McCain ally Hagee sees Hitler as fulfilling God’s will

May 21, 2008

Last week, John Hagee, a televangelist sought out by John McCain for political support, expressed regret to Catholics for his attacks on the Roman Catholic Church (he’s called the church, among other things, “the great whore” and “a false cult system”). This week, it looks like it’s time for yet another apology.

John Hagee, the controversial evangelical leader and endorser of Sen. John McCain, argued in a late 1990s sermon that the Nazis had operated on God’s behalf to chase the Jews from Europe and shepherd them to Palestine. According to the Reverend, Adolph Hitler was a “hunter,” sent by God, who was tasked with expediting God’s will of having the Jews re-establish a state of Israel.

Seriously. He really did make the argument.

This is the guy whose support McCain worked for a year to earn. It’s also the guy McCain refuses to repudiate, and to this day, whose endorsement he’s “proud” and “glad” to have.

For that matter, it’s also the same guy Joe Lieberman defended on Fox News last week, because, as Lieberman explained, Hagee “represents a lot of people in this country, particularly Christians who care about the state of Israel.”

More from Sam Stein’s report:

Going in and out of biblical verse, Hagee preached: “‘And they the hunters should hunt them,’ that will be the Jews. ‘From every mountain and from every hill and from out of the holes of the rocks.’ If that doesn’t describe what Hitler did in the holocaust you can’t see that.”

He goes on: “Theodore Hertzel is the father of Zionism. He was a Jew who at the turn of the 19th century said, this land is our land, God wants us to live there. So he went to the Jews of Europe and said ‘I want you to come and join me in the land of Israel.’ So few went that Hertzel went into depression. Those who came founded Israel; those who did not went through the hell of the holocaust.

“Then god sent a hunter. A hunter is someone with a gun and he forces you. Hitler was a hunter. And the Bible says — Jeremiah writing — ‘They shall hunt them from every mountain and from every hill and from the holes of the rocks,’ meaning there’s no place to hide. And that might be offensive to some people but don’t let your heart be offended. I didn’t write it, Jeremiah wrote it. It was the truth and it is the truth. How did it happen? Because God allowed it to happen. Why did it happen? Because God said my top priority for the Jewish people is to get them to come back to the land of Israel.” (Listen to the audio below.)

The sermon, which was first posted by Bruce Wilson on his site, Talk To Action, adds another element to Hagee’s controversial stance on the state and history of Israel. It also may provide a new round of political headaches for McCain who has admitted that seeking out Hagee’s endorsement was a mistake, but still declared himself “glad to have” it.

John Hagee’s Ministries did not immediately return request for comment.

I can’t imagine why not.

I’m trying to imagine what the reaction would be if Obama sought out a pastor, accepted his endorsement, campaigned alongside him, defended him from criticism, and then we learned that this same pastor thought Hitler was fulfilling God’s will. I have a hunch reporters might ask Obama if he’d be willing to repudiate such a person.

I have know these folks – its called “Calvinism” and yes, cartoonist Bill Waterson named Calvin is named for 16th-century theologian John Calvin, founder of Calvinism and a strong believer in predestination.

They believe we don’t have free will, we are all puppets on a string – it is very convenient for repugs, neocons, various criminals, addicts, and anyone else with strong “character defects” because it means you can really be as big a jerk as you please and you can proclaim you are doing God’s will when you do it.

In many ways – it is more about being a control freak – in this case, controlling God (hey – sounds kind of blasphemous, doesn’t it?).

It doesn’t matter what you did – you are doing the work on the LORD!

No point arguing with these folks or even trying to have a dialog, cuz they believe they speak for God him/herself.

More trivia: Hobbes is named after 17th-century philosopher Thomas Hobbes, who had what Watterson described as “a dim view of human nature.” According to Watterson, the two names are intended as a joke for people studying political science.

  • Tangentially, who in their right might would support a “loving God” who used Hitler as his agent?

  • It’s hard to believe that people find Jeremiah Wright to be horrible, but John Hagee to be basically OK.

    But they do. They actually do.

  • SteveT – works in strange ways, man – sometimes very VERY strange ways…

  • Well said little bear! (First Comment, May 21st, 2008 at 4:36 pm)

    Hagee wants to set things in place for a bizarre biblical end-times prohecy. Yup, the big one, Armageddon.

    What the hell kinda spiritual message is that!?

