Updated June 23 In the weeks since protests against racism began after the killing of George Floyd, activists around the world have been toppling statues, either by pressuring public officials or by tearing the monuments down themselves. Activists have naturally focused on memorials to Confederate leaders or others who enacted racist policies, and associate monuments…
It is American Hanukkah’s perennial irony that this so-called “Festival of Lights” is both literally and figuratively outshone by the myriad Christmas lights that blanket trees and yards from well before Hanukkah begins to well after it concludes. Though observant viewers might glimpse a handful of candles by the window during the brief time that…
Exactly five centuries ago, Martin Luther sparked what would become the Protestant Reformation by nailing a list of criticisms on a church door in Germany. Luther decried what he saw as abusive and corrupt practices in the Roman Catholic church — but reserved a very special kind of hatred for Jews, whom he branded an…
A new museum exhibition in Berlin details how the Nazis made use of the anti-Semitic words of Martin Luther, the leader of the Protestant Reformation, RNS [reported]. The exhibit is located in the Topography of Terror, a museum about methods of Nazi repression that was built in the former headquarters of the Nazi secret police,…
Martin Luther’s spoon, which he gifted to his friend, a Hebrew specialist who helped him translate the Old Testament in the 1520s, is unusual, to say the least. Said to come from a unicorn’s horn, it was meant to protect against poison. The spoon folds up and is secured with a pin shaped like a…
— The Church of Norway, the state’s Lutheran church, condemned church founder Martin Luther’s anti-Jewish legacy. The church made the statement ahead of the 500-year anniversary of the Protestant Reformation, started by the 16th century German theologian, The Associated Press reported. The Church of Norway’s General Synod acknowledged that Luther’s writings were used in Nazi propaganda and were…
Germany’s main Protestant body distanced itself from the anti-Semitism of its founder, Martin Luther, and pledged to confront the dark side of its roots. In a unanimous decision Wednesday by its 120 members, the EKD Synod, the decision making body of the Evangelical Church in Germany, renounced the 16th century theologian’s calls to persecute and…
BERLIN (JTA) — Germany’s top Jewish leader urged Protestants to confront and condemn anti-Jewish teachings of Martin Luther, who began the Protestant Reformation. Speaking at a conference in Berlin last week, Josef Schuster, head of the Central Council of Jews in Germany, said he hopes for a clear sign from the Protestant Church condemning Luther’s…
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