The Wise Turk

"I would rather be ruled by a wise Turk than a foolish Christian." These words are popularly attributed to Martin Luther, but he did not actually say them. The quote is (perhaps erroneously) thought to be a loose paraphrase of what he said in his "Open Letter to the Christian Nobility of the German Nation":

It is said that there is no better temporal rule anywhere than among the Turks, who have neither civil nor temporal law, but only their Koran; and we must confess that there is no more shameful rule among us, with our spiritual and temporal law, so that there is no estate which lives according to the law of nature, still less according to Holy Scripture. (1)

That is not to say Luther wanted Turkish rule--he certainly did not! (2) In context he was not praising the Turks but mocking the Roman papacy in his day. Even so, the apocryphal quote gives us food for thought. Who is more fit to rule: the wise Turk or the foolish Christian? The idolator with strong political acumen, or the saint with no skill in statesmanship?

In the Middle Ages, which would have been preferable: to be a Christian under Muslim conquerors who brought a primitive form of religious toleration, or a Muslim under Christians crusaders who scarcely tolerated their own? Even with the numerous restrictions and withholding of 1st, 2nd and 3rd amendment rights, it is arguable that Muslims afforded Christians better civil protection than Christians granted them in turn.

(1) Qtd. from Veith's Luther's "wise Turk" quote that he didn't say.
(2) In the same letter, Luther writes, "But as the pope is Antichrist, so the Turk is the very devil. The prayer of Christendom is against them both."

EDIT: Reworded post to sound better.