Western Civilization_ Volume B_ 1300 to 1815 - Jackson J. Spielvogel [102]
Martin Luther. This painting by Lucas Cranach the Elder in 1533 shows Luther at the age of fifty. By this time, Luther’s reforms had taken hold in many parts of Germany, and Luther himself was a happily married man with five children.
Germanisches Nationalmuseum, Nuremberg//© Scala/Art Resource, NY
THE INDULGENCE CONTROVERSY Luther did not see himself as either an innovator or a heretic, but his involvement in the indulgence controversy propelled him into an open confrontation with church officials and forced him to see the theological implications of justification by faith alone. In 1517, Pope Leo X had issued a special jubilee indulgence to finance the ongoing construction of Saint Peter’s Basilica in Rome. Johann Tetzel, a rambunctious Dominican, hawked the indulgences in Germany with the slogan “As soon as the coin in the coffer rings, the soul from purgatory springs.”
Luther was greatly distressed by the sale of indulgences, certain that people who relied on these pieces of paper to assure themselves of salvation were guaranteeing their eternal damnation instead. Angered, he issued his Ninety-Five Theses, although scholars are unsure whether he nailed them to a church door in Wittenberg, as is traditionally alleged, or mailed them to his ecclesiastical superior. In either case, his theses were a stunning indictment of the abuses in the sale of indulgences. It is doubtful that Luther intended any break with the church over the issue of indulgences. If the pope had clarified the use of indulgences, as Luther wished, he would probably have been satisfied, and the controversy would have ended. But Pope Leo X did not take the issue seriously and is even reported to have said that Luther was simply “some drunken German who will amend his ways when he sobers up.” Thousands of copies of a German translation of the Ninety-Five Theses were quickly printed and were received sympathetically in a Germany that had a long tradition of dissatisfaction with papal policies and power.
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Martin Luther, Ninety-Five Theses (1517)
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Of course, Luther was not the first theologian to criticize the powers of the papacy. As we saw in Chapter 12, John Wyclif at the end of the fourteenth century and John Hus at the beginning of the fifteenth century had attacked the excessive power of the papacy. Luther was certainly well aware of John Hus’s fate at the Council of Constance, where he was burned at the stake on charges of heresy.
THE QUICKENING REBELLION The controversy reached an important turning point with the Leipzig Debate in July 1519. In Leipzig, Luther’s opponent, the capable Catholic theologian Johann Eck, forced Luther to move beyond indulgences and deny the authority of popes and councils. During the debate, Eck also identified Luther’s ideas with those of John Hus, the condemned heretic. Luther was now compelled to see the consequences of his new theology. At the beginning of 1520, he proclaimed: “Farewell, unhappy, hopeless, blasphemous Rome! The Wrath of God has come upon you, as you deserve. We have cared for Babylon, and she is not healed: let us then, leave her, that she may be the habitation of dragons, spectres, and witches.”4 At the same time, Luther was convinced that he was doing God’s work and had to proceed regardless of the consequences.
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Luther and the Ninety-Five Theses
To most historians, the publication of Luther’s Ninety-Five Theses marks the beginning of the Reformation. To Luther, they were simply a response to what he considered Johann Tetzel’s blatant abuses in selling indulgences. Although written in Latin, Luther’s statements were soon translated into German and disseminated