In “Islam’s Expansion Across Europe: Not Martin Luther’s Fault,” one Paul Gottfried pretends to respond to my article, “The Pro-Islamic West: Born 500 years Ago.” While many of his own readers saw through and exposed his misrepresentations in the comments section more thoroughly than I ever would have, Gottfried’s piece is still worth examining if only for the important lessons surrounding it.
First, if you seek an example of or are uncertain what a “strawman argument” is — typically defined as “giving the impression of refuting an opponent’s argument, while refuting an argument that was not presented by that opponent” — then look no further than to Gottfried’s “rebuttal,” which exemplifies the strawman fallacy in a very special way, beginning with its title: “Islam’s Expansion Across Europe: Not Martin Luther’s Fault.” Bravo, Gottfried — what an insight! But who ever said “Islam’s expansion across Europe” was Luther’s fault? Well, if you read Gottfried’s piece without crosschecking his claims against my article, apparently I did. Of course, back in the real world, I never did. Indeed, as someone who just finished writing a (forthcoming) book about the history of Islamic jihad against Europe — at least 75 percent of which occurred before not after Luther — the claim strikes me more than most as absurd.
Gottfried’s next obvious distortion appears in his very opening sentence: “In one of the stranger manifestations of misguided Catholic piety or repugnance for the Protestant Reformation, being exhibited on the occasion of its 500th anniversary, Raymond Ibrahim reveals a bizarre version of the blame game.” I will address the “repugnance” thing below; for now, why does Gottfried offer as a possibility that I might have been motivated by “misguided Catholic piety” when I had clearly written that “I am, for the record, neither Protestant nor Catholic”?
Only two conclusions exist: either Gottfried never read my article (which is pathetic for someone claiming to “rebut” it), or else he is willfully misrepresenting. Although my first instinct was inclined to the former, other “techniques” employed by Gottfried point to willful deception. For example, he never quotes me as saying the things he claims I say — the way I am quoting him here — except on two occasions: in both, he claims I wrote that Luther urged “passivity” against the hostile Muslim invaders. In reality, I had written that “Luther originally preached passivity,” which, of course, is an indisputable fact. Lest there remain any confusion on this point, along with the several quotes and sources I cited in my original article — including Luther’s own words that although the Muslim sultan “rages most intensely by murdering Christians in the body … he, after all, does nothing by this but fill heaven with saints” — here are some more Western authorities:
According to S.J. Allen and Emilie Amt, university professors and editors of The Crusades: A Reader: “The Protestant leader Martin Luther had earlier preached against an Ottoman crusade, believing that it was a Catholic cause, and therefore wrong in the eyes of God. Luther changed his mind after Vienna, when the threat moved closer to home…” (p. 413).
Ditto for Thomas Madden (Crusades historian): “Luther set the tone for Protestant thought on the Turkish threat. When [Pope] Leo X was still trying to resurrect his crusade in 1520, Luther wrote that ‘to fight against the Turks is to oppose the judgement God visits upon our iniquities through them.’ In Luther’s view, crusades against the Ottomans were wars against God…. After the siege of Vienna in 1529, the Turkish threat became much more dire to Germans, and so Luther changed his mind” (A New Concise History of the Crusades, pp. 209-210).
Be that as it may; the relevant question here is, why does Gottfried intentionally misquote me — twice — as saying that Luther preached “passivity” when I wrote that he “originally preached passivity”? Simple: my formulation is correct, whereas something as “subtle” as omitting my qualifier (“originally”) leads to the formulation that Gottfried needs to knock out his strawman.
One can go on and on, but the point should be clear by now. Anyone interested in seeing more observations concerning Gottfried’s distortions is encouraged to go through the comments section of his article.[1]
As for the second, more important lesson. Although many Protestants made it a point to agree with my original article, for others, the Reformation and especially Luther seem to be beyond reproach. Now, on the one hand, I understand the frustration, especially among pro-Israel Protestants: they’ve had to apologize for and be embarrassed by Luther’s notorious antisemitism — and they’ll be damned if Islam is also going to be laid at Luther’s feet; hence the kneejerk response to any claim that negatively associates Luther with Islam.
But this misses the point of my original article entirely: to trace how and why the image of Islam dramatically improved in the West over the last few centuries; and yes, like it or not, Protestantism and its leaders played a major if unintentional role in this change, particularly by using “good” and “noble” Islam as a foil to demonize “bad” and “corrupt” Catholicism with. This is not a “controversial” view; it is established fact confirmed by many historians, including Protestant ones. Nor does the mere acknowledgment of this fact reflect, as Gottfried claims, “a repugnance [on my part] for the Protestant Reformation.”
