Martin
Luther: How One Man Responded
By Joy F. Kirch
Western
Philosophy Spring 2000
Philosophy is a fascinating field of study because it is constantly fluctuating. One day's mode of thought is the next day's old news. Philosophers are an interesting breed of idealistic and opinionated (or perhaps just hardheaded) thinkers. It is rare that philosophers ever agree on a subject, so new ideas are amended to the old every day, and much to students' delight (or dismay), philosophy books become fatter and fatter by the year. In addition, philosophers are powerful: The kinds of thought that philosophers construct are very significant because they shape human minds. Philosophers influence each other; philosophers deeply affect the way that mankind thinks and acts.
For example, Marxism, it is well known, brought about two extremes in ideology: the fascist governments in Italy and Germany under Mussolini and Hitler, and the communist governments, first in Russia under Lenin and Stalin and later spreading into China, Cuba, and the former Soviet satellite countries (just to name a few). The fascist and communist interpreters of Marx, however different their regimes were, affected not only the government structure of the countries they overthrew but also the religious ideologies and the happiness and well being of their people. The enforcement of the topsy-turvy Marxist ideologies demanded the deaths of millions of people as a sacrifice to the governments. Unfortunately, communism and fascism also wreaked havoc on the world in the form of both Cold and World Wars. It is clearly evident that to wield the philosophical pen is to wield true dominance. Philosophy moves the minds of people.
Philosophy is definitely a powerful shaping force on religion and ethics. On the one hand, there exists the thought that everything is equal. This way of thinking first started with Wittgenstein's proclamation in Tractatus that nothing carries significance anymore, that "all propositions are of equal value" because ethics cannot be put into words (qtd. in Melchert 621). Ergo, ethics is transcendental, leaving the world no value at all. If there is no value in the world, does value exist in another realm? Does God exist in this other realm to oversee morality? To Wittgenstein, even arguments for or against the existence of God were completely worthless. The statement "God exists" (or even the statement "God does not exist") is meaningless because the verifiability criterion cannot be met (Melchert 628). So, we are left hanging. What is the point of continuing on in this world?
On the other hand, there exist thinkers to whom ponderings on morality and the existence of God are key as well. However, these thinkers have a very different take on these subjects. One such philosopher is Martin Luther. It seems a bit bizarre to think of Luther as a philosopher; he is more renowned for the Reformation and break from the Roman Catholic Church than for his philosophical ponderings. His philosophy, though, is the key to understanding both his break from the Church and its effects on history. As mentioned before, philosophers influence each other; new philosophies are not created in a vacuum. Likewise, many philosophers and ways of thinking had a direct impact on the way Luther saw the world and formed his thoughts; among these were Aristotle, Augustine, the Occamists, the Medieval Mystics, and Erasmus. Luther's views agreed and differed with these others in such a way that would change philosophical and moral thought and the history of the world forever, whether Luther desired this or not.
The Effect of Luther's Family and Formative Years
Luther lived in the times that Thomas Hobbes called "nasty, brutish and short" (qtd. in Kittelson 35). The plague was running rampant all over Europe. Ordinary people, like Luther's family, slaved and suffered while heads of great churches and monasteries profited. The times were violent-German peasants exercised the right to feud and settle their disputes outside of the courts using weapons and force (Kittelson 35). Obviously, the life expectancy of people at this time was not much to brag about, and the quality of life was even less. Luther was fortunate to live to a hardy 62 years of age.
It is important, first, to examine some vital events and people in Luther's life in order to understand exactly where he was coming from (both physically and mentally). Who could possibly be more vital to his life than Luther's parents, Hans and Margaretta, who gave him breath and existence? Martin was reared in a religiously conservative peasant household in Germany. Life was rugged and devout at the same time. Hans was a miner who prospered under the guidance of St. Anne and later came to own six foundries, but the family was not rich: Margaretta still had to go to the woods to collect firewood for the family (Bainton 26). Martin's parents were by no means educated, and they still harbored pagan religious beliefs alongside their Roman Catholicism:
For them the woods and winds and water were peopled by elves, gnomes, fairies, mermen and mermaids, sprites and witches. Sinister spirits would release storms, floods, and pestilence, and would seduce mankind to sin and melancholia. Luther's mother believed that they played such minor pranks as stealing eggs, milk, and butter; and Luther himself was never emancipated from such beliefs. "Many regions are inhabited," said he, "by devils. Prussia is full of them, and Lapland of witches. In my native country on the top of a high mountain called the Pubelsberg is a lake into which if a stone be thrown a tempest will arise over the whole region because the waters are the abode of captive demons" (Bainton 26-7).
