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@ Orlanth, I am a little late here but I really enjoyed the insights you brought with the diagrams.

I have enjoyed reading the intelligent debate on this thread but have a question for those pushing the Hitler = Christian theory? Just a devil's advocate thing? or is there a reason you think it is important?

Thanks.

dogma wrote:

Orlanth wrote: there are plenty of Hitler quotes by which he claims to be doing Gods work, others show his open distain for religion.

As I've said before in other threads, religion and the belief in God are not the same thing, and cannot be used as though they were interchangeable.

One can be religious without believing in God (most prominently some Buddhists), or believe in God without being religious (Agnostic theists).

Given this, its easy to understand how someone might consider themselves to be a Christian while holding disdain for the establishment of religion. In fact, there was a fairly prominent priest who behaved largely in consistence with that idea, I think he nailed something to a door at some point.

This comment has indicative not exhaustive. Hitler showed more than a 'distain for religion', I mentioned that rather than everything Hitler appeared opposed to with regards to relgion in total because the point was that hisd comments were directly contradictory. Hitler was no Buddhist or Agnostic theist or anything other than an amoral opportunist. Any deep set views he may have had were clearly to any political mileage he could get from playing one cartd of another.

To reiterate, the only constant with Hitlers spiritual beliefs or pretty much anything else is that what he said changed as per his political whims or needs. In this as in most other things he was dangerously unscrupulous to the extent that any promise or policy he made was not reliable or stable. The German people, his own party and military commanders found this out on a recurring basis, as did his Axis partners and anyone else he dealt with diplomatically.
This combined with unequivocably contradictory statements on spiritual matters cant be read in any way other than that Hitlers religious beliefs were utterly flexible, changable and interchangable. This pattern does not match any religion, denomination or philosophical movement with which I am familiar. In fact it is mutually exclusive with most faiths which rely on a consistent declaration and commitment of faith to some extent or other, with Christianity being no exception.

Orlanth wrote:
Hitler showed more than a 'distain for religion', I mentioned that rather than everything Hitler appeared opposed to with regards to relgion in total because the point was that hisd comments were directly contradictory

Yes, and I disagree with that. The core of my point is that what you're claiming as contradictory was in fact, not. And, even if that were the case, simple contradiction is not sufficient to indicate that a particular person does not believe something., as it does not allow for the possibility that the person is simply highly tolerant of cognitive dissonance. We've all met people that are perfectly comfortable saying things like "I'm a theist, but I don't believe in God."

I could have gone further, but felt that a short response was more fitting, as I disagree with nearly every statement made in the post in question for the reason stated.

Orlanth wrote:
Any deep set views he may have had were clearly to any political mileage he could get from playing one cartd of another.

Actually, I don't think its clear at all. Hitler was a political opportunist, but his passion for Nazism seems awfully likely to have been legitimate; as much of that ideology is less than useful in terms of seizing power. One can be relatively amoral (and I sincerely doubt that Hitler was amoral given his tendency to make moral pronouncements) and opportunistic while having deep seated convictions.

Orlanth wrote:
This combined with unequivocably contradictory statements on spiritual matters cant be read in any way other than that Hitlers religious beliefs were utterly flexible, changable and interchangable.

Again, they aren't contradictory, but even to the extent that you might view them in such a way it makes no sense to to conclude that erratic pronouncements of faith disqualify a person from a certain religion, as doing creates a very, very strange standard of religiosity. Is the person who is wracked by a crisis of faith no longer a Christian? Is a person whose understanding of Jesus' teachings changes over time not a Christian?

Orlanth wrote:

Emperors Faithful wrote:
Interesting points, I enjoyed reading this. Can you provide a source that shows the translation into Jehovah's Witness is not entirely correct?
Furthermore, the persecution of other Christian sects does not immediately exclude one from being a Christian themselves.

Purple Triangle

The direct translation is Bible Student. This does not mean all who study the Bible, though eventually it might have done so had Nazi-ism persisted. It refered to those outside the mainstream churches, surviving under the kirshenkampf namely Roman Catholicism and Lutheran Protestantism which were too big to persecute and included many appeasers anyway.

It was used to brand Jehovah Witnesses, that is essentially the sole use of the purple band. Your arguement that this would eventually include all those who study the bible is complete conjecture and has honestly come with little reliable evidence.

The majority of those listed were Jehovah's Witnesses, but not exclusively so. From the Nazis own definition they were defering to those they consistered Bible followers. To follow the Bible yet be outisde the large established churches has a flexible meaning by the victims included any threat to the Nazi regime of a Christian nature. This included fringe christian groups and leaders of other Christian groups that would not do as they were told.

None of which makes the Nazi's non-Christian.

It should be remembered that pre-war numbers of Charismatics in Europe were very small, and while they were targeted as a relgious group they amounted to only a tiny percentage of the camp population.

Just 1% in your link (whether this is camp population or the percentage that the purple band was given to I'm not sure).

Bastion of Mediocrity wrote:I have enjoyed reading the intelligent debate on this thread but have a question for those pushing the Hitler = Christian theory? Just a devil's advocate thing? or is there a reason you think it is important?

It's not a theory. It's generally accepted historical fact. There's no other religious category he really fits into. Also, if you attempt to disconnect Nazism's antisemitism from traditional European Christian antisemitism, you lose some important historical perspective.

General Grog's effort in this thread is historical revisionism. He's passing on the writings/ideas of people who are attempting to change history to better suit their wishful view of reality. I feel an obligation to oppose this due to my love of truth.

Incidentally, wasn't it GG who initially called Hitler a neo-pagan antitheist in another thread?

Emperors Faithful wrote:Incidentally, wasn't it GG who initially called Hitler a neo-pagan antitheist in another thread?

He was using language which comes from the historical revisionists to whom I just referred.

Mannahnin wrote:

Emperors Faithful wrote:Incidentally, wasn't it GG who initially called Hitler a neo-pagan antitheist in another thread?

He was using language which comes from the historical revisionists to whom I just referred.

Yes, whereas Orlanth is suggesting that it is the athiests who are repeatedly using Hitler's religion as a whacking stick against Christian posters.

There's one atheist whom I'm aware of who I guess you could say that about. Matty has one of those Hitler quotes in his sig, though he leaves it unattributed. Overall he seems to have softened a bit and stopped ranting so much about "god botherers". Orlanth has definitely had some success getting Matty to be more polite, and I think a lot of people have accepted that most of the time when he's talking trash he's had a few beers and doesn't mean any harm. When he crosses the line he's still subject to moderator response, of course, but he seems to do so less often.

