Martin Luther

Martin Luther

1. CONTEXT

   • Church
     • Roman Catholic Church — authority of Pope = crowned every monarch, top of political pyramid >> infallible
     • 1520. CHOICE. Unified Europe under authority of Catholic Church = shattered & splintered
       • Culmination of 3 centuries of discontent towards performance & life of Church = Not EVENT but PROCESS [14th to 17th cen] — Peter Wallace
   • Social & Economic Problems
     • Plague & Black Death
       • Mid 14th cen — Europe experiences plague >> prior = overpopulated & underfed [pop = 75-80mil]
       • Bad harvests = famine >> catastrophic 30-40% pop wiped out in 10 years >> TESTED FAITH, Theology ramped up
     • Technological Changes
       • Urban phenomenon — shift from agricultural >> 16th cen 20% pop Germany lived towns [Cologne pop. 40,000]
       • 1457. Johannes Gutenberg invented PRINTING PRESS — books could only be produced by copyist, production = slow & expensive
         • Revolutionised availability of books = 1460-1500 more books produced than whole history beforehand
   • Religious Crisis
     • Catholic Church Theology = 7 SACRAMENTS [sacred] means by which God could communicate >> Marriage, Baptism, Penance etc. [Justification by Works ]
     • Western Schism
       • Internal rivalries & factions >> prior to Ref [mid 14th cen] = fatally weakened
       • 3 claiming to be Pope >> Holy Roman Empire, Pope Charlemagne crowned first emperor 800 | Pope Boniface VIII not crowned French king — Palais des Papes, Avignon = French chose own Pope
     • Anti-Clericalism
       • Clergy — extravagant lifestyle, supposed to taken vow of poverty >> marrying & children — against vows to remain alone
       • Pope Alexander VI [1492-1503] made cardinal by uncle, selling church offices to family >> ability to bribe
     • Heresies
       • John Wycliffe [1320s-84] & Lollards >> English philosopher, all access Bible — Lollards group of preachers, teaching abuses of corruption
       • Jan Hus [1372-1415] >> Bohemia, popular preacher, disciple of Wycliffe’s translated writing into Czech language — Chaplin to uni of Prague >> 1415. Tried for treason [burned at stake] looked at as champion of protestant ideas
   • Ranke [german historian 19th cen] ‘there have been few times in which the awareness of crisis has reached and encompassed all social classes and pervaded suc h extensive areas of Western Europe’

2. ERASMUS

   • Humanism
     • Fall of Constantinople to Ottoman Empire 1453 — ancient literature to West
     • Education = Key >> keen to return to original sources, civilisation based & reliable, not copies & corruptions
     • ‘Ad Fontes’ back to sources >> Diarmaid MacCulloch ‘the best definition of a humanist is an editor of text’
     • The Donation of Constantine [ancient document] = promised power to Bishop of Rome >> Lorenzo Valla discovered forgery
   • Leading humanist scholar 16th cen. >> never became Protestant, remained Catholic.
   • Early 16th cen. = 30% all books published, were of Erasmus’ writings >> Adagai 1500 | The Handbook of the Christian Soldier 1504 | In Praise of Folly 1511
   • The New Testament — published 1516, used most ancient manuscripts of Bible >> opened doors of teaching = scrutiny. Original vs Vulgate

3. EARLY LIFE

   • Born 1482, Saxony, Germany. University of Erfurt = graduated 1505 with MA degree in law >> return to uni [thunderstorm, patron saint etc] >> Monastery
   • Exercised by guilt >> self-mortification. 1507. Ordained as a priest, felt too sinful to engage in godly act. 1509. Went on pilgrimage [appalled by sights in Rome]
   • Indulgences
     • Tetzel = leading expert in selling indulgences >> buy slip of paper = buy whomever time out of purgatory... pay for salvation
     • 1517. Hard sell of indulgences >> Charles V & Pope keen to rebuild Vatican. ‘As soon as the coin in the coffer rings / the soul from purgatory sprints’
   • Conversion & Justification by Faith
     • 1509 >> Wittenberg university >< 1516 teaching using Erasmus’ Greek New Testament
     • ‘The righteous [or just] shall live by faith’ Romans 1: 16-17
     • FAITH — evidence & experience. Jesus on cross = price for human sin >> JUSTIFICATION BY FAITH
   • Early Ref
     • Luther >> 95 Thesis — salvation not bought by money.
     • Called to Church Council in Heidelberg in Germany — Frederick the Wise [prince of Saxony] protection. Cross-examined = refused to retract words
     • Charles V [imperial emperor] power play between imperial & papacy >> July 1519 Imperial Diet in Leipzig Germany = examined before John Eck, attacked power of Pope
     • 1520. Papal Bull = excommunicating Luther >> burned >> ‘Diet of Worms’ tried for heresy = refused to recant ‘here i stand i can do no other’

4. REFORMATION

   • German Towns
     • Philip Melanchthon [1497-1560] — Luther right hand man >> in absence championed cause of religious reform...clerical celibacy abolished overnight = allowed to marry
     • Andreas Karlstadt [1486-1541] thorough-going revision, mass should be banned, clergy not wear fancy vestments >> rapid reform, iconoclastic riots = radical refashioning
     • Martin Bucer [1491-1551] Luther = too conservative... new protestant on scene Zwingli, led alternative movement
     • Reformation = german towns >> middle-class rising to sustain & protect political power | cities = printing presses, universities & new ideas
     • Luther produced new translation of Bible from Erasmus’ Greek New Testament in German language 1523
   • Peasants War
     • Appeal to German nationalism >> 1520 published address to Christian nobility of German nation — patriotism of German princes, assert power against Charles V & Pope
     • 1522-23. Knights Revolt — many bishops, churchmen who opposed Lutherism = attacked & killed >> defenders of peasantry, exacerbated predicament of peasants
     • ‘Blessed are the poor in spirit for they will inherit the earth Jesus, Matthew’s Gospel, Ch 5.
     • Thomas Muntzer [1488-1525] — radical views, complete reordering of society >> figurehead of peasants revolutions, religious toleration accepted
     • LUTHER AGAINST... extreme betrayal, followers of Luther >> Against the Robbing and Murdering Hordes of Peasants 1525 ‘it is just as when one must kill a mad dog; if you do not strike him, he will strike you’
   • Princely Ref
     • After 1525. German princes coordinated work, ref become princely led magisterial movement, carefully controlled
     • Slowly began to transform Germany >> drew up state parliaments, systems of gov, legal systems etc at state level
     • Patchwork quilt of territories — decision to remain Catholic or adopt Protestantism | 1536 Luther died | 1530 Diet of Augsburg = all Protestants together, agreed upon confession of faith, Lutherism etc .
       • 1555 = Treaty of Augsburg >> TRUCE between Charles V & Schmalkaldic League