Savaged by my own faith tradition!


I was a Lutheran before I grew up and got wise, so it is particularly piquant to be insulted by Martin Luther. He wasn’t bad at it.

You pant after the garlic and melons of Egypt and have already long suffered from perverted tastes.

What you say is a blasphemy that has made you worthy of a thousand deaths.

Your astute minds have been completely turned into stinking mushrooms.

You are the devil’s most dangerous tool!

He speaks to me!

(via Making Light)

Comments

  1. pacomius says

    I pant after the garlic and melons of Egypt and have already long suffered from perverted tastes.

    Gets my vote as motto for the upcoming GAC

  2. Alverant says

    Garlic and melons? Is that some kind of euphemism for a woman’s naughty bits or is my mind in the gutter? (or both)

  3. christophburschka says

    That site is great! :D

    Your astute minds have been completely turned into stinking mushrooms.

    If only the “fan” mail you get could be so eloquent and literate…

  4. eigenperson says

    Man, this Martin Luther guy sure is a controversialist. I bet he gets tons of page views and advertising dollars for his stridency, but doesn’t he realize that he’d do better at convincing people if he was more polite?

  5. frankb says

    Martin Luther missed out on a winner if he didn’t say, “May the fleas of a thousand camels infest your armpits.”

  6. says

    He [Tetzel] called Luther “a leper with a brain of brass and a nose of iron”

    http://www.economist.com/node/21541719

    Weird stuff. Pope purportedly called him a drunken German priest, but that was probably just pretty close to the truth.

    As for garlic and melons of Egypt, that’s a reference to either God or Moses, I don’t remember which for sure, accusing the Israelites of preferring to go back to slavery in Egypt with a few edible perks, than to keep on toward freedom.

    Glen Davidson

  7. AussieMike says

    It does feel nice to have someone recognise you for you talents and appreciate who you are.

    Bring on the stinking mushroom brain I say, and I dare you to show me your 1000 deaths because I know of only one.

  8. CompulsoryAccount7746 says

    “You are the white devil and a glittering Satan.”

    Looks like there was a Lutheran antecedent to Twilight…
     
    “You cowardly slave, you corrupt sycophant, with your sickening advice!”

    I thought christians were supposed to love being sycophantic slaves doling out advice.

  9. ftfkdad says

    I think this Martin Luther quote might have been meant for you: “But I resist the devil, and often it is with a fart that I chase him away”

  10. CompulsoryAccount7746 says

    “You completely close your mind and do nothing but shout, ‘Anathema, anathema, anathema!’ so that by your own voice you are judged mad.”

    “Your words are so foolishly and ignorantly composed that I cannot believe you understand them.”

    “How is it, then, that you drivel like people in their second childhood?”

    “Must we believe your nightmares?”
     
    Snappy dialogue like that might make a Theist vs Theist debate watchable.

  11. Robert B. says

    Hahahaha, the next time I want a Christian to go away, I’ll write:

    “Perhaps you want me to die of unrelieved boredom while you keep on talking.” – Martin Luther

    It’s the attribution that cracks me up, somehow.

  12. Azuma Hazuki says

    Sometimes I think religions are started by neurotics and schizophrenics. Luther was pretty messed up from what I read, and gave birth to a tradition that, looking back on it, was Calvinist before Calvin.

  13. Sili says

    Weird stuff. Pope purportedly called him a drunken German priest, but that was probably just pretty close to the truth.

    And look who’s now Pope! I guess Luther got the last laugh on that one.

  14. richardwarden says

    >What you say is a blasphemy that has made you worthy of a thousand deaths.

    – These quotes are taken out of context, so they don’t offer a fair evaluation of Luther’s ideas.

    I find it interesting that you mock Luther’s tone, but the New Atheism being promoted by Myers and others essentially promotes hatred against theists. – A bit hypocritical, it seems.

  15. says

    I find it interesting that you mock Luther’s tone

    Far from it, his tone is the part we appreciate most. The man clearly had a flair for expressing his displeasure.

    These quotes are taken out of context, so they don’t offer a fair evaluation of Luther’s ideas.

    And which of Luther’s ideas should we be giving a fair evaluation?

    How about these?

