Luther's fortress : Martin Luther and his Reformation under siege

231 Pages·2015·5.63 MB·English

by  Luther

ALSO BY JAMES RESTON JR.
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Copyright © 2015 by James Reston Jr.
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Set in 12 point Goudy Old Style Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Reston, James, Jr.,
1941– Luther’s fortress : Martin Luther and his Reformation under siege / James Reston, Jr.—First
[edition].
pages cm Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-0-465-05797-9 (ebook) 1. Luther, Martin, 1483–1546. 2. Reformation. I. Title.
BR326.6.R47 2015
284.1092—dc23
[B]
2014049254
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
for
Reverend James Ashton Devereux
CONTENTS
Prologue
ONE The Birth of a Contrarian
TWO Worms
THREE Appointment at Altenstein
FOUR Patmos
FIVE Lowly Monk Versus Lofty King
SIX Unclean Thoughts, Devouring Fires
SEVEN Rivals Surface
EIGHT Wrestling the Devil
NINE The New Creature
TEN A Clandestine Mission
ELEVEN Twenty-Seven Books in Ten Weeks
TWELVE Rome
THIRTEEN All Alone
FOURTEEN Fanatics Take Over
FIFTEEN Liberation
SIXTEEN Consolidation
SEVENTEEN Fruition
Epilogue
Author’s Note
Acknowledgments
Selected Bibliography
Index
PROLOGUE
T
HIS IS THE STORY OF THE MOST INTENSE AND PIVOTAL
PERIOD in the life of the great Reformer Martin Luther: the period from
April 1521 to March 1522, when he was held in solitary confinement in the
imposing castle called the Wartburg, after defending himself against the charge
of heresy at the Diet of Worms. Months earlier, the Vatican had officially
proclaimed him to be a heretic. At that conclave in Worms, through the so-called
Edict of Worms, the Holy Roman emperor, Charles V, conferred double
jeopardy on Luther by levying the most serious charge of the secular world
against him, banning him as an outlaw. In the succeeding eleven months, Luther
hid in terror, as the fear of being found and seized and eventually burned at the
stake tormented him.
Like Luther’s life, his movement also hung by a thread during this fraught
period. His cohorts at the epicenter of the rebellion in Wittenberg, men who had
rallied to his cause in the preceding years and whom the Vatican had also
excommunicated, grew increasingly reckless in his absence, as Luther’s time at
the Wartburg wore on. If he perished, internal discord almost certainly would
have undermined his movement. Luther and Lutheranism could easily have
become an obscure footnote in history. At this great turning point in the history
of Western civilization, the Protestant Reformation might never have happened
at all.
At the Wartburg, beset by inner demons and physical torment, thrown back
on his inner resources in secrecy and in solitude, the great Reformer could well
have gone crazy. Instead, he wrestled courageously with the most profound
questions of Christian life: priestly vows, celibacy, sexuality, priestly marriage,
Heaven and Hell, obedience and dissent, ecclesiastical authority, and personal
witness. He interpreted Holy Scripture for the common person. He pondered a
Christianity devoid of papal guidance, fashioned a new scriptural doctrine, and
reformulated biblical texts, all the while struggling at a distance to keep his
fragile movement alive, vibrant, and safe from daunting external threat and
internal dissension. Miraculously, Luther not only survived this ordeal at the
Wartburg but flourished.
His literary output in these furtive months was astonishing: letters, sermons,
essays, translations. He accomplished all of this even though he was suffering
from physical ailments, and even though visions of a dire fate, hallucinations of
Hell and Satan, and nightmares about his personal sinfulness troubled his mind.
Indeed, without books to refer to during this period, he would succeed in
changing the German language forever, as he would transform a rebellion
against Rome into a lasting alternate religion.
Luther’s burst of passion and brilliance—and his amazing concentration—
would save his movement, impart to it a doctrine separate from Roman
Catholicism, and give birth to Protestantism. Luther’s accomplishments during
this period catapulted him from the status of a lowly monk on the fringes of
religious life in Europe to the pinnacle of Christian thought. Hounded into the
Wartburg, he emerged with the strength and stature to face his persecutors—and
triumph over them.
T
HE PERIOD OF 1483 TO 1546, LUTHER’S LIFESPAN, WAS AN era of
giants: Henry VIII in England; Francis I in France; Charles V, the Holy
Roman emperor presiding over most of Europe; the Medici popes, Leo X and
Clement VIII in Rome; and Suleyman the Magnificent in Constantinople. It was
a time of conflict between Charles V and Francis I in Italy, the sack of Rome in
1527 by Protestant forces from Germany, and the siege of Vienna by Suleyman
in 1529 and 1532, when the Ottoman sultan threatened to spread the dominion of
Islam all the way to the Rhine River. It was the time of Christopher Columbus
and the opening of the New World, of Vasco da Gama and the opening to India,
and of the Renaissance with its luminaries: Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci,
Raphael, Albrecht Dürer, and Machiavelli.
Luther’s lifetime also saw the ascendancy of some of the most powerful and
interesting popes Christendom had ever known. After the glorious celebration of
the Christian Jubilee in the year 1500, Julius II was elected in 1503 and became
known as the warrior pope, as he presided over the reconquest of Bologna and
other important papal dominions in central Italy in his effort to prevent French