Preview

AP European History Essay: Martin Luther

Satisfactory Essays
Open Document
Open Document
315 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
AP European History Essay: Martin Luther
Luther was a revolutionary after his excommunication because of his writing: On the Babylonish Captivity of the Church. This writing caused the official break with Rome, and the creation of a new system of faith. In this document, Luther calls Rome a brothel and compares it to Babylon. His language in this document is scathing, sarcastic, and brutal. However, the people now viewed the conflict between Luther and the Church as one between Satan and God. This was Luther’s official break with Rome. With this break came the creation of a new system of faith. This system focused on liberation. Liberation from the “middlemen”, or the priests, as each individual has a personal relationship with God. Roman Catholics were supposed to believe that they had to go through the priest to receive forgiveness from God. Martin Luther states that this is absurd. People should have a personal relationship with God, and did not have to go to church to talk with God. Each Christian has a relationship with God, and this liberated Europeans and Christians: everyone could now ask for forgiveness on their own. Martin Luther also believed that each Christian was a priest.
Luther also introduced the 5 basic theological principles of the new reformed religion: Sola Fide, (by faith alone) Sola Scriptura, (by Scripture alone) Solus Christus, (through Christ alone) Sola Gratia, (by grace alone) and Soli Deo Gloria (glory to God alone). The main point of these 5 ideas is the sola, meaning alone. This expresses that the church was not need to have faith. The only things needed to be a good Christian are God and the bible.
This new religion was revolutionary, and appealing to the people because they did not need to be wealthy to be a good Christian, and could be close to God by themselves. This new belief system proves that Luther was a revolutionary after his excommunication.
Continue Reading
View Writing Issues

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Powerful Essays

    Ap Euro Martin Luther Conservative or Revolutionary
    • 1706 Words
    • 7 Pages

    Ap Euro Martin Luther Conservative or Revolutionary

    Martin Luther was one of the greatest monks, priests, and theological teachers of Germany, along with being the symbol of the Protestant Reformation. He did not start off so religious however. One day he was caught in a frightening and dangerous storm. He prayed to God begging not to be killed, and vowed to become a monk if he survived. He did live, upholding his word to the lord, and joined a monastery. He joined an Augustinian friary in 1505, where he suffered from anfechtung, or spiritual anxiety. He never knew if he was doing enough good works to achieve salvation and gain entrance to the kingdom of heaven, as it was believed by the Catholic religion that it took good works along with faith in order to enter. To take his mind off of his religious worries, he was recommended to a teaching post at the University of Wittenberg. There, he taught theology and was quite popular among his students. Luther suffered from constant constipation, so he often read the bible while on the toilet. One day while doing this a certain passage from the epistle of St. Paul to the Romans: “the just shall live by faith,” which led to Luther’s core belief of sola fide, or faith alone. Through this belief, Luther believed that the only thing needed to achieve salvation was to live by faith alone, which challenged the Roman Catholic Church’s theology that both faith and good works were necessary. Luther shared his beliefs with the people of the Holy Roman Empire, demanding change to the way theology was widely taught. He agreed with parts of the current teachings and was conservative, wanting to keep parts of the religion the same. He kept the sacraments, however reduced the amount of them from 7 to 2. He was also like many Roman Catholic religious figures,…

    • 1706 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Powerful Essays
    Read More
  • Good Essays

    Essay On Protestant Reformation
    • 679 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Essay On Protestant Reformation

    While continuously more Christians of Europe were beginning to lose their faith in the church’s leadership and were developing a feeling of doubt or mistrust, it was the Reformation and Martin Luther who came in and gave the people a sense of direction and feeling of hope. This new Protestant tradition at the time lifted this overwhelming cloud of misused power over the Christian community and provided a time for change with new opportunities. The Protestant reformation ended the religious unity of Europe and the church and furthermore started a new era in the history of western…

    • 679 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
    Read More
  • Good Essays

    Apush Chapter 3 Outline
    • 725 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Apush Chapter 3 Outline

    A.) The Protestant Reformation Produces Puritanism Martin Luther denounces the authority of the priests in 1517 and spurred religious reform throughout Europe which spread for more than a century.…

