Quick question. What if, hypothetically of course, he was atheist? Would you generalize all atheists as Hitler?

http://www.nobeliefs.com/mementoes.htm

LOL Well so much for the atheist question....

LOL the word HYPOTHETICAL!!!

No, I would not deny he was an atheist. I do not deny Stalin was an atheist.

I would not generalize all atheists as Hitler like, just as I do not generalize all christians the same. It just seems many theists seem rather keen on claiming he was "not a TRUE christian". Why do this? He was christian, he invoked god and jesus often. If you disagree with him say, "he may have been christian but not all christians are that way", instead of resorting to the no true scotsman fallacy.

I feel this goes to the "Attach ego to god" bit.

I can't have fault because then god would have fault, and that can happen. Therefore Hitler wasn't a christian like me. 

Hitler and Martin Luther

Some theists attempt to argue that Hitler was an atheist. While this claim is untrue, focusing on Hitler's religious beliefs is actually irrelevant: what matters is that Hitler called upon pre-existent, christian inspired hatred and persecution of Jews, and for this reason, christianity is one of the culprits for the holocaust:

Luther's Racism

The magazine Christian History, Issue 39, 1993 (published by Christianity Today) devoted a whole issue to Martin Luther's life and legacy. Pages 38-39 quote his work On the Jews and Their Lies which gives us an idea about how moral Luther's views were:

"Set fire to their synagogues and schools. Jewish houses should be razed and destroyed, and Jewish prayer books and Talmudic writings, in which such idolatry, lies, curing, and blasphemy are taught, [should] be taken from them." Their rabbis [should] be forbidden to teach on pain of loss of life and limb."

This is a man held to be a moral authority? Luther also urged that "safe conduct on the highways be abolished completely for the Jews," and that "all cash and treasure of silver and gold be taken from them." What Jews could do was to have "a flail, an ax, a hole, a spade" put into their hands so "young, strong Jews and Jewesses" could "earn their bread in the sweat of their brow." Do you think any Fuhrer you may have heard of might have gleaned an idea or two from that last passage alone? In fact, think of Hitler while reading the next paragraph.

Luther proposed seven measures of "sharp mercy" that German princes could take against Jews: (1) burn their schools and synagogues; (2) transfer Jews to community settlements; (3) confiscate all Jewish literature, which was blasphemous; (4) prohibit rabbis to teach, on pain of death; (5) deny Jews safe conduct, so as to prevent the spread of Judaism; (6) appropriate their wealth and use it to support converts and to prevent the Jews' practice of usury; (7) assign Jews to manual labor as a form of penance.

Is there no clearer blueprint for the Final Solution than the works of one of christianity's greatest reformers and moralists?

Worse yet, Luther was no paper philosopher - he advised clergy, their congregations, and all government officials to help carry out these measures. Since most Jews had been expelled from Germany before 1536, Luther's counsel was implemented by few officials. Yet a harsh anti-Jewish measure in 1543 mentioned Luther's On the Jews and Their Lies.

Both Luther's friends and his foes criticized him for proposing these measures. His best friends begged him to stop his anti-Jewish raving, but Luther continued his attacks in other treatises. He repeated as true the worst anti-Semitic charges from medieval literature: that Jews killed Christian babies; they murdered Christ over and over again by stabbing eucharistic hosts; they poised wells. As usual, he did not allow facts to deter him from his emotionally driven lies.

Luther now thought what he had accused Catholics of thinking in 1523: Jews were dogs. "We are at fault for not slaying them!" he fumed shortly before his death. Yet one more hypocricy for the master of hypocrisy.

While my argument does not rely solely on demonstrating that the writings of Luther inspired the holocaust (Instead, it implicates Hitler's use of christianity's long history of christian persecution of jews), the following passages come from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_Luther_and_the_Jews help demonstrate Luther's role in the holocaust.

British historian Paul Johnson has called On the Jews and their Lies the "first work of modern anti-Semitism, and a giant step forward on the road to the Holocaust." (Johnson, A History of the Jews, p. 242.)

While some Lutherans deny the charge, the Nazis did cite Luther's treatise to justify the Final Solution (Egil Grislis, "Martin Luther and the Jews," Consensus 27 (2001) No. 1:64.).

The line of "anti-Semitic descent" from Luther to Hitler is "easy to draw," according to American historian Lucy Dawidowicz. ("The War Against the Jews, 1933-1945&quot.

Professor Robert Michael, Professor Emeritus of European History at the University of Massachusetts, Dartmouth, argues that there is a "strong parallel" between Luther's ideas and the anti-Semitism of most German Lutherans throughout the Holocaust. Like the Nazis, Luther mythologized the Jews as evil, he writes. They could be saved only if they converted to Christianity, but their hostility to the idea made it inconceivable (Robert Michael, "Luther, Luther Scholars, and the Jews," Encounter 46:4 (Autumn 1985), pp. 339-56.).