To reiterate — and for those hard of reading or worse — here is what I wrote in my original article:
That the Protestant Reformation unwittingly benefited Islam should not be interpreted as an attack on the Reformation or a defense of Catholicism. Nor does it say anything about the theological merits, or truths, of either…. Rather, the point here is that the actions of fallible men, of both religious persuasions, had unforeseen consequences. And, if the historic rifts within Christendom—beginning at Chalcedon in 451, when Orthodoxy (not Catholicism or Protestantism) broke apart—always worked to Islam’s advantage, it should come as no surprise that the greatest of all Christian sunderings also had the greatest impact.
Incidentally, the irony of all this is that it is I, not those who revere Luther, who emulates his approach. For I truly find no man — not just popes, but Protestants, including their founder — infallible. (Hence here I stand. I can do no other.)
From here we reach the greatest of all lessons: while increasing numbers of Western people are aware that Islam is hostile to the other, many fail to progress beyond this simple truism. The result is that they see only half the picture: yes, Islam is an intrinsically militant and supremacist creed — but that is not why the West is currently being terrorized by it. Rather, the West is being terrorized because of the West. Long gone are the days when Muslims, through sheer might alone, threatened and invaded the West. Today Islam is being enabled and empowered entirely thanks to a number of warped Western philosophies and “isms” that have metastasized among and crippled the populace from effectively responding to the suicidal road their civilization is speeding on.
As such, a little introspection is needed.
Plainly put, those who insist Islam is intolerant and violent — while equally insisting that nothing associated with them or theirs can ever be implicated in the equation — should consider if they are consigning themselves to a permanent state of limbo, forever taking one step forward followed by another step back in their struggle against jihad.
Notes:
[1] Perhaps the most comprehensive fisking Gottfried received was at the keyboard of commenter Brian Kelly. As it still appears as “awaiting moderation,” relevant portions of it follow:
Everything from the title of this article on downwards is a misrepresentation of Ibrahim’s article. The article being complained about here by Gottfried just doesn’t exist. The one Gottfried links to just doesn’t say the things that Gottfried says it says. Let’s fisk out some examples, starting with the title:
Gottfried’s Title: ISLAM’S EXPANSION ACROSS EUROPE: NOT MARTIN LUTHER’S FAULT
Did Ibrahim say that Islams expansion into Europe was Martin Luther’s fault? No. In fact, he disavowed that claim of course.
Gottfried: “Raymond Ibrahim’s bizarre version of the blame game.”
What follows is Gottfried’s version of the blame game, which Ibrahim never participated in, and even disavowed.
Gottfried: “he places the blame for Muslim Turkish expansion across Eastern and Central Europe in the sixteenth century at the doorstep of Martin Luther.”
No he doesn’t. Why doesn’t Gottfried QUOTE Ibrahim placing the blame on Martin Luther? Answer: because Ibrahim doesn’t place the blame on Martin Luther.
Gottfried: “[implying that Ibrahim said] If this wayward monk had not nailed his ninety-five theses to the door of the Wittenberg cathedral on October 31, 1517, and had not launched a rebellion against the Roman Church, the Muslim danger supposedly could have been contained.”
Says who? Gottfried again. Only Gottfried makes this BIZZARE claim. Not Ibrahim. Again, if Ibrahim had said this, Gottfried would have quoted it.
Gottfried says: “[implying that Ibrahim said] Not only did Luther and his followers weaken the unity of the Christian West, but also gave support to the Muslim penetration of Europe. While the Turkish army moved from Hungary westward toward Vienna, Luther was urging “passivity” before the hostile invaders and, according to Ibrahim, implicitly and explicitly aiding the Turks by weakening the resolve of Christian Europe.”
Again, Gottfried is implying that ‘Ibrahim says’, but not quoting him, because Ibrahim NEVER said it.
That’s a very unscholarly, very sloppy, and sensationalized misrepresentation of what Ibrahim said. He NEVER said that Luther ‘gave support’ to the Muslim penetration of Europe. It is words like ‘giving support’ which make the difference between unhelpful actions in favor of an enemy, and treason.
Gottfried says: There are so many holes in this anti-Protestant brief that one hardly knows where to begin one’s criticism.
However many “holes” one imagines one sees, a good place to begin one’s criticism is to actually READ the article properly to make sure the holes exist. Make sure you can represent a person properly before you disagree with him. Use quotes, like a professor teaches their students to do in cases like this. Quotes force the writer to be balanced.
