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"How could Jesus Christ have been God in the same way as God the Father". He did not deny the divinity of Christ, but considered him a "lesser god". Jesus Christ, the Son, according to Arius, was a very evolved soul as compared to the rest of humanity, but much less than the Father, as the Son possessed neither the eternity nor the divinity of the Father.

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Story of God Moltmann challenged this argument, saying that in order for God to love, God has to suffer, thus God suffered on the cross Jesus' death is the climax of God's sharing of suffering. Suffering is a result of the amount of unconditional love God has for humanity. "He

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Arianism, in Christianity, the Christological (concerning the doctrine of Christ) position that Jesus, as the Son of God, was created by God. It was proposed early in the 4th century by the Alexandrian presbyter Arius and was popular throughout much of the Eastern and Western Roman empires, even after it was denounced as a heresy by the Council of Nicaea (325).

Liberale da Verona: "Jesus Before the Gates of Jerusalem"SCALA/Art Resource, New York

Beliefs

Arianism is often considered to be a form of Unitarian theology in that it stresses God's unity at the expense of the notion of the Trinity, the doctrine that three distinct persons are united in one Godhead. Arius's basic premise was the uniqueness of God, who is alone self-existent (not dependent for its existence on anything else) and immutable; the Son, who is not self-existent, cannot therefore be the self-existent and immutable God. Because the Godhead is unique, it cannot be shared or communicated. Because the Godhead is immutable, the Son, who is mutable, must, therefore, be deemed a creature who has been called into existence out of nothing and has had a beginning. Moreover, the Son can have no direct knowledge of the Father, since the Son is finite and of a different order of existence.

According to its opponents, especially the bishop St. Athanasius, Arius's teaching reduced the Son to a demigod, reintroduced polytheism (since worship of the Son was not abandoned), and undermined the Christian concept of redemption, since only he who was truly God could be deemed to have reconciled humanity to the Godhead.

History of controversy and conflict

In 325 the Council of Nicaea was convened to settle the controversy. The council condemned Arius as a heretic and issued a creed to safeguard "orthodox" Christian belief. The creed states that the Son is homoousion tō Patri ("of one substance with the Father"), thus declaring him to be all that the Father is: he is completely divine. In fact, however, this was only the beginning of a long-protracted dispute.

Council of Nicaea imageBROKER/AGE fotostock

From 325 to 337, when the emperor Constantine died, those church leaders who had supported Arius and had been exiled after the Council of Nicaea attempted to return to their churches and sees (ecclesiastical seats) and to banish their enemies. They were partly successful. From 337 to 350 Constans, sympathetic to non-Arian Christians, was emperor in the West, and Constantius II, sympathetic to the Arians, was emperor in the East. At a church council held at Antioch (341), an affirmation of faith that omitted the homoousion clause was issued. Another church council was held at Sardica (modern Sofia) in 342, but little was achieved by either council. In 350 Constantius became sole ruler of the empire, and under his leadership the Nicene party was largely crushed. The extreme Arians then declared that the Son was "unlike" ( anomoios) the Father. Those anomoeans succeeded in having their views endorsed at Sirmium in 357, but their extremism stimulated the moderates, who asserted that the Son was "of similar substance" ( homoiousios) with the Father. Constantius at first supported those homoiousians but soon transferred his support to the homoeans, led by Acacius, who affirmed that the Son was "like" ( homoios) the Father. Their views were approved in 360 at Constantinople, where all previous creeds were rejected; the term ousia ("substance" or "stuff") was repudiated; and a statement of faith was issued stating that the Son was "like the Father who begot him."

After Constantius's death (361), the non-Arian Christian majority in the West largely consolidated its position. The persecution of non-Arian Christians conducted by the Arian emperor Valens (364-378) in the East and the success of the teaching of St. Basil the Great of Caesarea, St. Gregory of Nyssa, and St. Gregory of Nazianzus led the homoiousian majority in the East to a fundamental agreement with the Nicene party. When the emperors Gratian (367-383) and Theodosius I (379-395) took up the defense of non-Arian theology, Arianism collapsed. In 381 the second ecumenical council met at Constantinople. Arianism was proscribed, and a statement of faith, the Nicene Creed, was approved.

That did not, however, end Arianism as a viable force in the empire. It maintained favour among some groups, most notably some of the Germanic tribes, to the end of the 7th century. The Polish and Transylvanian Socinians of the 16th and 17th centuries propounded Christological arguments that were similar to those of Arius and his followers. In the 18th and 19th centuries, the Unitarians in England and America were unwilling either to reduce Christ to a mere human being or to attribute to him a divine nature identical with that of the Father. The Christology of Jehovah's Witnesses is also a form of Arianism, for it upholds the unity and supremacy of God the Father.
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Melissa Petruzzello, Assistant Editor.

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...Danube basin, they had embraced Arian Christianity (which denied that the Son was of the same substance as the Father), and their first bishop, Ulfilas, translated the Bible into Gothic. Given its heretical nature, this religious literature in a written vernacular could not survive, and, with conversion to orthodox ("catholic")...

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...these conflicts was the so-called Arian controversy. In his interpretation of the idea of God, Arius sought to maintain a formal understanding of the oneness of God. In defense of that oneness, he was obliged to dispute the sameness of essence of the Son and the Holy Spirit with God...

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Arianism, in Christianity, the Christological position that Jesus, as the Son of God, was created by God. It was proposed early in the 4th century by Arius of Alexandria and was popular throughout much of the Eastern and Western Roman empires. It was denounced as a heresy by the Council of Nicaea in 325.

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Some readers may think this an odd article to be published by "a journal of religion and public life." It is an exercise in theology, philosophy, and the history of ideas on a question that may seem far removed from anything that might be called public life. In fact, however, it is pressingly pertinent to the Church's most important public task: communicating the gospel, and doing so in a culture whose dominant virtues are compassion, empathy, and, as it is sometimes put, feeling one another's pain. In such a culture, it is very tempting to speak of God as compassionate, empathic, and, therefore, suffering as we suffer. I believe that temptation should be resisted. Understanding why it should calls for a careful examination of relevant considerations in theology, philosophy, and the history of ideas.

From the dawn of the Patristic period Christian theology has held as axiomatic that God is impassible-that is, He does not undergo emotional changes of state, and so cannot suffer. Toward the end of the nineteenth century a sea change began to occur within Christian theology such that at present many, if not most, Christian theologians hold as axiomatic that God is passible, that He does undergo emotional changes of states, and so can suffer. Historically this change was inauguratedby such Anglican theologians as Andrew M. Fairbairn and Bertrand R. Brasnett. Within contemporary Protestant theology some of the better known theologians who espouse the passibility of God are Karl Barth, Richard Bauckham, John Cone, Paul Fiddes, Robert Jenson, Eberhard Jüngel, Kazoh Kitamori, Jung Young Lee, John Macquarrie, Jürgen Moltmann, Wolfhart Pannenberg, Richard Swinburne, Alan Torrance, Thomas F. Torrance, Keith Ward, and Nicholas Wolterstorff.

Among Catholic theologians, while they may differ as to the exact manner and extent of God's passibility, one nonetheless finds a strange mix of theological bedfellows. They include, among others, Raniero Cantalamessa, Jean Galot, Hans Urs von Balthasar, Roger Haight, Elizabeth Johnson, Hans Küng, Michael Sarot, and Jon Sobrino. Of course one must add the host of Process Theologians who, following the lead of Albert North Whitehead and Charles Hartshorne, hold, by the very character of their philosophical position, that God is by nature passible and so can suffer. This theological shift has been so overwhelming, so thorough, and has been achieved with such unquestioned assurance that Ronald Goetz has simply, and in a sense rightly, dubbed it the "new orthodoxy."

What has brought about such a radical reconception of God? How, in only one hundred years, has the Christian theological tradition of almost two thousand years, so readily and so assuredly, seemingly been overturned? There are basically three factors that have contributed to this change: the prevailing social and cultural milieu, modern interpretation of biblical revelation, and contemporary trends in philosophy.

