What Was Hitler's Religion?

There is a difference between being msiguidedly into the occult and actively promoting a pagan religion over Christianity. You are correct that many 'Christians' have probably done the former, despite it being in opposition to their supposed faith, but the latter, which is what Hitler did, is enough to invalidate any claim to Christianity on the part of the adherent.

Click to expand...

Where does he actively promote pagan religions over christianity? He spoke of the christian god quite frequently, in that his actions were in accordance to what the "almighty creator" wanted. I agree in that he may not have been a "good christian" as was stated earlier and we can argue the definition of a "true" christian, but in his mind he was "doing god's work" and so his religion (as warped a version as it was) was christianity. As far as the practice of pagan rituals or using pagan symbols, deciding religion, people that consider themselves "true" christians do it all the time, usually out of ignorance, but it is done all the same.

Lycan said:

Where does he actively promote pagan religions over christianity? He spoke of the christian god quite frequently, in that his actions were in accordance to what the "almighty creator" wanted. I agree in that he may not have been a "good christian" as was stated earlier and we can argue the definition of a "true" christian, but in his mind he was "doing god's work" and so his religion (as warped a version as it was) was christianity. As far as the practice of pagan rituals or using pagan symbols, deciding religion, people that consider themselves "true" christians do it all the time, usually out of ignorance, but it is done all the same.

Click to expand...

Try in the SS. And you're talking to someone who not only lost one family member to the holocaust but had another serve in the Waffen SS on the eastern front, so you can take it from me that I grew up with this stuff. I am not ignorant. In public with the general populace Hitler did indeed refer to God - that's the sort of political expedience that even Stalin engaged in when it suited him (as it did when Hitler invaded). Would you say that he was a Christian? In the inner circles of the NSDAP, and particularly in its more militarised entities such as the SS, SA, SIPO (another family member was a high ranking officer in the latter) it was a different matter. He promoted Germanic paganism and the occult over Christianity to a startling degree. It was part of his master race nonsense and a way of solidifying his 'Aryan' Empire. Whether he actually believed in the stuff is beside the point, but to promote such things is more than sufficient to forfeit any right to claim you are a Christian.

James

Sunstone said:

What was Hitler's religion? I'm very confused about this. I've heard so many different ideas about what his religion was. Can you help me with this?

Click to expand...

Uh...Lutheran??? I think he might have been raised on Lutheran teachings or went to a Lutheran school as a boy....I know the current Pope went to the same school as Hitler did when he was a young boy. Was it a Lutheran school? I can't remember which religion the school was associated with, whcih they both attended.

I heard Hitler felt compelled to rid the world of all Jews based on some obscure Lutheran doctrine...

FFH said:

Uh...Lutheran??? I think he might have been raised on Lutheran teachings or went to a Lutheran school as a boy....I know the current Pope went to the same school as Hitler did when he was a young boy. Was it a Lutheran school? I can't remember which religion the school was associated with, whcih they both attended.

I heard Hitler felt compelled to rid the world of all Jews based on some obscure Lutheran doctrine...

Click to expand...

No, Hitler wasn't a Lutheran. He certainly wasn't raised on Lutheran teachings and nor did he go to a Lutheran school. He was Austrian, not north German (south Germany still being overwhelmingly majority RC), and as with the vast majority of his countrymen, was raised as a Roman Catholic (how you could even contemplate the idea that the current Pope went to a Lutheran school is beyond me, but I'd have to say that it's highly unlikely that he and Hitler went to the same school at all as the Pope, unlike Hitler, is German - he was in the Hitler Youth, however, which is an entirely different thing).

Having put that particular nonsense to rest, I must now ask whether you believe that a person raised as a Christian but who in his adult life promotes paganism can still be said to be Christian at all? I'd say not. After all, would you claim that all of us here who are converts to faiths other than those we were raised in are still members of those childhood faiths? In other words, would you say that, despite my conversion to Orthodoxy, I am still Lutheran? Clearly you would not. In much the same way, Hitler's being raised as a Roman Catholic in no way answers the question posed in the OP. His adult beliefs and practices, in fact, preclude that answer from even being a possibility.

