4 ms·

Luther is pretty much defined by his opposition to the Catholic church. One of his complaints is that the Catholic church applies reason to scripture (in the fo

by beojan 9y ago

Luther is pretty much defined by his opposition to the Catholic church. One of his complaints is that the Catholic church applies reason to scripture (in the form of a millienium and a half of philosophical and theological debate within the church, at Luther's time) instead of just taking it literally, as it was written. You can't quote him and generalize to all religion from that.

freeflight 9y ago
> You can't quote him and generalize to all religion from that. I'd argue you can generalize pretty much most organized religions from that, but not everything spiritual or peoples actual believes. Imho religion is merely a institutionalized form of spirituality, enforced on a whole community trough dogma. But dogma is never a good thing especially not for the seeking traveler because by it's very nature it's unreasonable and incapable of change. The human mind most certainly needs a place to channel it's fascinations for the unknown and unanswerable, I'm just not sure that institutionalized religion is really a healthy way to "fulfill" that need.
- beojan 9y ago
  He was criticizing Catholicism for relying on reason. You certainly can't then generalize and say Catholicism is anti-reason, so you can't say religion is anti-reason. What you call dogma is largely a body of knowledge that has been passed down the same way scientific knowledge has been passed down. Ignoring it isn't very different to ignoring the body of published scientific literature and insisting on rediscovering everything for yourself.
- dragonwriter 9y ago
  > I'd argue you can generalize pretty much most organized religions from that How can you generalize about organized religion from a quote whose thesis was specifically a disagreement with the largest organized religion in the world?
  - freeflight 9y ago
    It was specifically in disagreement with the Catholic church, but that doesn't mean that Luther's suggestions and ideas had been any better in regards to "dogma over reason". Contrary to popular believe Luther was not that flawless shining beacon of reformation he's often made out as, he and his believes came with their very own issues. Like him being a rampant anti-Semite and his views held a lot of weight with the German people. His influence on those matters can in large parts be directly followed to what happened in the Third Reich where a majority population of Christians (96%+) ruthlessly hunted down all "undesirables". If nowadays anybody would publish a book called "On the Jews and Their Lies" you'd be hard pressed to defend such a thing without coming across like a total asshole with Neo-Nazi tendencies. For Luther is was merely one publication among many showcasing his deep hatred for Jews, yet this barely gets mentioned when his person is discussed, like it never happened. Even in Germany, it's a rather recent development for people to shine a light on the questionable past of the "big reformer". During the last German Protestant Church Congress a protest group (they protested to stop government subsidies for churches, yes that's an actual thing in Germany) put up a large statue of Luther with some of his most distasteful quotes [0]. Organizers called police, police declared that these quotes are "Volksverhetzend" aka "hate speech/incitement of the masses" and with that they could ban the protesters from the premises. Mind you: Police declared Luther's quotes as hate speech, not statements made by the protesters. [0] https://hpd.de/artikel/luther-polizeilich-attestierter-volksverhetzer-14459 https://hpd.de/artikel/luther-polizeilich-attestierter-volks...

by beojan 9y ago

freeflight 9y ago

> You can't quote him and generalize to all religion from that. I'd argue you can generalize pretty much most organized religions from that, but not everything spiritual or peoples actual believes. Imho religion is merely a institutionalized form of spirituality, enforced on a whole community trough dogma. But dogma is never a good thing especially not for the seeking traveler because by it's very nature it's unreasonable and incapable of change. The human mind most certainly needs a place to channel it's fascinations for the unknown and unanswerable, I'm just not sure that institutionalized religion is really a healthy way to "fulfill" that need.

beojan 9y ago
He was criticizing Catholicism for relying on reason. You certainly can't then generalize and say Catholicism is anti-reason, so you can't say religion is anti-reason. What you call dogma is largely a body of knowledge that has been passed down the same way scientific knowledge has been passed down. Ignoring it isn't very different to ignoring the body of published scientific literature and insisting on rediscovering everything for yourself.
dragonwriter 9y ago
> I'd argue you can generalize pretty much most organized religions from that How can you generalize about organized religion from a quote whose thesis was specifically a disagreement with the largest organized religion in the world?
- freeflight 9y ago
  It was specifically in disagreement with the Catholic church, but that doesn't mean that Luther's suggestions and ideas had been any better in regards to "dogma over reason". Contrary to popular believe Luther was not that flawless shining beacon of reformation he's often made out as, he and his believes came with their very own issues. Like him being a rampant anti-Semite and his views held a lot of weight with the German people. His influence on those matters can in large parts be directly followed to what happened in the Third Reich where a majority population of Christians (96%+) ruthlessly hunted down all "undesirables". If nowadays anybody would publish a book called "On the Jews and Their Lies" you'd be hard pressed to defend such a thing without coming across like a total asshole with Neo-Nazi tendencies. For Luther is was merely one publication among many showcasing his deep hatred for Jews, yet this barely gets mentioned when his person is discussed, like it never happened. Even in Germany, it's a rather recent development for people to shine a light on the questionable past of the "big reformer". During the last German Protestant Church Congress a protest group (they protested to stop government subsidies for churches, yes that's an actual thing in Germany) put up a large statue of Luther with some of his most distasteful quotes [0]. Organizers called police, police declared that these quotes are "Volksverhetzend" aka "hate speech/incitement of the masses" and with that they could ban the protesters from the premises. Mind you: Police declared Luther's quotes as hate speech, not statements made by the protesters. [0] https://hpd.de/artikel/luther-polizeilich-attestierter-volksverhetzer-14459 https://hpd.de/artikel/luther-polizeilich-attestierter-volks...