It was originally human suffering that became the catalyst for espousing a passible and thus suffering God. Surely, God must suffer in solidarity with those who suffer. This was first expressed within the context of the social ills of industrial Britain in the late-nineteenth century. However, the icon that has come to embody this assumption is Auschwitz. Jürgen Moltmann, in The Crucified God, was the first to employ Elie Wiesel's graphic and horrific story (which has subsequently appeared in over thirty books and articles) of a Jewish boy hung by the Nazis along with two men in the camp at Buna (Moltmann wrongly places it in Auschwitz). It took half an hour for the youth to die and, as the men of the camp watched his torment, one asked: "Where is God now?" Wiesel heard a voice within him answer: "Where is He? He is here. He is hanging there on the gallows." While Wiesel interpreted his inner voice as expressing what has now become disbelief in a loving and just God, Moltmann exploited the story to argue for a God who suffers in union with those who suffer. In the midst of the Holocaust and hundreds of other contemporary occurrences of horrendous human suffering, this argument, often expressed with passionate sentiment and emotion, continues to win theological adherents. How can God be an immutable, impassible, idle, and indifferent bystander in the midst of such unspeakable suffering? If God is a loving and compassionate God, as He surely is, He must not only be aware of human suffering, but He must also Himself be an "active" victim of such suffering. He, too, must suffer.

This contemporary experience of human suffering, which seemed to demand a passible God, found a ready ally and firm warrant, it appeared, within the biblical revelation of God. The Old Testament seems to give ample proof that He not only is passible but that He also indeed suffers. God revealed Himself to be a personal, loving, and compassionate God who has freely engaged Himself in, and so ensconced Himself within, human history. He mercifully heard the cry of His enslaved people in Egypt and determined to rescue them. Moreover, God revealed Himself, especially in the prophets, to be a God who grieved over the sins of His people. He was distressed by their unfaithfulness, and suffered over their sinful plight. So disheartened was God by their hard-heartedness that He actually became angry. However, "my heart recoils within me; my compassion grows warm and tender. I will not execute my fierce anger; I will not again destroy Ephraim; for I am God and not mortal; the Holy One in your midst and I will not come in wrath" (Hosea 11:8-9). Thus God in the Old Testament suffers on account of, with, and on behalf of His people. Ultimately it is the revelation of His love that demands that God suffer. Expressing the sentiment of many, Moltmann writes: "Were God incapable of suffering in any respect, and therefore in an absolute sense, then He would also be incapable of love."

Moreover, the heart of the Christian kerygma is that the Son of God became man and lived an authentic human life. Within that human life the Son's death on the cross stands as the consummate event. From the Incarnation and the cross theologians argue for God's passibility on three interconnected levels. First, it is because God has always suffered with those He loved that He sent His Son into the world. The cross then expresses fully God's eternal divine nature and thus is the paradigm of a suffering God. Second, while the Christian Christological tradition has always upheld the truth that the Son of God suffered as man, though not as God, contemporary theologians find such a distinction illogical and therefore unacceptable. If the Son of God actually became man, then He not only suffered as man but such suffering must have washed into His very divinity as well. Third, the Son, on the cross, did not then merely experience the abandonment of the Father as man but equally as God. Moreover, such abandonment simultaneously pertains to the Father's own experience. The Father suffered the loss of His Son. Thus the suffering cry of dereliction was a cry being experienced within the very depths of God's passible nature.

Now, the world was not immune from human suffering until the last two centuries, nor had Christians ceased consulting the Bible. Why, then, did what now seems so obviously true only become evident after nearly two thousand years of Christian theology? According to many contemporary theologians, Greek philosophical thought, especially Platonism, had hijacked biblical revelation. The static, inert, self-sufficient, immutable, and impassible God of Platonic thought usurped, via Philo and the early Church Fathers, the living, personal, active, loving, and so passible God of the Bible. This philosophical and theological deformity, having entered into the very genetic make-up of the Christian gospel, bred its mature distorted offspring within Scholasticism, especially in the writings of Aquinas. Only relatively recently, especially in the wake of Hegel and the rise of Process Philosophy, have theologians perceived the extent of the deformity and so been able therapeutically to redesign the authentic genetic structure of the gospel. Actually, the curative procedure is easily done. One only needs to hold that God is neither immutable nor impassible, but is both mutable and passible, and so He suffers. Presto, the gospel is once more, philosophically and theologically, its vibrant self.

I would acknowledge that the above arguments are, even in the brief summary form that I have presented them, intellectually and emotionally powerful, though often the emotional sentiment appears to far outweigh reasoned argument. Nonetheless, I believe that the entire project on behalf of a passible and so suffering God is utterly misconceived, philosophically and theologically. It wreaks total havoc upon the authentic Christian gospel.

In considering this matter, the first issue that must be addressed is the nature of God as revealed within the biblical narrative, for ultimately the question of His impassibility or passibility must be in conformity with it.

Undeniably the Old Testament speaks of God as though He did undergo, at different times and in diverse situations, emotional changes of state, including that of suffering. However, I believe that such passages must be understood and interpreted within the deeper and broader revelation of who God is. While the Old Testament does not philosophically or theologically address the issue of God's impassibility or passibility, it does provide the revelational context from which it must be examined. This context consists in rightly discerning the biblical notion of God's transcendence and immanence. The manner in which God both transcends the created order and is present to and immanently acts within the created order will ultimately control whether He is passible or impassible. Now, within the Old Testament, it is precisely the very immanent actions of God that reveal the character of His transcendence. What then do these immanent actions reveal about the transcendent God?

God, in initiating the covenant and acting within it, manifested that He possessed at least four fundamental characteristics that set Him apart as God. First, He is the One God. While the Old Testament never treats the philosophical issue of "the One and the Many," the fact is that the more the unique oneness of God matured within the biblical faith the more God was differentiated from everything else-the many. Thus, to say that God is one not only specified that there is numerically only one God, but also that, being one, He is distinct from all else. His oneness speaks His transcendence.

Second, God is the Savior. As Savior His will and actions are not frustrated by worldly power or might, or by the vicissitudes of history, or even by the limitations of the natural physical order. Thus, the very same immanent salvific actions of God that manifested His relationship to His people equally identified His complete otherness. God could be the mighty Savior only because He transcended all this-worldly and cosmic forces.

Third, the mighty God who saves is the powerful God who creates. As Creator, God is intimately related to and cares for His good creation, particularly His chosen people, and yet, as Creator, He is not one of the things created, and is thus completely other than all else that exists.

Fourth, God is All Holy. God sanctified the Israelites for they were covenanted to Him as the All Holy God. God's holiness distinguished Him (the root of the Semitic word "holiness" means "to cut off") from all that was profane and sinful. Even when the Israelites defiled themselves by sin and infidelity, God Himself was not defiled. Rather it is specifically because He is the transcendent (the "cut-off") Holy One, and so incapable of being defiled, that He could restore them to holiness.

For God, then, to be transcendent does not mean that there are certain aspects of His being that are distinct from those aspects of His being that allow Him to be immanent. For the Old Testament, that which makes God truly divine and thus transcendent is that which equally allows Him to be active within the created order and so be immanent. To say that God is the One All Holy Creator and Savior is to express His immanent activity within the created order as the one who is not a member of that created order. This is the great Judeo-Christian mystery, which finds its ultimate expression in the Incarnation: He who is completely other than the created order can be present to and active within the created order without losing His complete otherness in so doing.

To undermine the transcendent otherness of God in order to make God seemingly more immanent undermines the very significance of His immanence. The importance of God's immanent activity is predicated in direct proportion to His transcendence. It is precisely because God transcends the whole created order of time and history that His immanent actions within time and history acquire singular significance. The one who is in the midst of His people is "The Lord [who] is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He does not faint or grow weary, His understanding is unsearchable" (Isaiah 40:28, see also the whole of chapters 40-45).

From within this biblical context of the immanent activity of the totally transcendent God, God is said to undergo emotional changes of state or even to change His mind. While such statements say something literally true about God, they are, I believe, not to be taken literally. Such statements do wish to inform us that God is truly compassionate and forgiving. He does grieve over sin and is angry with His people. However, such emotional states, firstly, are predicated not upon a change in God but upon a change within the others involved. God is sorry that He created human beings (Genesis 6:6-7) and that He appointed Saul king (1 Samuel 15:11,35) because they have become sinful. He relents of His anger and threatened punishment of the Ninevites (Jonah 4:2) and of the Israelites because they have repented (Exodus 32:14). Such reactions or changes predicated of God actually express a deeper truth-that of God's unchanging and unalterable love and justice as the transcendent other.

