Posted on 06/30/2017 4:43:54 PM PDT by Gamecock
The year 2017 is the year of Martin Luther—or at least it should be. Nearly 500 years ago on October 31, 1517, Luther nailed (or “mailed,” for some historians debate this point) his 95 theses to the door of Wittenberg Castle Church.
Even so, Luther didn’t become a full-fledged protestor of the church in that single moment. It took him about eight years (1513-1521) to challenge and hammer out a more robust understanding of the gospel.
Have you ever wondered what Martin Luther was reading during this crucial time in his life? Maybe I’m just a nerd, but I thought at least someone else might be interested in what Luther was reading during his slow, but steady, transition out of the medieval church and into the world of reformation.
Remember, Luther’s goal wasn’t to invent or start an entirely new church. His goal was to reform the church and call her to repentance and faith in the abiding Word of God.
Here are four books Martin Luther read that made him question everything:
1. The Psalms Luther spent time studying and lecturing through the Psalms in the Bible. He began to realize that the Bible teaches we are not generally sinful, we are totally sinful. Here, Luther had the beginnings of what theologians later would refer to as “total depravity,” meaning that we are sinful in our thoughts, words, and deeds.
2. Romans After that, Luther lectured through Paul’s letter to the Romans. He came across Romans 1:17, “For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith, as it is written, ‘The righteous shall live by faith.’” The last part of this verse is a direct quotation from Habakkuk 2:4.
Luther began to see something that he never saw before. He began to see the doctrine of imputation—that we are declared right before God not by our own righteousness, but by the righteousness of another. He began to understand that the righteousness of God that was such a terror to him as a priest (because it told him that he was unholy and unworthy), was actually the righteousness from God that told him he was holy and worthy. God gives this right standing by faith alone. It is a righteousness that is received as a gift and not earned.
3. Galatians It wasn’t until Luther started lecturing through Galatians that he began to realize that faith does not justify us before God. Faith is merely an instrument that God uses. Faith is a tool by which we embrace Jesus Christ as he is offered to us in the gospel.
Faith is, as John Murry once said, “extrospective.” It looks outward—not inward—to embrace the God who gives himself. In other words, faith is only an empty hand. It justifies because it grabs hold of the Jesus who justifies (Rom. 3:26).
4. Hebrews The last book that turned a medieval priest into a true Reformer was the letter to the Hebrews. Luther began to embrace an entirely different understanding of how the Old and New Testaments relate to one another. He realized that the law is not simply the Old Testament and the gospel is the New Testament, but that the gospel of God can be seen as preached throughout both Old and New Testaments.
The same Jesus of the same gospel was offered freely to both Jew and Gentile alike, throughout the whole Bible. Sure, there was a greater and fuller proclamation of that message, such that it went out to the whole world instead of only Israel and their close neighbors—but the gospel was preached nonetheless!
In short, reading and studying the Bible is what ultimately made Martin Luther “protest” the medieval church. Luther was convinced that the Bible was worth listening to. So this year we celebrate the anniversary of a “recovery of the bright light of the gospel.” To God alone be all the glory (Soli Deo Gloria).
"A new commandment I give unto you, That ye love one another; as I have loved you, that ye also love one another."
Then came the officers to the chief priests and Pharisees; and they said unto them, Why have ye not brought him? The officers answered, Never man spake like this man. Then answered them the Pharisees, Are ye also deceived? Have any of the rulers or of the Pharisees believed on him? But this people who knoweth not the law are cursed. (John 7:45-49)
What is the basis for your assurance of truth? For it seems that the RC argument is that an assuredly (if conditionally) infallible magisterium is essential for determination and assurance of Truth (including writings and men being of God) and to fulfill promises of Divine presence, providence of Truth, and preservation of faith, and authority.
And that being the historical instruments and stewards of Divine revelation (oral and written) means that such is that assuredly infallible magisterium. Thus any who knowingly dissent from the latter must be in rebellion to God.
Agree or disagree?
You mean married to a former nun?
Meanwhile,
• Cardinal Bellarmine:
"Some years before the rise of the Lutheran and Calvinistic heresy, according to the testimony of those who were then alive, there was almost an entire abandonment of equity in ecclesiastical judgments; in morals, no discipline; in sacred literature, no erudition; in divine things, no reverence; religion was almost extinct. (Concio XXVIII. Opp. Vi. 296- Colon 1617, in “A History of the Articles of Religion,” by Charles Hardwick, Cp. 1, p. 10,)
• The Avignon Papacy (1309-76) relocated the throne to France and was followed by the Western Schism (1378-1417), with three rival popes excommunicating each other and their sees. Referring to the schism of the 14th and 15th centuries, Cardinal Ratzinger observed,
"For nearly half a century, the Church was split into two or three obediences that excommunicated one another, so that every Catholic lived under excommunication by one pope or another, and, in the last analysis, no one could say with certainty which of the contenders had right on his side. The Church no longer offered certainty of salvation; she had become questionable in her whole objective form--the true Church, the true pledge of salvation, had to be sought outside the institution.
