Posted on 11/13/2007 9:33:06 AM PST by rhema
Embarrassed at the murderous legacy of atheist Communist regimes in the twentieth century, leading atheists seek to even the score with believers by portraying Adolf Hitler and his Nazi regime as theist and specifically Christian. Atheist websites routinely claim that Hitler was a Christian because he was born Catholic, he never publicly renounced his Catholicism, and he wrote in Mein Kampf, “By defending myself against the Jew, I am fighting for the work of the Lord.” Atheist writer Sam Harris writes that since “the Holocaust marked the culmination of…two hundred years of Christian fulminating against the Jews,” therefore “knowingly or not, the Nazis were agents of religion.”
How persuasive are these claims? Hitler was born Catholic just as Stalin was born into the Russian Orthodox Church and Mao was raised as a Buddhist. These facts prove nothing as many people reject their religious upbringing, as these three men did. From an early age, historian Allan Bullock writes, Hitler “had no time at all for Catholic teaching, regarding it as a religion fit only for slaves and detesting its ethics.”
How then do we account for Hitler’s claim that in carrying out his anti-Semitic program he was an instrument of divine providence? During his ascent to power, Hitler needed the support of the German people—both the Bavarian Catholics and the Prussian Lutherans—and to secure this he occasionally used rhetoric such as “I am doing the Lord’s work.” To claim that this rhetoric makes Hitler a Christian is to confuse political opportunism with personal conviction. Hitler himself says in Mein Kampf that his public statements should be understood as propaganda that bears no relation to the truth but is designed to sway the masses.
The Nazi idea of an Aryan Christ who uses the sword to cleanse the earth of the Jews—what historians call “Aryan Christianity”—was obviously a radical departure from the traditional Christian understanding and was condemned as such by Pope Pius XI at the time. Moreover, Hitler’s anti-Semitism was not religious, it was racial. Jews were targeted not because of their religion—indeed many German Jews were completely secular in their way of life—but because of their racial identity. This was an ethnic and not a religious designation. Hitler’s anti-Semitism was secular.
Hitler’s Table Talk, a revealing collection of the Fuhrer’s private opinions, assembled by a close aide during the war years, shows Hitler to be rabidly anti-religious. He called Christianity one of the great “scourges” of history, and said of the Germans, “Let’s be the only people who are immunized against this disease.” He promised that “through the peasantry we shall be able to destroy Christianity.” In fact, he blamed the Jews for inventing Christianity. He also condemned Christianity for its opposition to evolution.
Hitler reserved special scorn for the Christian values of equality and compassion, which he identified with weakness. Hitler’s leading advisers like Goebbels, Himmler, Heydrich and Bormann were atheists who hated religion and sought to eradicate its influence in Germany.
In his multi-volume history of the Third Reich, historian Richard Evans writes that “the Nazis regarded the churches as the strongest and toughest reservoirs of ideological opposition to the principles they believed in.” Once Hitler and the Nazis came to power, they launched a ruthless drive to subdue and weaken the Christian churches in Germany. Evans points out that after 1937 the policies of Hitler’s government became increasingly anti-religious.
The Nazis stopped celebrating Christmas, and the Hitler Youth recited a prayer thanking the Fuhrer rather than God for their blessings. Clergy regarded as “troublemakers” were ordered not to preach, hundreds of them were imprisoned, and many were simply murdered. Churches were under constant Gestapo surveillance. The Nazis closed religious schools, forced Christian organizations to disband, dismissed civil servants who were practicing Christians, confiscated church property, and censored religious newspapers. Poor Sam Harris cannot explain how an ideology that Hitler and his associates perceived as a repudiation of Christianity can be portrayed as a “culmination” of Christianity.
If Nazism represented the culmination of anything, it was that of the nineteenth-century and early-twentieth century ideology of social Darwinism. As historian Richard Weikart documents, both Hitler and Himmler were admirers of Darwin and often spoke of their role as enacting a “law of nature” that guaranteed the “elimination of the unfit.” Weikart argues that Hitler himself “drew upon a bountiful fund of social Darwinist thought to construct his own racist philosophy” and concludes that while Darwinism is not a “sufficient” intellectual explanation for Nazism, it is a “necessary” one. Without Darwinism, there might not have been Nazism.