    • 725 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
    Read More
  • Good Essays

    Martin Lindberg's The Late Medieval Church
    • 1160 Words
    • 5 Pages

    Martin Lindberg's The Late Medieval Church

    Martin Luther made radical statements challenging Papal authority, the deliverance of relief of purgatory via a monetary gain by the church, and exposing the corrupt dogma that exemplified the Roman Catholic Church. Luther, after stating the errors of the church, established what he believed was justification by faith. Luther reduced the amount of sacraments to those that were plainly supported by scripture verses the church’s use of sacraments by conjecture, he denounced the sale of paradise, and propounded that the Bible was the true religious authority, whereas, the church gave authority to a fallible man. Furthermore, Luther’s original intent was not to initiate a reformation, but was to allow for academic debate. Luther found questions regarding the church and theological misconduct that would force him to separate from the church in Rome and establish…

    • 1160 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
    Read More
  • Good Essays

    Study Guide
    • 744 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Study Guide

    -The church was saying that you needed to be saved and you needed Catholic priest to be directly involved in your path to salvation. Luther put emphasis on an individual’s personal relationship with God through Jesus.…

    • 744 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
    Read More
  • Good Essays

    How Did Martin Luther Promote Indulge Influences
    • 448 Words
    • 2 Pages

    How Did Martin Luther Promote Indulge Influences

    He challenged the authority of the pope to offer the sale of indulgences directly. This was seen as an attack on the Church. Luther was summoned to Rome. He would have to answer to the charges of heresy he was accused of. Luther did not respond to the summons. That only led to an escalating controversy between Luther and those who defended the faithful document. Luther continued writing about salvation. He wrote about reforms that he saw needed to occur in the church. As a result of that, the rift between Luther and those who believed in him, fueled a growing controversy. (The 95 Theses of Martin Luther)…

    • 448 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
    Read More
  • Good Essays

    Martin Luther Influence
    • 547 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Martin Luther Influence

    Added to the criticisms of indulgences that the Church was practicing, Luther was also reflecting on the popular sentiments in regards to the “St. Peter’s scandal.” Luther was questioning why the pope, whose wealth by then was more than the wealth of the richest Crassus, end up building St. Peters Basilica with the money of poor believers rather than building it using his money. Luther, through his translation of Roman’s 3:28 understood that faith was the key to salvation, which was not fully in use by the Church during his days.…

    • 547 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
    Read More
  • Good Essays

    Martin Luther's 95 Thesis Analysis
    • 367 Words
    • 2 Pages

    Martin Luther's 95 Thesis Analysis

    Martin Luther has impacted many people. He was a professor of theology and a German priest and wrote the 95 thesis. His revolutionary ideas served as the catalyst for the eventual breaking away from the Catholic Church and were later instrumental in forming the movement known as the Protestant Reformation. Luther wrote his radical “95 Thesis” to express his growing concern with the corruption within the church. In essence, his thesis called for a full reform of the Catholic church and challenged other scholars to debate with him on matters of church policy. Luther published his “95 Thesis” fully realizing that he faced excommunication and even death for protesting the traditions and beliefs of the Catholic church. To do so was considered heresy…

    • 367 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
    Read More
  • Good Essays

    Reformation Dbq
    • 763 Words
    • 4 Pages

    Reformation Dbq

    The Roman church fell into a great deal of corruption, under Pope Leo X who began spending more money than the church had in its treasury. The German people had grievances, brought before the diet, they felt that the church was heartless using people’s sins against them. (D4) The economy of the time was a mix of prospering upper and middle class, and poverty struck peasants. At this time people were looking to the church for salvation from the evils of life, this is where indulgences came into play. A short tempered German monk named Martin Luther, talked of feeling week and insufficient, under the control of the church. (D1) He studied the Latin and the Bible, knowing one helped him understand the other. After studying the original text Luther came to find that many things were not sufficient, such as the Seven Sacraments he ended up only keeping only two-baptism and the Lord’s Supper. The church declared that for salvation people must obey the Pope, this was defined under the rain of Pope Boniface VIII, a tyrant of his time in 1302. (D10)…

