Martin Luther's role in the German Reformation Martin Luther was born in Saxony. His father was a well off copper miner
Martin Luther's role in the German Reformation
Martin Luther was born in Saxony. His father was a well off copper miner. Martin Luther was well educated and very intelligent. He was a highly nervous child as his parents were very strict. He was beaten a lot at home and in school. Once when Luther was out he got caught in a thunderstorm and was terrified. He was so terrified that he made a promise to St. Anne that if he survived he would become a monk. He did.
He became a professor of theology in Frederick the Wise's university in Wittenberg. Luther was obsessed with the idea of being saved when he died (heaven). He was permanently unhappy and unknown. He lived out of the way and was continuously confessing, praying trying to figure out how he was going to be saved. One day Luther was praying in his cell when the answer to his question came to him. You don't have to pray and confess all the time just do nothing and believe and God will look after everything. Luther called this "Salvation by faith alone". Suddenly, he was a happy man and that should have been the end of that for Luther.
But at this time Pope Leo X was rebuilding St. Peter's Basilica in Rome. He invented "indulgencies" to raise the money. The indulgencies said that when you died you didn't go to heaven or hell; you went to place called purgatory which was in between the two. There you had to wait until God decided were you went but if you paid the pope to pray for you, you would go straight to heaven. Indulgency sellers were sent all over Europe and one of them arrived in Wittenberg, where Luther lived.
Martin Luther was born in Saxony. His father was a well off copper miner. Martin Luther was well educated and very intelligent. He was a highly nervous child as his parents were very strict. He was beaten a lot at home and in school. Once when Luther was out he got caught in a thunderstorm and was terrified. He was so terrified that he made a promise to St. Anne that if he survived he would become a monk. He did.
He became a professor of theology in Frederick the Wise's university in Wittenberg. Luther was obsessed with the idea of being saved when he died (heaven). He was permanently unhappy and unknown. He lived out of the way and was continuously confessing, praying trying to figure out how he was going to be saved. One day Luther was praying in his cell when the answer to his question came to him. You don't have to pray and confess all the time just do nothing and believe and God will look after everything. Luther called this "Salvation by faith alone". Suddenly, he was a happy man and that should have been the end of that for Luther.
But at this time Pope Leo X was rebuilding St. Peter's Basilica in Rome. He invented "indulgencies" to raise the money. The indulgencies said that when you died you didn't go to heaven or hell; you went to place called purgatory which was in between the two. There you had to wait until God decided were you went but if you paid the pope to pray for you, you would go straight to heaven. Indulgency sellers were sent all over Europe and one of them arrived in Wittenberg, where Luther lived.