Luther's sentiments were widely echoed in the Germany of the 1930s, particularly within the Nazi party. Hitler's Education Minister, Bernhard Rust, was quoted by the Völkischer Beobachter as saying that: "Since Martin Luther closed his eyes, no such son of our people has appeared again. It has been decided that we shall be the first to witness his reappearance ... I think the time is past when one may not say the names of Hitler and Luther in the same breath. They belong together; they are of the same old stamp [Schrot und Korn]" (Volkischer Beobachter, August 25, 1933 cited in Steigmann-Gall, Richard. The Holy Reich: Nazi Conceptions of Christianity, 1991-1945. Cambridge University Press, 2003, pp. 136-7.).

Hans Hinkel, leader of the Luther League's magazine Deutsche Kultur-Wacht, and of the Berlin chapter of the Kampfbund, paid tribute to Luther in his acceptance speech as head of both the Jewish section and the film department of Goebbel's Chamber of Culture and Propaganda Ministry. "Through his acts and his spiritual attitude, he began the fight which we will wage today; with Luther, the revolution of German blood and feeling against alien elements of the Volk was begun. To continue and complete his Protestantism, nationalism must make the picture of Luther, of a German fighter, live as an example above the barriers of confession for all German blood comrades."
(Steigmann-Gall 2003, p. 137.).

According to Daniel Goldhagen, Bishop Martin Sasse, a leading Protestant churchman, published a compendium Luther's writings shortly after Kristallnacht in which Sasse "applauded the burning of the synagogues and the coincidence of the day, writing in the introduction, "On November 10, 1938, on Luther's birthday, the synagogues are burning in Germany." The German people, he urged, ought to heed these words "of the greatest antisemite of his time, the warner of his people against the Jews." (Bernd Nellessen, "Die schweigende Kirche: Katholiken und Judenverfolgung," in Büttner (ed), Die Deutchschen und die Jugendverfolg im Dritten Reich, p. 265, cited in Daniel Goldhagen, Hitler's Willing Executioners (Vintage, 1997)).

William Nichols, Professor of Religious Studies, recounts, "At his trial in Nuremberg after the Second World War, Julius Streicher, the notorious Nazi propagandist, editor of the scurrilous antisemitic weekly, Der Stürmer, argued that if he should be standing there arraigned on such charges, so should Martin Luther. Reading such passages, it is hard not to agree with him. Luther's proposals read like a program for the Nazis." (William Nichols, Christian Antisemitism: A History of Hate (Northvale, NJ: Jason Aronson, 1995), p. 271).

In the course of the Luthertag (Luther Day) festivities, the Nazis emphasized their connection to Luther as being both nationalist revolutionaries and the heirs of the German traditionalist past. An article in the Chemnitzer Tageblatt stated that "[t]he German Volk are united not only in loyalty and love for the Fatherland, but also once more in the old German beliefs of Luther [Lutherglauben]; a new epoch of strong, conscious religious life has dawned in Germany." Richard Steigmann-Gall wrote in his 2003 book The Holy Reich: Nazi Conceptions of Christianity, 1919-1945:

The leadership of the Protestant League espoused a similar view. Fahrenhorst, who was on the planning committee of the Luthertag, called Luther "the first German spiritual Führer" who spoke to all Germans regardless of clan or confession. In a letter to Hitler, Fahrenhorst reminded him that his "Old Fighters" were mostly Protestants and that it was precisely in the Protestant regions of our Fatherland" in which Nazism found its greatest strength. Promising that the celebration of Luther's birthday would not turn into a confessional affair, Fahrenhorst invited Hitler to become the official patron of the Luthertag. In subsequent correspondence, Fahrenhorst again voiced the notion that reverence for Luther could somehow cross confessional boundaries: "Luther is truly not only the founder of a Christian confession; much more, his ideas had a fruitful impact on all Christianity in Germany." Precisely because of Luther's political as well as religious significance, the Luthertag would serve as a confession both "to church and Volk." (Richard Steigmann-Gall, The Holy Reich: Nazi Conceptions of Christianity, 1919-1945, (Cambridge University Press, 2003), p.138.)

Hence my old quote from Infidelguy:

Hitler burned people like Anne Frank for being Jewish. For that, we call him evil.

God burns Anne Frank for being Jewish, forever. For that, christians call him "good"

I don't get it either. Then again, all prejudice is irrational.

    Christians typically hated Jews because the "Jews killed Christ". However, christians also believe that Jesus came specifically to be a sacrifice.  So why they'd hate Jews for this defies reason....

