Martin Luther’s theologyHistory 100, May 10, 2006

Papers were handed back Monday - see your TA to get yours. Rewrites are due at the final exam.

Alternate final: Tues. 5/23, 1:30 p.m., room TBA.

Luther’s break with Rome1517: controversy over indulgences (Luther as faithful critic of Church)1518: basics of Luther’s theology worked out1519: disputation with Eck1520: Three great pamphlets1. Christian Liberty (Freedom of a Christian)2.Open Letter to the Christian Nobility of the German

Nation3. The Babylonian Captivity of the Church

1521: bull of excommunication, Diet of Worms

Luther’s antinomy

“A Christian is a perfectly free lord of all, subject to none.“A Christian is a perfectly dutiful servant of all, subject to all” (2).

• Inner vs. outer man

The Word and faith

• “One thing, and only one thing, is necessary for Christian life, righteousness, and freedom. That one thing is the most holy Word of God, the gospel of Christ” (5).

• “To preach Christ means to feed the soul, make it righteous, set it free, and save it, provided it believes the preaching. Faith alone is the saving and efficacious use of the Word of God” (7); “This faith cannot exist in connection with works” (8).

• “Therefore true faith in Christ is a treasure beyond comparison which brings with it complete salvation and saves man from every evil” (10).

Commandments and promises• “The entire Scripture of God is divided into two parts:

commandments and promises” (11).

• “Commandments...are intended to teach man to know himself, that through them he may recognize his inability to do good and may despair of his own ability. That is why they are called the Old Testament” (11).

• “Thus the promises of God give what the commandments of God demand and fulfill what the law prescribes so that all things may be God’s alone.... Therefore the promises of God belong to the New Testament” (13).

The benefits of faith• “A Christian has all that he needs in faith... and if

he has no need of the law, surely he is free of the law” (15).

• “When, however, God sees that we consider him truth and by the faith of our heart pay him the great honor which is due him, he does us that great honor of considering us truthful and righteous for the sake of our faith” (17).

• Faith “unites the soul with Christ as a bride is united with her bridegroom” (18).

The priesthood of believers• “Now just as Christ by his birthright obtained

these two prerogatives [of priesthood, prayer and preaching], so he imparts them to and shares them with everyone who believes in him according to the law of the above-mentioned marriage.... Hence all of us who believe in Christ are priests and kings in Christ” (25).

• Ecclesiastics should be ministers, not lords. “Although we are all equally priests, we cannot all publicly minister and teach” (29-30).

The outer man• “Here we shall answer all those who...now ask, ‘If

faith does all things and is alone sufficient unto righteousness, why then are good works commanded? We will take our ease and do no works and be content with faith.’ I answer: not so, you wicked men, not so” (33).

• “In this life,” a man “must indeed take care to discipline his body by fastings, watchings, labors, and other reasonable discipline and to subject it to the Spirit so that it will obey and conform to the inner man and faith and not revolt against faith” (34).

True good works

• “The works of a believer are like this. Through his faith he has been restored to Paradise and created anew, has no need of works that he may become or be righteous; but that he may not be idle and may provide for and keep his body, he must do such works freely only to please God” (38).

• “Good works do not make a good man, but a good man does good works; evil works do not make a wicked man, but a wicked man does evil works” (39).

True good works (2)

• “Any work that is not done solely for the purpose of keeping the body under control or of serving one’s neighbor, as long as he asks nothing contrary to God, is not good or Christian. For this reason I greatly fear that few or no colleges, monasteries, altars, and offices of the church are really Christian in our day—nor the special fasts and prayers on certain saints’ days” (60).

Against antinomianism

• “There are very many who, when they hear of this freedom of faith, immediately turn it into an occasion for the flesh and think that now all things are allowed them” (63).

• “Our faith in Christ does not free us from works but from false opinions concerning works, that is, from the foolish presumption that justification is acquired by works” (65).