In 1922, Franz Pieper read the final volume of Henry Ford’s much-maligned International Jew. Since most Christians, owing to a woeful ignorance of both Scripture and history, along with a healthy dose of pro-Jewish propaganda, have not reached the Christian view of the Jews, and because Pieper makes his trustworthy judgment on the November Revolution known, I have deemed it worthwhile to present in English Pieper’s comments and corrections on this well-known work, which I have referenced before and which are available in Lehre und Wehre, 68 (1922), pp. 281–282.
Ford and the Jews. We have received the fourth issue of Ford’s International Jew: “Aspects of Jewish Power in the United States.” The issue contains some true things. But the mistake of the presentation is the [p. 282] one-sidedness. International Jews are accused of being “getters” in the sense that they do not create value themselves, but financially exploit the value created by others. That the International Jew has a special skill in this cannot be denied. Only it is to be added that also the representatives of the Anglo-Saxon race, which is compared with the Jewish race, have developed a considerable skill in procuring the financial exploitation of the labor of others.
International Jews are further accused of considering themselves God’s “chosen people,” making propaganda in this sense, and claiming [beanspruchen] a dominant position in the world. This, too, cannot be denied. In the Zionist movement, Orthodox and Reform Jews find themselves together. But Ford — or the man who writes for Ford — takes the ruling position that he begrudges the Jews when he claims for the Anglo-Saxon-Celtic race: “They are the ruling people, chosen throughout the centuries to master the world.”
The International Jew, another accusation reads, is a revolutionary. This is certainly true, as recent history proves. But recent history likewise proves that representatives of the Anglo-Saxon-Celtic race have just made common cause with the Jews, in order to instigate revolution in Germany and thus win the war.
About the calling of the Jews in the world it is said: “They are now without a mission of blessing.” This, too, requires a certain restriction. The International Jew, or the Jewish people in their dispersion among all nations [Völker], has the calling to warn all nations against the contempt of the Gospel of Christ crucified. Would that the nations might take to heart this calling of the Jewish people. At the same time, as we know from Scripture, God had this in mind in the dispersion of the Jews among the nations, that the Jews be provoked to faith in the Gospel by the example of the Christians, not to faith in the “Anglo-Saxon religion,” as Ford writes. Also the plagues with which they plague each other should cause both parts, Jews and Gentiles, to repent, because it is still the time of grace. F. P.
As one can tell, Pieper did not reject the teaching of Scripture on the Jews just because certain men taught too strongly against them. For this reason, he must certainly, like Luther, be posthumously damned for these comments — and this will have to be declared by all to be right and Christian! In any case, no blasphemous excommunication of a church body which lies that it is the same one that Pieper served for over 50 years has any effect, because only the excommunication of Christ is valid. Otherwise Luther is certainly in hell, for he was for much of his life under the false excommunication of the Pope; this is the end result of the sacerdotalist poison in the churches.
Now, my readers are probably familiar with the so-called stab-in-the-back myth, which was, according to our modern “objective historians,” “an anti-Semitic conspiracy theory.” Hmm … how should I judge these high priests of Hedone? Should I join with the Missouri Synod, which with good reason said, “representatives of the Anglo-Saxon-Celtic race have just made common cause with the Jews, in order to instigate revolution in Germany and thus win the war,” or should I join the modern church bodies calling themselves Lutheran, who repudiate so-called anti-Semitism at every turn, especially that of Luther? Although this is not a difficult decision, the command of Scripture makes every other decision most unappealing: “Therefore do not be ashamed of the testimony about our Lord, nor of me His prisoner.” Whoever would be ashamed of Luther, Pieper, and others for their anti-Jewish statements, with which they spread “the testimony about our Lord,” may join the heathen religion of the Jews; or he could, perhaps, return to the Christian religion. Whatever he decides, may the words guide his choice: “How long will you limp on both sides? If the LORD is God, follow Him; but if Hedone, follow her.”
Altlutheraner 