If you see an atheist raise the issue of Hitler's religion in an unrelated discussion, that would seem to be an invocation of Godwin's Law.

Ah well, that's matty. He hates everyone equally.

Mannahnin wrote:
If you see an atheist raise the issue of Hitler's religion in an unrelated discussion, that would seem to be an invocation of Godwin's Law.

I take offense at this. A theist is every bit as capable of invoking Godwin's Law as an athiest.

Emperors Faithful wrote:

Mannahnin wrote:
If you see an atheist raise the issue of Hitler's religion in an unrelated discussion, that would seem to be an invocation of Godwin's Law.

I take offense at this. A theist is every bit as capable of invoking Godwin's Law as an athiest.

What are you taking offense to? Nothing I wrote excludes the possibility of theists running up against Godwin's Law too.

Mannahnin wrote:

Emperors Faithful wrote:

Mannahnin wrote:
If you see an atheist raise the issue of Hitler's religion in an unrelated discussion, that would seem to be an invocation of Godwin's Law.

I take offense at this. A theist is every bit as capable of invoking Godwin's Law as an athiest.

What are you taking offense to? Nothing I wrote excludes the possibility of theists running up against Godwin's Law too.

It was a joke. I knew I should have put one of these at the end of it.

generalgrog wrote:

Kilkrazy wrote:

Orlanth wrote:I don't offer chestnuts, I offer something logically whole.

You can often condense the truths of books in a line or two, but if that is all that is written they would be rather bare.

Some points are worth explaining properly. Just tossing out opinions dont add any real weight to the arguments on the thread, really they are just a vote on the issue.

I agree with much of your analysis, however it breaks down when you offer fringe sects in the camps as proof that Hitler wasn't a Christian.

One of the results of the What is a Christian? thread was that it means following the Nicene and Apostolic Creeds. Various minority sects such as Pentecostalists do not follow these creeds, and can be considered not Christian by the established majority churches, thus making them arguably heretical, etc, blah blah blah, and therefore "legitimate" targets for persecution.

That doesn't in itself make Hitler a Christian, of course.

Entirely wrong KK. As a Christian, my perspective is that no heretical group is a "legitimate" target for persecution. There is a difference between persecuting and following truth and trying to help someone understand their error via loving reason. Escpecially to the scale of the inquisition and the holocaust.

The point is that anyone that thinks it's ok to persecute ANYONE is not a Christian.

That's your personal view. Hitler and the Nazis may not have had the same perspective on things.

I am pointing out the fact that to the established churches, splinter sects may look like heretical groups ripe for entirely legitimate (in their eyes) persecution. We have seen it happen often enough in history.

The purpose of this point is to refute the idea that Hitler cannot have been a Christian because he persecuted Pentecostalists who are fellow Christians. If Hitler did not seen them as Christians, he was not persecuting fellow Christians. Put simply, an orthodox Christian Hitler might easily persecute Pentecostalists.

This doesn't prove he was or wasn't a Christian.

generalgrog wrote:Allright guys....now that I'm back from new job boot camp. I've been reading the thread and I have to say that so many smart people getting wrapped around the axle was amusing but it's also quite sad.

Sebster keeps saying that my source is crap..but he offers no counter source.

bs. I offered a simple reason to discount the quotes you provided; "There are no supporting documents for any of the quotes given, and in many instances we know them to be complete fabrications, because Hitler was known to be an entirely different place at the time of the supposed quote. It is a work of fiction, that was written with the specific political goal of distancing Hitler from Christianity."

I followed this up with direct quotes from Hitler in public forums, in which he couched his arguments in religious terms. I then mentioned his direct involvement in Positive Christianity, an effort to reconcile Christian belief and anti-semitism.

You didn't try to argue that, you just claimed my counter wasn't good enough and went on with pretending it didn't exist. That's a very poor effort at debate.

For some reason you guys think that anyone that raises their hand and says "I'm a Christian" is one(I haven't peeped over at the other thread yet).

No, I believe that someone who used his belief in Christ, among other things, to form his political views is a Christian.

So lets just keep this simple shall we.

Hitler is supposed to have said this..10th October, 1941, midday:

Christianity is a rebellion against natural law, a protest against nature. Taken to its logical extreme, Christianity would mean the systematic cultivation of the human failure. (p 43)

Do you know of any "real" Christian to have said anything like this? Hitler said Christianity is a failure(paraphrased) Would a real believer say such a thing?

The point, as I've already explained, is that he didn't say that or anything like that or anything else in Hitler's Tabletalk or any of the similar publications. There is no primary record for any of the quotes, they directly contradict known quotes from Hitler, the scribes charged with recording the information are on record as saying they were edited, and the man charged with editing them had an obvious motive to distance Christianity from the Nazis (he was a very Christian fellow). There is no reason to consider them reliable, unless you really, really want to believe that Hitler didn't believe in Christ.

More tidbits from NAZI eyewitnesses.

"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 Japaneses, who regard sacrifice for the Fatherland as the highest good? The Mohammedan religion too would have been much more compatible to use than Christianity with its meekness and flabbiness?"

And you will note nowhere in Speers wirting does he show Hitler giving anything like the rejection or contempt to Nazism that shows up in the frankly laughable Hitler's Table Talk.

To quote Herman Goerbels
"The Fuhrer is deeply religious, though completely anti-Christian. He views Christianity as a symptom of decay. Rightly so. It is a branch of the Jewish race... Both [Judaism and Christianity] have no point of contact to the animal element, and thus, in the end, they will be destroyed."

Yes, but he couldn't extend his contempt of of the Jewish roots of Christianity to overtly reject Christianity. That would mean embacing some non-German religion, or worse yet, atheism. Instead he developed positive christianity, which re-wrote the Bible as the story of Jesus the aryran being betrayed and killed by the deceitful Jews. Which is, of course, ridiculous, but the important lesson from that is to realise that Christianity, like any religion or any belief in general, is not immune to ridiculous re-interpretations that let people act how they want to act.

In other news, that link you provided is awful. Incredibly disineguous and well, stupid. It's built by people with an ideology, to repeat that ideology to like minded folk, with almost complete indifference to the history of what really happened. Most of the points made can be disproved with five minutes. The stuff on gun control is hilarious.

