Hitler's Favorite Newspaper.

Adolf Hitler declared "Der Sturmer" (The Stormer) his favorite newspaper. It was an eight-page, anti-Jewish tabloid published out of Nuremberg from 1923 to the end of World War II. The weekly was known for its over-the-top caricatures, showing Jews as ugly creatures with odd shaped bodies and distorted facial features. One recurring theme was the Jews attempt to sexually violate German girls.

The publisher of the newspaper was an elementary school teacher and World War One veteran named Julius Streicher. He was a regional leader in Bavaria, who also wrote a very poplar anti-Semitic children's book entitled "The Poisonous Mushroom," which likened Jews to an alluring but deadly toadstool. Top Nazi leaders, such as Himmler, endorsed the weekly newspaper and considered Streicher very effective in influencing the ordinary man on the street. Every weekly issue of Der Sturmer was posted for public reading in special glassed-in displays all over Germany.

As early as 1933, Streicher was advocating for the extermination of Jews. He was nicknamed the "King of Nuremberg" and his publishing firm made him a multi-millionaire. But when World War II came to a close, Streicher found himself behind bars in Nuremberg, charged for his crimes against humanity. Back issues of Der Sturmer were used in court to show that Streicher's portrayal of Jewish people as evil and subhuman played a key role in creating the conditions which fostered the Holocaust.

Streicher was in charge of the Jewish boycott of 1933, he advocated the Nuremberg Decrees of 1935, he ordered the Great Synagogue of Nuremberg to be destroyed, and on November 10, 1938, he publicly supported the Jewish pogrom which was taking place at that time. After over two decades of speaking and publishing articles that attacked Jewish people and incited racial hatred, he was found guilty of crimes against humanity and hanged in October 1946.

One of the most interesting things I discovered about Streicher was something he said during the Nuremberg Trials. He was asked if other publications in Germany addressed the Jewish question in a similar anti-Semitic way. He said: "Dr. Martin Luther would probably sit in my place in the defendant's dock today, if this book had been taken into consideration by the prosecution. In the book, 'The Jews and Their Lies,' Dr. Martin Luther writes that the Jews are a serpent's brood and one should burn down their synagogues and destroy them."

Wait a minute! Which Martin Luther is this condemned Nazi talking about? Is he talking about the German reformer Martin Luther, the hymn writer of "A Mighty Fortress is our God"? Surely this is not the Martin Luther in question! But alas, it is! In 1543, when Luther was sixty years old, just a few years before his death, he wrote his 65,000 word anti-Jewish treatise.

I was taken aback by Luther's attitude toward Jewish people. He expected them to convert to Christianity; when that didn't happen, he became angry and turned violently against them. He states that rabbis should not be allowed to preach and their prayer books destroyed, that synagogues and Jewish schools be set on fire, that Jewish homes burned and their property and money confiscated. He tells his fellow Germans, "We are at fault in not slaying them." He goes on to say, "Such a desperate, thoroughly evil, poisonous, and devilish lot are these Jews, who for these fourteen hundred years have been and still are our plague, our pestilence, and our misfortune." The byline that appeared at the bottom of every edition of Der Sturmer was, "The Jews are our misfortune."

Kristallnacht or the Night of Broken Glass was a pogrom against Jews that was carried out by paramilitary groups and civilians all over Germany. Officials looked on and did nothing as rioters destroyed over 260 synagogues. 7,000 Jewish businesses were damaged or destroyed. 30,000 Jewish men were put in concentration camps. The night of broken glass happened on November 10th, which is Martin Luther's birthday.

Luther's little book, "On the Jews and Their Lies" is available today and is still influencing people to consider Jews as evil and subhuman. This was a sad revelation to me. I never knew that the great religious reformer Martin Luther and Adolf Hitler's Nazism are inseparably connected by their extreme nationalism and their anti-Semitic views. Which begs the question: Did the Holy Spirit of God inspire Luther to write these hateful things about Jewish folk? Luther said Germans were at fault in not slaying them. Really? Would God's Holy Spirit lead Luther to advance a crusade of murder and destruction? Maybe "crusade" is not the best choice of words here. But who was Martin Luther listening to when he wrote this book?