James

Try in the SS. And you're talking to someone who not only lost one family member to the holocaust but had another serve in the Waffen SS on the eastern front, so you can take it from me that I grew up with this stuff. I am not ignorant. In public with the general populace Hitler did indeed refer to God - that's the sort of political expedience that even Stalin engaged in when it suited him (as it did when Hitler invaded). Would you say that he was a Christian? In the inner circles of the NSDAP, and particularly in its more militarised entities such as the SS, SA, SIPO (another family member was a high ranking officer in the latter) it was a different matter. He promoted Germanic paganism and the occult over Christianity to a startling degree. It was part of his master race nonsense and a way of solidifying his 'Aryan' Empire. Whether he actually believed in the stuff is beside the point, but to promote such things is more than sufficient to forfeit any right to claim you are a Christian.

Click to expand...

I never said or implied that you were ignorant. His belief in what he was doing is the point, if integration of pagan symbology, ritual, etc. into his version of christianity "forfeits any right to claim" then that would be the case for most religions people practice today...from the numerous branches of the bible religions to the neo-pagan religions alot of people tend to pick and choose, mix and match what benefits them and are still called <insert religion of choice here>. I never said he followed the religion correctly, just that if what he believed he was following was christianity then his religion was just that.

Lycan said:

I never said or implied that you were ignorant. His belief in what he was doing is the point, if integration of pagan symbology, ritual, etc. into his version of christianity "forfeits any right to claim" then that would be the case for most religions people practice today...from the numerous branches of the bible religions to the neo-pagan religions alot of people tend to pick and choose, mix and match what benefits them and are still called <insert religion of choice here>. I never said he followed the religion correctly, just that if what he believed he was following was christianity then his religion was just that.

Click to expand...

And I didn't say that he incorporated pagan ideas into Christianity, but that he encouraged the adoption of paganism over Christianity. Did you not read what I wrote? His public espousal of Christianity can only be seemn as a cynical political move when it is contrasted with such things as the institution of pagan ritual and services inside the SS in place of Christianity. The SS, internally, were encouraged to the point of it being a veiled requirement, to eschew Christianity for services such as weddings and were discouraged from the Christian equivalent. If I publicly pretended to still be a Buddhist for political gain, that wouldn't mean I was one if I privately practiced and promoted Christianity, would it? Hitler was no more Christian than I am Buddhist.

James

James said:

it's highly unlikely that he and Hitler went to the same school at all as the Pope,

Click to expand...

No, seriously he did. That was one of the first things they said about the current Pope... He went to the same school as Hitler did as a young boy.

James said:

I'd have to say that it's highly unlikely that he and Hitler went to the same school at all as the Pope, unlike Hitler, is German - he was in the Hitler Youth, however, which is an entirely different thing).

Click to expand...

Courtesy of Wiki

Following his fourteenth birthday in 1941, Ratzinger was enrolled in the Hitler Youth (a paramilitary organization of the Nazi Party) - membership being legally required after December 1939., but was an unenthusiastic member and refused to attend meetings.

His father was a bitter enemy of Nazism, believing it conflicted with the Catholic faith. In 1941, one of Ratzinger's cousins, a 14-year-old boy with the Down syndrome, was killed by the Nazi regime in its campaign of eugenics.

In 1943 while still in seminary, he was drafted at age 16 into the German anti-aircraft corps. Ratzinger then trained in the German infantry, but a subsequent illness precluded him from the usual rigours of military duty. As the Allied front drew closer to his post in 1945, he returned to his family's home in Traunstein after his unit had ceased to exist, just as American troops established their headquarters in the Ratzinger household.

As a German soldier, he was put in a POW camp but was released a few months later at the end of the War in summer 1945. He reentered the seminary, along with his brother Georg, in November of that year.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pope_Benedict_XVI

FFH said:

Courtesy of Wiki

Following his fourteenth birthday in 1941, Ratzinger was enrolled in the Hitler Youth (a paramilitary organization of the Nazi Party) - membership being legally required after December 1939., but was an unenthusiastic member and refused to attend meetings.