It follows, secondly, that God is said "to change His mind" or is portrayed as undergoing differing emotional states precisely because, as the transcendent God, He does not change His mind or undergo emotional changing states. "God is not a human being, that He should lie, or a mortal, that He should change His mind" (Numbers 23:9, also Psalms 110:4, 132:11, Ezekiel 24:14). The very language used, such as compassion, sorrow, suffering, anger, forgiveness, and relenting, seeks to express God's unswerving and unalterable transcendent nature as the One All Holy God who is Savior and Creator. The predication of various emotional changes of state within God are not literal statements of His passibility, but illustrate and verify the literal truth that God, being transcendent, far from being fickle as men are, is unalterably, within all variable circumstances, all-loving, all-good, and all-holy.

Some argue that such an understanding of the biblical notion of God only demonstrates His ethical immutability, that is, that He is consistently true to Himself as morally good and loving and not necessarily that He is ontologically immutable. However, I would argue that, for God to be ethically immutable, unchangeably loving and good, demands that He is ontologically immutable-that is, ontologically unchanging in His perfect love and goodness.

While the Fathers of the Church are often accused of transforming the living, loving, compassionate, and personal God of the Bible into the static, lifeless, inert, and impersonal God of Greek philosophy, this is clearly false, though there was the occasional misstep. What the early Fathers, such as Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, Clement of Alexandria, Origen, Tertullian, and Novatian brought to the long-standing philosophical colloquium concerning the nature of God was not primarily their own philosophical acumen, but their faith in the biblical God.

In keeping with biblical revelation, as opposed to pagan mythologies, they were concerned with upholding the complete otherness of the one God in relationship to the created order. They accentuated and clarified, against Platonism and Aristotelianism, that God did not merely order or set in motion preexistent matter but that, by His almighty power, He created all out of nothing- creatio ex nihilo. God was then no longer merely at the pinnacle of a hierarchy of being, but His transcendence, as Creator, radically placed Him within a distinct ontological order of His own. As such He was the perfectly good and loving personal God who eternally existed in and of Himself.

In order to accentuate these positive biblical attributes the Fathers predicated of God a whole cluster of negative attributes, some of which are directly biblical in origin and some of which came from philosophical reflection. These negative attributes served a twofold purpose. They primarily were employed to distinguish God from the created order, but in so doing they equally gave more noetic content to the positive attributes. For example, unlike the anthropomorphic pagan gods, God was incorporeal and so did not possess physical feelings, passions, and needs such as pain, lust, and hunger. This enhanced in turn the spiritual nature of His being. In the light of this complementary and reciprocal interplay between these positive and negative attributes, the early Fathers insisted that God was immutable and impassible.

Negatively, God is immutable in the sense that He does not change as do creatures, but He does not change for positive reasons as well. God's immutability radically affirms and profoundly intensifies the absolute perfection and utter goodness of God, who, as Creator, is the one who truly lives and exists. Because God's love is unchangeably perfect and so cannot diminish, He is then the eternally living God who is unreservedly dynamic in His goodness, love, and perfection. Similarly, while the divine attribute of impassibility primarily tells us what God is not, it does so for entirely positive reasons. God is impassible in that He does not undergo successive and fluctuating emotional states, nor can the created order alter Him in such a way so as to cause Him to suffer any modification or loss. Nor is God the possessor of negative and sinful passions as are human beings, with their susceptibility to fear, anxiety, dread, greed, lust, or unjust anger. For the Fathers, to deny that God is passible is to deny of Him all such passions that would debilitate or cripple Him as God. Almost all the early Fathers attributed impassibility to God in order to safeguard and enhance His utterly passionate love and all-consuming goodness, that is, the divine fervor and zealous resolve with which He pursues the well-being of His cherished people. Origen, for example, while ardently upholding God's impassibility, can equally speak of His "passion of love" for fallen humankind. Even God's anger was not conceived by the Fathers as a separate passion or intermittent emotional state within Himself, but as constitutive of His unchanging perfect goodness and providential care in the face of sin and evil.

The present critique of the Fathers is then entirely misconceived. Contemporary theologians wrongly hold that the attribute of impassibility is ascribing something positive of God, that is, that He is static, lifeless and inert, and so completely devoid of passion. This the Fathers never countenanced. The Fathers were merely denying of God those passions that would imperil or impair those biblical attributes that were constitutive of His divine being. They wished to preserve the wholly otherness of God, as found in Scripture, and equally, also in accordance with Scripture, to profess and enrich, in keeping with His complete otherness, an understanding of His passionate love and perfect goodness.

Aquinas brought new depth both to this patristic understanding of God and to our understanding of why He is immutable and impassible. Creatures constantly change because they continually actualize their potential either for good, and so become more perfect, or for evil, and so become less perfect. God is not in this act/potency scheme of self-actualization. God, Aquinas argued, is "being itself" or "pure act" and so cannot undergo self-constituting change by which He would become more perfect. Two pertinent points flow from this.

First, by being pure act, God possesses the potential to perform acts that are singular to His being pure act. While we cannot comprehend how God, as pure act, acts, the act of creation is God acting as pure act, whereby created beings are related to God as He is and so come to exist. Thus, the very act of creation that assures the wholly otherness of God is the very same act that assures creation's immediate, intimate, dynamic, and enduring relationship with God as God truly is in all His transcendent otherness. Second, as pure act or being itself, all that pertains to God's nature is in pure act. While God and rocks may both be impassible, they are so for polar opposite reasons. A rock is impassible because, being an inert impersonal object, it lacks all that pertains to love. God is impassible because His love is perfectly in act ("God is love") and no further self-constituting act could make Him more loving. God is absolutely impassible because He is absolutely passionate in His love. Thus creatures, and particularly human beings, through the act of creation are immediately and intimately related to God as He exists in His perfectly actualized love.

On the theological level, the persons of the Trinity are impassible for similar reasons. The Father is the pure act of paternity for He is the act by which He begets the Son in the perfect love of the Holy Spirit. The Son is the pure act of sonship for He is the act by which He is wholly the Son of and for the Father in the same perfect love of the Spirit. The Spirit is the pure act of love for He is that act by which the Father is conformed to be the absolutely loving Father of the Son and the Son is conformed to be the absolutely loving Son of the Father. Thus the persons of the Trinity are impassible not because they are devoid of passion, but because they are entirely constituted as who they are in their passionate and dynamic fully actualized relationship of love. Creatures, as merely created, are immediately related to this trinitarian mystery of love, and human beings can actually abide within the very trinitarian relationships by being conformed by the Holy Spirit into the likeness of the Son and so becoming children of the loving Father.

While I will now limit myself to speaking in terms of the one God rather than to the Trinity in order to simplify the grammar and syntax, what is said could be equally applied to the Trinity. Now, because God is fully actualized in His love and goodness, He cannot be deprived of that love and goodness which would cause Him to suffer, for to suffer such loss would make Him less than perfectly loving and good. Moreover-and here we touch the heart of the issue-it must be remembered, in accordance with the biblical notion of God, that while God is intimately related to creation as its Creator, He exists in His own distinct ontological order as the Creator. Therefore, the sin and evil that deprive human beings of some good and so cause them to suffer is contained wholly within the created ontological order and cannot reverberate or wash back into the uncreated order where God alone exists as absolutely good. If the sin and evil of the created order caused God to suffer, it would demand that God and all else would exist in the same ontological order, for only if He existed in the same ontological order in which the evil was enacted could He then suffer.

This is why most of the theologians who espouse a suffering God intentionally advocate a panentheistic notion of God-that is, that while God is potentially more than the cosmos, the cosmos is constitutive of His very being. (Those theologians who espouse a suffering God but deny panentheism fail to grasp the logic of their own position.) Being ensconced within the cosmic order God must necessarily assume all that pertains to that order, including sin and the suffering it causes. However, if His very nature is constituted by His being a member of the cosmic order, then He can no longer be its all-loving Creator. He becomes merely the one who attempts to bring order to the cosmic process after the manner of the Platonic Demiurge. Equally, since evil, which causes suffering, is the privation of some good, it would mean that a suffering God was deprived of some good and thus He would no longer be perfectly good. Moreover, if God, having lost His singular transcendence, is now infected by evil and suffering, then He too is immanently enmeshed in an evil cosmic process from which He, like all else, cannot escape.

