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An den Christlichen Adel deutscher Nation : von des Christlichen standes besserung / D. Martinus Luther. ..; Title page recto

Open Letter to the Christian Nobility of the German Nation Concerning the Reform of Christian Society

Church and state--Catholic Church

Church and state

Germany

Holy Roman Empire

History

Luther here argues in German for a full-scale overhaul of the Church, and that the secular powers of emperor and nobility had the authority and the responsibility to act in the face of a corrupted Church, whose members he dismissively referred to as "Romanists." He called for the end of major swathes of the medieval Church’s structure, including its elaborate calendar of feasts and saints days, and its vast industry of relics and pilgrimages. Among his demands was the abolition of clerical celibacy, arguing that to prohibit marriage was as futile as to "forbid eating, drinking, the natural movement of the bowels or growing fat." Though addressed primarily to non-ecclesiastical elites – whose support and protection were perhaps the main reason he survived through this period – the work uses populist rhetoric against the hierarchy of Church structures and teaching. It was reprinted at least fourteen times within just a few years. "Therefore…those who are now called ‘spiritual’ – priests, bishops, or popes – are neither different from other Christians, nor superior to them…." "...there is no true, basic difference between laymen and priests, princes and bishops, between religious and secular, except for the sake of office and work, but not for the sake of status….they all of the spiritual estate, all are truly priests, bishops, and popes." "...it may well happen that the pope and his followers are wicked men and not true Christians, not taught of God, not having true understanding. On the other hand, an ordinary man may have true understanding; why then should we not follow him?"

Luther, Martin, 1483-1546

Lotter, Melchior, approximately 1490-

Melchior Lotter d.J.

[1520]

No Copyright - United States

German

Still Image

4551076

1520

[Wittenberg]

books

[99] pages ; 20 cm (quarto)

Burke Library at Union Theological Seminary, Columbia University

Union Rare Pamphlets

GT2 1520anb

original filename:1900200035

recto, title page

reformatted digital