Protestant Reformation The practices of The Catholic Church during the sixteenth century caused a monk named Martin Luther to question The Church’s ways. Luther watched as families suffered physically, emotionally and economically by the hands of The Church. Luther saw no basis for The Church to charge people for their sins or prevent them from learning to read The Bible themselves. He watched as the money built up The Palace, yet tore apart the fundamental and spiritual reasons one goes to church in the first place. In an effort to change the practices of The Church, he wrote the 95 Thesis. In these, he stated his views on the abuses of The Church. This was the beginning of a large movement that would change religious practices over …show more content…
Also in regard to marriage, King Henry VIII used marriage and divorce as his reason for changing religion in England. He wanted an annulment from Catherine of Aragon. The Catholic Church refused to grant the annulment causing Henry VIII to take upon himself the authority of the English Church. He believed that all matters of the Church of England should be decided by himself, the King. Unlike Lutheranism, John Calvin’s Protestant beliefs included a predestined means of going to Heaven. He also preached to his followers to lead a very strict life. Because they were predestined, but wouldn’t know until death who was chosen, they were told to live a very calm life without temptation. His ideas of living without luxuries, dancing and alcohol made him very unpopular. Similar to Luther, Zwingli believed in following The Bible as it is written. Once The Bible was translated and all were able to read it for themselves, they found Zwingli’s beliefs easy to follow. As a pastor, he taught straight from The Bible and his followers respected him and largely accepted Protestant religion. Zwingli, as with other Protestants, gave up Roman Catholic practices such as Lent, clerical celibacy and mass. Many Protestant reformers continued to practice very much the same way. The large difference between their beliefs was, as stated previously, the practice of Communion. They each had their own ideas of the Last Supper and how to view the body and blood of Christ. Most
Martin Luther started the Protestant Reformation when he nailed his 95 theses to the door of the Castle Church in Wittenberg, Germany on October 31, 1517. It contained a series of 95 complaints that the once monk had with the church. He was steadfast in his efforts to get the church to change. Even refusing to repeal his complaints when threatened with excommunication.
He did this because he felt that he would never earn his eternal salvation otherwise. He didn't feel that all of the prayer, studying and sacraments were enough and felt that he would never be able to satisfy such a judgmental God. After entering the religious life he later became a monk and entered the Augustinian monastery at Erfurt in July of 1505. While there, Luther became a well-known theologian and Biblical scholar. Luther took his religious vocation very seriously. This led him into a severe crisis in dealing with his religion. He wondered, "is it possible to reconcile the demands of God's law with mankind's inability to live up to that law?" Luther then turned to the New Testament book of Romans for answers. He realized that everyone is burdened by sin because it happens as a result of our weaknesses. He concluded that man could never earn his salvation by leading a blameless life or by performing Holy acts. Instead, man's salvation was a divine gift from God resulting from faith in Jesus, especially the saving power of His death and resurrection. This was known as the protestant doctrine of "justification by faith alone." The fact that Luther believed this led him into his first confrontation. The leader of the Catholic Church, Pope Leo X, was trying to raise money in order to build St. Peter's Basilica in Rome. In order to do this, the Pope offered the sale of indulgences, which were donations of money that would give
Through different inspirations, the Protestant Reformation and Age of Enlightenment sought to change the stagnant traditions of European thinking in the 15th and 16th centuries. Began by German priest named Martin Luther in 1517, he was one of the first people to publicly call out the Catholic Church and their bargaining of indulgences by pasting the 95 Theses on the door of the Wittenberg church for everyone to see. The 95 Theses was a short list of the 95 flaws of the Catholic Church revolving around the use of their indulgences. Luther believed that people should not be scammed by the church and pay for fake indulgences for salvation, but rather come to a new understanding of salvation that came through faith alone. The other change of tradition was not getting your source of beliefs from the Catholic Church, but solely the Bible, which was a
The earliest most famous Protestant reformer, Martin Luther went to the school of Erfurt to study law in 1501, but he quickly became more interested in theology. Luther was exposed to recent humanist writings and read extensively in classical Latin, Greek, and Hebrew. In 1505, he enrolled in an Augustinian monastery. He spent a decade educating and preaching and visited Rome. The Reformation was a religious uprising in Europe in the 16th century, prompted by dissatisfaction with the set Roman Catholic Church, which directed to the formulation of the Protestant branch of Christianity.
The Protestant Reformation began during the Renaissance time period, it was the attempt to reform the Roman Catholic church. It led to the creation of Protestant churches. This reformation began after multiple church leaders started demanding individuals to supply them with such large quantities of goods, food, and money that individuals did not have much left to provide to their own family. Several believed if they did not contribute and present the church with what they asked, they would be denied entrance to heaven once they passed away. People saw how the church thrived while those who contributed were ravenous and penniless. Martin Luther, a monk, noticed several inaccuracies between what the Roman Catholic Church practiced and the Bible as he studied the Bible. He decided to speak out by creating the 95 Theses, and nailing it on the entrance of a catholic church. Protestants who had similar view as Luther’s began Luther-ism. John Calvin, had very similar views as Luther and was even inspired by him to reform the Catholic Church as well. I most admire Martin Luther because of how he spoke up and protested against the Roman Catholic church when he knew it could put him in danger, but I am most similar to John Calvin because of how he believes in predestination and how faith is revealed by living a righteous life.