Orlanth wrote:This is why quotes of Adolf Hitler on religion for and against are suspect. Were there some consistency in his commenatries some analogy could be inferred however clearly there is not. there are plenty of Hitler quotes by which he claims to be doing Gods work, others show his open distain for religion. Often one set of quotes or another are brought out to make a point. This is unfair. Both sets of quotations should be used. I wont quote them, we see enough of them from above quotes. What would be interesting is to know what he said and to whome, but most of the quotes I see here and elsewhere do not give much detail as to the setting.

Certainly, all quotes that are reliable should be used. The real issue is the reliance on extremely dodgy quotes, that are only accepted because they allow people to believe what they want to believe.

The only logical conclusion that can be drawn is that Hitler said what he said out of expediency. Any cursory look at Hitlers career shows that he cannot be trusted either in his politics or his oratory. Germany's war effort suffered when Hitler insisted his military prioritised fulfilling a promise he had recently made in one of his rallies. Likewise people suffered as Hitler shifted blame or created scapegoats to fuel his own oratory and to focus public ire where he wanted it.

Many of the quotes I provided came Hitler's speaches when he was in complete control of Germany. He had no reason to pander, yet he used religious terms anyway. The only sensible conclusion is that he believed.

Now, obviously, he wasn't a humble man who used the the good book as the guide to all his major decisions. He was a raging egomaniac with a wide range of ridiculous, almost nonsensical beliefs. He was raised Christian, and applied the same willingness he showed to re-interpreting history through the eyes of an anti-semite that he applied to his faith.

Frankly it is not really relevant anyway he was certainly his own man, in his position he could believe whatever he chose without much consequence after he was entrenched.

Yes, hence my point that his latter speaches are a good indicator of his beliefs. He was entrenched in power, and had no need to pander.

Hitler is often credited with being as Christian, though not as any other relgious denomination.

Because he didn't believe in another denomination, and it would be silly to argue he did.

15 “Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep's clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves. 16 You will recognize them by their fruits. Are grapes gathered from thornbushes, or figs from thistles? 17 So, every healthy tree bears good fruit, but the diseased tree bears bad fruit. 18 A healthy tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a diseased tree bear good fruit. 19 Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. 20 Thus you will recognize them by their fruits.
21 “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. 22 On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?’ 23 And then will I declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.’

Matthew 7: 15-22 Quotations of Jesus Christ from the Sermon on the Mount.

Verse 16 is the key here, but I covered the lot to ensure context. Not much more I need say on that.

Which means that only people who are seen in the fullness of history as good can be Christian, all those who believed in Christ but did harm are dropped away. The problems with which should be very obvious, from the point of view of gathering a full understanding of history.

Understanding of this truth will explain to you not only Hitlers motive for being flexible on his 'beliefs' but also explains why adhering to or condemining a belief/beliefs or the concept of belief can be expedient. It certainly explains Islam, Zionism and much of Christian chruch history. It is important to note that atheism is no solution to religious politics in terms or political tooling Atheism is proven to be just another politicised faith group voting/recruiting blok.

Yes, and we get that Hitler will have pandered to religion, as he pandered to the conservatives. But this doesn't discount the very plain and obvious fact that he had religious beliefs of his own.

When Hitler started his persecutions some Christians were among the the first to go.

Umm, persecuting specific sects of Christianity doesn't make you not Christian. Otherwise the Catholics couldn't be Christian because of what they did to the Protestants, and the Protestants couldn't be Christian because of what they did to the Catholics, and what kind of a nonsense would that be?

From what I know of generalgrog had the Nazis caught him he would go to the camps wearing such as symbol, so would I.

As an atheist, I would have been as well. Defining Hitler by the specifics of those he persecuted makes for a nonsense.

Quotes from Nazi leaders on the subject of religion are flexible enough to be used as propoganda by many with an axe to grind. I can forgive generalgrog for his commenatries as they are mostly used on anti-Christian 'poster' image files, though it would be more accurate to use them to counter commentaries that Hitler was on 'our side' as some like to put it. There is no evidence to link Hitler with any non-Christian religion and the arguments to suggest he was pro-Christian are not convincing because comments in this direction are cancelled out by other opposed quotes. Meanwhile by his actions, which speak far louder than his words, Hitler was bitterly opposed to some forms of Christianity, and played political games with other larger forms. Towards the end even very robust denominations like the Roman Catholics that had attempted to placate Hitler to save their own parishioners were witnessing severe persecution under the Nazis.

You want an actual understanding of Hitler's religious views. Read up on the actual church he started, which I've been mentioning from the first page, Positive Christianity.

In light of all that attempts by anti-Christian groups to paint Hitler as pro-Christian for their own gain is not only ignorant, it's insulting.

I'm sorry if you've read my efforts as such. I will tell you right now I am certainly not ignorant on this matter, and would find it very insulting if you considered me such.

I have no axe to grind against Christianity, I think I've made that very clear over countless threads by this point. My only interest is in the truth of the matter. Claiming Hitler didn't have Christian beliefs is not true.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

generalgrog wrote:The point is that anyone that thinks it's ok to persecute ANYONE is not a Christian.

Applying this posthumous 'he wasn't really a Christian' line of reasoning makes a nonsense of any effort to debate the role of religion in politics.

In history, we're interested in how religion played a part in deciding how and why people did what they did, so you can read Christian as 'someone who believed in Jesus Christ'.

If you want to take part in discussion of history, the definition of Christian as 'someone who's actions are approved by GG's understanding of the bible' has got to go.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

generalgrog wrote:

Mannahnin wrote:

As you say, persecution of fringe groups could be considered a holy act by church authorities under a number of circumstances, and many Christians have justified cruel and brutal acts by that sanction. Whether you or I think they were misguided and wrong to do so, that doesn't make them not Christians.

I'll go back to Jesus' wolf in sheeps clothing parable. And I ask you if a wolf dresses up in sheeps clothing it is a sheep? or is it a wolf? The Christian is the sheep the unrepentent ungodly person is the wolf.

So can a wolf be sheep by pretending to be one?

GG

I've already pointed out the fallacy in your argument above. I know you must have seen it, as it's Emperor's Faithful's sig. That argument refers to someone who thinks himself a wolf, but assumes the sheepskin of Christianity to prey on the Christians/sheep.

But here we are talking about someone who by any plain understanding of history thought himself a Christian. In this context your quote makes no sense.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Bastion of Mediocrity wrote:@ Orlanth, I am a little late here but I really enjoyed the insights you brought with the diagrams.