God may now suffer in union with all who suffer-and those who espouse a suffering God boast this to be of singular value-but in so suffering, humankind, and even God Himself, are deprived of any hope of ever being freed from evil and so the suffering that it causes. There is no hope of divine justice ever setting things right nor is there any hope of love and goodness vanquishing evil. The transcendent One All-Holy God of the Bible who, as Creator, is present to all creation, and who, as Savior, acts immanently within that creation, vanishes. Thus, a suffering God is not only philosophically and theologically untenable, but also religiously devastating.

Human beings have to enact various aspects of love depending on the situation. Sometimes love requires kindness or compassion or mercy or forgiveness. At other times it demands corrections and even anger. However, because God's love is perfectly existent, all aspects that pertain to that love are fully existent. God does not need, therefore, sequentially, in a passible manner, to enact these various facets of love in accordance with changing situations. God is always in "go position," so to speak. For example, when a person repents of sin, God need not change the manner of His love within Himself from that of an admonishing love to that of a forgiving love. If God did need to adapt and re-adapt and re-adapt Himself again to every personal situation in every momentary instance, He would be perpetually entangled in an unending internal emotional whirligig. Correlatively, human beings are able to know in faith or even experience the various facets of God's fully actualized love in accordance with their personal situation. In sin they experience God's love as rebuke and admonishment. In repentance they experience God's love as compassion and forgiveness. But it is God's unchanging love that is moving them and they experience that unchanging love in various ways as they move.

More specifically, God's compassion is then subsumed and contained within His perfectly actualized love, but now, unlike human compassion, it is devoid of the suffering that would render His love less than perfectly actualized. God is perfectly compassionate not because He suffers with those who suffer, but because His love fully and freely embraces those who suffer. The absence of suffering in God actually liberates God from any self-love that would move Him to act to relieve His own suffering. The absence of suffering allows God's love to be completely altruistic and beneficent. What human beings cry out for in their suffering is not a God who suffers, but a God who loves wholly and completely, something a suffering God could not do. As Michael Dodds has perceptively written, "If it were my friend's compassionate suffering itself that brought me consolation, then I would be in the peculiar situation of reacting in quite the opposite way to my friend's suffering from the way that he reacts to mine. For I would be taking some sort of joy in his suffering while he reacts rather with sadness at my own."

It is love and not suffering that ultimately is at the heart of compassion, for it is love that brings true healing and comfort. Thus for Aquinas "mercy is especially to be attributed to God, as seen in its effects, but not as an affection of passion." The truly compassionate person endeavors to dispel the cause of suffering, and thus God's mercy and compassion is most clearly manifested in His divine power and perfect goodness through which He overcomes evil and the suffering that it causes. While I would agree with Aquinas that mercy is not "an affection of passion" in the sense that it is a passible emotional state within God, I would see it, nonetheless, as a positive facet of His perfectly actualized and so completely altruistic love.

The compassion of God is seen then not in His suffering in solidarity with humankind, but in His ability to alleviate the cause of human suffering-sin. Here we witness the good news of the gospel and its evangelistic importance. The eternal Son of God, sent by the Father, came to exist as an authentic man by the power of the Holy Spirit. In becoming man the Son assumed our fallen humanity inherited from Adam, and so as one of us lived a holy life of obedience to the Father which culminated in the offering of His life on the cross to the Father as a loving sacrifice of atonement for sin. Thus the Son of God, who is impassible as God, truly suffered and died as man and as a man truly rose bodily from the dead. The import of this, in the light of the contemporary espousal of a suffering God, must be clearly grasped.

First, in accordance with the authentic Christological tradition, the eternal, all-perfect, and immutable Son of God experienced, as man, human weakness, frailty, suffering, and death in a truly and authentically human manner. He who is impassible as God was truly passible as man. As Cyril of Alexandria poignantly put it: "The Impassible suffers." However, since it was the Son of God who suffered, did He not equally experience such suffering within His divinity? No, for suffering is caused by the loss of some good, and while as man the Son was deprived of His human well-being and life, He was not deprived of any divine perfection or good. Moreover, to hold that the Son suffered as God would mean that He experienced our human suffering in a mitigated divine manner, and thus that He did not truly experience authentic human suffering. God in the end would not truly experience suffering and death as men experience suffering and death. Ironically, those who advocate a suffering God, having locked suffering within God's divine nature, have actually locked God out of human suffering.

Second, and most significantly, it was the human suffering and death of the Son, enacted on the stage of real history, that is salvific. In espousing that the Son of God suffered as God and that the Father suffered in union with His divine Son, contemporary theologians have reduced the passion and death of Jesus to a myth. What is taking place in history is but the mythical ahistorical expression of what is more importantly taking place within the Trinity itself. The overcoming of sin and the human suffering it causes is replaced by the more important concern of the Father and the Son extricating themselves from the suffering they have now experienced. While these theologians hold that the Father suffered in solidarity with His Son, there is no biblical warrant for this view. Rather, the Father, while not condoning the execution of His Son, is well pleased that His Son, in faithful obedience, would willingly offer His human life to the Father out of love for humankind.

Third, the pleasure of the Father is witnessed in raising His Son gloriously from the dead. The bodily resurrection testifies that Jesus' offering of His human life was salvific, and thus that the human suffering and death He bore were of the utmost importance. To place the significance of the Son's suffering within His divine nature is to relegate His human suffering and death to insignificance, and thus to relegate all human suffering to insignificance. The fully human resurrection of Jesus not only authenticates the reality and even importance of human suffering, it equally ensures that sin and death and the suffering these cause have been vanquished. The suffering and death of the Son incarnate is the Father's answer to human suffering.

Fourth, human suffering can rightly be interpreted only within the light of Christ as head of His body, and so within an ecclesial context. Those who come to faith and are baptized into the risen Lord Jesus are united to Him and so are confident, through the Spirit that dwells within them, that they, in the midst of their suffering, already share in His resurrection. Thus, they anticipate their own resurrection upon the return of Jesus in glory when He will right every evil and wipe away every tear. Moreover, as members of Christ's body, the Church, Christians find support within that entire body-the Saints in heaven and the saints on earth.

This ecclesial confidence, as a member of the risen Lord Jesus' body, is completely absent within a theology of a suffering God. There one is merely "consoled," in the midst of one's own isolated suffering, by God's co-suffering. Such consolation not only does not meet the test of its own meaning, it further gives the impression that all men and women, regardless of their religious affiliation, experience such consolation. This undermines entirely Jesus' evangelistic summons to proclaim the good news to all the world, for there is now no need to do so, since whatever consolation there is to be had in the midst of suffering can be had apart from Christ. It is no longer Jesus who is the Father's answer to evil and the suffering it causes and in whom one finds consolation and hope; hope is merely lodged in some generic suffering being called God. While Christians, in their acts of compassion and love, are able to bring non-Christians within the orbit of Christ's own consolation and love, non-Christians can fully participate in and so fully experience Christ's compassion and love only if they themselves become Christians.

Finally, Christians not only experience and interpret all their various forms of suffering in the light of Jesus their risen head, but they also realize that He too, as their head, continues to suffer with them, His body. Some of the Fathers, such as Origen and Augustine, basing themselves upon the New Testament, and especially Jesus' declaration that Paul was persecuting him, argued that when Christians suffer, either because of their own sin or the sin that is committed against them, it is properly attributed to Jesus as their head. In a real way it is not Christ who shares in the present sufferings of Christians, it is Christians who share in the present sufferings of Christ and so in their own flesh "complete what is lacking in Christ's afflictions" (Colossians 1:24). While Christ has completed the work of salvation, the suffering of righteous men and women continues to be the sufferings of Christ who is the head of the body, and thus their sufferings are in completion of or the filling up of Christ's present sufferings. But this suffering is the consolation and the glory of Christians. "For if we share abundantly in Christ's sufferings, so through Christ we share abundantly in comfort too" (2 Corinthians 1:5). Equally, "we suffer with Him in order that we may also be glorified with Him" (Romans 8:17).

I have attempted briefly to argue that God is impassible and so does not suffer. In the Church's most important public task of communicating the gospel, speaking of the God who does not suffer as we suffer may go against the cultural grain, but such is the God of Scripture and normative Christian tradition. As I have tried to show, the truth that God does not suffer is at the heart of the gospel, making it truly good news. This is especially in contrast to the bad news, which has become something like a "new orthodoxy," that God is in as much trouble as we are. We may intellectually grapple with the mystery of God in the midst of our suffering. However, in the end, it is only in becoming saints, especially in becoming martyrs, that we begin, in the midst of our own sufferings, most fully to fathom and most ardently to desire the perfect love of the all good and just Father made manifest in Jesus Christ.