The Nazis also drew on the philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche, adapting his atheist philosophy to their crude purposes. Nietzsche’s vision of the ubermensch and his elevation of a new ethic “beyond good and evil” were avidly embraced by Nazi propagandists. Nietzsche’s “will to power” almost became a Nazi recruitment slogan. I am not for a moment suggesting that Darwin or Nietzsche would have approved of Hitler’s ideas. But Hitler and his henchmen approved of Darwin’s and Nietzsche’s ideas. Harris simply ignores the evidence of the Nazis’ sympathies for Darwin, Nietzsche, and atheism. So what sense can we make of his claim that the leading Nazis were “knowingly or unknowingly” agents of religion? Clearly, it is nonsense.
So in addition to the mountain of corpses that the God-hating regimes of Stalin, Mao, Pot Pot and others have produced, we must add the body count of the God-hating Nazi regime. The Nazis, like the Communists, deliberately targeted the churches and the believers because they wanted to create a new man and a new utopia freed from the shackles of traditional religion and traditional morality. In an earlier blog, I asked what is atheism’s contribution to civilization? One answer to that question: Genocide.
Ugh, the atheists trying to inanely pin evil on Christianity. Guess what? The Devil was an angel at one point, too.
My other favorite is when they bring up the Inquisition as a comparison to the Muslim unrest going on in the world.
Nothing like going back several hundred years to have to make your point.
I don't have the web site handy---the link is at my office---but the Nuremberg war trials produced extensive documentation about the establishment of the "Nazi church." Hitler needed the Christians to help him kill the Jews, but they were next in line!
I think Hitler was a satan wannabee - doesn’t mean he didn’t believe in God - only that he wished to choose the devil and inflict evil on the world.
Naziism was as bad as communism in their "socialistic" ideals...both inevitably steering for totalitarianism...the 2 just went about it in different ways.
Hitler was no more a Christian than David Koresh or Fred Phelps. They used religion with speech as a tool for their own ends.
Btw, the "Hail Mary" in German doesn't use "heil" - it uses "Gegrüßet seist du." (you are greeted).
With all that said, Hitler was definitely aiming at his own deification (look at all the rotten art where he's a stand-in for various semi-divine Germanic legendary figures). He wanted to get there via a manufactured quasi-Nordic pagan religion of his own creation, not Christianity. He had no use for Christianity in any form, seeing it as a mere derivation of Judaism and a creed for weaklings.
The Nazis never were Christians. They sometimes used the cover of Christianity and other religions in their propaganda but they developed their own Pagan rituals for weddings, births and other important ceremonies. They also exterminated thousands of priests and millions of Christians in concentration camps.
The Nazis used any religion to further their power. For example, the Nazis raised two Muslim Waffen SS Divisions during the war. These were the only true “religious” SS Division the Nazis ever created (and it is safe to say that the Germany was not a Muslim nation). Himmler was fascinated by the thought of Muslims to be fearless soldiers willing to kill for their religion. One of these Muslim Waffen SS divisions (The Hanjer Division) was responsible for the murder of over 90 percent of the Yugoslavian Jewish population.
The Nazis were left-wing socialists. Yes, the National Socialist Workers Party of Germany, otherwise known as the Nazi Party, was indeed socialist, and it had a lot in common with the modern left. Hitler preached class warfare, agitating the working class to resist “exploitation” by capitalists — particularly Jewish capitalists, of course. Their program called for the nationalization of education, health care, transportation, and other major industries. They instituted and vigorously enforced a strict gun control regimen. They encouraged pornography, illegitimacy, and abortion, and they denounced Christians as right-wing fanatics. Yet a popular myth persists that the Nazis themselves were right-wing extremists. This insidious lie biases the entire political landscape, and the time has come to expose it.
2banana
In that respect, Hitler was somewhat under the sway of Alfred Rosenberg, who was anti-Christian, anti-Semitic, and an outspoken pagan. Rosenberg had put together a document of the thirty rules of a “National Reich Church,” which was completely anti-Christian (using Mein Kampf as a holy book, for example, and banning the Bible). But Hitler and the Nazis, on their way up and during their consolidation of power and the runup to 1939, had to couch their statements often in Christian rhetoric (such as “Nazism is positive Christianity”). For that, they leaned heavily on H.S. Chamberlain’s book “Foundations of the Nineteenth Century,” in which he maintained that Jesus Christ was an Aryan, not a Jew.
