Saturday, May 15, 2010

Martin Luther on the Turks

The power of the Turk is very great; he keeps in his pay, all the year through, hundreds of thousands of soldiers. He must have more than two millions of florins annual revenue. We are far less strong in our bodies, and are divided out among different masters, all opposed the one to the other, yet we might conquer these infidels with only the Lord’s prayer, if our own people did not spill so much blood in religious quarrels, and in persecuting the truths contained in that prayer. God will punish us as he punished Sodom and Gomorrah, but I would fain `twere by the hand of some pious potentate, and not by that of the accursed Turk.

Table Talk, On the Turk

3 comments:

jmw said...

I have some quotes from Calvin and Luther that you might like:

http://livingtext.wordpress.com/2007/05/18/the-reformers-on-islam/

http://livingtext.wordpress.com/2009/05/26/more-of-the-reformers-on-islam/

Roger said...

"we might conquer these infidels with only the Lord’s prayer"

Sounds nice and violent. Religion brings out the best in people.

The Atheist Perspective

jmw said...

Right. Sort of like Pol Pot, Mao or Stalin, the good atheists.

Why is violence wrong anyway? What standard do you point to?