Furthermore, do we have a single, properly interpreted verse of Holy Scripture that backs up Luther's advise to treat Jewish people as subhumans who are worthy of death and destruction? I think not. So where did Mr. Luther get these ideas? And what can we learn from this?

I point out in my book, "The Rise or Fall of America," that Satan is our #1 enemy, our chief national threat. One of his most effective tricks is to drop thoughts in our head that are disguised as our own thoughts. When we act on those thoughts, we fall into his trap. The thought is father to the deed!

An amazing example of Satan's deception is found in the book of Matthew, chapter 16. But first we look at verses 13-17: Now when Jesus came into the parts of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples, saying, "Who do men say that I, the Son of Man, am?" They said, "Some say John the Baptizer, some, Elijah, and others, Jeremiah or one of the prophets." He said to them, "But who do you say that I am?" Simon Peter answered, "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God." Jesus answered him, "Blessed are you, Simon Bar Jonah, for flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father who is in heaven."

We see in this passage that Simon Peter is used by God to proclaim Jesus of Nazareth as "the Christ, the Son of the living God." I would think Peter probably felt pretty good about himself. The God of heaven and earth used him to make a profound declaration! What an honor to be used of the Lord. But then we move down just a few lines to verses 21-23, where it states: From that time, Jesus began to show his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things from the elders, chief priests, and scribes, and be killed, and the third day be raised up. Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him, saying, "Far be it from you, Lord! This will never be done to you." But he [Jesus] turned and said to Peter, "Get behind me, Satan! You are a stumbling block to me, for you are not setting your mind on the things of God, but on the things of men."

Wow. One minute Peter is being used as a mouthpiece of God, and a few verses later, the same man is being used as a mouthpiece of Satan! In one instance, God gives Peter a revelation and Peter speaks it. In another instance, the devil gives Peter a word and Peter speaks it. At one point, Jesus said to him, "Blessed are you, Simon Bar Jonah." But a short while later, Jesus said to Peter, "Get behind me, Satan!"

The point is, Peter was deceived by Satan, he spoke words that were "inspired" by the evil one. In 1 Chronicles 21, David was deceived by Satan. In Acts 5, Ananias and his wife Sapphira were deceived by Satan. And I contend Martin Luther was also deceived when he wrote his little book condemning Jews to death. I assert Luther's "On the Jews and Their Lies" is itself a lie from the pit, a deception from hell.

If it's possible for Peter, shortly after receiving an inspired word from the Lord, to be misled by Satan, then anyone can be deceived! Which is why we have this word from God: "Be sober and self-controlled. Be watchful. Your adversary, the devil, walks around like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour. Withstand him steadfast in your faith" (1 Peter 5:8-9a).

Fighting the good fight of faith is not for the faint of heart! It requires discipline and constant vigilance. As believers, we struggle against the world, our own flesh and the attacks of Satan. When speaking about the weapons of our warfare, God tells us in 2 Corinthians 10:5 to bring "every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ." Our thoughts and ideas are to be filtered through and tested against the Word of God. Any thought or inclination that runs contrary to Scripture is to be rejected, for it comes either from my own wicked heart or from the evil one.

Jesus said, "I tell you that every idle word that men speak, they will give account of it in the day of judgment" (Matt. 12:36). The words of Martin Luther were used all over Germany to justify man's greatest crimes against humanity. Luther's words were some of the ideas that inspired Julius Streicher to publish Hitler's favorite newspaper. And neo-Nazis use Luther's anti-Semitic writings to this day to spread lies and racial hatred.

Let this be a serious lesson to us all. Are we testing what we say against the word of God. Are we testing what we hear against the truth of Scripture? Are we setting our minds on the things of God, or on the things of men? And most importantly, are we living with a keen awareness of the judgment seat of Christ (2 Cor. 5:10), when we'll be called upon to give account for our actions and our words?

"So, then, my beloved brothers, let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, and slow to anger; for the anger of man doesn't produce the righteousness of God." ~ James 1:19-20

Grace, Peace and Jahspeed!

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