Here's what I don't get. I think Martin Luther was trying to save people, so that's why he made his 95 theses and posted it on the door of Castle Church in Wittenberg, Germany.
Is
bear513 trying to say Martin Luther was wrong with the 95 theses and trying to save Reformers? Somehow, I do not get this message from his epithet-filled rants. What I get is a complaint in that the RCC members have not been lazy and worked to get into heaven, but Protestants just skate in. It sounds like he wants to keep people out instead of trying to keep an open mind.
Although Protestants like to think positively about Martin Luther because of his supposed belief in
sola Scriptura(the Bible alone), the truth is that Martin Luther changed parts of the Bible and discounted the value of many books.
Notice a change he admitted to regarding Romans 3:28:
You tell me what a great fuss the Papists are making because the word alone in not in the text of Paul…say right out to him: ‘Dr. Martin Luther will have it so,’…I will have it so, and I order it to be so, and my will is reason enough. I know very well that the word ‘alone’ is not in the Latin or the Greek text (Stoddard J. Rebuilding a Lost Faith. 1922, pp. 101-102; see also Luther M. Amic. Discussion, 1, 127).
This passage strongly suggests that Martin Luther viewed his opinions, and not the actual Bible as the primary authority–a concept which this author will name
prima Luther. By “papists” he is condemning
Roman Catholics.
Regarding the New Testament Book of Hebrews Martin Luther stated,
It need not surprise one to find here bits of wood, hay, and straw (O’HarePF. The Facts About Luther, 1916–1987 reprint ed., p. 203).
He also wrote,
St. James’ epistle is really an epistle of straw…for it has nothing of the nature of the gospel about it” (Luther, M. Preface to the New Testament, 1546).
Perhaps none of Martin Luther’s writings on the Bible are as harsh as what he wrote about “The Revelation of Jesus Christ” (Revelation 1:1). Specifically he wrote,
About this book of the Revelation of John…I miss more than one thing in this book, and it makes me consider it to be neither apostolic nor prophetic…
I can in no way detect that the Holy Spirit produced it. Moreover he seems to me to be going much too far when he commends his own book so highly-indeed, more than any of the other sacred books do, though they are much more important-and threatens that if anyone takes away anything from it, God will take away from him, etc. Again, they are supposed to be blessed who keep what is written in this book; and yet no one knows what that is, to say nothing of keeping it. This is just the same as if we did not have the book at all. And there are many far better books available for us to keep…My spirit cannot accommodate itself to this book. For me this is reason enough not to think highly of it: Christ is neither taught nor known in it” (Luther, M. Preface to the Revelation of St. John, 1522).