    Section XI of the treatise [On the Jews and Their Lies] advises Christians to carry out seven remedial actions. These are

    for Jewish synagogues and schools to be burned to the ground, and the remnants buried out of sight;
    for houses owned by Jews to be likewise razed, and the owners made to live in agricultural outbuildings;
    for their religious writings to be taken away;
    for rabbis to be forbidden to preach, and to be executed if they do;
    for safe conduct on the roads to be abolished for Jews;
    for usury to be prohibited, and for all silver and gold to be removed and “put aside for safekeeping”; and
    for the Jewish population to be put to work as agricultural slave labor.

    Which idea do you like the most?

  16. cag says

    richardwarden #15, we are equal opportunity mockers. Your absurd beliefs and abominable but powerless imaginary friends are worthy of “pity” mocking. They certainly have no power, either in themselves or over us. Any adult who believes in such absurd fairy tales should not only be mocked, but should be restrained from contact with children until they are able to reason for themselves. We mock not only your tone but also your message.

    When will you realize that your ancestors were indoctrinated into belief by the sword, but you accepted it willingly?

    You believe in a vile, imaginary monster whose only virtue is inaction. Your impotent pal has no power, no love, no morals. Until humans are disease free we will mock your dasdardly deity. We do not fear or pay protection money to your buddy. We will not join your club so that you can feel better about the mass delusion that you suffer from. To us you are the outsider.

  17. Robert B. says

    @ richardwarden:

    We were mocking what now? I thought we were appreciating his skill with the language. A good slam gets high praise around here; when Sikivu Hutchinson’s on a roll she makes PZ practically cream his pants. We evaluate the ideas in all the other posts around here. And we don’t hate theists, we hate theism. And…

    … oops, wait, almost forgot:

    “Perhaps you want me to die of unrelieved boredom while you keep on talking.” – Martin Luther

    *juvenile snickering* Sorry, I promised.

  18. kyoseki says

    My favorite Luther quote has always been “reason is the greatest enemy that faith has”.

    … yep, I’ll drink to that.

  19. nms says

    My soul, like Ezekiel’s, is nauseated at eating your bread covered with human dung. Do you know what this means?

    nope!

  20. chigau (2ICBDFL) says

    “You are poisonous, worthless gossips.”
    I am SO bookmarking that site!

  21. Robert B. says

    Oops, I seem to have confused two authors of the Black Skeptics blog. It was Frederick Sparks, not Sikivu Hutchinson, who got such orgasmic approval from PZ for the article I linked. Of course, Hutchinson can be quite eloquently caustic herself, when the need arises, but the article I was referring to was Sparks’.

  22. Azkyroth says

    You pant after the garlic and melons of Egypt and have already long suffered from perverted tastes.

    Your astute minds have been completely turned into stinking mushrooms.

    What?!

    I mean, his horrific misogyny, misology, and anti-semitism, sadly, were par for the course with Europe at the time, but how the FUCK did a man opposed to garlic and mushrooms ever gain any traction? O.O

    Man, this Martin Luther guy sure is a controversialist. I bet he gets tons of page views and advertising dollars for his stridency, but doesn’t he realize that he’d do better at convincing people if he was more polite?

    Thread won.

  23. anubisprime says

    OP

    “He speaks to me!”

    You me both PZ…you me both kidda!

    As for richardwarden @ 15

    Porcupine
    Dead
    Rotted
    Insert
    richardwarden’s ass

    Arrange the list sensibly!….sorry …clues for a theist then…

    Bend over and accept gracefully the bounty of your sky fairy….enjoy!

  24. Crip Dyke, Right Reverend Feminist FuckToy of Death & Her Handmaiden says

    I think richard warden meant to say:

    “Your words are un-Christian, antichristian, and spoken by the inspiration of the evil spirit.”

    Not that, in this case, even Martin Luther’s rhetorical skills would have helped him worth a tinker’s damn.

  25. Crip Dyke, Right Reverend Feminist FuckToy of Death & Her Handmaiden says

    On the other hand, I now have to sign all my own posts with:

    “Look how this great heretic speaks brazenly and sacrilegiously.”

    Oh how I so look forward to signing my posts off this way. And then having the richardwardens of the world say, “Uh, Yah! Like that! Wait, why is she insulting herself?”

    My dream is that someone just smart enough to answer that question on hir own shows up… not likely to find someone among the wack-a-loons that come here disciplined enough to reason it through.

    Anyway,
    Look how this great heretic speaks brazenly and sacrilegiously.
    –)->

  26. John Morales says

    Melons?

