The churches and the Nazis: how mainstream Christians betrayed Christ

[Jonathan_Burke]

@DJensen

No, it was you who first used the word “apologetic” and suggested that my source was an “apologetic work” instead of an “objective historical analysis” (21).

I’ll accept that correction; I misremembered, and thought you had used it in the previous thread

@DJensen

I merely pointed out that the best historians and scientists often have views to defend and are in that sense apologists and that this does not in any way diminish how objective their work is.

You did more than that. You characterized the work of historians as the work of apologists, which is not true. Being an apologist is the opposite of being objective; it’s explicitly taking a position and attempting to defend that position from criticism. That’s not being objective. You (mis)characterized historians as apologists in order to try and justify your appeal to Christian apologists in an attempt to contradict professional historians.

You characterized professional historians as being on one “side” of the issue being discussed, and Christian apologists as being on the other “side”. In reality
only Christian apologists are on any “side”; professional historians (when they are acting as professional historians), are not taking sides.

Let’s remember what’s going on here. We have academic sources saying most churches and most Christians supported the Nazis, and we have you trying to defend the churches and Christians in Germany by attempting to argue that the academics are wrong. You’re the only person doing apologetics here, and you need a lot more evidence than you’ve supplied so far.

@DJensen

Notice that I did not accuse any professional historians of dishonesty. I call them apologists because I think that as apologists per se, they would be honest in their work.

As I pointed out, this is inconsistent of you. When I used the word “apologist” you claimed I was insinuating dishonesty.

@DJensen

I pointed out that it is only a term that some (like yourself) consider pejorative.

But I don’t consider it pejorative.

@DJensen

Other than the numbers I had offered I don’t see any others.

That is exactly my point. If you really were interested in the numbers, you would have looked for more than those you found. But as I pointed out, even the numbers you presented support me rather than you.

1. In 1932, “Of the priests in Germany in ’32 (21,000), a third would clash with the Reich and several hundred were killed” (your words). To put it another way, more than 60% didn’t clash with the Reich.

2. In 1933 “Nearly 40% of the country’s pastors signed onto the League opposing the anti-Semitism” (your words). To put it another way, only 37% signed the league in 1933, and by 1935 that number had fallen to 26%.

These are the statistics you have provided, and it’s clear they are in direct agreement with what I said; most Christians in Germany supported the Nazis.

Note how in both instances, when citing these statistics you cited them in an explicitly biased way. In the first case you said “a third [of the priests in Germany] would clash with the Reich”, instead of saying “Two thirds of the priests in Germany didn’t clash with the Reich”. In the second case you said "Nearly 40% of the country’s pastors signed onto the League ", instead of saying “Less than 40% of the country’s pastors signed onto the League, and two years later that figure had fallen to 26%”. This is spin. This is deliberately biased reporting.

Not only that, but the first number actually grew as you comnented on it. The first time, you said “Nearly 40%”, and later this turned into “And going back to the 40%”. So you actually inflated it twice, firstly by giving the impression that it was almost 40%, and secondly by claiming explicitly that it was 40%.

Note also how you make statements for which you don’t think any statistical support is needed. For example, you said “Under Hitler’s regime, most professed Christians simply said nothing in order to survive”, without providing any evidence for this, statistical or otherwise. Where is your evidence for this? How do you know “most professed Christians” acted this way, for this reason? Where are your statistics?

@DJensen

But other than that I’m just asking what statistics you have to support your claims.

No that’s not what you’re asking, because even though I provided evidence for my claims, you insisted that I provide answers to the statistical questions you raised. This is a distraction; you are not dealing with the evidence I provided, and you are trying to change the subject instead.

Ironically you are using the same tactics as Holocaust deniers. When presented with clear evidence, instead of addressing the actual evidence they say “But you haven’t answered this question, you haven’t supplied these figures, you haven’t provided this data”. They do this to imply that unless those data points can be supplied, the historical fact of the Holocaust cannot be established. However, what they deliberately avoid is that the historical fact of the Holocaust can be established even in the complete absence of all the data they demand.

Notably, they typically avoid addressing the actual evidence which supports the case that the Holocaust is a historical fact; instead they want to talk about anything else.

@DJensen

Then we should question some of the basic theologies of the Christians we have discussed.