This reveals much not only about Luther's background in paganism but also about what the education he received had to overcome. His early schooling, unfortunately, was not much more enlightening than what he learned at home:
Aristotelian physics was regarded as an exercise in thinking God's thoughts after him, and the natural explanations of earthquakes and thunderstorms did not preclude occasional direct divine causation... The Master's degree for which Luther was preparing for the law could have equipped him equally for the cloth. The entire training of home, school, and university was designed to instill fear of God and reverence for the Church (Bainton 27).
This fear of God taught to him in school was to deeply affect him mentally and emotionally. He professed that he was extremely "sensitive and subject to recurrent periods of exaltation and depression of spirit" (Bainton 28). This condition can be blamed on the medieval Church's utilization of alternating fear and hope into the people with the threat of purgatory and the salvation of indulgences, and on the "oscillation between wrath and mercy on the part of the members of the divine hierarchy" (Bainton 28). In fact, he struggled profoundly with these issues in his early years, and they laid the foundation for his philosophical and theological struggles and ponderings.
Religion of the time demanded that salvation must be earned. People were convinced that the final judgment was on the horizon: Fire and brimstone was preached while saints and relics were venerated; pilgrimages were thought of as a way to save one's soul from eternal damnation. In an effort to make sure everyone at least thought about his or her soul's status, confession to the priest was made obligatory. People had to purge themselves of all sins they had failed to confess and work off in the world, lest they be sent to purgatory. However, if one bought an indulgence from the church, years could be erased from the time already earned in purgatory. Ironically enough, these indulgences that Luther came to despise and reject were printed on Gutenberg's printing press, just like Luther's German translation of the Bible would be a few years later (Kittelson 42).
Fortunately for Martin Luther, his father wanted his children to succeed in life. This, of course, included sending Martin to school and later to the university rather than having him stay at home to till the land or oversee one of the family's foundries. The education that Luther gained at the university proved to be a true turning point in the way that he looked at philosophical and theological issues. If it hadn't been for Luther's father's determination and encouragement of Martin's success, there may have been no great revolution in thought leading to the Reformation.
Influence of Aristotle
It was at the University of Erfurt where Luther learned, in depth, the philosophy of Aristotle. In fact, Luther even taught a course on the philosopher for a year (Erikson 86). Luther learned how to "think" by studying Aristotle's logic; in fact, for most students at universities at that time "nothing was more important than learning how to think in this logical and orderly way, and nothing was accorded more time in the typical day of students and masters. Every day featured disputations in which teachers assigned students a thesis or set of theses which they were required to defend according to the strict rules of logic" (Kittelson 46). Luther even disputed in public debates, and he must have been successful, as he was dubbed with the nickname "the Philosopher" (Kittelson 46).
It is obvious that Aristotle's philosophy played a huge role in Luther's life, assisting Luther in later coming to his own unique conclusions about philosophical and religious matters. It is key in comprehending Luther to understand what assumptions drawn from Aristotle's thought lie beneath Luther's beliefs. It was assumed, first, that all important truths have two characteristics: universality and consistency with one another. True learning's objective is to discover these truths and express them in clear propositions (Kittelson 47). So, one could theoretically derive truths from one discipline, like law, and apply them to another discipline, like theology. This leads to Aristotle's teaching that words can be assigned meanings that are universally true in any discipline. Using these assumptions, important theological issues were resolved in those times. When contradictory statements were found in the Bible, Aristotle's logic was used to settle the problem. This was a very easy thing to do, for "all that was necessary was to assign a meaning to the words that would allow the student or professor to construct a logically consistent system" (Kittelson 47). The Bible, widely believed by these students and faculty to be the inspired word of God, was not believed to be unblemished and perfect (as Luther himself later came to conclude); it seems that only Aristotle and his system were flawless.
Nevertheless, James M. Kittelson in his book Luther: The Reformer gives a good example of Aristotelian thinking and its significance to theology:
The old story about medieval theologians debating how many angels can sit on the head of a pin illustrates this mode of thinking. Whether they ever actually did debate this seemingly trivial question is beside the point. To them, it would have masked an issue of great importance. The answer given-whether none, one, or an infinite number-carried with it assertions about whether angels did or did not have bodies, and therefore about whether heaven was material or spiritual. If heaven were material, then it had to be located in a place, because this is the nature of material things. If it were located in a place, then, at least in principle, human beings could find it in the here and now. Moreover, it could not be eternal, because it is the nature of things visible to pass away. By extension, the doctrines of the resurrection and of eternal life would suddenly disappear, and of course that could not be (48).
It is apparent why these seemingly inconsequential questions seemed very important. This is the kind of the debate that Luther probably would have enjoyed in his youth, and his education and interest in Aristotle's logic later led him to pose questions and seek answers that nobody had conceived of before.