Thomas G. Weinandy is a Capuchin priest and the Warden of Greyfriars, Oxford. He tutors and lectures in History and Doctrine at the University of Oxford. His book Does God Suffer? was published in 2000 by the University of Notre Dame Press.

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Does God Suffer? | Thomas Weinandy, O.F.M. Cap.

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Some readers may think this an odd article to be published by "a journal of religion and public life." It is an exercise in theology, philosophy, and the history of ideas on a question that may seem far removed from anything that might be called public life.

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ANTHOLOGY: (1) McGrath A (ed) – The Christian Theology Reader, 2nd edition, Moltmann J – Chapter 3.30 Jürgen Moltmann, ‘The Suffering of God’, pp. 218–221 (Blackwell, 2001) 

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ANTHOLOGY: (1) McGrath A (ed) – The Christian Theology Reader, 2nd edition, Moltmann J – Chapter 3.30 Jürgen Moltmann, ‘The Suffering of God’, pp. 218–221 (Blackwell, 2001) 

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Luther and the Protestant Reformation: Crash Course World History #218

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PBS - Martin Luther – Complete documentary. (Parts 1 & 2)

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Happy 490th anniversary of the Reformation of the Christian Church!
On October 31st 2007, the Church will celebrate the 490th anniversary of the Reformation of the Sixteenth Century.

This reformation began in Godâ€™s providence through a peasant minerâ€™s son who became a monk and then a great teacher of Biblical truth. It is important to remember how the Reformation of the Sixteenth Century was arguably the greatest revival of Christianity since the Apostolic Age. The Reformation was a return to Biblical Christianity and Apostolic Catholicism because the Church had degenerated into unbiblical Roman Catholicism.

This paper is submitted to remind you of Godâ€™s grace and goodness, and to encourage us all to continue to stand on Scripture Alone as our guide for faith and life, knowing that we are justified before God by grace alone, and to know that we all can boldly access Godâ€™s mercy and fatherly goodness through One Mediator, the Man Christ Jesus!

Apostolic Catholicism
In Godâ€™s goodness and providence, the Reformation of the Sixteenth Century was a return to the Biblical foundation of the Apostolic Church and Age. The Reformation was not the beginning of a â€œnewâ€ way or form of Christianity, but a return to proper biblical foundations. To appreciate the continuity between the Protestantism of the Reformation and the Apostolic Church, we must be careful to distinguish Catholicism and Romanism. There is a similarity between pre-Christian Israel and post-Christian Judaism, and pre-Reformation Catholicism and post-Reformation Romanism. Protestantism of the Reformation reclaimed the doctrines of the early church (â€œCatholicismâ€), such as the Apostleâ€™s Creed, the anthropology and soteriology of Augustine on sin and grace, access to God through One Mediator, Jesus Christ. Post-Reformation Romanism (as well as Medieval Romanism) had added many traditions to biblical truth and was therefore no longer faithfully â€œCatholicâ€ or Catholicism in character and identity because it was not built on the only foundation of the Apostles and Prophets, Jesus Christ the Chief Cornerstone (cf. Eph. 2:20). The Reformation was ultimately a return to Apostolic Catholicism (as the â€œCatholic Churchâ€ confessed in the Apostleâ€™s Creed and Nicene Creed).

Prior to the Reformation, there were many abuses in the Church of Rome and a dark degeneration had occurred in the faith and practices of the church. There was false teaching (transubstantiation, sacraments of penance, saint veneration, relics, etc.), immorality and dishonesty in the leadership of the Church, more adherence to the traditions of men than the Word of God, and for many in the Church, there was a desire for a return to peace and purity. Although the Church of the pre-Reformation was corrupt and in need of a reforming, it was still the Church of Jesus Christ, and was not wholly apostate, because Jesus as Head and King of His Church has promised that gates of hell would never prevail (Matthew 16). The Reformation was not made up of schismatics and sectarians. The Roman Catholic Church was reformed from within, and those who God had called to reform her were returning ad fontes or â€œback to the sourceâ€, foundation, or first principles of Biblical-Apostolic Christianity.

The Doctrines of the Reformation: Scripture Alone
The Reformation was profoundly influential and liberating in religious beliefs as well as in the influence it had more broadly on thinking in society and culture. The influence and liberty of the Reformation was because it was a return to the source and foundation of the teaching of Scripture alone over traditions of men; the grace of God found in the Lord Jesus Christ, emphasizing his merits and work, rather than the sinful attempts at good works of men; a call for all believers to recognize their place of service and worship in the Christian Church (cf. Eph. 4:11), over against a papal and priestly hierarchy. The Scriptures were the only infallible source of Godâ€™s special revelation to man and were to be the sole guide and authority for the Christianâ€™s faith and life. The Scriptures were translated into the languages of the people and expositional preaching of the Scriptures taught all of the people of God; it was no longer merely a book to be interpreted and studied by the priesthood. The Scriptures are to rule and govern the faith and practice of the Church as well as the thinking and reason of men.

Justification by Faith Alone
The return to the Scriptures alone was simultaneously a rescue and restoration of the gospel of grace. Justification by faith alone was the truth that the fullness of grace and truth of God in Jesus could be obtained through faith alone in the merits of Jesus Christ. Justification by faith alone is the doctrine of being reckoned or declared righteous by faith because a sinner is clothed in Christâ€™s righteousness (see Romans 4). Justification by faith alone was the heart of the good news or gospel that a sinful person could have a right standing before God not based on their own works, but on the works and merits of Jesus Christ imputed to the sinner. In the Reformation the proper distinction was made between the doctrines of justification and sanctification. Justification was a declaration of righteousness received by faith in Christ plus nothing. Sanctification naturally follows justification, but in contrast to it, is the actual making a person righteous. Justification was a declaration that a person was righteous before God based on Christâ€™s righteousness; sanctification was the making a person righteous as he lived and believed the scriptures throughout his life. In the pre-Reformation Church, justification and sanctification had been confused.

Priesthood of All Believers
The Reformation was also a return to the biblical teaching of the priesthood of all believers. This biblical truth taught the people were all saints by virtue of being united to Jesus Christ by faith, and because they were Christians they could access God the Father through One Mediator, the man Jesus Christ, and that he was the Mediator, not the hierarchical priesthood of the Church. This teaching did not undermine the authority given to ordained ministers in the Church to serve ministerially and make his word known to the people as Ephesians 4:11-16 teaches (cf. Hebrews 13:7, 17). The teaching of the priesthood of all believers did prevent the usurping and abuse of authority and despotism as had been practiced by the Medieval Roman Papacy and priesthood.

Although many critics of Protestantism and the Reformation would point out the fact that instead of one monolithic, visible, unified, Roman Catholic Church, there are many denominations, it is important to note that there can always be the unity of Christâ€™s Church in diversity. The one, holy, catholic, and apostolic Church can be unified and at the same time diverse, even though it might not be visibly unified in one institution like the Roman Catholic Church. Denominationalism might not be the ideal, but in a world of sin and misery, God in his providence can use each faithful denominational stone who hold to the once for all faith delivered to the saints that is articulated in the Apostles Creed to build his holy temple.

Liberty and Tolerance in Religion
The Reformationâ€™s influence led not only to liberation in Christ, but a liberty and tolerance in the practice of religion. There were at least three theories on toleration that have been practiced throughout Church history as articulated by George Gillespie of the Westminster Assembly in the 1640s. The first view was the Papist Theory that what the Pope and the Church teaches should be affirmed, and nothing else tolerated; in this theory heretics and schismatics are punished by the Church and civil government. The second view or theory of toleration was that the magistrate does not have the right as a civil ruler to prevent heresy and false teaching, but should enforce liberation and toleration. The third view or theory, that has also been called the â€œPresbyterian theory of the seventeenth centuryâ€ purports that the magistrate or civil ruler may and ought to exercise his power in protecting the Church from heretics and false teachers. This third theory of toleration was included in the original Westminster Confession of Faith of the 1640s (this power to the civil magistrate was not included in the American form of the confession). The influence of the Reformation with regard to liberty and toleration extended the furthest in the Constitutional provision in the United States of America that there will be no state religion or church, and that all religion and practices will be tolerated without fear of persecution. What began as a revolt against papal tyranny became eventually a revolt against any form of tyranny by the Church or the state; this outcome we recognize because of the grace of God and the Reformation.