This is a gross rewriting of history. Firstly Kittel’s anti-Semitic theological views were not unusual. Secondly your attempt to blame “liberal theology” is transparently self-serving. The anti-Semitic theology of the Nazi era was not the product of “liberal theology” or of theologians thinking they could “deviate from biblical teaching”. On the contrary, it was the product of centuries of traditional theology, including a particularly toxic strain of Lutheranism. Far from being the result of liberal theologians feeling they were able to deviate from what the Bible said, it was the result of traditional theologians feeling they were upholding what the Bible said.

@DJensen

How many Germans of each group were atheists and agnostics? Are there any other important categories which might fit these four?

These questions are distractions, because we don’t need to answer them in order to determine whether or not most Christians supported the Nazis. We already know that in 19333 about 98% of Germans were Christians, with the majority being Protestant (around 67%), and a substantial minority Catholic (around 32%). By 1939 Protestants accounted for around 54%, Catholics 40%, other theists 3.5%, and atheists and agnostics 1.5%. So we know there were virtually no Germans self-identifying as atheist or agnostic. That actually renders one of your questions void.

@DJensen

The references you offered do not provide any further information applying to the questions I raised.

Even if this was true, it is irrelevant since they offer evidence for the statement I made. To date you have failed to address the sources I provided. You might want to pay particular attention to what’s said about church teachings in Germany at the time.

@DJensen

No, the No True Scotsman fallacy does not apply since it is Jesus who is here essentially defining a true follower, a true Christian.

I am not sure if you understand what the “No true Scotsman” fallacy is. The fact that Jesus can differentiate reliably between true and false Christians is irrelevant to the issue of whether or not you are committing the “No true Scotsman” fallacy. This is what the fallacy looks like.

1. No true Christian would support the Nazis.
2. Consequently, anyone supporting the Nazis could not have been Christian.
3. Therefore no Christians supported the Nazis.

If you agree with this reasoning, then you are committing the “No true Scotsman” fallacy. If you don’t agree with this reasoning, then the meaning of the parable of the tares is yet another irrelevant distraction from the topic at hand.

@DJensen

Here is your statement: “Firstly it wasn’t even 40%, and secondly it fell to 26% just two years later, as anti-Semitism grew worse .” (emphasis yours!) (25.)

No. You are misreading what I wrote. The words you quoted from me do not say “The falling number of signatories necessarily indicates anti-Semitism was increasing”, or “proving anti-Semitism was increasing”, or anything similar. I did not appeal to this figure as evidence for the rise in anti-Semitism. I said the number of signatories fell as anti-Semitism increased. That statement takes the rise of anti-Semitism as an established fact, not as a claim which needs to be supported. If you want to deny that anti-Semitism grew worse from 1933 to 1935, we can have that discussion.

Again, you’re attempting to avoid the fact that this figure is contra-indicatory to your attempt to deny most Christians supported the Nazis.

@DJensen

Because we do not know that. We know that a quarter of all the pastors in Germany did support the Confessing Church, which taken in itself was a large number. The majority did not sign. As I’ve pointed out, this does not indicate that they all opposed the Confessing Church.

I didn’t say it was evidence that they all opposed the Confessing Church. I said it indicated the majority did not support it. That is absolutely indicated by the statistic. In 1933 only 37% signed the league, and by 1935 that number had fallen to 26%. That indicates the overwhelming majority did not support it.

@DJensen

Many likely supported it but refused to sign out of fear or otherwise out of the desire to remain under the Nazi radar.

How is that a rational conclusion from the evidence? Given that the number fell in just two years, how is that an indication that “Many likely supported it”? You’re interpreting signing the league as support for the Confessing Church, and you’re interpreting not signing the league as support for the Confessing Church. How is this rational? This is completely unsubstantiated reasoning. It’s mere pre-suppositionalist apologetics.

Let’s take another example.

1. Suppose a survey indicates 75% of US citizens agree with the statement “Only white people are human”.

2. Suppose a newspaper reports this survey with the words “Many US citizens agree that non-white people are human”.

Would you say this is an accurate report of the survey, or would you say it is clearly biased? Would you attempt to claim that the other 75% actually agree that non-white people are human, but they just didn’t feel confident saying so?

Every time the Holocaust is raised on this forum, it’s fascinating to see the efforts various groups make to distance themselves from it. No one wants to take responsibility. Apparently it just happened in some mysterious way, and no beliefs (religious or scientific), were responsible. At least the atheists and agnostics here don’t try to claim that atheists and agnostics were the heroes.