    From the Pffft:

    In central Asia the practice is reputed to have long been widespread, and remains a part of the culture, as exemplified by the proverb, Women for breeding, boys for pleasure, but melons for sheer delight.[42]

    [42] Sir Richard Burton, Kama Sutra: the Hindu art of lovemaking, intro. Pathan proverb, also reported in similar forms from the Arab countries, Iran and North Africa.

  27. 'Tis Himself, OM says

    Your astute minds have been completely turned into stinking mushrooms.

    I don’t know about anyone else but my astute mind has been completely turned into a perfumed mushroom.

  28. raven says

    These quotes are taken out of context, so they don’t offer a fair evaluation of Luther’s ideas.

    Not really. Martin Luther was a kook and a malevolent personality.

    1. He was a flaming misogynist. His comment that women were only good for childbearing and when they died it was do big deal was a classic that has set the tone since then. I’m sure Rick Santorum (a Catholic for irony’s sake) would agree.

    2. He was a notorious antisemite who wrote a book, On the Jews and their Lies that detailed a Final Solution. It was widely reprinted by the Nazis and at Nuremberg, some of them said they were just carrying out his plan.

    3. He was a superstitious kook who saw devils and demons everywhere. Not that that isn’t common today among certain xians but most of us have moved on from that.

  29. raven says

    Sometimes I think religions are started by neurotics and schizophrenics.

    Yeah, seems like it.

    Martin Luther (Protestantism) was a bigoted wacko.

    John Calvin (various Xian Reformed) wasn’t a nice guy either. (Both founders of my natal religion FWIW.)

    Joseph Smith (Mormon) was a convicted conman, a liar, and an overaged adolescent whose made up heaven is some guy being a god with a herd of goddess wives who he spends all eternity fucking.

    L. Ron Hubbard (Scientology) was a not very talented science fiction writer who got tired of being poor.

    Reverend Sun Myung Moon (Moonie-ism) is still alive. He is a pretty strange guy who claims to be jesus christ the second.

    Reverend Jim Jones (People’s Temple) wasn’t too successful. After the mass suicide of him and 800 people in Guyana, the cult hasn’t been too popular.

    Of the religion founders that are recent enough to be historical, they all seemed to be pretty weird. One wonders what jesus and Mohammed were really like.

    PS One of my quite distant cousins is a severe schizophrenic but very smart. He started a vaguely Hinduish New Age cult that ended up being successful. After a few decades he gave it up. “I realized that my followers were crazier than I am.” I can’t even imagine how crazy that must be.

  30. raven says

    Shorter RichardWarden.

    What you said about Martin Luther is a blasphemy worthy of a thousand deaths because your minds are stinking mushrooms. You are the devil’s most dangerous tools!

    Thanks for the compliments Richard. Do we get cookies for that?

    but the New Atheism being promoted by Myers and others essentially promotes hatred against theists.

    Richard, I realize you are stupid but atheist haters are dime a hundred. Even the Pope has tossed his two lira in on that.

    Eight US states have laws prohibiting atheists from holding public office and/or serving on juries. These laws are no longer enforceable but they don’t dare remove them. The xians would scream and faint if they tried.

  31. KG says

    Some more quotes showing what a wonderful, reasonable, tolerant person Martin Luther was.

    “Reason is the Devil’s greatest whore; by nature and manner of being she is a noxious whore; she is a prostitute, the Devil’s appointed whore; whore eaten by scab and leprosy who ought to be trodden under foot and destroyed, she and her wisdom… Throw dung in her face to make her ugly. She is and she ought to be drowned in baptism… She would deserve, the wretch, to be banished to the filthiest place in the house, to the closets.”

    —Martin Luther, Works, Erlangen Edition v. 16, pp. 142-148.

    “Reason is the greatest enemy that faith has; it never comes to the aid of spiritual things, but—more frequently than not—struggles against the divine Word, treating with contempt all that emanates from God.”

    —Martin Luther, Table Talks in 1569.

    “Heretics are not to be disputed with, but to be condemned unheard, and whilst they perish by fire, the faithful ought to pursue the evil to its source, and bathe their heads in the blood of the Catholic bishops, and of the Pope, who is the devil in disguise.”

    —Martin Luther, Table Talks (as quoted in Religious History: An Inquiry by M. Searle Bates, p. 156).

