In 1517, Martin Luther, an Augustinian monk, kick-started the momentous event the world has come to refer to as the Protestant Reformation with the nailing of his famous paper to the door of the church of the university town of Wittenberg.
This year, preparations have been going on in various towns with significant connections to the reformation with the renovation of relevant institutions, commemorative exhibitions, conferences, lectures, visits to heritage sites and memorial services to mark the 500th anniversary of the reformation. A plethora of books have also been written to celebrate the history and legacy of the reformation. Historic towns like Wittenberg have been witnessing influx of visitors and tourists who desired to see firsthand the relics associated with this epic event. Christian historians and interest groups are also busy examining the teachings of Lutheran churches worldwide seeking to understand how their present doctrines reflect the themes the original reformer fought and shed their best blood for.
It leads us to ask the essential question, “What actually is the Protestant Reformation?”
The Protestant Reformation is the religious revolution of the 16thcentury and one of the most significant events in Western Church history. It occurred in reaction to the serious and series of doctrinal abuses by the Roman Catholic Church and the dangerous pervasion of the written word of God, the Bible. The goal of the reformers at the time was to reform the Roman Church and reverse the grave impoverishment of the church as a spiritual and moral fortress. What started basically as pockets of attempts by a small section of the clergy to force some changes within the church quickly thrived to become the basis of a radical and far-reaching religious, social and political transformation ever recorded in modern history. By far, the reformation of the 16th century has become the standard for reflection and measurement of where Christianity is at, in any point in time.
The Lessons Of The Reformation
As we look back 500 years, precisely on October 31st this year, since Luther and others were used by the Holy Spirit to awaken Christendom to the truth of God’s word, what are the lessons learnt from the reformation?
We will endeavor to present, in historical context, the events that were prevalent in the Western Church prior to 1517 which formed the catalysts for the Reformation and identify reformation footprints in the moral and spiritual decadence of our time. It is not the preoccupation to indoctrinate anyone or denigrate any institution or denomination; but rather to remember and present the reformation in its biblical and historical framework to gain perspective on the times we live in and be reminded of our prophetic future as the Church of our Lord Jesus Christ.
The events in the mediaeval Roman Catholic church that formed the backdrop and gave impetus to the emergence of the 16th century reformers were one of widespread spiritual bankruptcy. The Church was beleaguered with grave malpractices and generic corruption of the clergy. The papacy (popes and cardinals) increasingly exerted itself into all aspects of life, national and international politics, laying claims to both temporal as well as political powers, commanded armies and could declare wars against potentates, sell church offices to the highest bidders, received taxes from sovereign states and did degenerate to the point where it could actually determine who was of low birth or nobility.
The popes and cardinals adopted the lifestyles of kings and princes and lived in such palatial opulence that contradicted their projected humble spiritual statuses as the Overseers over the souls of the faithful. They exercised rulership over vast territories generally known as the “papal states”. The debauchery was such that in the decades before the Reformation, men like St. Francis, Peter Waldo, Jan Hus, and John Wycliffe vigorously fought these institutionalized evils to little effects. Increasingly, the overwhelming power and influence of the popes and their meddling in the political affairs of nation states led to more ignoble practices, prestige seeking and power struggles with European princes who relished any opportunity to weaken their influence.
Commenting on the state of the church at that time, Pope Francis stated, “The church was not a role model, there was corruption, there was worldliness, there was greed, and lust for power.”
At this time also, the Church devised all means to lessen the sin burden on the soul of her adherents, as long as it will help the institution achieve its domineering ambition. Emphasis was placed by the church on works as against faith. Men could do enough to merit or earn entrance to heaven through contributions in cash or kind. In other words, contrary to God’s word in Ephesians 2:5-8,Romans 3:24 the Roman Church taught that God’s graces like salvation, could be earned through good works.