His father was a bitter enemy of Nazism, believing it conflicted with the Catholic faith. In 1941, one of Ratzinger's cousins, a 14-year-old boy with the Down syndrome, was killed by the Nazi regime in its campaign of eugenics.

In 1943 while still in seminary, he was drafted at age 16 into the German anti-aircraft corps. Ratzinger then trained in the German infantry, but a subsequent illness precluded him from the usual rigours of military duty. As the Allied front drew closer to his post in 1945, he returned to his family's home in Traunstein after his unit had ceased to exist, just as American troops established their headquarters in the Ratzinger household.

As a German soldier, he was put in a POW camp but was released a few months later at the end of the War in summer 1945. He reentered the seminary, along with his brother Georg, in November of that year.

[URL="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pope_Benedict_XVI"]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pope_Benedict_XVI[/URL]

Click to expand...

This says absolutely nothing about schools. Where on earth did you get that from? The Hitler Youth was not a school and did not exist when Hitler was a boy - it was an organisation aimed at indoctrinating German youth into Nazi ideaology and was created by Hitler. It was a sort of political and propagandist version of the boy scouts, much as the pioneers were in the communist eastern bloc.

Now as Hitler was born and grew up in a town called Braunau am Inn in Austria, please explain how he could have gone to school in Bavaria, which is where Pope Benedict is from, given that that would have been then, as now, in a different country. Or are you trying to say that the Pope was sent to school in Austria? Neither situation seems likely and you've yet to produce any evidence to support your position which appears, judging by the 'evidence' you did provide to have been based solely on your misunderstanding of what the Hitler Youth was.

James

ADOLPH HITLER SAID:

"I am personally convinced of the great power and deep significance of Christianity, and I won't allow any other religion to be promoted. That is why I have turned away from Ludendorff and that is why I reject that book by Rosenberg. It was written by a Protestant. It is not a Party book. It was not written by him as a Party man. The Protestants can be left to argue with him ...

As a Catholic I never feel comfortable in the Evangelical Church or its structures. That is why I will have great difficulty if I try to regulate affairs of the Protestant churches. The evangelical people or the Protestants will in any case reject me. But you can be sure: I will protect the rights and freedoms of the churches and not let them be touched, so that you need have no fears about the future of the Church."

Hitler was also ready to discuss with the Bishop his views on the Jewish question: "As for the Jews, I am just carrying on with the same policy which the Catholic church has adopted for fifteen hundred years, when it has regarded the Jews as dangerous and pushed them into ghettos etc., because it knew what the Jews were like. I don't put race above religion, but I do see the danger in the representatives of this race for Church and State, and perhaps I am doing Christianity a great service."

FFH said:

ADOLPH HITLER SAID:
"I am personally convinced of the great power and deep significance of Christianity, and I won't allow any other religion to be promoted. That is why I have turned away from Ludendorff and that is why I reject that book by Rosenberg. It was written by a Protestant. It is not a Party book. It was not written by him as a Party man. The Protestants can be left to argue with him ... As a Catholic I never feel comfortable in the Evangelical Church or its structures. That is why I will have great difficulty if I try to regulate affairs of the Protestant churches. The evangelical people or the Protestants will in any case reject me. But you can be sure: I will protect the rights and freedoms of the churches and not let them be touched, so that you need have no fears about the future of the Church." Hitler was also ready to discuss with the Bishop his views on the Jewish question: "As for the Jews, I am just carrying on with the same policy which the Catholic church has adopted for fifteen hundred years, when it has regarded the Jews as dangerous and pushed them into ghettos etc., because it knew what the Jews were like. I don't put race above religion, but I do see the danger in the representatives of this race for Church and State, and perhaps I am doing Christianity a great service."

Click to expand...

And yet in private he did indeed push another religion over Christianity, when he set up the SS cult including worship of the Teutonic deities such as Wotan and encouraged the SS, particularly officers such as my great uncle, to espouse it and forget about Christianity. As I said, Hitler was a political opportunist in the vein of Stalin and was certainly not averse to lying for the sake of national unity, but a Christian he was not.