I have enjoyed reading the intelligent debate on this thread but have a question for those pushing the Hitler = Christian theory? Just a devil's advocate thing? or is there a reason you think it is important?

Thanks.

There are many folk, you have likely read posts from some of them in this thread, who believe a Christian is a better person than a non-Christian. Or even more incredibly, that a non-Christian can only be a good person by borrowing the beliefs of Christians. These folk have a real problem with recognising that belief in the Christian God isn't the only way that a person can be good, and this lends to them assuming that bad people couldn't possibly have been Christian. Some time ago on this forum there a poster who was utterly shocked at the idea that any serial killer could have been Christian, despite many posters listing many serial killers who professed a strong belief in Jesus Christ.

The issue, then, is the efforts of folk to protect that belief by rewriting history.

Does it matter that Hitler was a Christian? No, he could have had any faith, or none at all, and would have been just as monstrous.

Does it matter that people realise Christians can be just as monstrous as anyone else? Yes, that really, really matters.

Thank you to everyone who responded to my question. Very enlightening. As someone who is not well versed in Nazi history, I found a lot of the information provided very interesting.

At first I felt that nazis could not be eugenist and Christian, but I have since relented because, frankly, people can convince themselves to believe in 2 non-agreeing philosophies and not feel hypocritical.

What a marvel is man! (sarcastic)

A man is a forked radish (Shakespeare).

Both the USA and Sweden carried out eugenist practices in the early 20th century.

It was not a purely Nazi obsession.

I have no idea about the specifically Christian outlook on the concept.

My argument hang on several seperate points each of which independently challenge any attribution of a faith group Christian or otherwise to Hitler. This is why my previous argument was presented in stages, though that appears to have been overlooked.

Answering commentaries on:

Hitlers quotes and what we can ascertain from them.

dogma wrote:

Orlanth wrote:
Hitler showed more than a 'distain for religion', I mentioned that rather than everything Hitler appeared opposed to with regards to relgion in total because the point was that hisd comments were directly contradictory

Yes, and I disagree with that. The core of my point is that what you're claiming as contradictory was in fact, not. And, even if that were the case, simple contradiction is not sufficient to indicate that a particular person does not believe something., as it does not allow for the possibility that the person is simply highly tolerant of cognitive dissonance. We've all met people that are perfectly comfortable saying things like "I'm a theist, but I don't believe in God."

An incorrect argument sorry. It is entirely contradictory. Let me take two example quotes, we will take an assumption of authenticity for both groups of quotes for now or we will get nowhere, and end up picking others until we get a match:

"National Socialism and religion cannot exist together.... The heaviest blow that ever struck humanity was the coming of Christianity. Bolshevism is Christianity's illegitimate child. Both are inventions of the Jew. The deliberate lie in the matter of religion was introduced into the world by Christianity.... Let it not be said that Christianity brought man the life of the soul, for that evolution was in the natural order of things."

vs

"By fighting off the Jews, I am doing the Lord's work."

I picked the first two I could find and they are contradictory in word and ethos. There is the possibility that a didferent Lord is meant, grog has implied this. I don't buy that explanation. In any event both are soundbites, either one can be beleived as Hitlers true opinion, or the other, not both but possibly neither. Allowing for Hitlers Modus Operandi of saying what he wanted to who he wanted and holding his promises lightly there is no rweason to take him at his word for either comment.

dogma wrote:

Orlanth wrote:
Any deep set views he may have had were clearly to any political mileage he could get from playing one card or another.

Actually, I don't think its clear at all. Hitler was a political opportunist, but his passion for Nazism seems awfully likely to have been legitimate; as much of that ideology is less than useful in terms of seizing power. One can be relatively amoral (and I sincerely doubt that Hitler was amoral given his tendency to make moral pronouncements) and opportunistic while having deep seated convictions.

However Hitlers passion for National Socialism had a consistency to it, as did his distain for blacks, Jews etc. Thus there is a legitimacy to say Hitler was an anti-semite or a racist. There is no consistency on Hitlers commentaries on religion, this combined with a known tendency to say what he wanted others to hear, his track record of success and skill in terms of charismatic persuasion, his track record of not being in the slightest bit trustworthy in regards to his promises, plus his track record of amoral leadership and lack of personal humantarian ethics, thats all five in a row; all this makes Hitler a witness with a poor credibility.

Were this any form of testimony at a hearing it would be thrown out or dismissed out of hand. Hitlers contradictory comments on religion may indicate an obsession over the subject, bourne up by the fact that he persecuted unto death many peole for their religion or relgious ethnicity. From this we can safely conclude he hated certain types, we cant conclude membership of any other.

This is not just concerning Christianity. I found some fairly 'positive' Hitler quotes regarding Islam and how it was a superior religion or should have been the religion of Europe. I will link and link but not bother quoting them won't bother quoting them, partly because its futile as its just more contradiction. Besides I would not want anyone to think Hitler was pro-Muslim and by extension assume he might have been one. There is enough ammo against Islam without adding something unfair like a pro-Moslem Hitler quote.

dogma wrote:
Is the person who is wracked by a crisis of faith no longer a Christian? Is a person whose understanding of Jesus' teachings changes over time not a Christian?

Yes to both counts, though I will cover this below.


The meaning of the Purple Triangle

Further evidence of the non-Christian identity of Hitler. On two counts, first some groups that Hitler persecuted were Christians; second some individual Christians of denominations not specifically targeted were individually targeted and some of those were murdered/martyred. I do not want to give weighting of Christian victims of Hitler over any other in terms of human suffering, it is merely clearer evidence of the non-Christian nature of Hitler and Naziism in general.

Emperors Faithful wrote:
Purple Triangle
It was used to brand Jehovah Witnesses, that is essentially the sole use of the purple band. Your arguement that this would eventually include all those who study the bible is complete conjecture and has honestly come with little reliable evidence.

It should be remembered that pre-war numbers of Charismatics in Europe were very small, and while they were targeted as a relgious group they amounted to only a tiny percentage of the camp population.

Just 1% in your link (whether this is camp population or the percentage that the purple band was given to I'm not sure).

1% sounds about right because the fringe denominations were very small, mostly limited to youth groups Christian elements of the Jazz Clubs. Were there more of them it would be a larger percentage. Nevertheless is was a Christian group marked for death.



Can Hitler previously had been or later become a Christian.

