[Gamecock]

Ping

[Charles Henrickson]

4 Books That Made a Priest Leave the Church

I am a Lutheran pastor, and as soon as I saw that headline, the first book that came to my mind was Romans. Second was Galatians. Third was Psalms. So I was pleased to see that those were the first three books mentioned in this article.

[amihow]

And who made Luther smarter and more accurate than the persons Christ conferred authority on some 1,400 years prior?

Is Joseph Smith just as accurate? How about Henry8th? How about all the people who broke away from Luther and Henry in disagreement to start their own churchs?

Basic reality check: an opinion and it’s opposite cannot both he true.

[caww]

Good read.....thanks!

[sphinx]

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

Well, that's one way of putting it.

Luther was ordered on pain of excommunication to recant. Since he believed, on the points in dispute, that he was in the right, he regarded a forced and insincere recantation as perjury, a mortal sin. He refused to recant and was excommunicated.

As we might put it today, Luther didn't leave the church; the church left him.

[The KG9 Kid]

Submitted for your approval:

Constantine's Sword: The Church and the Jews, A History

I have a feeling that Martin Luther and James Carroll would have been at odds with one another and Luther would have saved his foulest scatalogical insults for any debate between them.

[Wuli]

“the persons Christ conferred authority on some 1,400 years prior”

The persons - leaders of the Roman Catholic Church in 1517 - were neither the apostles, nor the disciples of Yeshua before or after the crucifixion, nor even Paul nor Paul’s contemporaries. “Tradition” does not “pass” “the authority” of Christ. Like salvation it is a gift received by faith.

There is no Christ chosen “vicar” of Christ. In is an institutional invention, invented by humans NOT to “maintain the faith”, only to maintain the domination of the institution. Faith had been purged from the church institution by its own corruption, corruption that was secular, venal and sinful.

[Roman_War_Criminal]

One of them has to be the HOLY BIBLE!

[boatbums]

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).

That was an amazing insight Luther received. Though I believe that this was the gist of the gospel understood by the Apostles and passed down through them to their disciples, it got lost somewhere along the way. Man's merit and his personal righteousness established through his good works, avoidance of sin, reception of grace-infusing sacraments and his fidelity to the "church" became the way man could grab hold of the grace of God that brings salvation. It was this false gospel - this accursed gospel - that God exposed through Luther and the other Reformers before and after him. It truly is a wondrous thing to contemplate the grace of God - it takes more than a lifetime to ever grasp it all. Grace is undeserved, unmerited, unearned and NEVER based on what we do for God. It is the very reason why NO ONE can boast.

[Salvation]

Celebrating the Bible is great.

But remember that Luther didn’t come on the church scene until the 1500s.

It was only Catholicism until then. In fact, Luther had been educated as a Catholic.

But then he fell into disobedience and apostasy.

[af_vet_1981]

Then there was the fifth book, perhaps the most antisemitic book ever written. Germany implemented Luther's seven point plan and worked out his reformer's hatred with a vengeance.

He may have been just a fallen soul, like King Henry VIII, held under some restraint, until all restraints were removed and each re-formed Christianity in his own image, Henry to be the epitome of the English King with no boundaries, a murdering adulterer, and Luther to be the consummate German antisemite who wrote down his hatred for posterity while presuming to choose which books were and were not holy. The following are excerpts from Luther's work entitled "The Jews & their Lies":

"What shall we Christians do with this rejected and condemned people, the Jews? Since they live among us, we dare not tolerate their conduct, now that we are aware of their lying and reviling and blaspheming. If we do, we become sharers in their lies, cursing and blasphemy. Thus we cannot extinguish the unquenchable fire of divine wrath, of which the prophets speak, nor can we convert the Jews. With prayer and the fear of God we must practice a sharp mercy to see whether we might save at least a few from the glowing flames. We dare not avenge ourselves. Vengeance a thousand times worse than we could wish them already has them by the throat. I shall give you my sincere advice:

First to set fire to their synagogues or schools and to bury and cover with dirt whatever will not burn, so that no man will ever again see a stone or cinder of them. This is to be done in honor of our Lord and of Christendom, so that God might see that we are Christians, and do not condone or knowingly tolerate such public lying, cursing, and blaspheming of his Son and of his Christians. For whatever we tolerated in the past unknowingly ­ and I myself was unaware of it ­ will be pardoned by God. But if we, now that we are informed, were to protect and shield such a house for the Jews, existing right before our very nose, in which they lie about, blaspheme, curse, vilify, and defame Christ and us (as was heard above), it would be the same as if we were doing all this and even worse ourselves, as we very well know.

