Martin Luther: Biographical Sketch in This Essay,

Martin Luther: Biographical Sketch

In this essay, I have presented a biographical sketch of one of the major "players" in the Reformation i.e. Martin Luther. I have discussed his life starting from his birth till his death. In the conclusion, I have mentioned how important he was for the revolution in Europe and how Christians today can follow his footsteps and exemplary character.

At the same time as the Catholic Church made efforts for setting its base and went ahead as the most important and chief institute of religious conviction in the history of world, a lot of compromise were made so that the institution can build and advance further. Sorry to say, one of the sufferers of this Catholic flow was the true-connection-oriented Christianity. With the development and progress of the Catholic Church, the world witnessed the removal of the common man and the domination and unquestioned superiority of clergy in the church. The church of Jesus Christ was given the status of the protected church during Constantine's reign in the early 300 A.D. Christianity was made the Roman Empire's official religion with the issuance of the Edict of Milan. In the subsequent years, a number of people and groups tried to grab power but none of them become as prominent as the force that was getting together in Roman territory. As a consequence, the walls of Rome were a dwelling for the power of the Christian Church for the hundreds of years ahead (Atchley, 2010).

The Reformation can be recognized by 6 most important movements i.e. "The German Reformation (1517-1546), the German-Swiss Reformation (1525-1609), the Swiss Brethren (1527-1648), the French-Swiss Reformation (1534-1564), the English Reformation (1534) and the Catholic Counter Reformation (1563) and the Thirty Years' War." The one hundred and thirty-one years of Reformation introduced a number of leaders to the world including Ulrich Zwingli, John Calvin, Thomas Cranmer, Philip Melanchthon, John Knox, Henry VIII etc. (Atchley, 2010).

It is necessary for a movement to succeed that someone comes forward risking his personal life willingly. Martin Luther was such an individual who willfully set aside his personal safety and security and put everything he had at risk. Due to his unforgettable and relentless contributions, Martin Luther is acknowledged as the "Father of the Reformation." His determination and unbending enthusiasm to oppose the Catholic Church over the trading of extravagance was the earliest official Reformation act despite the fact that a lot of people before Luther were involved in standing against the Catholic Church (Atchley, 2010).

The Early Years

Luther was born on November 10, 1483 to Margaret Luther and Hans Luther and was the eldest of their seven children. As he was born on Saint Martin's Day, he was named Martin as a result of baptism. He was just one-day-old when he was baptized thus becoming an official member of the Roman Catholic Church. From an early age, Luther had a strong yearning for discovering and having religion as a main feature of his everyday life. The prayers and holy texts at home enthused and motivated Luther. It is an interesting fact that the pictorial representations of Christ made little Luther fearful. He was also afraid of the graphical representations of hell and the pain in that. His father wanted Luther to join civil services and live a life that was of quality. Both Luther's mother and father were particularly strict and rigorous. Even Luther mentioned later that the retribution was every so often unreasonable, unfair and too much. According to quite a lot of scholars, Luther's formative years were also a reason of depression he faced in his later life (Atchley, 2010).

When Luther was 18, he was sent to Erfurt University where he learnt the basics of becoming a civil servant. Towards the end of his studies in July 1505, he made the decision of joining a monastery for the reason that there was a horrible thunderstorm and frantic pleas were made. Thus, he became a member of the Augustinian Order in Erfurt without more ado. At the same time as he was a member of the Augustinian Order, he acquired the Doctor of Theology degree from the University of Wittenberg. At the age of twenty-eight in 1511, Luther also received a professorship as the professor of Scripture. As he has now achieved both education and respect in society, Luther committed himself as a teacher and as the administrator of the Catholic Church affairs. As a lecturer and teacher to juveniles, he taught them about life and faith as well as regarding the Holy Scriptures, liturgy and ascetic life. This was the same time when Luther himself became a passionate reader of the Scriptures himself. His struggle has been summarized by Baker in this manner, "How long Luther had been pondering these things cannot be determined. By the time he received his second degree at Erfurt, he had an overwhelming feeling that he must get right with God. He (Luther) had experienced several frightening incidents that caused him to think about eternal things" (Atchley, 2010).

In Search of God

At the age of twenty-six, Luther had become an important part of the monastery and fulfilled his duties in the best manner possible. For fulfilling his responsibility, young Luther was obliged to make a pilgrimage to Rome as his monastery's representative. A lot of people before him had taken advantage of this opportunity for their growth, development and to give a boost to their careers. However, Luther was completely different. Instead of gaining benefits, he spent most of his time in making tours to churches of Italy. It was astonishment for him seeing and observing the corrupt and luxurious lifestyles of the priests and monks. He was also struck by their wickedness, dishonesty, lack of knowledge and disrespect of the Roman priests. When he returned to Saxony, Luther was stunned and annoyed. Such an experience motivated Luther to do something for Christian cause (Atchley, 2010).

Irrespective of the fact that Luther prayed and read Scriptures for innumerable hours, he was not successful in finding peace and was failed to connect with God. However, Luther's life drastically changed due to the never-ending learning and confession that made him aware of his personal immorality and discontentment before God (Atchley, 2010). As he read the Romans' Book Scriptures, Luther dedicated his life and heart to Christ and made him the only source of escape by committing to faith. As a consequence of this realization, Luther started to be recognized "for sola fide or justification by faith, sola scriptura or Scripture alone, and sola sacerdos or the priesthood of the believer" (Atchley, 2010) that later turned out to be the three doctrines of Luther's mystical place and position.