The study of the Reformation can be understood in particular epochs or periods, and it is important to remember certain dates. The German Reformation officially began with Lutherâ€™s 95 Theses in 1517 and ended with the Thirty Yearâ€™s War in 1648. The Swiss Reformation followed the German Reformation, was begun by Zwingli from 1517 until his death in 1531, then continued by John Calvin from 1531 until Calvinâ€™s death in 1564. The Reformation extended from Germany and Switzerland to Holland (Synod of Dort, 1618); to England (Henry VIII and Edward VI [1527-1553], a short Roman Catholic period under Queen Mary [1553-1558], to a continuing of the Reformation under Elizabeth [1558-1603]; to Scotland (John Knox, 1505-1572), and eventually to the United States, but was wholly suppressed in the Roman Catholic States of Italy and Spain.

Martin Lutherâ€™s Reformation

The powerful and mighty Spirit of God began the Reformation through a humble German minerâ€™s son named Martin Luther. Luther was born on November 10, 1483 and lived for most of his 63 years for the truth of the gospel until he died on February 18th, 1546. Martin Lutherâ€™s father and mother disciplined him rigorously and raised him as a faithful Catholic who was greatly devoted in his life and doctrine. Luther studied theology and humanistic studies at the University of Erfurt and graduated in 1505 as a Master of Arts (or modern equivalent to the Doctor of Philosophy degree). Dr. Luther now turned his attention to the study of Law (primarily because of his fatherâ€™s wishes), but Godâ€™s providence would intervene in Lutherâ€™s life and he would become an Augustinian monk.

In 1505 Luther entered an Augustinian cloister or monastery in Erfurt, Germany and the Reformation would begin with this manâ€™s conversion and convictions. Dr. Lutherâ€™s primary reason for becoming a monk was to be accepted by God and obtain grace and salvation from God. In the monastery, Dr. Luther was acutely aware of his own unworthiness before God, and as much as he tried in his rigorous devotion in prayers, worship exercises and study to be assured of his salvation, he only became more disillusioned of his sinfulness, as simultaneously Godâ€™s judgment became clearer to him through the Law. As much as Luther tried to escape the sin problem found in the world by secluding himself in the monastery, the more he was aware of the problem of sin dwelling within his own heart.

Martin Lutherâ€™s Hope in the Gospel of Grace
John von Staupitz was Lutherâ€™s senior at the Augustinian monastery, eventually becoming his friend, and an unintentional cause of the Reformation. Staupitz taught Luther the zeal of preaching, pastoring, and theological study, as well as the hope of the gospel being found in Christ. Staupitz encouraged Luther to enter the priesthood in 1507, and to become a Doctor of Divinity in order that he might preach and teach the Bible. Dr. Lutherâ€™s great struggle during this time was that his sins before God were preeminent in his mind, and he knew that he was worthy of Godâ€™s strictest and severest punishment, but Staupitz helped Luther to realize the gospel of Godâ€™s grace found in Christ alone as a cure for sinfulness. Staupitz has rightly been called Lutherâ€™s â€œspiritual fatherâ€ and the one who first shared the hope and healing power of the gospel to Dr. Luther who had been terribly wounded by Godâ€™s Law. The Reformation happened under Godâ€™s guidance and providence through the struggle of the one man Martin Luther to find grace and hope in Jesus Christ. Dr. Lutherâ€™s discovery and reception of the gospel of grace would change the world and in the new found confidence Luther had in his right standing before God, others would come to know this good news as well in a time when few had any assurance of right standing.

The doctrine of justification by faith alone is the gospel doctrine that Luther came to understand and believe from Scripture. Through the assistance of Staupitzâ€™s counsel, and especially Lutherâ€™s study of the biblical writings of the Apostle Paul, Luther came to understand the peace of God that passes all understanding in realizing that the good news of the gospel is that a man is saved by faith alone in Christâ€™s righteousness and not in oneâ€™s good works. In Lutherâ€™s study of Romans (particularly the passage from Romans 1:17), he came to understand that the righteousness that God requires - -God supplies to the sinner by faith in the Person and Work of Christ. The righteousness that is given to the sinner who believes in Christ is imputed to the believer, and the believer is clothed in Christâ€™s righteousness, standing perfectly before the throne of God as a recipient of mercy and grace, rather than wrath. Dr. Luther had been taught in Medieval Roman Catholicism that a sinner must struggle and work hard before God in order to be made righteous and then hopefully declared righteous. Luther realized from the Apostle Paul that faith alone was the instrument whereby a sinner receives by imputation the righteousness of Christ, and then is declared righteous based only on Christâ€™s merits. The Medieval Roman Catholic system of theology had confused the biblical doctrines of justification and sanctification, and this had caused a great deal of anguish in young Lutherâ€™s soul because Luther knew from the Law of God that even his best works for God were tainted by sin. Luther reasoned that if his best works were sinful before God, there was no hope for him before Godâ€™s judgment but to receive His damnation. Dr. Luther had stood before the Law of God condemned; he now stood by faith in the grace of God justified and declared righteous in Christ. Lutherâ€™s understanding of the gospel of grace was to change his entire life and teaching, strengthen his faith, and encourage him to make this known to as many as possible no matter what the consequences; this is the heart of how the Reformation happened in one manâ€™s soul, and expanded outward to all those who believed the truth.

Lutherâ€™s Visit to Rome
Luther had a significant experience when he visited Rome (ca. 1512); there he took part in certain traditions that were supposedly to help relatives in purgatory by reducing their temporal sentence of divine punishment. As he climbed the stairs of the Scala Santa (â€œHoly Stairsâ€) in Rome, the tradition was that if he ascended the twenty-eight steps on bended knee he would gain an indulgence by the Pope. As Luther ascended ascetically, he remembered Romans 1:17: â€œThe just shall live by faithâ€ and knew in his heart that this superstitious ascetic devotional practice could never cure a manâ€™s sinful condition, and give him the hope of right standing before God. Furthermore, Luther observed in the â€œHoly City of Romeâ€ much unholy, degenerate and immoral practices- - even by the Pope himself; these observations in Rome planted seeds of doubt concerning the Roman Church, and was to continue to be watered and grow in Lutherâ€™s realization and reform for the next few years, as well as the rest of his life.

Dr. Luther, Professor of Theology at Wittenberg
In 1502, Frederick III (â€œthe Wiseâ€) of Saxony founded the University of Wittenberg. Staupitz was the first dean of the theological faculty at Wittenberg, and invited Dr. Luther to be a teacher of theology. Luther moved from the convent at Erfurt to the small town of Wittenberg (â€œthe extreme boundary of civilizationâ€ in Lutherâ€™s words) to become professor in 1508 for a short while, settling permanently in 1511 as Professor of Theology until his death in 1546. At Wittenberg, Luther preached and taught for the remainder of his life. The university is important in the development of the Reformation, for it was there that Luther began to study, teach and preach the scriptures in their original language, particularly with the help of Erasmusâ€™ publication of the Greek Testament in 1516, and his scholarly colleague Philip Melanchthon. Through Lutherâ€™s study of the Apostle Paulâ€™s Epistles to the Romans and Galatians, as well as the Psalms, Luther became more biblically precise in his theological knowledge. In contrast to the Medieval Scholastic Theology of his time, as well as the current allegorical method of interpretation, Luther eagerly engaged in an exegetical and expositional teaching of Godâ€™s Word to his students by 1516. This exposition of Scripture would have a profound effect upon Luther the man, as well as Luther the Reformer, not to mention his many students who were hearing the gospel of Godâ€™s grace in Christ for the first time. Dr. Luther made his gospel teaching known to a wider audience in his publishing of the Psalms of David in 1517. In these expositions of the Psalms written in German popularly for all the people to read, Luther clearly set forth the biblical doctrine of sin and grace, law and gospel. The Law revealed our sins before God; the gospel rescued us from Godâ€™s wrath because of Law only in the gospel found in the righteousness that God has given by faith alone in Jesus Christ. Dr. Luther made known the comforting hope of the gospel of Godâ€™s grace for all sinners who believe. At the beginning of 1517, Luther was a Christian who was assured of his right standing before God in Christ; he was not yet a Reformer and necessarily opposed to Roman Catholicism- -this would occur later in the year.