Gottfried says: He did not urge “passivity” in the face of this civilizational crisis. Indeed, Luther was willing to join forces with Catholic princes, even though they were killing and expelling his followers, in order to combat the “Devil’s army.”
Ibrahim did say that Luther ORIGINALLY preached passivity towards Islam, but notice how Gottfried takes the ‘originally’ out and argues as if Ibrahim said it without the qualification of ‘originally’.
[…]
Gottfried said: “Moreover, between 1525 and 1530, even while the Turks were moving on Vienna, the Habsburg emperor and Europe’s premier defender of the Catholic faith, Charles V, was fighting against his fellow-Catholics, including Pope Clement VII, the French, the English, and the Republics of Venice and Florence.”
Well, yes. Which is exactly the kind of thing that Ibrahim himself drew attention to out in his balanced article, and a little more scholarly reading of Ibrahim’s article and less indignation would have spared Gottfried from indignantly adding the missing balance to Ibrahim’s article which Ibrahim had already *explicitly* added himself : Ibrahim said: ‘By 1535, “It was one of the bitterest truths,” writes historian Roger Crowley, “that the Catholic King [Charles V] would spend more time, money, and energy fighting the French and the Protestants than he ever devoted to the war with [Sultan] Suleiman” ‘
Ibrahim’s article itself has many other calm and scholarly disavowals all of the kinds of point that Gottfried is falsely accusing him of making:
Ibrahim said: That the Protestant Reformation unwittingly benefited Islam should not be interpreted as an attack on the Reformation or a defense of Catholicism.
So: the summary of the situation is that Gottfried’s article is a big, emotional, straw man. It is hysterical. As Ibrahim says, he does not have a ‘horse in this race’. Unfortunately, when there is a many-century-old fight going on, even if you don’t want to take part in it, people will perceive you that way, and it’s often the people who have a horse in the race who can’t but see you that way. Those whose views are biased and emotional see the opposing views of others as biased and emotional, even when they are not.
SIDNEY LOGGINS says
Many do not understand that Luther was not a protestant – he was a reformer, and that is markedly different. The Protestants just “made it up” as they went with regard to theology…perhaps the greatest offender was Calvin but Wesley shares in this “my personal revelations are applicable to all Christians…” Christ did not teach Calvinism nor did He teach Wesleyanism. In Lutheran circles (and others) this is known as “Evangelicalism” where original doctrines are discarded or changed to reflect “works theology”, that I can somehow “participate” in my own salvation… a greater heresy does not exist.
Sons of Liberty says
Sidney Loggins , you are right that Luther did not want to leave the Catholic Church and was upset when followers wanted to burn down Catholic Churches. However, he had major complaints with the Church and the fact that we are saved by the GRACE of Jesus Christ was not being emphasized . Ibrahim brings up some excellent points in the fact that THE CHRISTIAN CHURCH had many disagreements long before Muhammad or Martin Luther . Jesus talked about FALSE PROPHETS ,…and so did Paul later in his writings. Satan works to DIVIDE Jesus Christ’s Church and has from it’s beginning in the 1st Century AD. I believe that was what Raymond Ibrahim was correctly exposing in regards to the Christian Church not putting up a UNIFIED DEFENSE to the spread of Islam . It is still obvious today in the fact that Lutheran Services and Catholic Charities are taking Federal money to SETTLE Muslim refugees all across the USA ,.without realizing what they are DOING TO OUR COUNTRY ! They don’t realize that they are HELPING the Muslim Brotherhood with the HIRYA , ( CIVILIZATION JIHAD ). President Trump has the right idea , we can help them MORE over in their OWN COUNTRIES by providing safe spaces and aid. You don’t bring in people who because of their ideology will NEVER ASSIMILATE and will NEVER ACCEPT the US CONSTITUTION as the LAW OF THE LAND . They BELIEVE IN SHARIA , …..which will never be accepted in the US ,…unless we bring in so many that through birth rates they take control ! Which is EXACTLY what Obama and the Democrats want to do ,…TO TRANSFORM AMERICA . Leo Hohmann’s book , STEALTH INVASION , clearly shows what our government is up to ,..and the Lutherans and Catholics are HELPING THEM.
David Ramseur says
Most of those charities had already been thoroughly been infiltrated by the left. A lot of the Christian Church has been infiltrated by secular progressives masquerading as believers. These are the days we live in (at least in the post Christian west). It really is a shame.
Pablo says
Gottfried got FRIED!
Joe says
Ha ha, Fried by Gott!
I have no idea why he did this. What was going on in his head?