In 1522, Luther began to organize a reformed church and was the first to translate the New Testament into German. This New Testament sold almost 200,000 copies and created great appeal for Lutheranism. It allowed many Germanic people to read the Bible because it no longer required the people to know Latin. However, it did not reach everyone as many people were still illiterate. From its beginning, the reformation was tied to political affairs as it was supported by many German
The Protestant Reformation was the 16th-century religious, political, intellectual and cultural upheaval that splintered Catholic Europe, setting in place the structures and beliefs that would define the continent in the modern era.
Due to the actions of Huldrych Zwingli the Reformation began to advance throughout the Swiss Conferderation, but several states refused because of the preferred ways of The Catholic Church. Zwingli combined an partnership of the Reformed states to form an alliance that boarded the Swiss Conferderation along religious lines. This then caused an eruptio between the two sides in 1529 causing a war. Simultaneously the ideas of Huldrych Zwingli catched the attention of other Reformers most importantly Martin
433). The opinions of Luther and Zwingli were neither new nor sacrilegious, but were based on belief and the Scripture.
Of the Freedom of Choice in the Selection of Food – After some of his friends broke the Lent fast by eating some sausages, Zwingli used the opportunity to preach on this matter in 1522. He says that the decision to fast or not to fast does not matter, so long as Christians are given a choice to decide for themselves in the first place. His argument comes from the desire to listen and receive guidance from the Holy Spirit. Besides, he says, the fasting of Lent and other seasons is yet another form of works, and therefore does not matter in regards to salvation as only the grace of God can save a person.
Although the Protestant Reformers (i.e., Luther, and Zwingli) challenged the Roman Catholic Church to return to Scripture as the primary source of Christian theology, members of other groups believed Luther and Zwingli failed to include the New Testament teachings on the difference between the church and society. As a result, a group of Protestant radicals led by Georg Blaurock and Conrad Grebel founded a new congregation that became known as the Anabaptist. The split occurred when the radicals could not convince Zwingli to agree with their views on the connection between the civic community and the religious community. Consequently, the Anabaptist and later the Mennonites expanded on the Protestant Reformation. In
At the time Luther wrote the “95 Theses on the Power of Indulgences” he presumed that reforms could still be made by the Pope and the church's hierarchy; however, after Luther received the papal bull excommunicating him, Luther’s ideology became diametrically opposed to the pope and the whole Roman Catholic structure (shilling 142). This break was a defining time
On January 26th of 1523, a council was to decide if Zwingli was going to be allowed to continue to proclaim his views or not. This meeting attracted a large crowd of approximately six hundred people! Zwingli then summarized his position on the 67 articles or theses he had written. Fabri – who was a Catholic theologian known for his writings opposing the Protestant Reformation – didn’t prepare for the argument Zwingli arranged…and because he was forbidden to discuss high theology before a layman (who was a non-ordained member of the church)… simply insisted on the necessity of the religious authority. Yet after several arguments, the decision of the council was that Zwingli would be allowed to continue his preaching and that all other missionaries
Protestant doctrine varied greatly from the doctrines of Catholicism. The main deviance in Protestant doctrine in is the answer of how a person obtains salvation. In Catholic doctrine a person obtains salvation through good works and penance. Luther felt that there is no amount of good works a person could perform to be worth of everlasting salvation. In "Justification by Faith Alone" Luther says, "… I grasp that the justice of God is that righteousness by which through grace and sheer mercy God justifies us through faith" (Luther 261). Luther's statement means that the way to obtain salvation is to believe and trust Jesus Christ and God (Kagen 357). Also Protestantism emphasized scripture over ritual. Luther attacked the catholic ritual in his “Babylonian Captivity of the Church.” He said that only two of the seven sacraments of the Catholic Church were biblical. Those two sacraments are baptism and the Eucharist. The Catholic Church’s policy of selling indulgences was another important part of the Catholic Church Luther attacked. He thought the idea that a person could buy their way to salvation was utterly wrong. He went on to say that the pope was not infallible (Kagen 360). That idea went completely against what the Catholic Church believed. These were some of the ways that Protestant Doctrine differed from Catholic Doctrine.
“We could keep on arguing for a hundred years and it wouldn’t get us anywhere! Until you can get rid of my verse I will not admit defeat.” (Documents on the Continental Reformation, p.97) When people are liberated with the power to think for themselves and own their own ideas, differences in opinion will occur. When we look at the Protestant Reformation we will see that key individuals such as Martin Luther and Ulrich Zwingli, even though they are protesting similar things, develop differences upon the way, especially in the way they interpret Scripture. These differences, in any movement, will ultimately affect the outcome and the development of the Protestant movement that started in 1517 with Luther. This essay aims to examine these differences between Luther and Zwingli and find out how the Protestant movement was affected by their differing opinions. Firstly, Luther and Zwingli’s reformations will be observed individually and what they each stood for and then we will discuss their major differences and the influence they had on the Protestant movement.