In the summer of 1516, Dr. Luther preached a sermon against the abuse of indulgences and upset Frederick the Wise, Elector of Saxony. Luther had experienced the forgiveness of sins because of Godâ€™s grace, and he wanted others to know that grace and forgiveness is found in Jesus Christ alone, who is full of grace and truth (John 1:14). As a pastor, and one who was becoming in influential teacher, Luther believed he should speak out about this Roman Catholic practice that he was beginning to understand undermined the true gospel of grace; but Martin Luther was still in essence a Roman Catholic monk who wanted the Church to be true to Scripture. It was not his intent at this point to start a great debate and a Reformation. Luther was following other preachers and teachers before him that had preached against indulgences such as Wycliffe in England and John Hus in Bohemia. In fact, later Luther would claim that his original arguments against Rome were rather weak compared to what he would go on to say as a powerful and gifted Reformer.

Luther and the Selling of Indulgences
The practice of selling indulgences had quite a history already in the Medieval Roman Catholic Church. Indulgences were sold for the remission of temporal punishments in purgatory, but only God could forgive and remit sins for eternity. Indulgences could be granted by a bishops or archbishops within their dioceses and only the Pope had the authority and power to grant pardon to all Catholics. The sell of indulgences was widespread and popular during the Crusades and received formal theoretical articulation in the writings of St. Thomas Aquinas in his Summa Theologicae. Pope Boniface VIII issued the first bull of papal indulgence in 1300. Indulgences were part of the Medieval Roman Catholic sacrament of penance. This sacrament included three elements: 1) Contrition of the heart; 2) Confession by the mouth to the priest (auricular confession); and 3) Satisfaction for sins by prayers, fasting, almsgiving, etc. There was a great storehouse that the Pope could draw from called the Treasury of Merit that supposedly contained works of supererogation or works done for God by Christ and the saints, whereby a person through the sacrament of penance could withdraw otherâ€™s merits to deposit in their own accounts before Godâ€™s holy tribunal.

During Lutherâ€™s time as Professor of Theology at Wittenberg, Pope Leo X was seeking to sell indulgences to line his greedy pockets as well as to build the Basilica of St. Peterâ€™s at Rome to his glory and memory. In one of Leoâ€™s districts in Lutherâ€™s part of Germany there was the Archbishop of Mainz, Albrecht who was the head of the German clergy. Both Leo and Albrecht were extremely dishonest and greedy men and lived as secularized and luxurious men in the prominent church positions. Archbishop Albrecht appointed one of the greatest salesmen of the Medieval Catholic Church of the time, Johann Tetzel (of the Dominican Order) to sell indulgences to the people, knowing that he was very shrewd, and he would benefit himself from much of the sales. Tetzel was not able to sell directly in Lutherâ€™s Wittenberg, but was assigned the task of proclaiming and selling indulgences just over the border where Luther lived.

Johann Tetzel, the great orator and hawker of indulgences, played upon the peopleâ€™s sympathy and with great procession, pomp and circumstance, told the people if they would give monetarily to the church, certain friends and relatives would have a reduced time in purgatory. Dr. Luther understood that the sheep of Christ were being fleeced. He wondered that if the Pope had the authority and power to reduce time and sentence in purgatory, why he didnâ€™t empty out all of purgatory if he had true access to this Treasure of Merit, and have mercy on the people, especially poor folks who would spend their last dime to purchase this hope from Tetzel. This event was not the cause of the Reformation, but it became the occasion for the Reformation that started in Germany.

Martinâ€™s â€œSilverâ€ Hammer and the Castle Church at Wittenberg
Dr. Luther was aghast at this hawkish selling of false hope to hurting and hopeless people, and chose the proper way to discuss an academic theological matter, by inviting other clergymen to a disputation concerning indulgences. Luther is not against the entire Medieval Roman Catholic traditions at this point, but he was very concerned about the abuse of the indulgences and wanted to understand more about the Popeâ€™s allowing the sell of them, while remaining charitable and giving the benefit of the doubt to the Popeâ€™s reasoning behind them. In order to invite others to academic debate, on October 31st 1517, the eve of All Saints Day when many clergymen would be present for the festival, Luther nailed ninety-five Theses on the door of the Castle Church in Wittenberg. Martin Luther never expected what would happen next. Because of the availability of the printing press, his Theses were copied and distributed literally all over Europe. The night was far spent and almost over, and the day of the Reformation had arrived- -even though Luther did not realize it.

Dr. Lutherâ€™s Ninety-Five Theses had the title: Disputation to explain the Virtue of Indulgences. Luther was approaching the question of indulgences with respect to the Pope; he appealed to the other ordained clergy, and with a considerate and moderate tone. At this point in Lutherâ€™s life, he would have given his own life to protect the life and reputation of the Pope as he was still a faithful monk of the Roman Catholic Church. His Ninety-Five Theses the spirit of Protestantism was at work, as Luther appealed to Scripture and reason for answers. Luther began his Theses by speaking of repentance as a life-long Christian virtue; repentance was not a one time event in a personâ€™s life but was what characterized the Christian life. Luther compares biblical repentance (and a lot of his own struggle with his sins and gaining Godâ€™s forgiveness through grace played into this) with the sacrament of penance. Luther says in his Theses that Jesus said to â€œRepentâ€ not to â€œDo penanceâ€. A fundamental thesis of Lutherâ€™s Ninety-Five Theses is thesis sixty-two, where Dr. Luther writes: â€œThe true treasury of the church is the holy gospel of the glory and grace of God.â€ Although Luther approached his questions respectfully in this way, the Roman Church leaders, particularly Leo was threatened by his writings, and Luther opened up for himself great opposition by undermining with scriptural teaching Medieval Catholic teaching. As historian Philip Schaff wrote: â€œBy attacking the abuses of indulgences, Luther unwittingly cut a vein of Medieval Catholicismâ€ (History of the Christian Church, Vol. VII, 160). Lutherâ€™s attempt at disputation caused a controversy that would lead to Reformation as God continued to build his church, and as his people stormed the gates of hell against those opposed to the gospel of free grace found only in the Person and Work of Jesus Christ.

Luther, Leo, and Melanchthon
Dr. Luther wrote his Theses respectfully and with hope that he could engage in a healthy debate with other clergy and the episcopacy. The time was ripe for Reformation and others such as Erasmus of Rotterdam (Holland) and Ulrich von Hutten also spoke out about church abuses; they were just unwilling to risk as much as eventually Luther realized he would have to risk, even at the point of risking his own life. As respectful as Dr. Luther tried to be, and as much as many thought his Ninety-Five Theses should be heeded due to the great need of reform, he exceedingly agitated many people, including Pope Leo X. Dr. Luther had started a great controversy that would end in Reformation. In Godâ€™s grace, he was not alone during this challenging time period of his life. God raised up a great Christian scholar of great learning in the classics, of tender and loving spirit, and one who was just a young man of nineteen when he became one of the most popular professors of the University of Wittenberg. This man, Philip Melanchthon became Lutherâ€™s lifelong friend, and one who would stand by his side during Lutherâ€™s struggle for Reformation in the Church. Melanchthon became like a son to Luther and they loved each other dearly throughout their lives. Luther needed support and friendship because he was literally standing strong against a formidable foe.

As Luther sounded the trumpet of the Reformation without full intention, he was met with great opposition from other scholars writing against him. Experienced and knowledgeable scholars such as Dr. Eck of Ingolstadt, who was at one time Lutherâ€™s friend, became his opponent. Unfortunately, no one could answer Lutherâ€™s questions and theses from the scriptures or the Latin Fathers, but had to necessarily argue for the inherent authority of the Pope and councils of the church. Through these debates, Luther became more learned, bold, and strong in standing for the teaching of the Bible. Dr. Lutherâ€™s teaching caused him to come directly into conflict with Pope Leo X and his authority over the Church.

Lutherâ€™s Apostolic Catholicism
Luther was a true Catholic; that is, Luther was a true Apostolic Catholic. He argued from the scriptures and from the early Church Fathers to prove that there was never accepted in the sacred writings, the writings of the fathers, or at any church council the doctrines expressed in the selling of indulgences. Luther argued that he was not heretic, but that he was a true Catholic by definition because he was building upon, not disagreeing with orthodox positions that had already been accepted long before him. Because of Leoâ€™s position and pride, he at first merely discounted Martin Luther as another â€œdrunken German monkâ€ who when he was sober, would see clearly his position and recant. Luther was being called everything from a drunken German to an arch-heretic because of his desire to initiate a theological debate and discourse. On August 7th, 1518, Pope Leo acted against Luther. Luther was cited to appear at Rome to recant his heresies. The Pope realized that this was more than a mere monkish debate and squabble that would go away; at the heart of this debate was the Popeâ€™s very authority over the Church and his people. Because of the protection of Elector Frederick the Wise, who was one of the most powerful princes in Germany at this time, Luther was not required to go to Rome. Because Frederick did not want to give up one of his best professors at Wittenberg, it was decided that he would give him protection and arrange an interview with the Popeâ€™s clergy in Augsburg.