Infidel says
I just cannot comprehend as to how the LEFT DISCOUNTS Robert’s IMMENSE scholarship on Islam.. Man these articles and the prolific writing of his on this subject…..speak otherwise!!!! We on the right are so thankful that we have such a man amongst us…
ac says
If Raymond or any of the readers don’t know about this book, I just want to mention it:
“Abrahamic Religions: On the Uses and Abuses of History” by Aaron W. Hughes
“in recent years, the category “Abrahamic religions” has emerged as a vague referent and as an ecumenical term to explain the myths, structures, and historical interactions among these three religions. As used today, the term is a modern creation, largely a theological neologism. Although I shall eventually
conclude that we should abandon using the term, the problem is actually much deeper. Our employment of “Abrahamic religions” is not simply a terminological mistake, but primarily a categorical one.”
Michael Copeland says
“It is unbelief (kufr) to hold that the remnant cults now bearing the names of formerly valid religions such as “Christianity” and “Judaism” are acceptable to Allah….”
Manual of Islamic Law, “Reliance of the Traveller”, w4.
carol says
Wow! That sure needs to be trotted out whenever we hear the buddy buddy “Abrahamic religions” routine.
Sons of Liberty says
The problem with that term and even connecting it to Christianity or Judaism is the fact that Islam means SUBMISSION and that all unbelievers MUST SUBMIT to the supremacy of allah. Christians and Jews DO NOT FORCE anyone to accept our beliefs and therefore can’t be compared to Islam.
Wellington says
Gottfried did a simply sloppy job of responding to Ibrahim. But this is what passes often times for truth anymore. Perhaps Stanford will want to hire Gottfried. I see a future there for him.
gravenimage says
+1
carol says
Too eager to forge “truth” rather than to keep his eyes and ears open to the evidence.
Anonymous says
Points well made. Reading William Federer’s book “Who Is King in America” he, too, makes the point regarding Charles V and the Peace of Augsburg. I had never heard of this, but it became clear just how dire things were in Europe. We know too little of our own history and and as Federer suggests at the beginning of his book, not knowing ones history is tantamount to Alzheimer Disease. The Left has worked diligently on erasing European and American history. It’s interesting that Islam has consistently done the same from the beginning. If you don’t know where you have come from you can not know where you are going. Mr. Spencer has enlightened me as to the real facts of the Crusades. He is a hero.
carol says
Anonymous…two of my favourites are:
Dr Bill Warner The true nature of Islam
and
Paul Weston in Salisbury
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78av3gjYZIc
Ibrahim itace muhammed says
Raymond Ibrahim, why skipping crusade wars in the middleast? Is that because Christians committed worst atrocities in those wars and you don’t people to know more about them?
gravenimage says
Ibrahim itace muhammed has said before that Islamic violence is laudable–even mass rape and slaughter–but that no one can be allowed to defend against Muslim savagery.
mortimer says
Ibrahim, please DENOUNCE the genocide of 3 million Bengalis and genocidal rapes of 400,000 Bengali women in 1971 by the Pak Army! We are waiting.
400,000 GENOCIDAL RAPES AUTHORIZED BY SHARIA LAW IN BENGALI INVASION 1971 – ‘gonimoter maal’ (war booty)
During the war, a fatwa in Pakistan declared that the Bengali ‘freedom fighters’ were Hindus and that their women could be taken as the ‘booty of war’. Imams and Muslim religious leaders publicly declared that the Bengali women were ‘gonimoter maal’ (war booty) and thus they openly supported the genocidal rape of Bengali women by the Pakistani Army and Al-Badr (“the moon”) and the Al-Shams (“the sun”) militias that supported them. Numerous women were tortured, raped and killed during the war. Bangladeshi sources cite a figure of 400,000 women raped, giving birth to thousands of war-babies. The soldiers of the Pakistan Army and razakars also kept Bengali women as sex-slaves inside the Pakistani Army’s camps, and many became pregnant. The perpetrators also included Mukti Bahini and the Indian Army, which targeted noncombatants and committed genocidal rapes, as well as other crimes against humanity.
Koran 8.41 Justifies Rape of Captive Women: “And know that whatever ye take as spoils of war, lo! A fifth thereof is for Allah, and for the messenger and for the kinsman (who hath need) and orphans and the needy and the wayfarer, if ye believe in Allah and that which We revealed unto Our slave on the Day of Discrimination, the day when the two armies met. And Allah is Able to do all things.”
Sons of Liberty says
Exactly, gravenimage . Also, The Crusades were in response to the MUSLIM INVASION of Jerusalem and the Holy Land.