    • 763 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
    Read More
  • Good Essays

    Martin Luther: a Brief History/Impact on Western Civiliation
    • 783 Words
    • 4 Pages

    Martin Luther: a Brief History/Impact on Western Civiliation

    The Roman Catholic Church, whose center was located in Rome, manifested all over Europe. It went beyond “geographic, racial, linguistic, and national boundaries.” (Perry, 2008) It was, in a way, like a disease that spread all over Europe, influencing every aspect of life, from society to culture. What Martin Luther slowly discovered on his mission to Rome was that in result of its expansion, the Church’s focus on wealth and power seemed to “take precedence over its commitment to the search of holiness in…

    • 783 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
    Read More
  • Better Essays

    Martin Luther Dbq-Ap European History
    • 1053 Words
    • 5 Pages

    Martin Luther Dbq-Ap European History

    Justine Chapel November 19, 2012 AP Euro P3 Martin Luther DBQ By the 1500’s many issues shows signs of disorder within the Church. The idea of selling indulgences (forgiveness for sin) for clergy benefit began to negatively spread throughout the people, along with opposition to pluralism (holding more than one office). This sparked many attempts to reform the church through individual groups, one of which being the Brotherhood of Common Life. One of their accomplishments was starting schools for the poor, in which educated none other than Martin Luther. By the time he became a priest, many people had already failed to reform the church. When Martin Luther entered Rome, he briefly supported the church before realizing the hidden corruption, and his optimism towards converting the Jews was accounted for before realizing their stubborn views of God. While his loving ideas towards peasants turned into hatred of rebellion, it proved to be a consistency because he had always believed peasants belonged in their place. These ideas changed due to the naïve spirit he entered with before being awakened by the truth.…

    • 1053 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Better Essays
    Read More
  • Good Essays

    US History Ch 1 Homework
    • 540 Words
    • 2 Pages

    US History Ch 1 Homework

    5. Martin Luther’s main disagreement with the Roman Catholic Church was how people could be saved from their sins. Luther preached that people were saved by a work of God through trust in Jesus Christ, not from penance.…

    • 540 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
    Read More
  • Good Essays

    How Did Luther Trust The Catholic Church Dbq
    • 672 Words
    • 3 Pages

    How Did Luther Trust The Catholic Church Dbq

    In the time that Luther spent at the Catholic church he discovered the hypocrisy of the teachings. Luther did not respect the idea that one could be allowed to pay to have their sins forgiven (Doc. 2). Luther experienced that evil practices that the Catholic church followed therefore he revoked them. He believed that the Pope was an evil man that ran the church as the Devil would (Doc. 4). Luther truly thought that the Catholics followed the Devil in the form of the Pope. Although Luther did not believe in the teachings of the Catholic church, he did accept as true the traditional teachings of God. Luther trusted in and practiced unconditional love for God (Doc. 3). Luther’s traditional attitude towards Gods teachings demonstrates his conservative values. On the other hand, Luther has some liberal ideas. Some of those liberal ideas are demonstrated with the idea of a secular…

    • 672 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
    Read More
  • Good Essays

    Martin Luther’s Break Away from the Roman Catholic Church
    • 565 Words
    • 17 Pages

    Martin Luther’s Break Away from the Roman Catholic Church

    Many factors lead up to Martin Luther’s break away from The Roman Catholic Church. Factors such as The Church selling indulgences, popes fighting for power, launching extravagant purchases, and the misteaching of the bible are some of the main reasons for Martin’s break off with the church. This essay will explain these points of how and why Martin Luther broke away from the church.…

    • 565 Words
    • 17 Pages
    Good Essays
    Read More
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Globalization Notes
    • 439 Words
    • 2 Pages

    Globalization Notes

    By challenging the foundation of the Catholic Church’s authority, Luther’s ideas implicitly attacked the entire social order of Europe. His ideas regarding individual responsibility and the necessity of backing up theology with scripture opened the door to numerous interpretations and even further fragmentation of Western Christianity.…

    • 439 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
    Read More

Related Topics