  • How much longer before racists and white-supremacists “sponsoring” the “evacuation” of white Afrikaner families from South Africa are exploiting current anti-immigrant violence there to whip up funds as much as the worst sort of pity among “white trash” types?

    (Especially when you consider where the rationale therefor–“fear of persecution”–is unlikely to be well-grounded or substantiated; on the contrary, such is all the more likely to be scripted to the point of nuanced.)

  • …argued in a late 1990s sermon that the Nazis had operated on God’s behalf to chase the Jews from Europe…

    Say it ain’t so Joe…

  • I guess Hagee and the wingnut hordes will have nothing to complain about when God allows the AntiBush to smite the political career of John McCain.

    Fundamentalists are so f’ed in the head it’s not even funny. They think that a God who could stop all manner of suffering (if He wanted to) is worthy of worship.

  • This isn’t about anti-semitism, but about blood, and soil, and heritage. And roots. It’s about patriotism and pride in one’s country.

    And Nazis have been left to feel they are underassault, their values, slipping away. They wear their swastika’s with pride; the Jews wear their Stars of David with shame. These Germans are proud to make their neighborhoods pure,, living among fellow Germans; the Jews are self-conscious, balking at being with their own in the ghettos.

    This is something Hillary understands, it’s etched deep in her DNA, but Obama never will.

  • What I find galling is that all this stuff has been on the web for months. And people are just catching on now? Geez.

  • I’m aware that the imporance of this is because if a Democrat said this it would be twisted and blown out of proportion, but by itself I don’t see any reason to take offense at this. Hagee isn’t in any way praising Hitler. He’s basically just claiming that some biblical prophesy anticipates what Hitler did.

    Keep in mind the Old Testament god was a pretty nasty, ruthless guy who did lots of things that you wouldn’t want your kids doing, like demanding you kill your own children, like bringing pain and suffering to the faithful just to test their faith, like slaughtering whole cities, etc etc. The Old Testament god was very capable of sending a guy like Hitler down to persecute the Jews. It was Jesus who taught him love and forgiveness, at least that’s what one should observe from the differences between the two books of the bible.

    If this passage was from the new Testament, mea culpa. But still, this one’s a stretch. Sorry.

  • Hagee’s is the unspeakable argument that George Steiner puts into Hitler’s mouth at the conclusion of The Portage to San Cristobal of A.H.. Hitler defends himself (at an ad hoc trial in the South American jungle) as the greatest Zionist ever.

  • Ah, Amazon has Steiner’s book online. Hitler speaks to his judges:

    “But did Herzl create Israel or did I? Examine the question fairly. * * * Perhaps I am the Messiah, the true Messiah, the new Sabbatai whose infamous deeds were allowed by God in order to bring His people home.”

    Sounds like Hagee, except for the Messiah part (or has that sermon not come to light yet?).

  • rian @ 13, there IS a tacit endorsement in Hagee’s Hitler comments. It’s not just that the Bible said those things WOULD happen, but that they SHOULD. The Apocalypse that precedes the final battle between good & evil where all good Christians will ascend to God’s right side can not happen, not until the Jews get all of their ducks in a row in Israel. Thus, the Holocaust was necessary, NOT a necessary evil, just necessary. And Hagee wants to ascend, apparently presumes he will, mainly because he accepts the word of God as it’s written (or as we think it was written) in the Bible. Because the Holocaust gets HIM that much closer to Heaven via the Apocalypse, it’s all good in the hood, so let the Nazis mettle in the schtetl.

  • So, according to Hagee, Adolph got a bad rap in being vilified by history when in fact he was the fall guy for only carrying out God’s plan. Who knew the history books had it so wrong? McCain must really be desperate to reach out to pond scum like Hagee and still welcome his endorsement.

  • First: a minor correction. Talk2Action is Dr. Fred Clarkson’s site, Bruce is just one of the many contributors, along with Ed Brayton, Frank Cocozzelli, Rob Boston, Bill Berkowitz and the invaluable dogemperor, among others. And why the single site that keeps a very close eye on the intersection between toxic religion and toxic politics is so little known stumps me. All this stuff on Hagee — and more on the much more dangerous Rod Parsley — has been there for months.

    And after Hagee fibnishes apologizing to the jews, he’s got the gays (“responsible for Katrina”), women (“What’s the difference between a woman with PMS and a terrorist? You can argue with a terrorist.”) and blacks (“Slavery has returned … to the Cornerstone Baptist Church” which might have been just an un-funny line in the North, but not in Texas or any other ex-slave state).