}:-)4
Uh oh... not another ‘inconvenient truth’ for the secular leftists.
To be a Christian you must follow Christ. Who can keep a straight face and say that Hitler did this?
Anyone can make a claim as to what they are, but it does not make it so.
Was Hitler a Christian? He was probably baptized as an infant, but the determinant is how a person lives his/her life. By their fruits you will know them.
Hitler a disciple or follower of Christ? I don't think so.
This is a good one:
Hitler’s war on Christ: Joel Miller explores Nazi plan to eradicate the Church
January 12, 2002
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/606793/posts
Good point. Believing in God is not the same thing as being a follower. Intellectual assent is not enough.
Mr. niteowl77
Matthew 7
21 Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven.
22 Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? and in thy name have cast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful works?
23 And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity.
No mention of him being a Theosophist. He was the ultimate New Ager. He was into people like Alice A. Bailey and Madame Blavatsky. These people were the founders of what has emerged into the modern New Age movement. Do a search on the internet and see what comes up.
He was for all intents and purposes a Satanist.
Mel
Actually they're all derived from the same Old German root meaning "whole."
Certainly. But they mean very different things. I don’t think Hitler was thinking “holy” - I think he was thinking “archaic greeting to pagan overlord.”
The fact that atheists even run with the “Hitler was a Christian” line in the first place shows that they are not nearly as “bright” as they think themselves to be.
Martin Bormann's (Nazi Chancellor) "TABLE TALKS 1941-1944" are the transcripts of Hitler's conversations. It contains this Hilter quote from 8/21/42:
"Had Charles Martel not been victorious at Poitiers—already you see the world had already fallen into the hands of the Jews, so gutless a thing Christianity!—then we should in all probability have been converted to Mohammedanism, that cult which glorifies the heroism and which opens up the seventh Heaven to the bold warrior alone. Then the Germanic races would have conquered the world. Christianity alone prevented them from doing so."Albert Speer Minister for Armaments wrote in his "Inside the Third Reich" the following:
'Hitler had been much impressed by a scrap of history he had learned from a delegation of distinguished Arabs. When the Mohammedans had attempted to penetrate beyond France into Central Europe during the eighth century, his visitors had told him, they had been driven back at the Battle of Tours. Had the Arabs won this battle, the world would be Mohammedan today. For theirs was a religion that believed in spreading the faith by the sword and subjugating all nations to that faith. The Germanic peoples would have become heirs to that religion. Such a creed was perfectly suited to the Germanic temperament. Hitler said that the conquering Arabs, because of their racial inferiority, would in the long run have been unable to contend with the harsher climate and conditions of the country. They could not have kept down the more vigorous natives, so that ultimately not Arabs but Islamized Germans could have stood at the head of this Mohammedan Empire.'In short, Hitler despised Christianity as a weakling Jewish influence Religion, but he admired Islam and bemoaned the fact the Islam did not conquer all of Europe in the 8th century.'Hitler usually concluded this historical speculation by remarking "You see, it's been our misfortune to have the wrong religion. Why didn't we have the religion of the Japansese, who regard sacrifice for the Fatherland as the highest good? The Mohammedan religion too would have been much more compatible to us than Christianity. Why did it have to be Christianity with its meekness and flabbiness?"'
Christian is as Christian does. Hitler was no Christian.
Christian is as Christian does. Hitler was no Christian.
You Mean Hitler Wasn’t A Priest?
The truth is, in fact, out there.
http://www.nationalreview.com/shiflett/shiflett012102.shtml
Heydrich planned to infiltrate Catholic seminaries with Hitler Youth/ SS and subvert the Church from within. Hitler said he would settle up with the Church after the War, especially after Cardinal Gehlen’s and others’ sermons from the pulpit helped galvanize opposition to the T4 program [euthanasia], forcing Hitler to shut it down.
CORRECTION: Jewish influence Religion = Jewish influenced Religion
Oh, I definitely agree. It’s not too different from the Spanish “viva!”
He believed if you're bad, your soul lands on the roof and you can never get it down.