You see lots of antisemitism in christianity (and outside of it too).  

If memory serves, the premise wasn't ever that Hitler was individually atheistic (although with a Christian backdrop for Europe and Germanic history, you still have to take what he says with a grain of political salt) but that the concept that the Nazis enforced - the "arian" race being the master race- was derrived and justified from evolution.

Weikert in From Darwin to Hitler explains and proves this thouroughly. 

It's here:

http://www.rationalresponders.com/hitler_and_martin_luther

However, to me the key point isn't so much that Luther inspired the holocaust so much as it is that Hitler was influenced by, and called upon christian persecution of Jews.  Lutherans were a major part of that however, so it's all interconnected. 

It is hard to pinpoint Hitler's actual beliefs. He used Christianity to win support and justify his policies to a largely Christian population. He was also behind the German Faith Movement, which was a new religion based upon ancient Germanic and Norse pagan Gods. His beliefs seem muddled in terms of religion but one thing is clear, he had a belief in something spiritual about the Aryan race, that they were proud, noble and strong, and as a skinny, dark haired, vertically impaired (repressed homosexual?) he found that very appealing.

I think it is for historians to study in depth what religion Hitler was, I do not think he was an atheist in the strict scientific/philosophical sense, but he wasn't part of any mainstream religion, even when his party was the mainstream, he saw the uses of religion in propaganda, and used the deep-rooted memetic parasites to his advantage, and it does seem that he was probably theistic in some abstract way.

You're not serious about "persecution of Jews had nothing to do with that particular superiority complex", are you?

(sorry if this is a repeat - it lost my last comment)

Yes I am.   What makes you think otherwise?  And it doesn't matter how many religious people argued against Hitler.  What matters is whether Hitler himself had a religious context.

And while I have your attention, could you explain:

The tortures of the Inquisition

The witch burnings

The Cathar Extermination

The Crusades of conquest

etc 

I agree that Hitler had a "religious context". It does matter that serious, dedicated, religious Germans were able to see through that veneer and recognize it for the sham that it was.
It does matter that people of religion and people of conscience organized resistance to the regime and frequently sacrafice their lives for their beliefs.

Furthermore, your post implies that the "Final Solution" was not a question of racial superiority dogna of the NSDAP. Not true.

"But we do not have the right to enrich ourselves with even one fur, with one Mark, with one cigarette, with one watch, with anything. That we do not have. Because at the end of this, we don't want, because we exterminated the bacillus, to become sick and die from the same bacillus.
I will never see it happen, that even one bit of putrefaction comes in contact with us, or takes root in us. On the contrary, where it might try to take root, we will burn it out together. But altogether we can say: We have carried out this most difficult task for the love of our people. And we have taken on no defect within us, in our soul, or in our character."
- Heinrich Himmer, Poznan, Oct 4, 1943

"We see clearly that this war could only end with the extermination of the Germanic peoples, or that Jewry must disappear from Europe. I already said it on September 1, 1939 [sic] in the German Reichstag...that this war will not end the way the Jews have foreseen it, namely that the European Aryan peoples will be exterminated; rather the result of this war will be the annihilation of Jewry. For once all the others will not bleed to death alone; for once the ancient Jewish law will come into play: an eye for an eye; a tooth for a tooth."
- Adolf Hitler, Jan 30, 1942

"I have also left no doubt that, if the nations of Europe are again to be regarded as mere shares to be bought and sold by those international money and finance conspirators, then that race, Jewry, which is the real guilty party in this murderous struggle, will be saddled with the responsibility. I also made it clear that this time, not only would millions of children of European Aryan races starve, not only would millions of grown men meet their death, and not only would millions of women and children be burned or bombed to death in the cities, but that the real culprit would atone for his guilt, even if by more humane means."
- Adolf Hitler, Political Testament, page 3

"The most fearsome example of this kind is Russia where he (Jewry) allowed 39 million humans in truly fanatical wildness to die or starve in inhuman agony, in order to secure the mastery of a great people for a gang of Jewish literati and stock exchange bandits."
"The result is not only the end of freedom for the people oppressed by the Jews, but rather also the end of these parasites of the peoples themselves. After the death of the victim, the vampire dies sooner or later."
-Mein Kampf, 1925, vol I, p 358

"This contamination of our blood, which hundreds of thousands of our people blindly ignore, is used by the Jew today according to plan. These black parasites of the peoples deliberately violate our inexperienced, young blond girls and thereby destroy something that cannot be replaced in this world."
-Mein Kapmf, 1925, vol II, p629

"Was there any excrement, any shamelessness in any form, above all in cultural life, in which at least one Jew would not have been involved? As soon as one even carefully cut into such an abscess, one found, like maggots in a decaying body, often blinded by the sudden light, a kike."
-Mein Kapmf, 1925, vol I, p65

" Jewish question: tremendous calm in G.G. (Generalgouvernement) since solution of Jewish question

Race war

total solution

obviate possibility of creating avengers for our children "
- Heinrich Himler, notes for a speech, Jan 26, 1944

It's all about race.