Aristotle also saw a great importance in distinguishing between "that which originates in God's love, and that which man can accomplish with his God-given reason and free will" (Erikson 185). Man is given an identity and a means of self-verification through reason and will. According to Erik H. Erikson in his book, Young Man Luther,
In theological terms, this process was one of reading God's goodness from the ordo which he had manifested in the world. Man could practise his power of observation by contemplating forms and similarities, images and ideas; he could establish causalities and eventually translate them into experiments, and thus become God's assistant planner and mover (185).
Aristotle believes that man has God-given free will. Luther's views of free will are revealed in a later section. Suffice it to say for now that this is one point where Luther and Aristotle go their separate ways.
Indeed, Luther later came to have a great aversion to Aristotle's philosophy, which he dubbed the "many-headed serpent" (Kuiper 277). Luther's full attack on Aristotle mainly stems from the "profane and bold worldliness" Luther accuses Aristotle of bringing to theology (Kuiper 277). Luther is sickened most of all by the followers of Aristotle and those who teach his works; he believes that they are so tightly bound to Aristotle's teaching that they no longer think for themselves. In fact, he writes in a bitterly scathing commentary:
The men who interpret them [Aristotle's works] are bound to keep silence, not for five years as did the Pythagoreans, but forever and ever, like the dead. They must believe all, obey always; nor may they ever, even for practice in argument, skirmish with their master, nor mutter a syllable against him. What will they not believe who have credited that ridiculous and injurious blasphemer Aristotle? His propositions are so absurd that an ass or a stone would cry out at them.
My soul longs for nothing so ardently as to expose and publicly shame that Greek buffoon, who like a spectre has befooled the Church. If Aristotle had not lived in the flesh I should not hesitate to call him a devil.
The greatest part of my cross is to be forced to see brothers with brilliant minds, born for useful studies, compelled to spend their lives and waste their labor in these follies (277-278).
Thus, Luther began bearing arms against scholasticism. In this matter, Luther could not keep silent; he proclaimed that nobody could become a good theologian without first abandoning Aristotle. Luther ushered in the beginning of the end of "following the herd" in philosophical and intellectual matters and he shook up the entire world of thinking in his Disputation Against Scholastic Theology (also known as the Ninety-Seven Theses, not to be confused with the later Ninety-Five). Barend Klaas Kuiper in Martin Luther: The Formative Years states Luther's beef vividly:
The schoolmen had forced the contents of divine revelation into the thought forms of the Aristotelian philosophy. In course of time they had borrowed from him not only the dialectical forms, but also his definitions and principles. Aristotle had behaved himself as the proverbial camel. At first the schoolmen had allowed him to protrude his nose into the tent of Christian theology. He had ended by forcing his way in completely. Philosophy at first had acted as the handmaid of theology, but finally became its mistress. Hagar had usurped Sarah's place. The teaching of the Church had been corrupted by a rationalism, in which Aristotle had been permitted to sit in judgment on Christ and the Apostles (287).
These little-heard-of Ninety Seven Theses were a plea for the reformation of universities and the rampant scholasticism within them. Sadly enough, these theses of Luther were widely ignored (probably because he deeply offended the very scholars he was attempting to engage in debate). But attacking Aristotle was just a starting point for Luther's assault on the theology he had been educated to believe in.
Augustine
There is a well-known story that Luther was walking home one day when, all of a sudden, a thunderstorm struck. Luther was nailed to the ground by a bolt of lightening, and at that moment, Luther changed his life forever by shouting (in German, of course), "Help me, St. Anne! I will become a monk!" (qtd. in Kittelson 50) What would have happened had that near-death experience never occurred, no one can say. Certainly there would be no Lutheran Church, and Luther's thinking and influence would have gone elsewhere; indeed, the whole course of the world would have been diverted.
After this incident, Luther became a monk of the Augustinian order, so it is inevitable that Augustine had much influence on Luther's mind. Luther, in his early years, identified his position with that of Augustine (Hägglund 214). Augustine centered all of his theology on faith, and this is why Luther came to believe that this man was the greatest theologian since the apostles (Erikson 183). Indeed, in light of this, it is not difficult to see why faith became such an important and highlighted issue in Luther's thoughts and theology. Augustine also proclaimed that man is totally lost and that only God has Being in Himself: "Things are and are not; they are because from God they derive existence; they are not because they only have being, they are not being. ... they exist not all at once, but by passing away and succeeding, they together complete the universe, whereof they are a portion" (qtd. in Erikson 183). It is only by the grace of God, Augustine says, that man is given a mind and a memory, the things which compose identity, and in this identity, man can see God's presence: "Sure I am that in it Thou dwellest, since I have remembered Thee ever since I learnt Thee, and there I find Thee, when I call Thee to remembrance" (qtd. in Erikson 183). Although man is evil, he is given through grace a chance to receive possible perfection through Jesus Christ's sacrifice. The vision of a loving God who distributes grace to imperfect mankind is one to which Luther clings and attempts to justify in his mind as he struggles over his own salvation during his tumultuous years as an Augustinian monk.