Hitler was raised a Roman Catholic, this of itself doesnt mean much. Manny Dakka atheists or agnostics were taised ointo one denomination or other, ones personal choice is relevant. Also being raised into a denomination might not indicate a relgious faith even in the parental group but a social or cultural distinction. A good more modern example of this is northern Ireland, everyone knows if they are a Cath or a prod, this doesnt indicate that they believe at all or they ever set foot in a church.
Nevertheless let us leave it open that Hitler might have been raised a Christian or even been one. I will ignore speculation on this and for the sake of arguemnt assume it was so becaise it is not in any way relevant. Peiople can turn away from a faith and Hitler may have been a Christian in his youth, as there is evidence that Stalin possibly was, that is equally irrelevant. Stalin was something else by the time he rose to power, and he was at least consistent on his unbelief.

Could Hitler have later become a full Christian? Technically yes. One one condition, a deathbed repentence was possible. We will ignore the fact that suicide is a sin, all sin is forgivable but one and Hitler did worse sins than suicide, but he chose his own death and the timing of it, so if he genuinely prepented before he shot himself he may have become Christian, even saved. This Hitler-might-be-in-Heaven comment might anger some, but this promise of Jesus to accept all who genuinely repent concerns everyone, not just monsters. Excluding monsters irregardless of repentence would mock the ideal of salvation or its limitless grasp. Hitler probably knew enough about the Christian faith to attempt this, God however is a good judge of character and the question 'do you mean it' is not one you can wrangle round him by deception. A repentence means a pro-active new life, Hitler showed no evidence of saying, I goofed, let the remaining victims go, his last hours were more of the same and there is recod of his actions in them.

Furthermore a last minute repentence is irrelevant to the real question, was he a Christian throughout or in part of his time in power? Any one of us could make a last minute repentance, inlcuding those who are opposed to Christianity on this thread, any one of us may have been a Christian in the past, and rejected it at a later date, choosing another life. in terms of there here and now, or in hitlers case in terms of his actions during his time of power, both are irrelevant.


Can Hitler have been a Christian in spite of his actions.

We have a number of people who think he can:

Orlanth wrote:The majority of those listed were Jehovah's Witnesses, but not exclusively so. From the Nazis own definition they were defering to those they consistered Bible followers. To follow the Bible yet be outisde the large established churches has a flexible meaning by the victims included any threat to the Nazi regime of a Christian nature. This included fringe christian groups and leaders of other Christian groups that would not do as they were told.

Emperors Faithful wrote:
None of which makes the Nazi's non-Christian.

Mannahnin wrote:

Bastion of Mediocrity wrote:I have enjoyed reading the intelligent debate on this thread but have a question for those pushing the Hitler = Christian theory? Just a devil's advocate thing? or is there a reason you think it is important?

It's not a theory. It's generally accepted historical fact. There's no other religious category he really fits into.

Orlanth wrote:They are all WRONG.

Who's getting upset again? I certainly didn't get upset with GG. I pointed out his error, and yours.

Your and GG's and Jesus' opinion on who is a "true" or good Christian is totally irrelevant to determining what religion a person is a member of for sociological or historical purposes. The majority of Americans are not weeds. And you can't accurately call every bad Christian something else any more than the Mormons can honeslty call Anne Frank a Mormon.

Hitler espoused Christianity. He attempted to found his own version of it, Positive Christianity. In public and private comments he denigrated the church, but also endorsed and supported Christianity in general, especially his twisted interpretation of it.

Orlanth wrote:National Socialism and religion cannot exist together....

You are still referencing and quoting a discredited source. Choosing not to respond to criticisms that this source is highly unreliable, but continuing to quote it, is a dishonest argument.

Mannahnin wrote:

Orlanth wrote:They are all WRONG.

Who's getting upset again? I certainly didn't get upset with GG. I pointed out his error, and yours.

Not upset, underline for emphasis.

Your still wrong Mannahnin, and you will keep being wrong until you use Jesus Christs definition of Christianity rather than your own.
This doesnt mean you must be a Christian to understand, only you must understand Christianity.

I covered that point when I stated that Mohammed's testimony in the Koran is a categoric source as to who or what is a Moslem. I am no Moslem, not that I needed to repeat that bit, but I dont need the robes or go on Hajj to apply the yardstick.

Mannahnin wrote:
Your and GG's and Jesus' opinion on who is a "true" or good Christian is totally irrelevant to determining what religion a person is a member of for sociological or historical purposes. The majority of Americans are not weeds. And you can't accurately call every bad Christian something else any more than the Mormons can honeslty call Anne Frank a Mormon.

Hitler wsnt a bad Christian, he wasnt a Christian at all.
Jesus' rules, not mine.

Mannahnin wrote:
Hitler espoused Christianity. He attempted to found his own version of it, Positive Christianity. In public and private comments he denigrated the church, but also endorsed and supported Christianity in general, especially his twisted interpretation of it.

It had Mein Kampf replacing Bibles on altars. This was at best a 'cult' based on Christianity, there are plenty of those around. Christian Science is one, its neither Christianity, nor Science.

Come on Mannahnin, you think a new join-or-face-Gestapo denomination called Positive Christianity founded by Hitler during the Third Reich was going to be.. Positive? It's as much a stretch of the imagination to call it Christian either.

For your information the current Chinese regime has been trying something similar. At firt they just tried to kill, imprison or drive out the Christians, but like the Romans they found that didnt work. So they incorporated it instead. The state church in China allows certain things to be preached but not others and interferes in what Christianity teaches or means, not to be a member of the state Church is to face brutal prosecution. In a State Church you can for example sing hymns, but you preach Jesus is the 'Way the Truth and the Life', because the Party is. I have met dissidents fleeing from China who were part of the House Churches, so called because those wgho did not worship at the state church.
China has relaxed a little, partly because some non state Churtches do good work, such as Catholics coming in and setting up mnursing homes for the elderly. The other reason they are quieting down is because House Churches are hard to eradicate, Communist china is far from the first monolithic state to try and rid itself of Christians, you can butcher a few, but there will always be more. China understands that the way to kill a church is to let it stagnate not to persecute it. Dodgy vicars, boring vicars, grasping televangelists and kiddy fiddlers will succeed where legions of secret police will not.
Still joining non State Church is a bad career move, the Chinese know this and so the state Churches still exist and are still used even though they clearly dont preach the same message, the Chinese know that too.