Second, I advise that their houses also be razed and destroyed. For they pursue in them the same aims as in their synagogues. Instead they might be lodged under a roof or in a barn, like the gypsies. This will bring home to them that they are not masters in our country, as they boast, but that they are living in exile and in captivity, as they incessantly wail and lament about us before God.

Third, I advise that all their prayer books and Talmudic writings, in which such idolatry, lies, cursing and blasphemy are taught, be taken from them. (remainder omitted)

Fourth, I advise that their rabbis be forbidden to teach henceforth on pain of loss of life and limb. For they have justly forfeited the right to such an office by holding the poor Jews captive with the saying of Moses (Deuteronomy 17 [:10 ff.]) in which he commands them to obey their teachers on penalty of death, although Moses clearly adds: "what they teach you in accord with the law of the Lord." Those villains ignore that. They wantonly employ the poor people's obedience contrary to the law of the Lord and infuse them with this poison, cursing, and blasphemy. In the same way the pope also held us captive with the declaration in Matthew 16 {:18], "You are Peter," etc, inducing us to believe all the lies and deceptions that issued from his devilish mind. He did not teach in accord with the word of God, and therefore he forfeited the right to teach.

Fifth, I advise that safe­conduct on the highways be abolished completely for the Jews. For they have no business in the countryside, since they are not lords, officials, tradesmen, or the like. Let they stay at home. (...remainder omitted).

Sixth, I advise that usury be prohibited to them, and that all cash and treasure of silver and gold be taken from them and put aside for safekeeping. The reason for such a measure is that, as said above, they have no other means of earning a livelihood than usury, and by it they have stolen and robbed from us all they possess. Such money should now be used in no other way than the following: Whenever a Jew is sincerely converted, he should be handed one hundred, two hundred, or three hundred florins, as personal circumstances may suggest. With this he could set himself up in some occupation for the support of his poor wife and children, and the maintenance of the old or feeble. For such evil gains are cursed if they are not put to use with God's blessing in a good and worthy cause.

Seventh, I commend putting a flail, an ax, a hoe, a spade, a distaff, or a spindle into the hands of young, strong Jews and Jewesses and letting them earn their bread in the sweat of their brow, as was imposed on the children of Adam (Gen 3[:19]}. For it is not fitting that they should let us accursed Goyim toil in the sweat of our faces while they, the holy people, idle away their time behind the stove, feasting and farting, and on top of all, boasting blasphemously of their lordship over the Christians by means of our sweat. No, one should toss out these lazy rogues by the seat of their pants.

* * *

But what will happen even if we do burn down the Jews' synagogues and forbid them publicly to praise God, to pray, to teach, to utter God's name? They will still keep doing it in secret. If we know that they are doing this in secret, it is the same as if they were doing it publicly. for our knowledge of their secret doings and our toleration of them implies that they are not secret after all and thus our conscience is encumbered with it before God.

* * *

Accordingly, it must and dare not be considered a trifling matter but a most serious one to seek counsel against this and to save our souls from the Jews, that is, from the devil and from eternal death. My advice, as I said earlier, is:

First, that their synagogues be burned down, and that all who are able toss in sulphur and pitch; it would be good if someone could also throw in some hellfire. That would demonstrate to God our serious resolve and be evidence to all the world that it was in ignorance that we tolerated such houses, in which the Jews have reviled God, our dear Creator and Father, and his Son most shamefully up till now but that we have now given them their due reward.

* * *

I wish and I ask that our rulers who have Jewish subjects exercise a sharp mercy toward these wretched people, as suggested above, to see whether this might not help (though it is doubtful). They must act like a good physician who, when gangrene has set in, proceeds without mercy to cut, saw, and burn flesh, veins, bone, and marrow. Such a procedure must also be followed in this instance. Burn down their synagogues, forbid all that I enumerated earlier, force them to work, and deal harshly with them, as Moses did in the wilderness, slaying three thousand lest the whole people perish. They surely do not know what they are doing; moreover, as people possessed, they do not wish to know it, hear it, or learn it. There it would be wrong to be merciful and confirm them in their conduct. If this does not help we must drive them out like mad dogs, so that we do not become partakers of their abominable blasphemy and all their other vices and thus merit God's wrath and be damned with them. I have done my duty. Now let everyone see to his. I am exonerated."

[editor-surveyor]

.
>> “The same Jesus of the same gospel was offered freely to both Jew and Gentile alike, throughout the whole Bible” <<

This statement is essentially gibberish.

“Jews” are followers of Phariseeism. Jews didn’t exist until the second temple period. Did you mean Israelites, or Hebrews?