A practical outworking of the above was in the sale of indulgences by the papacy; the immediate factor that actually precipitated agitations for the reformation of the church. Indulgencies are official church papers issued to people, not only to forgive them of present sins but also to absolve them of future consequences, and in exchange they made some religious donations of specified amounts of money. The Roman Catholic Church esteems the pope as Christ on earth, with the power to forgive sins and bestow sanctifying grace; therefore the papers they issued allegedly also guaranteed retributive justice for souls of family members held up in purgatory (another doctrine that has no Biblical basis) and gain for them entrance into heaven. The money realized from the sales were shared between the bankers, civil authorities and representatives of the Pope. The papacy’s share was used to finance the rebuilding and refurbishment of St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome to its present standards. A notorious figure at the head of this practice at the time of Martin Luther in Leipzig was a certain Johann Tetzel.
Not Loving Their Lives Unto Death
Other areas of conflicts between the Church and the reformers include the claim that the church is the sole interpreters of the Bible; laypeople were not allowed to own or even read one. There was a general lack of interest and massive ignorance concerning God’s word, even amongst the clergy of the day as recorded by Bishop John Hooper in 1551, stating that half of 311 Roman Catholic priests examined could not say the Lord’s Prayer. Members of the clergy who gave Biblical interpretations different from that approved by the Roman Church were classified as heretics and faced sentences from long range jail terms to death by hanging, strangling or burning at stake. Many who were martyred on this premise include the Lollards, Marranos, Stratford Martyrs and such noble personalitiesas Archbishop Thomas Cranmer, Bishops Nicholas Ridley and Hugh Latimer, Michael Servetus and William Tyndale. Tyndale’s crime was that he recognized the need for clergy and laypeople to know the Word of God by having it in a language they could understand. On being criticized for his zeal in translating the Bible, Tyndale responded, “I defy the Pope and all his laws; if God spare my life, ere many years, I will cause the boy that driveth a plough to know more of the Scriptures than thou dost.” Tyndale’s remain was exhumed 30 years after his death and burnt because of his translations of the New Testament into English language.
The unbiblical Church belief of “sacramental efficacy” also created a chasm between the Roman Church and the reformers. In his 1520 book, “The Babylonian Captivity of the Church”, Martin Luther disagreed with the way the sacraments distracted from the words of God’s promises with the emphasis on merits as the rites in sacraments like baptism, communion, marriage, elevated human observation over faith in God’s promises and did not keep perspectives within that allowed in the Scriptures. The reformers clamoured for internal changes and actually made attempts to get the papal modification of these unbiblical doctrines and practices.
Some of these agitations for internal reform predated the 16th century reformation, such as the Waldenses, Joachim, John Wycliffe, and at a point led to the convening of the Fifth Lateran Council of 1512-1517. The resultant outcome of the deliberations saw the adoptions of far reaching measures, though the implementation was met with measured results in certain areas. They could not obtain official doctrinal reversal by the papacy and that was the situation until the emergence of Martin Luther and the latter reform movement.
God And The Press
By far, the most important trigger for the reformation could be seen in the invention of the printing press and its associated consequences. Before this time, the Bible could only be seen in few places and was only written in Latin, a dead language to many as nobody understood it apart from a section of the clergy. The printing press helped to further the works of translators like Wycliffe in making copies of translations quickly available in larger quantities in vernaculars like French, Spanish, Italian, English and German, etc. It means that lay people could now read the Bible for themselves and understand it, without dependence on the clergy for interpretation.
The quiet objections of the early reformers would now be fueled into mass movements supported by the lately enlightened populace when the agitations arose. From here it was easy to articulate and thematise the reformers’ thoughts into popular categories, “sola Christus” (the all-sufficiency of Christ alone), “sola fide” (justification by faith and faith alone), “sola scriptura” (the Bible and the Bible alone) and “sola gracias” (saved by grace and grace alone), which rapidly spread all over Europe and gained popular acceptance with the faithful. Many have postulated that the reformation of the 16th century gave the Bible back to men, who could now read for themselves and understand its sacred messages. The reformation was seen as the “bursting into life of the latent truth of Scripture.”
Before now, attempt at reformation of the Church, apart from happening in pockets of isolated epochs and events, was riddled with doctrinal disunity amongst the reformers themselves. There was no unity and consensus of beliefs by the prominent figures; but this ended with the development of broad themes and the prophetic characterization of the Pope as the anti-Christ. The reformers found basis for this belief in the Word of God as Romanism came to represent apostate Christianity. This became the unifying point against the Church of Rome the moment the heat was turned on the reformers through the counter reformation movement of the Church authorities.