Mannahnin wrote:

Orlanth wrote:National Socialism and religion cannot exist together....

You are still referencing and quoting a discredited source. Choosing not to respond to criticisms that this source is highly unreliable, but continuing to quote it, is a dishonest argument.

You are confusing one type of 'unreliable quote' with another. Quotes can be unreliable as to whether a person said it, or unreliable as to whether a person meant it. I can point out that this and the other matching but diametrically opposed quotes are contradictory, and are thus unreliable in terms of whether they were honest personal opinions of Hitler. That is an honest argument.

Were the quotes spurious, and not quotes from Hitler then they would not indeed make an honest argument. However this is not the case. We have plenty of Hitler quotes to choose from on this subject, and no great debate indicating that the quotes were not Hitler quotes at all. I must admit to not knowing where these quotes came from, but there are a lot, and you can find them and the pattern of contradiction is there. If even some of them were true it would be enough to draw the conclusions I have done, as Hitler is a very studied figure, for them all or nearly all to be bogus would have raised major questions by now. My study of Hitler quotes comes from a Google search, though I did double source quotes or choose opposed viewpoints. I am no student of Hitler or authority on his quotes, if you know more please tell. Howver I am yet to find any reference to bogus Hitler quotes clogging the internet to be used by people to assume the other guy has Hitler on 'their side'.

If you were to assume that the quotes themselves form a dishonest argument because they cannot be proven as coming from Hitler then frankly you shoot down your argument not mine. Were Hitlers own commentaries not indicative then there is no excuse to paint him as a Christian, bad one or otherwise. After all any study of the subject will conclude that by his actions he wasn't a Christian. As it so happens that is the only real acid test anyway, but if you insist on thinking (erroneously according to Jesus) that a vacant confession of Christianity make him a Christian, in spite of other statements denying Christianity vehemently (which makes your conclusing illogical anyway), then denying Hitlers quotes denies your only opportunity to even attempt to claim Hitler was Christian.

Orlanth wrote:
An incorrect argument sorry. It is entirely contradictory. Let me take two example quotes, we will take an assumption of authenticity for both groups of quotes for now or we will get nowhere, and end up picking others until we get a match:

"National Socialism and religion cannot exist together.... The heaviest blow that ever struck humanity was the coming of Christianity. Bolshevism is Christianity's illegitimate child. Both are inventions of the Jew. The deliberate lie in the matter of religion was introduced into the world by Christianity.... Let it not be said that Christianity brought man the life of the soul, for that evolution was in the natural order of things."

vs

"By fighting off the Jews, I am doing the Lord's work."

I picked the first two I could find and they are contradictory in word and ethos. There is the possibility that a didferent Lord is meant, grog has implied this. I don't buy that explanation. In any event both are soundbites, either one can be beleived as Hitlers true opinion, or the other, not both but possibly neither. Allowing for Hitlers Modus Operandi of saying what he wanted to who he wanted and holding his promises lightly there is no rweason to take him at his word for either comment.

Again, those aren't contradictory. A contradiction follows when two opposing premises of an argument are held to be simultaneously true. A good example of a contradiction is "I''m a Christian, but also not a Christian."

It is not contradictory to excoriate Christianity, while also considering oneself to be a Christian; that sort of consideration leads to a strange world in which Martin Luther is not a Christian.

Additionally, I have no idea what you mean by a "contradiction of ethos". I think, perhaps, that you believe that the two offered statement could not possibly be made one person with a contiguous set of beliefs, but that strikes me as a product of your ow myopic perspective, rather than any real attempt at appreciating what is necessary to prove a contradiction, Contradictions cannot arise from how you feel about something.

Also, its very poor form for you to use a quote from a discredited source (Table Talk), while also framing an argument that allows you to insert your own views due to Hitler's own supposed unreliability.

Orlanth wrote:
There is no consistency on Hitlers commentaries on religion, this combined with a known tendency to say what he wanted others to hear, his track record of success and skill in terms of charismatic persuasion, his track record of not being in the slightest bit trustworthy in regards to his promises, plus his track record of amoral leadership and lack of personal humantarian ethics, thats all five in a row; all this makes Hitler a witness with a poor credibility.

I've already dealt with the supposed inconsistency of Hitler's statements on religion.

Amorality and a lack of humanitarian ethics is not something that makes someone an unreliable source. I can fully endorse the genocide of one group of people, while refusing to tell the slightest lie to another. Similarly, not being trustworthy with regards to a set of promises does not mean Hitler lied, it means he failed to fulfill his promises for an undefined reason. Likewise being charismatic does not make one a liar, and the premise "Hitler said what others wanted to hear" renders your argument circular.

You're drawing needlessly specific conclusions.

Orlanth wrote:
Were this any form of testimony at a hearing it would be thrown out or dismissed out of hand.

Yes, we know that's how you feel. But how you feel has no bearing on the quality of your argument.

Orlanth wrote:
Yes to both counts, though I will cover this below

So, you're effectively claiming that if someone's faith wavers (crisis of faith), or they obtain a better understanding of Gospel of Mark when reading it for a second, third, or fourth time (changing interpretations) then they are not Christians? That's preposterous for two reasons. First, it indicates that anyone who struggles with their faith (every person who has it) cannot be a Christian; meaning that there are no Christians. Second, it indicates that anyone who develops their faith over time (every person who has faith) cannot be a Christian; meaning that there are no Christians.

You're running head first into a Scotsman.

The logic being employed here by Orlanth and GG is so twisted it's actually painful to read. I could spend the next hour typing up examples, but I'll just allow sebster and dogma to do that for me.....

dogma wrote:
Again, those aren't contradictory. A contradiction follows when two opposing premises of an argument are held to be simultaneously true. A good example of a contradiction is "I''m a Christian, but also not a Christian."

They are contradictory in that they cannot both indicate a core belief, they can indicate something Hitler said on a whim. This is the issue at stake. Was Hitler a Christian? For this to be so it must ba a core belief, if it isn't a core belief then he wasnt a Christian anyway.
When it comes to 'a contradiction follows when two opposing premises of an argument are held to be simultaneously true', where do you get that idea. This isnt a lab, you shouldnty be applying that type of contradiction as with determining a methematical or pure logical principle. The contradiction here is human: contradictory statements need not be simultaneous to be contradictory. Someones testimony in say, a court, may contradict itself later. its a condradiction, and it rendeers a testimony invalid. You need to think more like a lawyer or historical scholar than a philosopher or physicist. Besides the timeline of Hitlers quotes cover a span of several years and overlap.