By Biblical definition, “Israel” is the believing remnant of the descendants of Jacob, and those that sojourn with them. That term covers all who have believed, and will believe, until Yeshua gathers us at the Day of Trumpets. They are his Kehillah, or Assembly.
(often mistakenly called a “church.”)
.

[The Mayor]

Bump

[imardmd1]

Thanks!

[Mark17]

Good for Luther, but it only took me one verse to leave the Catholic Church. John 3:3. 😇😁🙏👍

[ZULU]

Intetesting
I think it also had to do with the absolute, utter, corruption of the Medieval Papacy as well as the unending drain of money and wealth from the German states to the Papacy.

[boatbums]

I happened upon this additional information that ties into the OP article and thought I would share it:

Dr. R. Scott Clark, Professor of Church History and Historical Theology at Westminster Seminary California, put Luther's work into perspective:

Reformation Day, as we know it, is misleading. It creates the impression that the Reformation was about "cleaning up" the church. It wasn’t. There were moral reform movements about in the late middle ages and early 16th century but the Reformation wasn’t one of them. The Reformation was a theological event that was intended to have moral consequences, but it wasn’t first of all about moral self-improvement and tidying the ecclesiastical house. Beware all the various “Reform” movements in our churches today that want to turn the Reformation into moral renewal (and that’s most of them). Beware when folk invoke a "new" Reformation who don’t understand the old one. Beware when folk call for a Reformation that requires a repudiation of the first Reformation. Those movements abound.

Reformation Day, as we know it, perpetuates the pietist myth that the Reformation happened suddenly and in one-fell-swoop of religious experience (the so-called Turmerlebnis). It wasn’t and it didn’t. The Reformation doctrines developed gradually between 1513-21. In succession, and with fits and starts, Luther gradually realized the great Reformation solas. There are some Reformation solas with which we’re not all familiar. Luther’s first breakthrough happened during his lectures on the Psalms when he realized that Scripture teaches that we’re not just a little sinful but that we’re completely sinful, i.e., that the effects of sin are radical and affect every faculty. We’re not able to "do our part" or to "do what lies within us" toward justification because, as a consequence of the fall, all that lies "within us" is sin and death. Therefore the first Reformation sola was "solely unable." This is the essential assumption behind sola gratia, the claim that justification is by grace alone. Grace, is no longer to be reckoned a sort of medicinal stuff with which we are injected, with which we cooperate toward eventual justification. Luther came to understand that grace is God’s attitude of favor toward sinners. Grace isn’t something with which we are infused. Rather, God is gracious toward us. He shows us favor. He gives to us what we do not deserve: righteousness and life.

Only then did Luther realize, as he next lectured through Romans that it was only by the imputation of the righteousness of Christ that we are justified. The entire medieval system was about interior moral renewal. The Reformation is that the gospel is outside of us. The Gospel is that Christ has done it all for us. Justification is solely on the ground of imputed righteousness.

During his next two sets of lectures in Galatians and Hebrews Luther gradually realized that the medieval definition of faith as "formed by love" (fides formata caritate) is false and a misreading of Gal 5. Faith doesn’t justify because it produces sanctity (holiness) in internal moral renewal. Faith justifies because it apprehends Christ and his obedience and death for us (pro nobis). This is solus Christus. Faith is an open, empty hand. Faith is a beggar. Faith looks outside of itself and one’s self to Christ. Faith has no power except Christ its object. Faith is receiving and resting on Christ and his finished work for sinners. Faith is a certain knowledge and a hearty trust in Christ and his gospel. That’s sola fide.

With these breakthrough conclusions came others. During this period Luther came to a new hermeneutic. Where much of the patristic and all of the medieval church had read the Bible to contain two kinds of law, old and new, Luther came to see that the Bible had throughout two kinds of words: law (do) and gospel (done). The gospel is not: here is more grace so you can keep the law. The gospel is not: Christ will approve of you if you do your part. The gospel is: Christ has done it. This turn to the law/gospel hermeneutic was a foundation stone of the entire Reformation and it was adopted by all the Protestant churches and confessions Reformed and Lutheran. One of the great tragedies is that today there are congregations that will celebrate Reformation Day or who celebrate a nearby Reformation Sunday who will look you straight in the eye and tell you that the Reformed don’t use a law/gospel hermeneutic.

Another global change that occurred at the same time is the turn to Scripture as the magisterial and unique authority for faith and life (sola scriptura. There’s no one point at which this view developed, but it’s certainly symbolized by Luther’s stand for the sole and unique magisterial authority of Scripture at the Diet of Worms in 1521.) http://beggarsallreformation.blogspot.com/2010/04/why-i-chose-reformation500-theme.html