ref name=gritsch8687>Gritsch, Eric W. (2012). ''[https://www.google.com/books/edition/Martin_Luther_s_Anti_Semitism/tZzH7ZZM-94C?hl=en&gbpv=1&pg=PA86 Martin Luther's Anti-Semitism: Against His Better Judgment]''. Grand Rapids, Michigan: [[William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company]]. {{ISBN|978-0-8028-6676-9}}. pp. 86–87.</ref> Luther advocated setting [[synagogue]]s on fire, destroying Jewish [[Siddur|prayerbooks]], forbidding [[rabbi]]s from preaching, seizing Jews' property and money, and smashing up their homes, so that these "envenomed worms" would be forced into labour or expelled "for all time".<ref name=":0">Luther, ''On the Jews and Their Lies'', ''Luthers Werke''. 47:268–271.</ref> In [[Robert Michael (historian)|Robert Michael]]'s view, Luther's words "We are at fault in not slaying them" amounted to a sanction for murder.<ref>Luther, ''On the Jews and Their Lies'', quoted in Robert Michael, "Luther, Luther Scholars, and the Jews," ''Encounter'' 46 (Autumn 1985) No. 4:343–344.</ref> "God's anger with them is so intense," Luther concluded, "that gentle mercy will only tend to make them worse, while sharp mercy will reform them but little. Therefore, in any case, away with them!"<ref name=gritsch8687/> Luther launched a polemic against vagrants in his 1528 preface to ''[[Liber Vagatorum]]'', saying that the Jews had contributed Hebrew words as a main basis of the ''[[Rotwelsch]]'' [[cryptolect]]. He warned in the admonitory preface Christians not to give them alms as it was, in his opinion, to forsake the truly poor.<ref>{{Cite book |title=Dialects of the Yiddish Language: Winter Studies in Yiddish, Volume 2. Papers from the Second Annual Oxford Winter Symposium in Yiddish Language and Literature, 14–16 December 1986 |chapter=Chapter 9. Early Yiddish in Non-Jewish Books |publisher=[[Pergamon Press]] |year=1988 |isbn=978-0080365640 |last=Rosenfeld |first=Moshe N. |oclc=17727332 |editor-first=Dovid |editor-last=Katz |editor-link=Dovid Katz |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=NSyLBQAAQBAJ&pg=PA99 |access-date=22 February 2023 |via=Google Books |page=99 }}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |title=Small Dictionaries and Curiosity: Lexicography and Fieldwork in Post-medieval Europe |chapter=Chapter 5. first curiosity-driven wordlists: Rotwelsch |publisher=[[Oxford University Press]] |year=2017 |isbn=978-0198785019 |last=Considine |first=John P. |url=https://academic.oup.com/book/9269 |url-access=registration |oclc=955312844 |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=MmLODQAAQBAJ&pg=PA36 |doi=10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198785019.001.0001 |access-date=22 February 2023 |via=Google Books |page=37 }}</ref> Luther spoke out against the Jews in Saxony, Brandenburg, and Silesia.<ref name="Michael:Josel/Strasbourg">Michael, 117.</ref> [[Josel of Rosheim]], the Jewish spokesman who tried to help the Jews of Saxony in 1537, later blamed their plight on "that priest whose name was Martin Luther—may his body and soul be bound up in hell!—who wrote and issued many heretical books in which he said that whoever would help the Jews was doomed to perdition."<ref>Quoted by Michael, 110.</ref> Josel asked the city of Strasbourg to forbid the sale of Luther's anti-Jewish works: they refused initially but did so when a Lutheran pastor in [[Hochfelden, Bas-Rhin|Hochfelden]] used a sermon to urge his parishioners to murder Jews.<ref name="Michael:Josel/Strasbourg" /> Luther's influence persisted after his death. Throughout the 1580s, riots led to the expulsion of Jews from several German Lutheran states.<ref>Michael, 117–118.</ref> [[Tovia Singer]], an [[Orthodox Judaism|Orthodox Jewish]] rabbi, remarking about Luther's attitude toward Jews, put it thus: "Among all the Church Fathers and Reformers, there was no mouth more vile, no tongue that uttered more vulgar curses against the Children of Israel than this founder of the Reformation."<ref>{{cite web |last1=Singer |first1=Tovia |title=A Closer Look at the "Crucifixion Psalm" |url=https://outreachjudaism.org/crucifixion-psalm/ |website=Outreach Judaism |date=30 April 2014 |access-date=20 July 2019}}</ref> Summary: Please note that all contributions to Christianpedia may be edited, altered, or removed by other contributors. If you do not want your writing to be edited mercilessly, then do not submit it here. 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