  32. says

    well, as a cultural Lutheran (though not baptised) myself, back in my days as an agnostic, I sorta admired Luther for standing up to the Catholic Church (I blame the indoctrination by the Lutheran kindergarten). I guess I willfully ignored his less savoury aspects.

    A favourite quote used to demonstrate that he was a man of the people:

    Warum rülpset und furzet ihr nicht? Hat es euch nicht geschmecket?
    (Why are you not belching and farting? Did you not like the food?)
    (apparently this quote is apocryphal)

    in the German part of the atheist blogosphere, whenever Luther is mentioned, the Martin Luther apologists crawl out of the woodwork, ready to defend their idol.

    Wow, am I glad I don’t do this let’s-try-and-reconcile-religion-with-reason stuff anymore…

    Interesting enough though, his Doctrine of the two kingdoms was credited by Madison as an inspiration for the separation of church and state. Over in Europe though, it was used as justification for the feudal lords to come down hard on the peasant revolts (you should read what Luther had to say about those uppity peasants)

  33. anubisprime says

    KG @ 34

    Got the distinct impression reading those snippets of proclamations, that Martin Luther was not a great advocate of rationality or indeed analytical cognizance and definitely has a downer on that other true religion of the katoliks’

    As for his Christian lurve’ of atheists & heretics…(which apparently atheists are by default…I checked) It seems such attitude of universal lurve’ for all men regardless of faith or world view is verging quite convincingly on the non existent to extremely biased, at least that would be my guess there.

    These traits are so copied and imitated by the present day brethren in all aspects of the word of Martin Luther that it is exceedingly difficult to work out at what point Martin Luther farts and the acolytes inhale!

    I am particularly fond of this snippet of wisdom from…

    Martin Luther, Table Talks in 1569.

    “Reason is the greatest enemy that faith has; it never comes to the aid of spiritual things, but—more frequently than not—struggles against the divine Word, treating with contempt all that emanates from God.”

    Now it is to be seriously considered why that should be so…
    Because that confession seems to echo precisely the present day attitude to science from the god soaked,

    The other rants are just a touch of good ‘ole xian spitting of the dummy…another trend seen and heard all to frequently in this age from his fans.

  34. dianne says

    Reverend Sun Myung Moon (Moonie-ism) is still alive. He is a pretty strange guy who claims to be jesus christ the second.

    Most people who claim to be Jesus Christ are pretty strange. I’ve met several Jesus Christs (doing your psych rotation on the experimental ward can do that for you) and they’ve all been weird. Jesus Garcia and Jesus Hernandez, on the other hand, are perfectly normal people.

  35. saguhh00 says

    The supernatural is defined as that which is beyond the natural, and since the Universe is natural, the supernatural must be beyond the Universe. As that which is beyond the Universe cannot be tested or observed, but can only be especulated about or imagined, the superenatural can only be imagined or especulated about. Therefore, believing in the supernatural is the same as believing in pure imagination. The Gods of religions do not exist because miracles (i.e., magick) do not exist. The existence of a Supreme Being is possible, but not the existence of the Gods worshipped by human beings, because the Gods of religions depend on magick (miracles), which does not exist.
    Religion, as organized belief in the supernatural, is by definition false.

  36. says

    “You moderate enforcer and eulogizer of moderation. You are one of those bloody and deceitful people who affect modesty in words and appearance, but who meanwhile breathe out threats and blood.”

    Was he watching the GOP debates? Or maybe just Wolf Blitzer?

  37. truthspeaker says

    saguhh00 #39 – well said. I have a similar response to people who claim their god is undetectable by science. If it’s not detectable by science, how do you know it’s there or know anything about it?

    FYI the English word is “speculate”. Is Spanish your native language by any chance?

  38. truthspeaker says

    Cool. I knew Spanish didn’t have the “sp” sound at the beginning of words, but I didn’t know Portuguese was the same way.

  39. truthspeaker says

    Barely any.

    I know they’re closely related, and some people say they’re almost mutually intelligible.

  40. gragra says

    He forgot the one about you mother being a hamster and your father smelling of elderberries.

  41. saguhh00 says

    @truthspeaker
    Barely mutually intelligible they are, but their grammar and syntax are almost the same.

  42. yoav says

    As someone who use fruit flies for research I appreciate the nice coincidence of getting

    You are a Baal-zebub – that is, a man of flies.