Enter Martin Luther
It is a popular belief that Martin Luther’s 95 theses were first step in an attempt to break away from the Roman Church, but historical records seem to point to something different. At the earliest times, the aim of the reformers was not to break away from Romanism but rather to reform it and reestablish the doctrines and practices in conformity with the Bible. Luther was a forefront advocate of this ambition and he wrote the Pope particularly exposing the dangers to the Church in abandoning the Bible as the single authority for man’s salvation. Luther’s objections were solely against the practice of collection of indulgences and appeared without any major criticism of Rome. He was incensed with the deceit of the commoners by the clergy that salvation could be bought and he was determined to take on the mighty Roman Church on that point. After a Sunday service on October 31st 1517, he nailed his 95 theses or topics for debate, written in Latin all dealing with the question of indulgences addressed to Tetzel and Albert. By the aid of the printing press, the theses was translated into German and spread all over the place.
Luther was summoned by Church leaders to the Diet of Worms with the expectation that he will recant this stand. He presented a treatise titled, “On The Babylonian Captivity of the Church” and “On the Freedom of a Christian”, refusing to recant his beliefs and teachings. Pope Leo X in 1521, with Luther’s refusal to back down from his convictions, issued a papal bull excommunicating Luther from the Roman Church. Luther received the bull which he later burnt outside the church and before the people, thus signaling utter defiance of the Pope and denouncing his authority. The move by Luther to challenge the only and all-powerful church establishment of the time gradually became a movement that spread like wildfire throughout Saxony, Scotland, Netherland, France and to other parts of the Christian world and thus began the movement referred to as the Protestant Reformation.
Movement Orchestrated By God
Luther on his own would not have made such far-reaching impact. It is the most important act of God upon the Church of Jesus Christ in our modern time. As stated, it was not Martin Luther’s desire to separate from the Roman Catholic Church or start a movement of any kind, but God used that as an instrument to bring about necessary changes in His Church. Luther agreed so much that the movement was God’s intention rather than his achievement stating, “Like a blind mule I was led by Him.” God raised Duke Johann Friedrich of Saxony, an elector of the Kaiser or Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire, the highest political office in Luther’s region to protect him against persecution. Through a dream vividly revealing the event of the Reformation shortly before the posting of the 95 theses on the door of the Wittenberg church, the Duke was persuaded to protect Luther. When the heat was on Luther, Duke Friedrich took on the role of his protector and shielded him from execution especially in the years during his translation of the Bible from Latin to German. The movement spontaneously advanced beyond the imaginations and influences of Martin Luther through other 16thCentury reformers to shake the entire world and brought about the fundamental transformations we have come to associate with the Church of Jesus Christ today.
There were great political upheavals and the accompanying loss of crowns or territories to the Roman Catholic Church, but of significance to us are the positive effects on the church which include the restoration of true worship, placing of the word of God in the hands of the people leading to the evangelization of new lands, propagation of the true gospel of salvation through Jesus Christ and justification by faith alone, adoption of the Holy Word of God as sole authority and guide for mankind, etc.
Another aspect of the Reformation that is seldom discussed is influx of reformed music. Not only did God restore the Bible and prophetic insights back to the people, He also gave the world wonderful spiritual songs – Ephesians 5:19, Colossians 3:16 – through people like Sebastian Bach who was a wonderful composer of Christian music.
By far the greatest result from the Reformation was the spread of the Bible to many parts of the world. The ensuing doctrinal enlightenment brought fresh apostolic zeal, acceptance of the Bible as the foundation for truth, the centrality of Christ and extolling His accomplished works as perfect and sufficient basis for faith and eternal assurance.
The greater details of the Reformation have been examined by many other volumes somewhere else, but it eventually led to the breakout from Romanism, of many other Christian groups like the Lutherans, Calvinists, Anglican Church, and the whole Protestant and Evangelical world as we know it today. The Roman Church was eventually forced to reform itself by introducing measures at the Council of Trent (1545- 1563) which in effect were meant to counter the Protestant Reformation.
Moses E. Oputah is the Managing Editor of Kingdom Times.