It was at the same time that he started the close inspection of the church fathers' contributions. He also started deep analysis of the Scriptures. He concluded after thoroughly investigating the holy texts that "the notion of justification by faith, and faith alone had been lost somewhere in church history" (Atchley, 2010). This discovery made him to acknowledge and implement this notion in his personal life. He also started others to learn this new found faith. However, after some time passed, this resulted in obvious disagreements and opposition with those who were the authorized figures in theological establishment. He was opposed for the reason that his teachings contradicted the teachings of the conventional priests of the Catholic Church. Thus, he faced strong hostility with this new faith as both the Church and his peers disregarded his idea of a new faith (Atchley, 2010).

After the conversion to this newly-established faith based on the doctrine of sola fide, sola scriptura and sola sacerdos, Luther started teaching it. The people at Wittenberg witnessed the success of these new theological doctrines in the region as more and more people started to follow it (Atchley, 2010).

The 95 Theses

In 1517, the pope gave an individual named John Tetzel the power to put indulgences up for sale so that the money for the restoration of Roman buildings could be paid, particularly for the restoration of St. Peter's. However, Luther was completely sure that the selling of indulgences was an attempt to deceit the people of Wittenburg as they were made to believe that purchasing indulgences would result in the forgiveness of their sins. Therefore, Luther responded to Tetzel's erroneous actions and wrote a pamphlet known as "The 95 Theses." The aim behind writing this pamphlet was to crystal-clearly criticize the indulgences. It consisted of 95 points and Luther believed that they must be considered academically instead of discussed generally (Atchley, 2010).

It can be said that the publication of the 95 Theses was an open pronouncement from Luther regarding the impiety, badness and corruption of the Catholic Church. After a number of years, Luther decided to separate himself from the prevailing system in Rome as a step towards the reformation of the church. He aimed to transform the existing church into the type of church presented in the Scriptures (Atchley, 2010).

The writings of Luther faced strong condemnation by pope in 1518 who declared that his writings conflicted with the Church's teachings. Luther's teachings were also examined by a series of commissions. A public verdict known as the papal bull was issued by Pope Leo X in July 1520 concluding that the proposals of Luther were unorthodox and contradicted with accepted beliefs of the Christian community. He was asked to take back and disavow his propositions in 120 days in Rome. However, after Luther's refusal to repudiate, he was excommunicated from the Catholic Church in 1521 by Pope Leo (Atchley, 2010).

Split with the Church

Luther realized that he had to break with Rome. Therefore, he decided to make his position wider and thus aimed to include extensive transformations and developments. In 1520, while addressing to the Christian Nobility of the German Nation. Luther showed encouragement towards "the new nationalism by advocating German control of German ecclesiastical matters and appealed to the German princes to help effect the reformation in Germany" ("Luther, Martin," 2012). He made it clear that he did not consider pope as the Scripture's final analyst and was against him voicing the principle of the priesthood of each and every one of the followers. He also attacked the dishonesty, fraud and vice of the prevalent church and recommended a homecoming to an ancient agrarian social order instead the prevalence of commercialism and usury ("Luther, Martin," 2012).

He also published "The Babylonian Captivity of the Church" that was meant to criticize the papacy without finding the middle ground. Luther simply demonstrated his denial of those who claimed authorization of the priesthood for connecting the God and man ("Luther, Martin," 2012). He also later published "The Freedom of a Christian Man" that restated Luther's principle of justification by reliance on God and no-one else "and presented a new ideal of piety -- that of the Christian man, free in conscience by virtue of faith and charged with the duty of conducting himself properly in a Christian brotherhood" ("Luther, Martin," 2012). One of his main contributions is the German translation of the New Testament. He also started to translate the entire Bible. However, it took more or less ten years for the translation to complete ("Luther, Martin," 2012).

Last Years

The iconoclasts who were Carlstadt's subjects at Wittenburg made drastic changes in the society that were unacceptable and unpardonable according to Luther. Thus, the fear of his movement's endangerment made Luther to neglect his personal well-being and he decided to go back to Wittenburg. After his return to the native city, Luther remained there for the rest of his life and kept himself busy in the organization and circulation of the new gospel. It was unfortunate that Luther's popularity among the masses faded after his solid opposition of the Peasants' War. It was astonishing for the reason that this clash had been fostered by Luther's own spirit of self-autonomy and liberalism. The Freedom of the Will by Erasmus strongly criticized the doctrine of the enslaved will of Luther and this publication became another reason of the Luther's weakened position. All the same, Luther's doctrines dispersed to a number of towns and autonomous cities and the support of a lot of German aristocrats helped him to strengthen ("Luther, Martin," 2012).

In 1525, Luther met Katharina von Bora, a former nun and they got married the same year. The couple gave birth to 6 children (three sons and three daughters). Luther had Philip Melanchthon and Justus Jonas as his best friends who helped him in continuing the selfless efforts. Luther also involved himself in building a proficient educational system. He also produced general writings related to the matters of church including "the composition of hymns, a liturgy, and two catechisms that are basic statements of the Lutheran faith" ("Luther, Martin," 2012).

Increasingly severe ill health and the epidemics of nationwide political and religious dissolution troubled Luther to a great extent during the last years of his life. It was at Eisleben that the great Reformer took his last breath. He was buried in his hometown i.e. Wittenberg. He left behind an evangelical set of guidelines that spread all over the Western world and manifested itself as the initial rupture in the Catholic Church's unanimity. His concepts related to both society and religion transformed the society and people in Germany. The contemporary German standards also got fixed with Luther's writings that contained powerful and influential colloquial speech ("Luther, Martin," 2012).