Q – What is your honest opinion of Ken Ham? – PART 2
The following are some excerpts from the “Medieval Source book: Martin Luther (1483-1546) The Jews and their Lies, Excerpts (1543).”
1. Therefore the blind Jews are truly stupid fools…
2. Now just behold these miserable, blind, and senseless
people.
3. Therefore be on your guard against the Jews, knowing that wherever they have their synagogues, nothing is found but a den of devils in which sheer self-glory, conceit, lies, blasphemy, and defaming of God and men are practiced most maliciously and veheming his eyes on them.
4. 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?
5. No, one should toss out these lazy rogues by the seat
of their pants.
6. 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!
7. I brief, dear princes and lords, those of you who have
Jews under your rule– if my counsel does not please
you, find better advice, so that you and we all can be
rid of the unbearable, devilish burden of the Jews,
lest we become guilty sharers before God in the lies,
blasphemy, the defamation, and the curses which the
mad Jews indulge in so freely and wantonly against
the person of our Lord Jesus Christ, this dear mother,
all Christians, all authority, and ourselves. Do not
grant them protection, safe-conduct, or communion
with us…. .With this faithful counsel and warning I
wish to cleanse and exonerate my conscience.
8. Let the government deal with them in this respect, as
I have suggested. But whether the government acts or
not, let everyone at least be guided by his own
conscience and form for himself a definition or
image of a Jew.
9. However, we must avoid confirming them in their
wanton lying, slandering, cursing, and defaming. Nor
dare we make ourselves partners in their devilish
ranting and raving by shielding and protecting them,
by giving them food, drink, and shelter, or by other
neighborly deeds.
10. I shall give you my sincere advice… 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…
Second, 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 that they are not masters in our country…
Third, I advise that all their prayer books and Talmudic writings, in which such idolatry, lies, cursing and blas-phemy are taught, be taken from them.
Fourth, I advise that their rabbis be forbidden to teach…
Fifth, 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, trades-
men, or the like. Let them stay at home.
Sixth, I advise that usury be prohibited to them, and that all cash and treasure of silver and gold be taken from them and put aside for safekeeping. The reason for such a measure is that, as said above, they have no other means of earning a livelihood than usury, and by it they have stolen and robbed from us all they possess. Such money should now be used in no other way than the following: Whenever a Jew is sincerely converted, he should be handed one hundred, two hundred, or three hundred florins, as personal circumstances
may suggest. With this he could set himself up in some occupation for the support of his poor wife and children, and the maintenance of the old or feeble. For such evil gains are cursed if they are not put to use with God’s blessing in a good and worthy cause.
GO TO PART 3