Martin Luther (1483–1546) was the German monk who initiated the Protestant Reformation that challenged the teachings and the authority of the Roman Catholic Church. Luther preached that salvation came by grace through faith alone rather than by deeds.
Born in Eisleben, Saxony, Luther studied at the University of Erfurt, became an Augustinian friar, and later a Doctor of Theology. In 1510, he visited Rome as a representative of many Augustinian monasteries and was horrified by the corruption he found there. Outraged, he published his “95 Theses” and condemned papal abuses and the sale of indulgences. Between 1519 and 1520, Luther wrote a series of pamphlets developing his ideas, which spread quickly throughout Europe.
Within a year, Pope Leo X dismissed Luther as an outspoken “son of iniquity.” Excommunicated in 1521, Luther refused to recant his assertions at an assembly of the Holy Roman Empire. It was at this gathering that he pronounced his famous words, “Here I stand, I can do no other, God help me.”
Emperor Charles V declared Luther an outlaw and a heretic. In 1534, Luther published a complete translation of the Bible into German, underlining his belief that people should be able to read it in their language. The translation contributed significantly to the spread and development of the German language.
The foremost ideas of Luther’s reform movement were treasured by the Lutheran Churches who summarized Luther’s essential message in their Book of Concord (1580.)
In his final years, Luther wrote diatribes against the Jews, the papacy, and the Anabaptists, a radical wing of the Reformation movement. He wrote Against the Jews and Their Lies (1542) calling upon authorities to burn Jewish synagogues and to expel Jews if they did not convert to Christianity. Some scholars believe that these points of view sowed the seeds of anti-Semitism in Germany.
More: Wikipedia • READ: Works by Martin Luther
The human heart is like the millstone in a mill; when you put wheat under it, it turns and grinds the wheat into flour.—If you put no wheat in, it still grinds on, but then it is itself it grinds and slowly wears away.
—Martin Luther
Topics: Heart
Next to theology I give music the highest place of honor.
—Martin Luther
Topics: Art, Music
I am afraid that the schools will prove the very gates of hell, unless they diligently labor in explaining the Holy Scriptures and engraving them in the heart of the youth.
—Martin Luther
Topics: Education
If he have faith, the believer cannot be restrained. He betrays himself. He breaks out. He confesses and teaches this gospel to the people at the risk of life itself.
—Martin Luther
Topics: Evangelism
Every man must do two things alone; he must do his own believing and his own dying.
—Martin Luther
Topics: Nature, Death, Dying
How soon ‘not now’ becomes ‘never’.
—Martin Luther
Topics: Procrastination
In our sad condition our only consolation is the expectancy of another life. Here below all is incomprehensible.
—Martin Luther
Topics: Hope
Our Lord has written the promise of resurrection, not in books alone, but in every leaf in springtime.
—Martin Luther
Topics: Difficulty, Time, Eternity
Reason is the greatest enemy that faith has; it never comes to the aid of spiritual things, but – more frequently than not – struggles against the divine Word, treating with contempt all that emanates from God.
—Martin Luther
Topics: Reason, Faith
The human heart is like a ship on a stormy sea driven about by winds blowing from all four corners of heaven.
—Martin Luther
Topics: Heart, Decisions, Indecision
Riches are the pettiest and least worthy gifts which God can give a man. What are they to God’s Word, to bodily gifts, such as beauty and health; or to the gifts of the mind, such as understanding, skill, wisdom! Yet men toil for them day and night, and take no rest. Therefore God commonly gives riches to foolish people to whom he gives nothing else.
—Martin Luther
Topics: Money, Riches
Lord God, I thank thee that thou hast been pleased to make me a poor and indigent man upon earth. I have neither house nor land nor money to leave behind me.
—Martin Luther
Topics: Poverty
I shall never be a heretic; I may err in dispute, but I do not wish to decide anything finally; on the other hand, I am not bound by the opinions of men.
—Martin Luther
An angel is a spiritual creature created by God without a body for the service of Christendom and the church.
—Martin Luther
Topics: Angels, Religion
When Eve was brought unto Adam, he became filled with the Holy Spirit, and gave her the most sanctified, the most glorious of appellations. He called her Eva, that is to say, the Mother of All. He did not style her wife, but simply mother,—mother of all living creatures. In this consists the glory and the most precious ornament of woman.
—Martin Luther
Topics: Mother
The fewer the words, the better the prayer.
—Martin Luther
Topics: Brevity, Prayer
Love is an image of God, and not a lifeless image, but the living essence of the divine nature which beams full of all goodness.
—Martin Luther
Topics: Love
Sin is, essentially, a departure from God.
—Martin Luther
Topics: Sin
There is no more lovely, friendly, and charming relationship, communion, or company than a good marriage.
—Martin Luther
Topics: Marriage, Charm
An earthly kingdom cannot exist without inequality of persons. Some must be free, some serfs, some rulers, some subjects.
—Martin Luther
Topics: Equality
You should not believe your conscience and your feelings more than the word which the Lord who receives sinners preaches to you.
—Martin Luther
Topics: Faith
God uses lust to impel men to many, ambition to office, avarice to earning, and fear to faith. God led me like an old blind goat.
—Martin Luther
Topics: God, Faith, Divinity
Faith, like light, should always be simple and unbending; while love, like warmth, should beam forth on every side, and bend to every necessity of our brethren.
—Martin Luther
Topics: Faith, Love
Music is a discipline, and a mistress of order and good manners, she makes the people milder and gentler, more moral and more reasonable.
—Martin Luther
Topics: Music
How soon not now, becomes never.
—Martin Luther
Topics: Defects, Procrastination
Who loves not wine, woman and song, remains a fool his whole life long.
—Martin Luther
Topics: Thought, Fools, Reason, Foolishness, Wine
The defects of a preacher are soon spied. Let him be endued with ten virtues, and have but one fault, and that one fault will eclipse and darken all his virtues and gifts, so evil is the world in these times.
—Martin Luther
Topics: Preaching
Next to theology I give to music the highest place and honor. And we see how David and all the saints have wrought their godly thoughts into verse, rhyme, and song.
—Martin Luther
Topics: Music
Where God builds a church the devil builds a chapel.
—Martin Luther
Topics: Churches, Religion
The Devil beget darkness; darkness beget ignorance; ignorance beget error and his brethren; error beget free-will and presumption; free-will beget works; works beget forgetfulness of God; forgetfulness beget transgression; transgression beget superstition; superstition beget satisfaction; satisfaction beget the mass-offering; the mass-offering beget the priest; the priest beget unbelief; unbelief beget hypocrisy; hypocrisy beget traffic in offerings for gain; traffic in offerings for gain beget Purgatory; Purgatory beget the annual solemn vigils; the annual vigils beget church-livings; church-livings beget avarice; avarice beget swelling superfluity; swelling superfluity beget fulness; fulness beget rage; rage beget license; license beget empire and domination; domination beget pomp; pomp beget ambition; ambition beget simony; simony beget the pope and his brethren, about the time of the Babylonish captivity.
—Martin Luther
Topics: Consequences
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