Occamists
Occam was an early rebel against the church. Having once been a member of the order of the Franciscans, he had the audacity to contradict the Pope by claiming the Christians should be denied private property (Erikson 87). Occam, like Luther later, came under heavy fire for his views, and it is easy to see how Occam and Luther can be compared. Occam was a foretaste of the Luther yet to come.
Martin Luther stumbled into Occamism at the university in Erfurt; it was "the first academic theological-ism which engulfed Luther, and this happened before he had the necessary intellectual equipment to see its relativities and interdependencies in the history of thought" (Erikson 87). In other words, Occamism surrounded Luther at the university, and he didn't have the brains yet to think it through thoroughly. Occamism even infected the Aristotelian thinking, which led to a huge ideological gap between the nature of physical things and the nature of the supernatural. Erik H. Erikson describes the confusion, created by Occamists, that ensued for Luther:
In the age-old conflict between realism and nominalism, Occam had formulated a moderate nominalism. He taught that concepts are only symbols of things and exist only in the act of giving meaning, in significando; while things exist by themselves. This skepticism, however, was limited by the assurance that the intellect, if it could create things out of itself, would create a world just like the real one: for both ideas and things come from God and there is an exact correspondence between the number of ideas which God put in man's head and the number of things out of which he made the physical universe. Thus Aristotle could have his physical universe, and Plato his ideas, and God could have them both, mirroring each others' works-an ideal solution for the budding scientific mind which wished to experiment with things, but not a convincing solution for young minds who desperately wish to know how things and ideas, specifics and universals, earth and heaven, hang together. In other words, a very reasonable solution, but not an emotionally convincing one, especially for a young person in whom justification had become the core-problem: how to know when God justifies-and why (89).
Justification came to be a monstrous question in Luther's life, and the thanks for that are due to Occam and the seeds of doubt that he planted in Luther's mind.
Luther was to later ambush Occamism for many reasons. Luther attacked the Occamists' Pelagian doctrine of grace and its blending of theology and philosophy. The doctrine states that man can love God above all things, by his own powers, and then he will receive grace. Grace is given as a reward to those who have done their best to prepare to receive it (Hägglund 216). So, one must be good in order to receive grace for bad deeds not yet committed. In Luther's opinion, this was preposterous: Grace is given by God first because mankind characteristically loves itself above all things and can do nothing good. Grace can be received only by those who are sinful-after all, of what use is grace when you are perfect and do not need any?
Luther parts ways as well with Occamism's view of the relationship between theology and philosophy. Luther was opposed to the Occamists' "logic of faith" that is applicable when mysteries of the faith are involved; it was a sort of blending between theology and philosophy, utilizing reason to solve theological propositions. Rational speculations could be made concerning a matter of faith in order to interpret the issue, in effect placing theological knowledge on the same level as philosophical conjecture (Hägglund 218). Luther was disgusted by this "logic of faith" and claimed that "no one could be a theologian unless he rejected the help of Aristotle" (Hägglund 214). In other words, nobody can reveal the truth of faith by utilizing reason because "reason has been blinded through the corruption of nature and as a result is unable to understand 'what belongs to the Spirit of God'" (Hägglund 218).
As Luther rejected more and more of the Occamist principles, he increasingly became a hero to the young students of theology. Luther traversed a hard road to his final philosophical and theological views from the Occamism so prevalent in his university, and he will always be connected to, compared to, and accused of Occamist thoughts that laid part of the foundation for his philosophical education. The lesson to be learned here (for all would-be philosophers) is that you cannot run away from your roots without somebody catching you.
Medieval Mysticism's Influences
Before this section commences, a brief sample definition of a brand of medieval mysticism is in order. One renowned German mystic was Tauler. Tauler's Mysticism, briefly, is exemplified in the following excerpt from Young Man Luther by Erik H. Erikson:
God begins where all categories and differentiations end; he is the Unborn Light. To reach him, one must be able to develop the raptus, the rapt state of complete passivity in which man loses his name, his attributes, and his will. He must achieve ... a total state of letting things be, letting them come and go. This includes the all-Christian condition of accepting total guiltiness, but without excessive remorse or melancholy. ... God becomes, for an instant, mightily active; his coming is as quick as a glance which cuts through all the ways of the world. But mind you, this ray of light from God's eye does not penetrate to him who attempts to look at God; it comes only to one who is in a state of total receptivity, free of all striving (189).
Medieval mysticism's impact on Luther's thought and Luther's reaction to it cannot be underestimated because it so thoroughly permeated society and religion during Luther's time. Luther thought highly of certain German mystics (especially Tauler), and he appreciated some of their contributions to theology, even though the distance between Luther and the typical mystics was great (Hägglund 219-20).
Luther adopted (or was raised with) certain principles of mysticism. According to Hägglund, "Mysticism represented a personal, experiential kind of religion, which was in opposition not only to the Christianity of the institutional church but also to scholastic education. The mystics insisted that philosophic wisdom was unprofitable and deceitful" (218). Luther would agree with the mystics concerning scholasticism, and his criticism of scholasticism was much more profound. Luther also goes along with the mystics in their utilization of the terms "old man" and "new man" (referring to man's will in opposition to God and united with God, respectively), the emphasis mystics placed on suffering and tribulation in the growing Christian's life, killing the egocentric will, and the differentiation between the "inner" and the "outer" man (Hägglund 218-19).
However, Luther splits with the medieval mystic beliefs in key areas. One is the theological view of man and sin. The mystics held to the idea that there is an indestructible divine nucleus in man's innermost being. The mystic way is to turn away from all that is external, from all that belongs to the world. Even sin was looked upon at times as something external, something that does not touch the inner man. It amounts to this, that the world is looked upon as something unreal, immaterial, which the mystic must learn to disregard. ... For the mystic the object is to enter his own innermost being and thereby to experience liberation (Hägglund 219).
Luther had very different ideas. Man is sinful because of original sin, and the sinful nature is so serious that it cannot be ignored. Man must come to terms with this fact because man gains self-knowledge only when he comes to know himself in his true form as a sinner.
In addition, Luther and the mystics view the union of God and man in disparate ways. The mystics saw this union as one that takes place in the soul of man, separate and apart from sin and corruption. However, as noted above and according to Luther, any union of God and man would have to be one acknowledging man's sinful nature. As Haggland so aptly words it, "As seen from the human side, it is not absorption in the divine but a recognition of sin and a plea for grace" (219). From Luther's perspective, there is no escaping man's fallen nature; an attempt to do so is made only out of pure foolishness. It was impossible for Luther and the mystics to reconcile on this point.
Erasmus and the Ill-Fated Free Will Debate
Desiderius Erasmus of Rotterdam was a scholar in whom Luther at first had great respect. Erasmus satirized "the stupidity of the clergy, the obscurantism of the professors, and the superstition of the common people" (Kittelson 76). He, like Luther, saw the deep-seated problems in the Church and universities at the time. However, Luther came to despise Erasmus' Aristotelian tendencies, and he mourned the fact that such a great mind as Erasmus' was wasted on such idiotic ideas (Kuiper 288). Luther's respect for Erasmus dwindled daily.
As Luther began to debate more and more openly on matters of scholasticism and theology, he counted on Erasmus for neutrality. They had, without rancor, corresponded for several years. In spite of this, Erasmus and Luther disagreed on the most fundamental issue of true religion. Erasmus proclaimed that true religion is "a matter of the inclination of the heart", while Luther believed that it is true doctrine that one can apprehend only through studying the Scriptures-thus Luther's later translation of the New Testament into the language of the people, German (Kittelson 204).
Erasmus soon realized that his followers were straying toward the ways of Luther, so he naturally was tempted to join the club and begin a full frontal assault on Luther. Even though he was not adept at doctrinal matters, he distanced himself from Luther concerning freedom of the will. In A Diatribe on the Freedom of the Will, Erasmus argues (rather weakly, to say the least) that this question cannot be resolved from the Scriptures because they are unclear. So one must listen to reason and experience, which say that people must have free will (Kittelson 204-5).
Luther was absolutely appalled by the pettiness of the book. He procrastinated in writing a response because, he said, "I cannot describe how terrible I feel about this little book on the freedom of the will. ... It is very difficult for me to answer such an unlearned book from such a learned man" (qtd. in Kittelson 205). Luther waited for over a year to reply to Erasmus' book in On the Bondage of the Will. Luther's contribution to the debate on free will is discussed below. While Erasmus stated that the Scriptures give no definite answer to the query, Luther said that it is the work of Satan to say that there is no final answer to such an important question as freedom of the will. Needless to say, Luther's response to the Diatribe proved Erasmus' folly in taking on the father of the Reformation; Luther's rejoinder was enough to destroy completely the credibility of Erasmus in the matter (Kittelson 206).
Luther on Philosophy and Theology
The main goal of this paper is to put Martin Luther and his revolutionary ideas into focus in the context of philosophers and thoughts that influenced him. But a major question remains: Would Luther, the great reformer of the Church, have liked to been called a philosopher himself? There's no doubt that at one point in time (early in his university years) he relished the very thought of being so close to greatness (i.e., Aristotle) by the grace of this appellation. However, as discussed earlier, Luther came to despise his one-time hero, and he would probably spurn even the slightest connection of his name with philosophy. Luther ultimately found philosophy to be inadequate.
But what led to Luther's detestation of philosophy? Before we can find out, we must travel back through Luther's thought process.
First, Luther had been tortured particularly by the question of divine justice. He did not take this subject lightly-it was a matter of eternal life or damnation. Luther knew that he was a sinner and that the penalty for sin is death. He also knew that God is just and must punish sin with death; "from this dilemma he could find no escape" (Tjernagel 28). Luther became a monk in hopes of gaining peace for his soul, but his problems and questionings did not dissolve. Instead, they strengthened and tortured him even more. He began to see his good works as useless in gaining salvation, and he saw Christ, the savior of mankind, as a terrible judge who demands righteousness. Luther saw no way to evade the penalty of sin (Tjernagel 29).
As mentioned earlier, Luther's break with Aristotle came after this period of soul struggling and realization. Luther discovered that the problem wasn't with God; it was with philosophy: "His difficulties and perplexities and failures had been caused by a corrupted theology, and at the bottom of all that terrible mischief was the heathen Aristotle" (Kuiper 287).
Once Luther broke free of Aristotle, he gained a new view of God. As Luther began his lectures on the Psalms at the monastery, he saw expressed in the book the same feelings of being forsaken by God that he himself had experienced. He wondered how this could be so: How could Jesus, part of the triune God, have this moment of imperfection in doubting God? At this juncture, Luther's understanding changed completely. Luther had these feelings, he knew, because he himself, as a human, was imperfect. Rather than losing faith entirely, Luther realized that Christ was not imperfect. He took on the sins of the world at the moment on the cross in order to identify with humanity. He felt Himself at that one moment as all mankind feels-estranged from the Holy. At that point, God lost his usual judge-like stance and saw eye to eye with his people. The All-Terrible God merged with the All-Merciful (Bainton 62-3).
Where does philosophy fit into this picture? According to Luther, it doesn't! Philosophy is absolutely unable to understand this paradox. In the words of the Reformation history specialist Roland Bainton in Here I Stand: A Life of Martin Luther, "Philosophy is unequal to it. Only faith can grasp so high a mystery. This is the foolishness of the cross which is hid from the wise and prudent. Reason must retire. She cannot understand that 'God hides his power in weakness, his wisdom in folly, his goodness in severity, his justice in sins, his mercy in anger'" (63).
Luther found philosophy absolutely incompetent for revealing God as well. As the Occamists had destroyed St. Thomas Aquinas' synthesis whereby nature and reason lead through unbroken stages to grace and revelation, great gulfs were discovered between nature and grace and between reason and revelation (Bainton 219). Philosophy and theology were forced to go their separate ways, developing two different kinds of logic and arithmetic. An illustration of this is the doctrine of the Trinity, in which theology states that three distinct persons exist in one, whereas philosophy holds that this statement is ridiculous. Luther sides with theology and is recorded as saying to his teachers, "whereas by the standard of human reason two and five equal seven, yet if God should declare them to be eight, one must believe against reason and against feeling" (Bainton 219). Philosophy to Luther became even more lacking in respect to the cleavage between natural man and redeemed man, which in turn widens the gap between natural and revealed religion. In other words, man still resembles God in some ways, and Adam's fall didn't destroy this, but the meaning of the resemblance is unintelligible to someone who is not familiar with the original pattern (Bainton 219). So philosophy is unable to reveal God's greatness to someone who has no inkling of the omnipotence of God.
How is God revealed, then? Luther believed that nature couldn't reveal God, because-even though God is revealed through nature-the observer must have faith already to see God's presence. Nature is of no help to the seeker of God sans faith. Likewise, history could not reveal God. Although good things happen to good people and evil things happen to evil people most of the time, some of the time the contrary is true (Bainton 216-18). How can one know that God is present at a particular point when events seem random unless one already knows the contrariness of God? God appears to hide from those who seek him.
Only one method, according to Luther, remains for finding God: the searching of the Scriptures. In fact, Luther founded his entire theology on Scripture, held by believers to be the inspired Word of God. For Luther, the Bible "proclaimed Christ and him crucified, that is, the back-and forth of law and gospel which repeatedly condemned and saved sinners" (Kittelson 177). The most astonishing statement by Luther, however, is that by evident reason and meditation on God's Word, everyone could come to the same conclusion. Yet Luther cautioned, "It is not yet knowledge of the gospel when you know the doctrines and commandments, but only when the voice comes that says, 'Christ is your own, with his life, teaching, works, death, resurrection, all that he is, has, does, and can do'" (qtd. in Kittelson, 177). This "voice" that comes arrives via faith. Bengt Hägglund, a theology expert, explains it this way: "Faith is of primary importance in the interpretation of the Bible; this means that Scripture should be understood in the spirit of Christ and not legalistically" (221).
Luther also asserted that the word of God is not an abstraction; rather, it is deeply personal and requires study by all who seek the truth of God. The Bible can be understood "from out of itself", with each person acting as his or her own individual interpreter. Clerical interpretations are not necessary to gain an understanding because the Word itself possesses an "external clarity". Because of this, Scripture is the sole foundation of faith (Hägglund 222-23). It is for precisely this reason that Luther began to translate the New Testament of the Bible into the common language of the people, German. A peasant with very little education could not be expected to fully understand God in the Latin of the Roman Catholic Church, and, indeed, the opinion of the church is not necessary to gain a right understanding of God. At that time, this revolutionary thought must have seemed frighteningly liberating to the people of the Church and threateningly menacing to the Church itself.
Luther on Free Will
Luther, as mentioned above, tackled the question of free will first in his Ninety-Seven Theses, penned primarily to overthrow Aristotle, and later in a written battle with Erasmus.
Sickened by Aristotle's claim that mankind has free will, and disheartened by the rampant scholasticism, Luther struck out on his own and presented his ideas of free will in the Disputation Against Scholastic Theology (or, Ninety-Seven Theses). A good source to see for the complete argument is Martin Luther's Basic Theological Writings, edited by Timothy F. Lull. Portions of Luther's attack on Aristotle, taken from Martin Luther: The Formative Years by Barend Klaas Kuiper, follow:
It is false that the will, left to itself, can do good as well as evil; for it is not free, but in bondage.
It is not in the power of man's will to choose or reject whatever is offered to it.
Man cannot of his own nature will God to be God. He would prefer to be God himself, and that God were not God. ...
In a word, nature possesses neither a pure reason nor a good will....
From beginning to end, we are not masters of our actions, but their slaves. ...
The law of God and the will of man are two adversaries, that without the grace of God can never be reconciled.
What the law commands, the will never wishes, except as through fear or love it puts on the appearance of willing.
The law is the taskmaster of the will, who is not overcome but by the Child that is born unto us.
The law makes sin abound, for it exasperates and repels the will.
But the grace of God makes righteousness abound through Jesus Christ, who causes us to love the law.
Every work of the law appears good outwardly, but inwardly it is sin.
The will, when it turns toward the law without the grace of God, does so in its own interest alone. ...
Grace is not given in order that the work may be done more frequently and more easily, but because without grace there can be no work of love.
To love God is to hate one's self, and to know nothing outside of God (280-82).
Although Luther invitingly challenged all interested professors to join in on his debate of free will, which as illustrated above leads to grace and God, nobody was willing to take him on. The Ninety-Seven Theses were widely ignored.
However, Luther's sparring match with Erasmus could not be disregarded. Luther so soundly beat Erasmus that even Luther's enemies had to give him credit. Luther pooh-poohs Erasmus' "reason and experience" as a simple cop-out. In Luther's response to Erasmus, On the Bondage of the Will, Luther bitingly replied to each and every citation in detail, stating that free will is allowed to man, but only with respect to what is beneath him, not what is above him (Kittelson 205).
However, man's will can not move toward the righteousness of God. True freedom of will is a divine attribute that belongs solely to God. Luther borrowed from Augustine to make his point: "The human will is like a beast between [God and Satan]. If God sits on it, it wills and goes where God wills to go. ... If Satan sits on it, it wills and goes where Satan wills. Nor does it have the power to choose which rider it will go to or seek, but the riders struggle over which of them will have it or rule it" (qtd. in Kittelson 205-6). The human will is merely a puppet in the cosmic struggle that God has won through Christ, the salvation of humanity. Complete and total free will is not possible for a creature that does not hold all of the power.
Outcomes of Luther's Life and the Reformation
Luther's life and realizations can be summed up in a few verses from a hymn he wrote entitled "Dear Christians, One and All, Rejoice", which can be found in The Lutheran Hymnal. The very title itself suggests the very change that took place in the man from a brooding, insecure monk to reassured revolutionary, thanks to his revised theology. Verses two through four describe in autobiographical detail his metamorphosis and some ground-breaking theological beliefs:
Fast bound in Satan's chains I lay,
Death brooded darkly o'er me,
Sin was my torment night and day,
In sin my mother bore me;
Yea, deep and deeper still I fell,
Life had become a living hell,
So firmly sin possessed me.
My own good works availed me naught,
No merit they attaining;
Free will against God's judgment fought,
Dead to all good remaining.
My fears increased till sheer despair
Left naught but death to be my share;
The pangs of hell I suffered.
But God beheld my wretched state
Before the world's foundation,
And, mindful of His mercies great,
He planned my soul's salvation.