Some, although you may wanna start another post for that.

Christians oppose Christians all the time. Why was there Christian opposition to any ruler in Europe at any time since the founding of the Church? Answer: Christians can get involved in politics just as anyone can.  

I personally agree that Hitler's religious statements were probably more motivated by political expediency than by any genuine faith. However, her certainly never classified himself as a atheist, nor spoke as though he rejected notion of God. And, as Todangst has shown, his Final Solution was torn right from the Christian guide book to anti-semitism.

Would anyone really be surprised to hear that Hitler's main objective was to advance the cause of Adolf Hitler, and that he'd use any means to further his own goals?

 Again, what matters here is this: Hitler was one man. No matter how clever he was, no matter how stirring a speaker he could be, if there wasn't a willing audience, nothing he believed would matter. The simple reality is that Hitler couldn't do a thing unless millions of people were wiling to follow.  And they were willing to buy into Hitler for various self agrandizing reasons... and one of the key motivators was a pre existent hatred of Jews inculcated by christianity.

Excellent point. Even if Hitler was an atheist, the country he was leading was very, very Christian. 

Hitler could not have made everyone develop a hatred of jews like that.  He was feeding from the ambient anti-semitism around.  This goes back a lot further than hitler, and is definately religiously inspired.

Atheist have no reason to hate jews. 

I was replying to Tilberian's post. He just happened to quote Todangst

[edit:fixed quote tags]

The authers of the Bible were Jews. I smell a condtridiction

So.........to be clear on all this.,,..Hilter was a Christian or at least claimed he was.

I still think that lacks a true appreciation of what someone can claim to be and yet not really be.

  In the end our labels are not just a product of what we claim, but what others see in us.

This is especially true concerning members of a group deciding if someone meets their criteria for inclusion.

  This may not be logical or consistent, but as the fallacy points out a subjective term never can be. The truth is Christians are for the most part not going to regard Hitler as a Christian, regardless of what he said.

I would agree though that his athiesm or lack thereof has no real bearing on the fact that he was a meglomaniacal oportunist looking to achieve glory and power at any cost.

Christians should stop using his supposed athiesm as a reason to justify the need for organized religion to prevent atrocity. 

Not at all, Its obvious Christians as well as any type of person can commit horrible deeds. If you deny this you deny the history of humanity.

Im just saying that the scotsman fallacy fails in appreciating the complexities of group identity and self identification with a particular group.

There are criteria which people have for their belief systems, in the end the majority of that group decides who falls within that criteria.

True, but so did most european countries and to a lesser degree the U.S. The issue of the Holocoast and the Nazi question in general is something we really need to understand.

Hopefully these debates get us away from the moot points, and bring us to the deeper issues of mass psychology and the desire of human beings to negate their own freedom, subjegating it to a unified vision.

Sigh. I know I am sweeping against the tide, but I will again say that this is moot.  What matters is what the people who he led believed. Hitler didn't invent antisemitism. Hitler can't create hatreds in people wholecloth... you can't invent racism, bias, prejudice, long standing historical enmities... you can only call upon them, you can only stir them up, you can use them to achieve your own results, but you can't just INVENT THEM where they do not exist.

Look at Hitler's own life way before the 1930s. He grew up an antisemite. His family was antisemitic. His town, his country were antisemites. Hitler didn't invent christianity and judaism and the hatreds and prejudices. He was born into them, just like many others, and he used them to his own benefit.

Hitler could have been an avowed at atheist the entire time, and still christianity, (Lutheran and Catholic) would have some of the blood on its hands, because  it is these social forces that were used to inculcate antisemitism.

This is not to pin the holocaust on the church. It's merely to point out that christianity, as a social structure, has a long, long, long history of inculcating hatreds and prejudices. Some might say that ultimately, human personality, and not 'christianity' is to blame and that Hitler equally yoked science (social darwiniasm) as a support for his Final Solution.  This is true... he was just as likely as to cite darwin or christianity as a justification for his crimes.... but the difference here is that christianity specifically targeted jews as a focus of hate stemming back centuries.... and the specific institutions of christianity repsonsible: some of the Lutherans, the catholic church, deserve blame, not for the holocaust, but for inculcating the hatreds that made the holocaust a possibility.