Luther, Cardinal Cajetan, and Dr. Eck
At Augsburg in October 1518, Luther continue to defend his views as Biblical and Catholic against Cardinal Cajetan who was one of the Popeâ€™s chief representatives and able theologians of the Church. At this debate that had been arranged because of Frederickâ€™s power and protection, Dr. Luther solidified his position more strongly by arguing that he had the Scriptures as his foundation and that he must obey God rather than man. By this time, Luther is openly and publicly disagreeing with the Pope, and denying his authority when the Pope undermines Scriptural teaching. The heart of the matter here in Augsburg against Cajetan was that Dr. Luther made clear that the Scriptures were the sole authority of matters of faith and life. Because of the explicit undermining of the Popeâ€™s authority, Cajetan threatened Luther with excommunication. As Luther continued to think through the matter at the time, he struggled with the fact that if the Pope was disagreeing with the scriptures, then he perhaps could be the Anti-Christ. In 1519, Luther was again commanded by the Church to revoke his heresies. Pope Leo was so desperate to silence Luther, and knew his power was limited by Frederick that he sent Karl von Miltitz to Frederick with a bribe of position and eminence â€"the very â€œkingdoms of this world -- similar to the offer the devil made to Christ in his three temptations in the wilderness. Miltitz realized how much influence Dr. Luther had with the people; many were convinced by this time of Lutherâ€™s biblical position. Miltitz held a conference at Spalatinâ€™s house in January 1519 and pleaded with Luther not to divide the visible Catholic Church.

Dividing Christâ€™s Church was never Lutherâ€™s intention; his main and hopeful intention was to reform the Church. Dr. Luther felt the weight of the importance of seeking unity in the Church and for a season allowed a truce with Miltitz, even conceding that he might recant his views, but as time continued to pass and Luther grew stronger in his convictions about the authority of Scripture, Luther continued to fight. Lutherâ€™s debates continued next at Leipzig in the months of June and July 1519. At Leipzig Luther was to debate with John Eck. Dr. Eck was professor of theology at Ingolstadt in Bavaria and a strong advocate of Roman Catholicism and the Popeâ€™s position. The debate between Luther and Eck revolved around the authority of the Pope. Dr. Eck was supremely knowledgeable and a gifted orator, but Luther far surpassed him in his knowledge of the Scriptures. What became the chief point of discussion and contention as his debate with Cajetan was the authority of the Pope and the infallibility of the Pope. It is at this debate in Leipzig where Luther is first identified with the Jan Huss and his heresy that was condemned at the Council of Constance, and where Huss lost his life for standing on scripture alone. At Leipzig, Luther said that not only the Pope could err, but councils could err, and have, giving the example of the unjust condemnation of Jan Huss. As Dr. Luther is now publicly admitting his being very similar to one the Roman Church considered a heretic, he realizes that he can never recant or turn back from this; he must stand, and he must prayerfully and by Godâ€™s grace persevere come what may.

As the controversy spread and as many learned men critiqued Rome and the Churchâ€™s abuses of the times, Luther critiqued the Church and the Pope for what was most important to him, and in his mind what was their greatest sin: a disregard and profound misunderstanding of the gospel of Godâ€™s grace found in Jesus Christ. Dr. Luther truly believed that the Word of God would destroy all of Christâ€™s enemies and restore the Church to be a shining light of the gospel to all men. Luther believed the scriptural truth of the Prophet Zechariah: â€œNot by might, nor by power, but by my Spirit, saith the Lord of Hostsâ€ (Zech. 4:6). As Luther stood on the Word of God through the year 1520, the Pope of Rome began a process of excommunication in order to permanently silence Luther. This year and period would be the most arduous time for Dr. Luther as he spoke and wrote publicly, honestly, and boldly about the undermining of the Word of God and the sins and abuses of the Papacy and episcopacy, even to the point of claiming that the papacy as it presently existed was antichristian in nature and practice. Luther wrote a letter to Pope Leo X saying: â€œThe Church of Rome, formerly the most holy of all churches, has become the most lawless den of thieves, the most shameless of all brothels, the very kingdom of sin, death, and hell; so that not even the Antichrist, if he were to come, could devise any addition to its wickedness.â€

Lutherâ€™s Early Writings: Address to the German Nobility
Encouraged by his friend Philip Melanchthon, Dr. Luther wrote three popular books entitled Address to the German Nobility, The Babylonian Captivity of the Church, and the Freedom of the Christian Man. Lutherâ€™s main intent in writing the books was to express the importance of scripture as the rule of faith and life and the judge of all the ancient teachings and doctrines of the Fathers of the Church. Luther wanted all to know the gospel of the Word of God, and to be warned of the antichristian, unscriptural traditions of men that threatened to bind a Christianâ€™s conscience; Luther fought for true freedom in Jesus Christ!

In Lutherâ€™s book Address to the German Nobility, he writes: â€œThe time for silence is gone, and the time for speaking has come.â€ This Address is dated June 23, 1520, and when it went into print, many read and were influenced by this powerful book; this was one of the great â€˜bestsellersâ€™ of the day in Germany, and was extremely popular with the lay people. Dr. Luther addresses German nobles for the cause of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. He encourages them to make it possible for the gospel of grace to go forth from the sound preaching of Godâ€™s Word and to use their secular power to free the Christian people from the bondage of the wicked papal powers that be. Dr. Luther teaches in his Address the importance of understanding the biblical teaching of the â€œpriesthood of all believersâ€ that basically teaches that it is up to every man, every conscience to read the Bible for himself, and to compare the teachings and traditions of men with what the Bible teaches. Rather than merely the priest craft having access to God through Christ, and the people having to come to Christ through them, Luther taught correctly that all believers had access to God through One Mediator, who was Jesus Christ. Lutherâ€™s teaching allowed room for a biblical understanding of the ordained ministry and office, but it cut down the mammoth tree of papal abuse and control over the people of God. Luther taught that men have callings, some to ordained office, some to other vocations, but that all were equally â€œsaintsâ€ or â€œpriestsâ€ in Godâ€™s sight.

In his Address, Dr. Luther calls upon the German Nobility to intervene in this struggle between biblical Christianity and antichristian abusive power, declaring how the papacy has lived untruthfully and unbiblically, yet protected with great power to achieve their diabolical schemes of greed, corruption, immorality, and lies. Luther ends his Address with twenty-seven practical articles of suggestion for change such as the abolition of the sell of indulgences, the practice of clerical celibacy, the performance of masses for the dead, the observation of certain festivals of the Church Year, a reduction of the number of monasteries, and that fasting should be optional and voluntary for the Christian. Luther concludes his Address by saying â€œMy greatest care and fear is, lest my cause be not condemned by men; by which I should know for certain that it does not please God. Therefore let them freely go to work, Pope, bishop, priest, monk, or doctor: they are the true people to persecute the truth, as they have always done. May God grant us all a Christian understanding, and especially to the Christian nobility of the German nation true spiritual courage, to do what is best for our unhappy Church. Amen.â€

Lutherâ€™s The Babylonian Captivity of the Church
Dr. Luther took up the pen next to write The Babylonian Captivity of the Church in October 1520, 1520 being a very prolific writing year for him. This book contrasted to the Address was written for scholars and clergy to consider Dr. Lutherâ€™s teaching. In Captivity Luther criticizes the entire sacramental system of the Roman Church that controlled the Christian people and held them captive through their entire lives, preventing them from hearing and understanding the true Gospel. Luther articulates in this book that because the Roman Church has deceived the people with the Roman sacramental system, and has held them in bondage, the Roman Church being the very image of the Babylonian tyranny enslaving the people in darkness. The first errors of the Roman sacramental system that Luther addressed had to do with the Sacrament of the Lordâ€™s Supper, particularly condemning the withdrawal of the cup from the laity, the doctrine of transubstantiation and the sacrifice of the mass. