 The
95 Theses
The explosion finally came around
the matter of the financing of the lavish building program of Saint Peter's
Basilica in Rome. As an untended spokesman for this critical mindset,
in 1517 Martin Luther posted his 95 theses on the door of the Wittenburg
castle church protesting, for theological reasons, the sale of indulgences
to finance the pope's schemes.
Behind this defiant action
was a long personal pilgrimage of Luther, one based on an deep desire to
unburden himself of a profound sense of guilt and personal condemnation
before God's judgment. For Luther, a personal breakthrough occurred as
the message sank into the head of this Augustinian professor concerning
Paul's teaching (Galatians and Romans) about divine Grace and forgiveness
received through the simple faith of the believer--and not through the
demands of any religious law or requirements of a religious system. So
"liberated" was he that he felt that his discovery had to be brought to
the world. The occasion of the sale of indulgences brought this desire
to the fore. With this action of challenging papal authority, Luther, unaware
of where this would eventually take him, uncorked an explosive force among
fiercely faithful Christians. It also excited the political interests of
the German princes who saw in this theological revolution an economic/political
opportunity they could not pass up.
For Luther the reform movement
was related to the matter of a sinner's personal justification before God.
Luther showed little interest in making broader changes within Christianity
beyond the throwing off of Roman spiritual authority--with its traditions
of works-righteousness. Substantial changes in worship, for instance,
were of lesser interest to Luther. Also the episcopal form of church
government (rule by bishops) was kept by Luther--though with the understanding
that the bishops were answerable to the local princes--not to Rome.
The pope's ability to reply
to Luther's challenge to ecclesiastical authority was greatly limited by
the protection that Frederick, imperial elector, placed around Luther.
Meanwhile, in Luther's debates with the papal opponents sent to silence
him, he was gradually drawn more deeply into a position defiant of Rome.
By 1520, Luther's defiance of Rome was total. To Luther, Rome was the anti-Christ.
At the end of that year Luther boldly and publicly burned the papal bull
requiring his submission. Luther, and much of Germany with him, was in
full religious rebellion against Rome.
Emperor Charles V Fights Back
 The
newly elected Holy Roman Emperor, Charles V (ruler of: powerful Spain and
its wealthy American colonies, the commercially energetic Netherlands,
and Austria and much of Italy), now took up the issue on the side of the
Roman church. Luther, now excommunicated but still under the protection
of Frederick and widely popular in Germany, was called by the Emperor to
an Imperial Council at Worms to give account of his views. Here Luther
stood firm in his views against the Roman church. Under an Imperial guarantee
of his freedom, Luther was able to get away from the Council before the
guarantee was retracted. From then on for the rest of his life, Luther
remained in seculsion--publishing works against the papacy and bringing
forth his German translation of the Bible.
In the meanwhile the Emperor
found himself preoccupied by an on-going war with France over control of
various cities and principalities in Italy. Thus the Emperor was seriously
distracted in his effort to quiet Luther. Then the Turkish threat to the
Emperor's Austrian holdings rose up again. Luther was relatively safe.
The Peasant War
Meanwhile the spiritual rebellion
of Luther against Rome soon spread as a mood of political rebellion of
the German commoner against princely authority. The autonomy of the individual
religious conscience gave over easily to the idea of the autonomy of the
individual political conscience. But in this, Luther proved to be no rebel.
In fact, he stood strongly on the side of the princes against the German
rebels (Karlstadt and Müntzer) who took up the political cause of
the German commoner against their rulers. In the peasant rebellion of 1524-1525,
Luther came down harshly against the peasants. The peasants and their leaders
were put down cruelly (6,000 peasants lost their lives alone in the one-day
battle of Frankenhausen).
The result of the Peasant
War was to move real power over to the various German princes. Thus in
Germany, the rule of the church was not a matter either of local congregational
power--nor of the power of popes and bishops. Rather, it was the ruling
prince in each of the many principalities that made up Germany who determined
each in his own territory its particular Christian character. Some remained
loyal to Rome (the southern German princes), some followed the Lutheran
line (the northern German princes). But in any case it was the local princes
who made that determination. The dependence of church on state was thus
set as the characteristic feature of German Christianity--a feature lasting
down into the 20th century.
Furthermore, because of Luther's
deep conservatism and the limitation of his vision of reform solely to
the context of an ongoing, though theologically reformed, agrarian medieval
religious order, Luther's movement remained confined to a highly rural,
still medieval north-central Europe--and had almost no impact in any of
the rapidly developing European urban areas. |
Miles
H. Hodges - 2006