Meanwhile you are ignoring the other part of the argument. Above all the point that Hitler failed to be a Christian according to Jesus' methods for detecting Christianity in someone.

dogma wrote:
It is not contradictory to excoriate Christianity, while also considering oneself to be a Christian; that sort of consideration leads to a strange world in which Martin Luther is not a Christian.

How do you come to that conclusion?

dogma wrote:
Additionally, I have no idea what you mean by a "contradiction of ethos".

Because you don't understand religion. This is called a Testimony, Christianity and other religions including Islam and Judaism (I canot speak for other relgions beyond that) rely heavily on the Testimony to determine who is what. Now as stated in the above posts the true perspective is how the 'heart' is changed by a relationship with God. Therefore as Jesus said 'you will know them by their fruit'. At some point you will have to get to the real point and address this issue if you have any hope of negating my argument, as I argue, as backed by scripture that Jesus' example of how to define a Christian is the one to use, all this argument over quotes is largely a smokescreen. The argument bwegins and ends whwen we ask the question, 'did Hitler bear good fruit or bad'. I hope you wont get too picky over the definition of 'fruit', Hitler wasn't a tree.

Nevertheless while fruit determines the heart attitude and thus the true spiritual status according to Christianity. Testimony is important accrding to all the Juaic based relgions including Christianity.

Q. Did Hitler show a consistent Testimony of faith in his religious comments?
A. No he didn't, he was contradictory and inconsistent

Again using the human/theological/legal/debate definition of 'contradiction' rather than one applied to pure science.

dogma wrote:
I think, perhaps, that you believe that the two offered statement could not possibly be made one person with a contiguous set of beliefs, but that strikes me as a product of your ow myopic perspective, rather than any real attempt at appreciating what is necessary to prove a contradiction, Contradictions cannot arise from how you feel about something.

As proven, you don't understand it, so you call it myopic. Isn't that more than a little loaded, to talk rationally you must rise above your bias. We are doing well so far, don't start to troll me now.
I can rise above my bias which is why I use Islam in my above posts as comparitive example, I am no fan of Islam (now reiterated a fourth time) but I can use the same theological principle I use for Christianity with Islam to assess what Islam judges to be true of itself from an internal perspective.

dogma wrote:
Also, its very poor form for you to use a quote from a discredited source (Table Talk), while also framing an argument that allows you to insert your own views due to Hitler's own supposed unreliability.

I covered this with Mannahnin above, probably while you were typing, refer to previous post.

dogma wrote:
Amorality and a lack of humanitarian ethics is not something that makes someone an unreliable source. I can fully endorse the genocide of one group of people, while refusing to tell the slightest lie to another. Similarly, not being trustworthy with regards to a set of promises does not mean Hitler lied, it means he failed to fulfill his promises for an undefined reason. Likewise being charismatic does not make one a liar, and the premise "Hitler said what others wanted to hear" renders your argument circular.

You are not getting the point because you have not 'dealt with the supposed inconsistency of Hitler's statements on religion' and as a result the rest of your argument is confused.

dogma wrote:
Were this any form of testimony at a hearing it would be thrown out or dismissed out of hand.

Yes, we know that's how you feel. But how you feel has no bearing on the quality of your argument.

Ketara wrote:
Correct me if I'm wrong, but Jesus said a lot of things? Many, if not most of which are not all followed 100% by every christian in the land?

Is there not a difference between failing to follow and openly flaunting?

Amaya wrote:

Ketara wrote:
Correct me if I'm wrong, but Jesus said a lot of things? Many, if not most of which are not all followed 100% by every christian in the land?

Is there not a difference between failing to follow and openly flaunting?

Not really. One is just open to display and more obvious. In both situations, the criteria has still failed to be adhered to.

Actually, ignore everything I have said up until this point. Back to basics. It oft helps to lay out precise points, in order to clarify exactly where you stand.

The Christian view here seems to be:-

Jesus said you should not do X,Y,Z. Therefore if you do X, Y, or Z, you are not a christian. End of story.

The logical flaws with this are that:-

1) Jesus did not claim that one had to follow these criteria to be part of a subgroup specifically labelled 'Christianity'.
2) These criteria are in doubt when compared to the evolution of Christianity across history, as virtually all Christians in times before today espoused completely different criteria.
3) The people issuing the criteria are in no way moreso qualified to issue them, than the people who they are actively trying to make not count as Christian. Therefore either side can label the other as the non-christian, and have just as much validity.

Persecution is a similarity. Burn the witches, torture the heretic until he confesses, convert the heathen or kill him and take his gold to ship back to spain. Or, evidently a far worse offense: gas the jews and the gypsies and melt down their gold to use for your war coffers.

Kilkrazy wrote:A man is a forked radish (Shakespeare).

Both the USA and Sweden carried out eugenist practices in the early 20th century.

It was not a purely Nazi obsession.

I have no idea about the specifically Christian outlook on the concept.

The US carried out it's last sterilisation of a prisoner in the 1970s. Seriously.


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Orlanth wrote:An incorrect argument sorry. It is entirely contradictory. Let me take two example quotes, we will take an assumption of authenticity for both groups of quotes for now or we will get nowhere

No, that's a ridiculous way to approach any study of history. I mean really, 'it's a bit tricky to examine the reliability of evidence, so we'll just accept it all as true'... what is that?

If we have a series of quotes with direct primary evidence, and a series of quotes that directly contradict them, that have no primary source, and that match neatly with the desired political goals of the person who published them... then the only sensible approach is to reject the second set of quotes as inherently unreliable.

Meanwhile, go and read about positive christianity. If you have any desire at all to actually learn about how Hitler reconciled Christian beliefs and Nazism, you'll find it there.

Were this any form of testimony at a hearing it would be thrown out or dismissed out of hand. Hitlers contradictory comments on religion may indicate an obsession over the subject, bourne up by the fact that he persecuted unto death many peole for their religion or relgious ethnicity.

Orlanth wrote:
They are contradictory in that they cannot both indicate a core belief, they can indicate something Hitler said on a whim.

No, that's fundamentally incorrect. A contradiction involves only one things: a statement that both P and -P are true. The statements you have offered are not negations of one another, and so are not contradictory. This is something that one learns in introductory logic, and it sort of boggles my mind that you cannot, or will not, come to terms with it.

