Demonizing the Jews: Luther and the Protestant Church in Nazi Germany

Christopher J. Probst

jun 2012 · Indiana University Press

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“An insightful analysis of the ways in which Protestant reformer Martin Luther’s anti-Jewish writings were used by German Protestants during the Third Reich.” —Contemporary Church History Quarterly
 
The acquiescence of the German Protestant churches in Nazi oppression and murder of Jews is well documented. In this book, Christopher J. Probst demonstrates that a significant number of German theologians and clergy made use of the 16th-century writings by Martin Luther on Jews and Judaism to reinforce the racial antisemitism and religious anti-Judaism already present among Protestants. Focusing on key figures, Probst’s study makes clear that a significant number of pastors, bishops, and theologians of varying theological and political persuasions employed Luther’s texts with considerable effectiveness in campaigning for the creation of a “de-Judaized” form of Christianity. Probst shows that even the church most critical of Luther’s anti-Jewish writings reaffirmed the antisemitic stereotyping that helped justify early Nazi measures against the Jews.
 
“A valuable contribution to our understanding of the churches under Nazism.” —Lutheran Quarterly
 
“An insightful account of the convoluted echoes and reverberations of this deeply problematic aspect of Luther’s legacy within German Protestantism over the longue durée.” —German Studies Review

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Christopher J. Probst is a visiting assistant professor of modern European history at Saint Louis University. He was a Charles H. Revson Foundation Fellow at the Center for Advanced Holocaust Studies of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum.