You Shall Not Kill

Because the Catholic Church, other Christian churches, and almost every national government permit exceptions to God's commandment that ""you shall not kill,"" Johannes Ude examines Catholic moral law to discern whether this commandment has absolute validity or may be modified so that in certain instances it is permissible to kill another human being. Written clandestinely during the Hitler regime, the book examines the generally accepted Catholic teachings of moral theologians and philosophers and finds that while they almost always reject abortion, suicide, sterilization, and the killing of terminally ill or mentally disabled persons, they justify the death penalty and ""just defensive"" wars. Ude concludes that because Christ commanded to love one's neighbors, including one's enemies, ""You shall not kill"" does not permit any exceptions and denies not only the right but especially the duty of self-defense, and, consequently, repudiates all wars. Ude firmly believes that the highest authority of the Catholic Church must forbid its members to fight in wars. He vehemently opposes the taking of interest (usury) and names capitalism a major cause of war, along with the weapons industry, competition for oil, and the complicity of Christian churches. ""A classic, courageous work drawing on the full resources of the Christian faith in response to Hitler. Ude's voice is today a cry of faith and hope, to a people on the brink of total death, that we shall not kill."" --Jim Douglass, author, JFK and the Unspeakable ""Regardless of how many books you have read on nonviolence and justified violence, you have read one too few until you read Johannes Ude's Thou Shall Not Kill. Completed just prior to being sent to a concentration camp by the Nazis in 1944, and employing with scholarly rigor the traditional categories of Catholic moral theology, he surgically removes all rational possibilities of just war theory having any place in the Church's life or in the Christian's life, while clarifying why nonviolent love as lived by Jesus is the only acceptable moral option for any Christians."" --Emmanuel Charles McCarthy, Byzantine Catholic priest; author, All Things Flee for Thou Fleest Me and Christian Just War Theory ""Johannes Ude's courage to write You Shall Not Kill under the murderous yoke of Nazi power is biblical. An uncompromising, nonviolent conviction burns up the pages of this modern prophecy. Ude's text survived underground despite his having been exiled from his province and imprisoned twice. His knowledge of war and spiritual torment and his truth-telling about war are portraits of Christ awaiting crucifixion: war is an evil horror; every war is an unjust war; Christians, you must refuse military service! Jesus demands nonviolence, no exceptions--this truth is the heart of Ude's message. Ingrid Leder's translation of Ude's now available spiritual gem is a gift to all English-speaking Christians, who today must heed Ude's cry, through Jesus, to 'put up the sword' or perish."" --Brayton Shanley, cofounder, Agape Community, Ware, MA Johannes Ude (1874-1965), an Austrian priest and university professor who earned doctorates in theology, philosophy, economics, and the natural sciences, wrote more than 150 books and pamphlets. A prominent figure in the international pacifist movement, he was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize twelve times--once by Albert Schweitzer. In the more than four thousand speeches he gave throughout Europe, he emphasized that providing for a dignified existence for every human being is a prerequisite for peace. For this and other views he was imprisoned under Hitler.