Saying that Christianity is perverted does not contradict the idea that one is doing the Lord's work, even where the Lord is considered to be the Christian God. Literally dozens of figures throughout history have openly made similar statements, it is not a position that is unique to Hitler.

Orlanth wrote:
This isnt a lab, you shouldnty be applying that type of contradiction as with determining a methematical or pure logical principle. The contradiction here is human: contradictory statements need not be simultaneous to be contradictory.

Yes, they do. The standard that you're applying is not one based on an open disposition. You are, no admittedly, only considering how you feel about what Hitler said. That is absolutely irrelevant to this conversation, because this conversation only pertains to how Hitler felt about Christianity and his statements regarding it. In this set of circumstances, all valid interpretations of the evidence in question must be considered. You cannot eliminate one because it disagrees with your feelings.

Orlanth wrote:
Meanwhile you are ignoring the other part of the argument. Above all the point that Hitler failed to be a Christian according to Jesus' methods for detecting Christianity in someone.

Again, you're applying only your emotional understanding of Jesus' teachings. It would not be very difficult for me to present of set of valid reasons for why Hitler's acts were consistent with core Christian principles.

Orlanth wrote:
How do you come to that conclusion?

Martin Luther excoriated Christianity, if you cannot do that and be a Christian, then he was not a Christian.

Orlanth wrote:
Because you don't understand religion. This is called a Testimony, Christianity and other religions including Islam and Judaism (I canot speak for other relgions beyond that) rely heavily on the Testimony to determine who is what.

Yes, I'm aware of this, but that is not different from the contradiction of word. You're basically taking Christianity, defining it, and then holding up statements in such a way that they can be considered consistent, or not consistent, with it.

You've essentially made a distinction where none exists. That, or you are again illustrating that you only care about how you feel with respect to the matter, which is, again, inappropriate here.

Orlanth wrote:
Again using the human/theological/legal/debate definition of 'contradiction' rather than one applied to pure science.

The definition you are using is that of the sophist, which is essentially how you have presented yourself in this entire thread.

Orlanth wrote:
As proven, you don't understand it, so you call it myopic. Isn't that more than a little loaded, to talk rationally you must rise above your bias. We are doing well so far, don't start to troll me now.

You haven't proven anything. You've made a statement, and then vaguely offered support for your position, while contorting the useful definition of terms to your whim, largely in order to present this as an argument from emotion. I consider this position to be myopic for the very reason that it is deeply rooted in your own biases, which you claim to be able to rise above.

Orlanth wrote:
I covered this with Mannahnin above, probably while you were typing, refer to previous post.

Yes, you did, and it was an unsatisfactory response. You're claiming that there is no serious controversy over whether or not certain statements were actually made by Hitler, when this is not at all the case; as has been repeatedly illustrated in this thread (and the scholarship on Hitler).

Orlanth wrote:
You are not getting the point because you have not 'dealt with the supposed inconsistency of Hitler's statements on religion' and as a result the rest of your argument is confused.

I've already explained this. If you are unwilling to use a legitimate standard for what constitutes a contradictory set of remarks, then there is no point in continuing this conversation.

Orlanth wrote:
Don't we all dislike Hitler here?

It doesn't matter whether or not we do, what matters is what he was.

Orlanth wrote:
Respectfully trying to apply an inappropriate logical regimen, this is a theology not a mathematical principle.

If the theology is logically invalid, then it is bad theology.

Orlanth wrote:
-I' m not saying that at all. In fact I don't see how you can draw this conclusion, it makes no sense. Please explain this one.

I asked you if the person who consistently alters their understanding of Jesus' teachings, over time, was still a Christian. You said that he wasn't, hence someone whose knowledge and understanding of scripture changes over time would not be a Christian.

Orlanth wrote:
You are starting from a false premise and misunderstand the concept of a Crisis of faith. Let me give you an example or two from the Bible, I wont dig out quote references at the moment. one example is Thomas' doubts regarding the Resurrection. Jesus blessed Thomas because Thomas belonged to him and forgave his struggles of the faith. King David wrote many psalms at a time of doubt, he was considered a gereat man of Faith, and listed as such iin the book of Hebrews, despite his times of doubt. in times of doubt certain Pslams are recommended verses. and yes we all have doubts, I am still a Christian.

Then why did you say to me that someone who experiences of crsis of faith ceases to be a Christian?

Perhaps there is a misunderstanding here, as we appear to be saying the same thing. I asked my question in the negative (eg. Are they not Christian?), perhaps you misread?

Orlanth wrote:
I cant see how you draw this conclusion at all, even if I ticked all your tick boxes as true and followed your deductions I still cant come up with this conclusion.

Its fairly simple, but I'll explain it again:

Only a person can be a Christian.
All persons change their understanding of Christianity over time.
No person who changes their understanding of Christianity over time can be Christian.
Therefore, there are no Christians.

But, again, this may simply be a misunderstanding.

Orlanth wrote:
So remember this is no atheism vs Christianity thread, this is over the religious beliefs of Hitler, so any part of the argument dealing with Hitler being a real, possible, potential or lapsed Christian has to be taken from a Christian point of view.

Which is itself, of course, a deeply contentious issue of definition.

Either way, I took the topic of this thread to be "What religion did Hitler follow?" My thought is that its difficult to determine, and largely irrelevant, but that, to the extent that it might be an issue, the only reasonable candidate is Christianity.

Orlanth wrote:
A little quote for you: 'the wages of sin are death'. I understand what that means, you may well do too, but by absolute logic it might not compute because death isn't on the payroll.

You're confusing the internal validity of a statement with the external validity between multiple statements. I'm not taking inherent issue with internal consistency of any statement about what a Christian might, or might not be. Rather, I'm taking issue with what, from my perspective, appears to be a very closed interpretation of Christian scripture and dogma on your part. Christianity is deep, but in large part it appears here as though you aren't justifying your judgment according to textual reference, but your own emotional sense of what that thing means. As such, it appears to me that you're seeing clarity where none really exists.

So Hitler: A Study in Tyranny is not considered to be accurate?

Amaya wrote:So Hitler: A Study in Tyranny is not considered to be accurate?

I haven't read it, but I believe it is still very well regarded. I believe, though don't quote me on this, that Bullock himself more or less moved on from the image he gave of Hitler in A Study in Tyranny, painting him as more idealistic, and less of the mercenary in that book. But that's from very vague recollections from eulogies given when Bullock died, so I could well be wrong. I do know the book is still well regarded.