My pastor and I were just discussing Luther while we were at the Diamondbacks game last night. My pastor is a history buff with the emphasis on church history. His take was that Luther “cracked” under the strain during the last five years of his life. Most of the stuff he did incompatible with Christian views; e.g., anti-semitism, occurred during this period.
Thanks for this insight. It makes a lot of sense. The shift is still tragic, but it’s at least more understandable.
He lost is daughter and went into a great depression(which he fought most of his life). docemntary did a great job on all of luther good and bad. Most interesting, as Hitler was using Luther’s writings to justify their anti sementim, a black pastor studied Luther. He changed his name and his sons’ name to Martin Luther as he was inspired by Luther non violence to make change.
He had kidney stones and bowl troubles late in life. Not excusing it, but he was pretty miserable at that point.
There is a shift in Luther’s writing at that time. Some of it was probably disappointment as the very wars he hoped to prevent started to erupt around him.