    And, btw, to soothe my own ego, I listed ALL of these things — and a more detailed description of Hagee’s real reasons for supporting Hagee in my original comment on him here — lost in my usual long-windedness, of course.

  • Hitler, like Bush, listened to God. And like the rest of good Germans, just followed orders. Thank you Mr Hagee, for making it clear.

    But I have a follow-up question… I understand now that Hitler’s attempt to exterminate Jews was a actually for their own good — he wanted them to have their own country, to follow God’s plan. But what about all the Poles? They already had a country… And what about the Gypsies and the homosexuals? Were they supposed to have established a country of their own somewhere too?

  • Its funny- God can give life to a bunch of bones and turn them into a living entity again, but he needs Hitler to chase the Jews back to Israel. Couldn’t God just “create” Fed-Ex and ship the Jews back in one big swoop?

  • The shepherd leads the sheep – to the butcher.

    Americans are so anxious to believe the lies of their leaders, a damn shame it is

  • Hagee will have to explain why Hitler was intent on completely destroying
    every single Jew on the planet. If he had succeeded, there would be no Israel.

  • Um, and so what was the Spanish Inquisition? God warming up for the big “Final Solution” relocation?

  • Feeling that kind of hate to kill millions of Jews or Muslims is a one way ticket on a rocket sled to hell. Evangelicals, if anything, should be exterminated. But that ain’t right.

  • RickAmburgey – or at a more profound level. If God can do anything, can he create a rock that is so big, he cannot lift it?

  • ijusndcijns – its not the evangelicals that are the problem, its the pentecostals and the calvinist.

    Evangelicals believe in the NEW testament and the kind loving God that Jesus represents.

  • Well me lads, yon chap~~ Pastor-of-Disaster Hagee is a Good Head’ IF you like Cabbage!!

    There is an old saying in Scotland that goes…Awa an blie yer heed Hagee.

    In English this time…Away and biol your head Hagee.

    Bonnie Scotland where they just dig Micheal Moore and his great movies.

  • I think any one who believes in a god ( or any god) should take a IQ test. I think we should examine what makes us human…. Oh wait we have the discovery channel. This is another example of how organized religion brings the worst out of you. They think that god’s words are infallible, but what Hagee did was he took passages from the bible and spun it around so it would seem inevitable the he was right. “Oh I didn’t say it Jeremiah did.” Well Jeremiah didn’t know that some wack job art school reject was going to kill an ethnic group ass. And besides Europe was plagued with anti-semitism since the middle ages and probably before that, so if you’re going off and say that some “hunter” was going to make the jews go to back Palestine then you’re no better than a klansmen telling a black person to go back to Africa.

  • I know it hurts, but y’all should try to get inside a Bible thumpers head.

    The suffering God allows to jews be it Jesus’ crucifixion, those led from Pharoah by Moses, those exiled to Babylon… are necessary step[s to promote a steadfast love of Jahweh. These are tests of faith that are SOP for the big guy. Is it so far fetched to see Hitler as another test? A required tool to dish out heaps of suffering for these chosen people who will rule over this little nation that will host Amageddon and Hagee’s inevitable destiny as prophesied (and therefore unpreventable and welcomed since it needn’t be avoided).

    Again, it’s not as though Hagee needs to be HAPPY any suffering occurred. It’s not germane to the argument. It’s irrelevant to him. He’s a spectator watching a horrible train wreck he can do nothing about. The suffering MUST happen as part of the plan to fulfill the story he’s spent his entire life believing as much as any of us breathe.

    It’s all rather existential with teh appearance of cruelty, but in a fatalistic sense, it’s entirely sensible. If you don’t believe Biblical prophesies are
    a) infallibly true and inevitable
    b) capable of human intervention to accelerate events towards their destiny

    all of it can easily seem as though this man is a vicious anti-semite. He may well be, but there is a less hostile view. One that allows us to understand not just Hagee, but multitudes of others who are motivated by the same beliefs and aren’t so obviously unhinged

  • Love pastor Hagee and I heard better sermons from this pastor. However, the hunter (Hilter) murder millions of people he did not give them an option to go to Israel. So I don’t understand how he can say this is God’s will? I understand God Chatising us but the Jews really didn’t do anything sinful?

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