People can consider themselves anything they want, but it doesn’t make it necessarily so.
Why was Hitler ticked at Himmler for spending so much time and money
on the Ahnenerbe (ancestoral research looking for Aryan culture around
the globe)?
Because Hitler was afraid that the plan to end Christianity (after
killing of Judaism) would get too much publicity. And the world might
realize that Himmler’s plan was to cobble together a “religion”
based on old pagan traditions that would replace Christianity.
This and lots of other great stuff about those wild-and-crazy
Nazis are in this well-documented book.
MASTER PLAN, THE: HIMMLER’S SCHOLARS AND THE HOLOCAUST
by Heather Pringle
http://www.amazon.com/MASTER-PLAN-HIMMLERS-SCHOLARS-HOLOCAUST/dp/0786887737/ref=pd_bbs_1/104-9427455-5875964?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1194980119&sr=8-1
More importantly Hitler, Mao and Stalin were all like todays liberals! Gods only unto themselves!
As a matter of fact the Church was one of the things the nazi's were set on destroying.
A distant relative of mine was a confirmation sponsor for Hitler. When Hitler didn’t show up on time for church, he went looking for him. When he found him, he grabbed Hitler by the ear and drug him screaming to church.
Hitler was no christian.
We are all sinners. Are Hitler's sins any greater than my sins? Is killing 6 million Jews any worse than wishing death to all Wahhabi Mooslems? It only takes one sin to damn us to hell. Isn't His blood and His grace sufficient to cover all sin?
I am not arguing if Hitler was a Christian or not, I am arguing that this is a silly debate for Christians to fall for.
If you can ask that question, you are morally clueless - whatever your religion may be.
Try reading Matthew 5.
“CLUELESS!”
Obviously you sir, are a master debater. I am no match for your superior debating skill. So I must admit defeat and give way to your unmatched intellect. /sarcasm
“Frizbeetarian”, that’s great! lol
“Horrors of War”, a recent DVD release: in the waning years of WWII Nazi scientists create bullet-resistant zombies who, against the plan, kill and eat anyone who gets in their way.
Featuring an American werewolf. Great battle scenes, a rape scene, lots of blood. R for violence. Photo of Hitler. Not in church.
Two snaps!
Nothing really to do with the topic, but I didn’t like the way things were going . . .
The two young men shared a room, experiencing the harsh poverty for indigent men, in Vienna,Austria. It is many years since I read Kubizek's book. One passage stands out. Whether anecdotal or personal experience by Kubizek, he mentioned Hitler and the Catholic Church.
It was said that Hitler plagued the life out of a Catholic priest. His sardonic questioning and reposts, forced the priest to drive him off.
Some Christian.
Fascinating... I'd never seen those quotes before. As if the Nazis didn't have bloody enough ambitions, they actually fantasized about controlling Islam as well.
Their mistake, of course, is in believing that anything like an industrialized Islamic Germany would've arisen between 732 and, say, 1930.
I love the irony, too, in the condemnation of my namesake for his military victory at Tours. The Carolingian Franks were probably more Germanic, overall, than the people of the Third Reich - and those 8th century Franks correctly identified the enemy.
Hitler's rabid hatred of the Jews and the Nazi plans and efforts aimed at exterminating those people make a lot more sense when one views the Nazis as the frustrated jihadists that they really were, down deep inside.
Had any of them understood and accepted even a minimal amount of the religious teachings they were born into, world history would likely not have record any of their actions. Others would have taken their places as the godless scourge of the National Socialist and Communist would have found others, likely just as evil.
Well, actually then we disagree. I have a friend who did an elaborate examination of Hitler’s “counter-Judaism,” and it’s interesting how MUCH of the Bible he knew, and inverted. His inversions were clever (”volk, reich, fuhrer” instead of “Father, Son, Holy Spirit”), need for the “purification of the blood,” a similar phrase as the Jews themselves used in referring to their need to spill blood for the remittance of sin; and so on. So I wouldn’t doubt Hitler knew EXACTLY the context he wanted to use “heil” in.
Sounds great. Zombies and Nazis...the only villians allowed in Hollywood these days.
July 6, 1945 — "The Nazi Master Plan: The Persecution of the Christian Churches"
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.