"It is against this background of a profoundly shaken ecclesial consciousness that we are to understand that Luther, in the conflict between his search for salvation and the tradition of the Church, ultimately came to experience the Church, not as the guarantor, but as the adversary of salvation. (Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger, head of the Sacred Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith for the Church of Rome, “Principles of Catholic Theology,” trans. by Sister Mary Frances McCarthy, S.N.D. (San Francisco: Ignatius, 1989) p.196). http://www.whitehorseinn.org/blog/2012/06/13/whos-in-charge-here-the-illusions-of-church-infallibility/)
• Catholic historian Paul Johnson additionally described the existing social situation among the clergy during this period leading up to the Refomation:
“Probably as many as half the men in orders had ‘wives’ and families. Behind all the New Learning and the theological debates, clerical celibacy was, in its own way, the biggest single issue at the Reformation. It was a great social problem and, other factors being equal, it tended to tip the balance in favour of reform. As a rule, the only hope for a child of a priest was to go into the Church himself, thus unwillingly or with no great enthusiasm, taking vows which he might subsequently regret: the evil tended to perpetuate itself.” (History of Christianity, pgs 269-270)
Good overall post, but on the above, as RCs will tell you, the (novel and unScriptural) RC doctrine of ensured perpetual magisterial infallibility does not hold that Peter was infallible in his person or his personal words, nor would his supposed successors be, but that this protection from error only applies when formally declaring something on faith or morals to all the church.
For Rome has presumed to infallibly declare she is and will be perpetually infallible whenever she speaks in accordance with her infallibly defined (scope and subject-based) formula, which renders her declaration that she is infallible, to be infallible, as well as all else she accordingly declares.
The 95 thesis were actually intended to correct the Roman church from abuses regarding indulgences, the doctrine of which was not all that official. But if not against "authentic teachings of the Catholic church," then it seems that pope was mistaken in warning Luther in his edict "Exsurge Domine" that he risked excommunication unless within 60 days he recanted 41 sentences drawn from his writings, including the Ninety-five Theses. But that is not all that Luther taught after being persecuted for these 95 appeals, arguments and exhortations, and certainly, among others, Luther's rejection of the novel and unScriptural premise of ensured perpetual magisterial infallibility, and of required submission of faith, or of mind and will based on it is contrary to Catholic teaching.
But the question must be asked, just what do you consider "authentic teachings of the Catholic Church?" Only infallible teachings, or also encyclicals, bulls, social teaching, whatever the V2 and or the CCC says?
For we have variant beliefs on this among RCs, even here.
When a pope and council requires RC rulers to exterminate those she defines as heretics then it is indeed Rome doing the killing, if by proxy. Denial of that is simply sophistry.
Just stop your hate please. The Protestants killed Catholics all over England and Ireland for not being heretics.
The only historical time I know of when the Pope sent out legions was to defeat the Muslims at the battle of Lepanto. Do you object to that?
Who sent the official Inquisitors?
Funny. He’s spent many posts arguing with you about the Law.
I challenge him with four passages about the Gospel far upthread and ask him to respond. Utter silence.
Bump
Placemarker
What about the term "Mordecai the Jew" used in the OT book of Esther (see Esther 5:13; 8:7; 9:29; 10:3)? The Hebrew word used was "Yehudi" which means: Jewish (see http://biblehub.com/hebrew/3064.htm).
Rules on the religion forum are more restrictive than on the main one. Don’t be surprised if this reply of yours is deleted.
Thanks!
Praise God for the blessings contained in them.
I believe one of the best verses of the Bible is Psalm 128:1 AV:
"Blessed is every one that feareth the LORD; that walketh in (H)is ways."
Let me guess that it was reading these in, and knowing the nuances of the Koine that impressed Luther.
And actually, thogh he was a leader of the Reformation, the Dutch priest and humanist known as "Desiderius Erasmus" in producing a fine Byzantine.Majority Textform was the true Father of the Reformation.
Yes, it is, but at least you and me, and a few other ex Catholics here, were teachable. Most of the Catholics around here, are Berean types. They want to know the truth. I never tell them to leave the Catholic Church. A few have stayed in it, but most leave it on their own. 😀😂😊
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