Wellington says
Indeed, gravenimage. The cretin, Ibrahim, aside, it is instructive that no defense of Islam ever “works.”
I can’t think of a single time when I have read a defense of Islam, here at JW or anywhere else, and over the course of some forty years of studying this religion, when I could say to myself, “Well, yes, Islam did good here because it was Islam. Glad it was around, et al.”
Of course, certain individual Muslim rulers over the centuries (and just common Muslims as well), most especially the ones not very devout, engaged in good actions, even noble ones at times (as Churchill himself said, sometimes the character of some Muslims is splendid but the religion nonetheless remains desultory in the extreme——or words to this effect by the Great Man), but NEVER have I encountered a defense of Islam as a whole that makes me think I have been too harsh with it. In fact, every year, the more I learn about this spiritual fascism which is Islam the more I am convinced that it is the longest-lived and best disguised evil ever instituted by man. Though, thankfully, the mask, the disguise, is slipping finally and it will continue to slip.
Of this I have no doubt. Good. But will it be done in time to save Western freedom? Here I have doubt.
gravenimage says
True, Sons of Liberty and Wellington.
As for your last point, Wellington, I fervently hope so.
Ibrahim itace muhammed says
Satan(holy spirit) dedicated worshiper Gravenimage, where is that celebrated forgiveness in Christianity? was it fulfilled by Jesus so that Christians can now take revenge? Afterall how many Christians were killed by Muslims before those brutal crusade wars where more than 20 million Muslims killed to the extent that fighters for Christ swimmed in human bloods up-to their ankles?
kabooooooooooooooooooooom says
You can’t swim in anything that only comes to your ankles, numbnutz. – although if you collect sufficient camel pee, instead of drinking it, in time you can go for a swim.
Being exposed to the product of islamic indoctrination, such as this pathetic arseclown should be sufficient to convince any rational thinker of the pure evil contained in it.
Return to shagging your goats and stop wasting valuable digital space.
gravenimage says
The appalling Ibrahim itace muhammed wrote:
Satan(holy spirit) dedicated worshiper Gravenimage, where is that celebrated forgiveness in Christianity?
…………………………..
How many times have we heard this from pious Muslims–that if Christians are “real” Christians, that they will gladly bare their children’s throats for the blade.
More:
was it fulfilled by Jesus so that Christians can now take revenge?
…………………………..
Defending your life and freedoms is not “revenge”.
emmett says
DID THEY BUILD TOWERS OF HUMAN HEADS ? DID THEY RAPE LITTLE CHILDREN ? DID THEY PROJECT ALL OF THEIR EVIL ANTI- HUMAN GARBAGE ON THEIR VICTIMS ?
Tom W Harris says
Anyone wondering why Gottfried write what he did can Google
and deduce that Gottfried is a self-hating Jewish piece of Nazi filth.. That’s why he attacked Raymond Ibrahim and distorted his views.
Ixor Kleb says
Thank you Tom,
I also noticed lurking in one of Paul Weston’s statements, “…our Christian-Greco-Roman heritage…”, the dropping of the traditional “Judeo-” from Judeo-Christian may also be revealing about Mr. Weston and his party.
gravenimage says
Ixor, I have not personally heard Paul Weston say anything anti-Jewish–although I have certainly not read all of his work.
I do know that antisemites *hate* him. Here’s the “Anti-Zionist League”:
Paul Weston
Paul Weston is a former member of the UK Independence Party (UKIP). In 2011 he left UKIP and founded the now defunct British Freedom Party (BFP) with members of the English Defence League (EDL) and former members of the British National Party (BNP). A firm friend of the Jewish tribe Weston has signed Yad Vashem’s guest book.
https://antizionistleague.com/scrapbook/jewish-organized-crime/traitors/paul-weston/
Lydia says
Thank you.
And as for preaching passivity, that precedes Luther and goes all the way back to Jesus and the sermon on the mount ‘turn the other cheek.’ There is a place for self defense, if one reads the entire bible it becomes clear.
( :
John Warren says
Why is there no mention of this quote by Gottfried in your complaint?
“it was not Protestants but the French Catholic king who assisted the Turks in regaining a foothold there. This came even while the French were persecuting Protestant Huguenots at home. Reducing the power of the Habsburgs, who ruled Spain and were Holy Roman Emperors in Germany, was clearly more important to his most Christian Majesty in Paris than launching a crusade against the Muslims.”
Politicianphobia says
So happy to see I bra him , the charmer taking time out to post.
gravenimage says
I presume you mean the appalling Ibrahim itace muhammed, and not the decent and erudite Raymond Ibrahim.