I would also note that the tone of these quotes is not that of a person convinced of the truth of Christianity but rather that of an outsider convinced (in this case I think he's rather trying to sound convinced) that Christianity has some value. The tone sounds no different to that imployed by, say, Tony Blair about Islam, and yet I doubt anyone would suggest on the basis of such speeches that Blair is Muslim.

James

James said:

This says absolutely nothing about schools. Where on earth did you get that from? The Hitler Youth was not a school and did not exist when Hitler was a boy - it was an organisation aimed at indoctrinating German youth into Nazi ideaology and was created by Hitler. It was a sort of political and propagandist version of the boy scouts, much as the pioneers were in the communist eastern bloc.

Now as Hitler was born and grew up in a town called Braunau am Inn in Austria, please explain how he could have gone to school in Bavaria, which is where Pope Benedict is from, given that that would have been then, as now, in a different country. Or are you trying to say that the Pope was sent to school in Austria? Neither situation seems likely and you've yet to produce any evidence to support your position which appears, judging by the 'evidence' you did provide to have been based solely on your misunderstanding of what the Hitler Youth was.

Click to expand...

Yeah, I guess when I heard that they went to the same school as youths from the media I wasn't really paying attention so I assumed it was an actual school, but in reality they were probably just referring to this Hitler Youth program which neither I nor the media fully understood at the time I guess..

BUDDY said:

A person's religion can be defined more by their actions than by what they say they believe. With this in mond I would say hat Hitler's religion was racism and human suffering.

Click to expand...

Well said and to the point. You either serve the God of love or the father of all lies, death and destruction. You cannot serve two masters.

Hitler was born into a Catholic family, as most Austrians were. His mother was very devout.
There is no evidence he was a practising Christian during his adult life.
There seems to be some serious speculation that he maintained some contact with the Vatican throughout the war. I suspect this was political rather than religious.

A good book to pick up on this topic was Spear of Destiny by Ravencroft. Ravencroft asserts that Hitler was a devout Satanist initiated by D. Eckhardt of the Thule Society (a satanic group that had ties to the Golden Dawn). All of the Pagan and Christian adornments was mere decoration according to Ravencroft.

BUDDY said:

A person's religion can be defined more by their actions than by what they say they believe.

Click to expand...

By who's interpretation? That of a single sect of Christianity? I think not. Hitler was Christian by the standard that he believed Jesus to have been the son of God and the Messiah. Not only did he believe that Jesus was the son of God and the Messiah, he also believed that the Bible supported his racial policies and cited the Bible as "proof" that what he was doing was the Christian thing to do. You may not like his interpretation of the Bible but it is/was a sect of Christianity nonetheless.

James the Persian said:

And yet in private he did indeed push another religion over Christianity, when he set up the SS cult including worship of the Teutonic deities such as Wotan and encouraged the SS, particularly officers such as my great uncle, to espouse it and forget about Christianity. As I said, Hitler was a political opportunist in the vein of Stalin and was certainly not averse to lying for the sake of national unity, but a Christian he was not.

I would also note that the tone of these quotes is not that of a person convinced of the truth of Christianity but rather that of an outsider convinced (in this case I think he's rather trying to sound convinced) that Christianity has some value. The tone sounds no different to that imployed by, say, Tony Blair about Islam, and yet I doubt anyone would suggest on the basis of such speeches that Blair is Muslim.

James

Click to expand...

Didn't Hitler also sign a peace treaty with France before invading them? Ones words and actions are not always supportive of each other. Words are easy.

The Old Testament advocates killing people of different beliefs, even children. There is some pretty violent stuff in there. Perhaps Hitler thought he was doing God's will. The loving God that most people worship is not the same one that appears in the Christian Bible in my opinion. You give that text to a crazy person like Hitler and it may help him to justify his horrid actions.

(I posted another thread with the question about why Christians get to pick and choose which parts of the Bible to believe in if anyone is interested in giving their opinion....)

Sunstone said:

What was Hitler's religion? I'm very confused about this. I've heard so many different ideas about what his religion was. Can you help me with this?

Click to expand...

Himself.

Hitler may have been a catholic but as he progressed into a homicidal megalomania, i suspect his religious views were getting warped into a view only understood in his own mind, and i think are really irrelevant to any comparison of any mainstream religion