Epstein Secrets

e institutions were charged with prosecuting heresy -- and prosecute they did, executing and torturing thousands of suspected witches, converts from Judaism (many of whom had been forced to convert), Protestants, and all manner of suspected heretics, particularly in the 15th and 16th centuries. Historia

ity is at least as much the property of the Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., as of the segregationists and slaveho

e institutions were charged with prosecuting h=resy -- and prosecute they did, executing and torturing thousands of suspected witches, converts from Judaism (many of whom had been forced to convert), Protestant=, and all manner of suspected heretics, particularly in the 15th and 16th centuries. Historian

ity is at least as much the property =f the Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., as of the segregationists and slavehol

ti-Judaism can flourish perfectly well without them, since its target is not a group of people but an idea. Nirenberg's thesis is that this idea of Judaism, which bears only a passing resemblance to Judaism as practiced and lived by Jews, has been at the very center of Western civilization since the b

Christians argue with other Christians by accusing them of Judaism. The same principle holds true in Nirenberg's fascinating later chapters. When Martin Luther rebelled against Catholicism, he attacked the church's "legalistic understanding of God's justice" as Jewish: "In this sense the Roman church had b

s Confessions . 6 But the most dramatic example of a religious EFTA_R1_01522117 EFTA02444880 Page 133 humanism that spread simultaneously into Judaism, Christianity, and Islam can be found when the lost texts of Aristotle were discovered, translated, and appropriated by scholars from these three

ional strivings of humans. He believed he found this view of Christian love in the New Testament (especially the writing of the apostle Paul) and Martin Luther, the giant of the Protestant Reformation. Nygren was particularly interested in dismantling the classical medieval Roman Catholic view of Christ

t in modem theories about the very nature of religion." Modem objections to anthropomorphism have taken two major forms. First, traditions within Judaism, Christianity, and Islam have long opposed the worship of "idols," and regarded anthropomorphism as a dangerous assault against genuine piety and

ction 2, p. SS. See again, for example, Thomas Aquinas, Summo Contra Gentiles, Book Two: Creation, chapters 31-38, pp. 91-115. See, for example, Martin Luther, Lectures on Galatians (1535), in Luther's Works, ed. Jaroslav Pelikan (St Louis, Missouri: Concordia Publishing House, 1964), vols. 26-27. Thoma

and Christians go to the same heaven, so that he didn’t have to convert.’ °! Another one of my clients, a far more sophisticated one, did convert to Judaism — on a weekly basis. He discovered that all the Jews in a particular federal prison were taken out every Friday night to have Shabbat dinner in the h

justify the censorship of a march by the likes of Martin Luther King through a segregated community in the south;

ognize gay marriages. Orthodox Jewish synagogues would not perform or recognize a marriage between a Jew and a non-Jew who did not wish to convert to Judaism. And those religious institutions that chose to perform or recognize gay marriages could do so. It would be entirely a religious decision beyond the

he line from anti-Zionism to anti-Semitism—a line Martin Luther King warned about in a speech at Harvard shortly

Germany as we spoke. “Conversion or death” was its most benign form, in places like Spain and Iran, many Jews faked it, staying alive and practicing Judaism secretly. Kleigfeld told me that the causes of this historical theme of persecution of Jews were complex. Among the frequently unmentioned events re

ad landed. When | asked my synagogue’s young people’s spiritual counselor, Rabbi Kleigfeld, to explain the feelings and actions of these children of Martin Luther’s Post-Reformation Christian Church, he answered that | already knew about similarly difficult places and times of our Twelve Tribes’ like Rome, Mediev

mbrance developed in his Confessions.° But the most dramatic example of a religious HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_021278 humanism that spread simultaneously into Judaism, Christianity, and Islam can be found when the lost texts of Aristotle were discovered, translated, and appropriated by scholars from these three rel

irational strivings of humans. He believed he found this view of Christian love in the New Testament (especially the writing of the apostle Paul) and Martin Luther, the giant of the Protestant Reformation. Nygren was particularly interested in dismantling the classical medieval Roman Catholic view of Christian

ept in modern theories about the very nature of religion.” Modern objections to anthropomorphism have taken two major forms. First, traditions within Judaism, Christianity, and Islam have long opposed the worship of “idols,” and regarded anthropomorphism as a dangerous assault against genuine piety and pro

ection 2, p.55. *See again, for example, Thomas Aquinas, Summa Contra Gentiles, Book Two: Creation, chapters 31-38, pp. 91-115. ‘ See, for example, Martin Luther, Lectures on Galatians (1535), in Luther’s Works, ed. Jaroslav Pelikan (St Louis, Missouri: Concordia Publishing House, 1964), vols. 26-27. * Thomas