A father's heart He turned to me,
Sought my redemption fervently:
He gave His dearest treasure. (387)
Luther, through his revelations and rejection of Aristotle and philosophy, found what he was searching for. However, in his quest, he shook up the entire history of the world from that point forward. It must be stressed, though, that Luther had no intentions of starting an upheaval or splitting away from the Roman Catholic Church. When the whole incident started, Luther simply wished for a scholarly discussion of several doctrines of the Church that he felt had gone awry. In fact, the preamble to his famous Ninety-Five Theses, which was nailed to the door of the church (a common place to post public notices) on October 31, 1517, says this:
Out of love and zeal for truth and the desire to bring it to light, the following theses will be publicly discussed at Wittenberg under the chairmanship of the reverend father Martin Lutther [sic], Master of Arts and Sacred Theology and regularly appointed Lecturer on these subjects at that place (Lull 21).
Regardless of the outcome, Luther's ordeal began innocently enough. But no debate (per se) actually took place because nobody responded to the invitation, perhaps out of fear (Lull 21). However, the debate did occur over a series of years in books, writings, and lectures that attempted to resolve such questions as indulgences and the problems of sin and grace, man's inability to do good, and free will and faith. Luther's innocent invitation ultimately resulted in the schism that took place in the Church of Rome (Hägglund 214-15).
The Reformation left several outcomes in its wake, not the least of which is the foundation of the Lutheran and other various Protestant Churches. These new churches reinstated, for the first time in hundreds of years, the authority of the Word of God in the church and in Christian life. The authority of the Roman Catholic Church weakened, and the power of the Pope and emperor was defied (Tjernagel 99-100). Religion was given back to the people, in a sense: The common people no longer needed the intermediary of the Church and were encouraged to develop their personal faith, made possible by Luther's and other Reformers' translations of the Scriptures into the language of the people. Luther's translation of the Bible itself did much to create the modern German language as he set out to prove that "German nightingales can sing as beautifully as Roman goldfinches" (qtd. in Kittelson 175).
This turbulent era led to changes in church-state relations; namely, religious liberty and toleration sprung forth out of the ruins of the religious wars. In these skirmishes, it was proven no longer possible to try to maintain religion by force. Also, because so many new religions came onto the scenes after the back of the Roman Catholic Church was broken, no one group could secure domination. The concept of the separation of church and state also came out of some of these new religious groups' refusal to allow either religious or secular authority. Luther's thought also encompassed both decentralizing and democratic influences: Individuals have spiritual freedom in their relationships with God, free from control by the Pope or the state (Tjernagel 101-3).
The Reformation period also affected man and society. Two of the most important social outcomes were the demolishing of monastic ideals and the changing of domestic relations. These are connected to Luther's theological condemnation of monastic institutions due to their glorification of poverty and salvation by good works, two things that Luther rejected. In destroying monastic ideals, Luther attached virtue to the peasant and the laborer and disavowed the idleness and begging of the monks. Economic self-reliance became a symbol of pride, and receiving charity became a symbol of humiliation. This idea obviously held enormous appeal to the working masses and was the forerunner of capitalism. The result: "A new morale for industry and a new sense of duty in rendering an honest day's work" (Tjernagel 104). Heightened productivity allowed for the expansion of industry. The changing ideal of monasticism also did away with the dignity of the celibate life. Luther exalted marriage and gave it honor as the Christian home began to be viewed as a place to practice and exemplify God's Word for the amelioration of future generations (Tjernagel 103-4).
Luther's Reformation, finally, guided changes in education and culture. Luther has even been touted as the father of education as we know it today because his insistence that each person have personal access to the Holy Scriptures demanded a universal system of education. For this reason, Luther was one of the first advocates of public education; the masses must be able to read the Scriptures. Not only that, but to have the ability to interpret the Bible, one must also have a general knowledge of things spoken of in the Scriptures, like history, geography, plants, and animals. In addition, interest in literature was stimulated and broadened by the appeal of Reformation writings. On a different note, Luther in particular held fast to the artistic and cultural past of Germany by making music and popular participation essentials in the worship service. Luther's own love of church music and penchant for creating it culminated in the music of Johann Sebastian Bach several years later (Tjernagel 104-6).
Whatever one might say about Martin Luther, one must come to the conclusion that Luther's theology was bold and uncompromising, much like the man himself. Although he ingested several philosophies in school and in life, Luther had the bravery and talent to choose among them, to question and disprove Aristotle, and throw down humanists of the time, like Erasmus. Luther "unsettles the foundations" of the Church in Rome and the emperor by stripping them of their authority; they were no longer the criteria by which truth might be known (Melchert 313-14). Instead, the Bible and the triumphant individual came to the forefront and took their place, as Luther insisted: "A simple layman armed with Scripture is to be believed above a pope or a council without it" (qtd. in Melchert 313).