CHAPTER III

A HISTORICAL SKETCH OF THE LUTHERAN REFORMATION AND THE CATHOLIC RESPONSE

35. Today we are able to tell the story of the Lutheran Reformation together. Even though Lutherans and Catholics have different points of view, because of ecumenical dialogue they are able to overcome traditional anti-Protestant and anti-Catholic hermeneutics in order to find a common way of remembering past events. The following chapter is not a full description of the entire history and all the disputed theological points. It highlights only some of the most important historical situations and theological issues of the Reformation in the sixteenth century.

WHAT DOES REFORMATION MEAN?

36. In antiquity, the Latin noun reformatio referred to the idea of changing a bad present situation by returning to the good and better times of the past. In the Middle Ages, the concept of reformatio was very often used in the context of monastic reform. The monastic orders engaged in reformation in order to overcome the decline of discipline and religious lifestyle. One of the greatest reform movements originated in the tenth century in the Abbey of Cluny.

37. In the late Middle Ages, the concept of the necessity of reform was applied to the whole church. The church councils and nearly every diet of the Holy Roman Empire were concerned with reformatio. The Council of Constance (1414-1418) regarded the reform of the church »in head and members« as necessary.9 A widely disseminated reform document entitled »Reformacion keyser Sigmunds« called for the restoration of right order in almost every area of life. At the end of the fifteenth century, the idea of reformation also spread to the government and university.10

38. Luther himself seldom used the concept of »reformation.« In his »Explanations of the Ninety-Five Theses,« Luther states, »The church needs a reformation which is not the work of man, namely the pope, or of many men, namely the cardinals, both of which the most recent council has demonstrated, but it is the work of the whole world, indeed it is the work of God alone. However, only God who has created time knows the time for this reformation.«11 Sometimes Luther used the word »reformation« in order to describe improvements of order, for example of the universities. In his reform treatise »Address to the Christian Nobility« of 1520, he called for »a just, free council« that would allow the proposals for reform to be debated.12

39. The term »Reformation« came to be used as a designation for the complex of historical events that, in the narrower sense, encompass the years 1517 to 1555, thus from the time of the spread of Martin Luther's »Ninety-five Theses« up until the Peace of Augsburg. The theological and ecclesiastical controversy that Luther's theology had triggered quickly became entangled with politics, the economy, and culture, due to the situation at the time. What is designated by the term »Reformation« thus reaches far beyond what Luther himself taught and intended. The concept of »Reformation« as a designation of an entire epoch comes from Leopold von Ranke who, in the nineteenth century, popularized the custom of speaking of an »age of Reformation.«

REFORMATION FLASHPOINT:
CONTROVERSY OVER INDULGENCES

40. On October 31, 1517, Luther sent his »Ninety-five Theses,« titled, »Disputation on the Efficacy and Power of Indulgences,« as an appendix to a letter to Archbishop Albrecht of Mainz. In this letter, Luther expressed serious concerns about preaching and the practice of indulgences occurring under the responsibility of the Archbishop and urged him to make changes. On the same day, he wrote another letter to his Diocesan Bishop Hieronymus of Brandenburg. When Luther sent his theses to a few colleagues and most likely posted them on the door of the castle church in Wittenberg, he wished to inaugurate an academic disputation on open and unresolved questions regarding the theory and practice of indulgences.

41. Indulgences played an important role in the piety of the time. An indulgence was understood as a remission of temporal punishment due to sins whose guilt had already been forgiven. Christians could receive an indulgence under certain prescribed conditions - such as prayer, acts of charity, and almsgiving - through the action of the church, which was thought to dispense and apply the treasury of the satisfactions of Christ and the saints to penitents.

42. In Luther's opinion, the practice of indulgences damaged Christian spirituality. He questioned whether indulgences could free the penitents from penalties imposed by God; whether any penalties imposed by priests would be transferred into purgatory; whether the medicinal and purifying purpose of penalties meant that a sincere penitent would prefer to suffer the penalties instead of being liberated from them; and whether the money given for indulgences should instead be given to the poor. He also wondered about the nature of the treasury of the church out of which the pope offered indulgences.

LUTHER ON TRIAL

43. Luther's »Ninety-five Theses« spread very swiftly throughout Germany and caused a great sensation while also doing serious damage to the indulgence campaigns. Soon it was rumored that Luther would be accused of heresy. Already in December 1517, the Archbishop of Mainz had sent the »Ninety-five Theses« to Rome together with some additional material for an examination of Luther's theology.

44. Luther was surprised by the reaction to his theses, as he had not planned a public event but rather an academic disputation. He feared that the theses would be easily misunderstood if read by a wider audience. Thus, in late March 1518, he published a vernacular sermon, »On Indulgence and Grace« (»Sermo von Ablass und Gnade«). It was an extraordinarily successful pamphlet that quickly made Luther a figure well known to the German public. Luther repeatedly insisted that, apart from the first four propositions, the theses were not his own definitive assertions but rather propositions written for disputation.

45. Rome was concerned that Luther's teaching undermined the doctrine of the church and the authority of the pope. Thus, Luther was called to Rome in order to answer to the curial court for his theology. However, upon the request of the Electoral Prince of Saxony, Frederick the Wise, the trial was transferred to Germany, to the Imperial Diet at Augsburg, where Cardinal Cajetan was given the mandate to interrogate Luther. The papal mandate said that either Luther was to recant or, in the event that Luther refused, the Cardinal had the power to ban Luther immediately or to arrest him and bring him to Rome. After the meeting, Cajetan drafted a statement for the magisterium, and the pope promulgated it soon after the interrogation in Augsburg without any response to Luther's arguments.13

46. A fundamental ambivalence persisted throughout the whole process leading up to Luther's excommunication. Luther offered questions for disputation and put forward arguments. He and the public, informed through many pamphlets and publications about his position and the ongoing process, expected an exchange of arguments. Luther was promised a fair trial. Nevertheless, although he was assured that he would be heard, he repeatedly received the message that he either had to recant or be proclaimed a heretic.

47. On 13 October 1518, in a solemn protestatio, Luther claimed that he was in agreement with the Holy Roman Church and that he could not recant unless he were convinced that he was wrong. On 22 October, he again insisted that he thought and taught within the scope of the Roman Church's teaching.

FAILED ENCOUNTERS

48. Before his encounter with Luther, Cardinal Cajetan had studied the Wittenberg professor's writings very carefully and had even written treatises on them. But Cajetan interpreted Luther within his own conceptual framework and thus misunderstood him on the assurance of faith, even while correctly representing the details of his position. For his part, Luther was not familiar with the cardinal's theology, and the interrogation, which allowed only for limited discussion, pressured Luther to recant. It did not provide an opportunity for Luther to understand the cardinal's position. It is a tragedy that two of the most outstanding theologians of the sixteenth century encountered one another in a trial of heresy.

49. In the following years, Luther's theology developed rapidly, giving rise to new topics of controversy. The accused theologian worked to defend his position and to gain allies in the struggle with those who were about to declare him a heretic. Many publications both for and against Luther appeared, but there was only one disputation, in 1519, in Leipzig between Andreas...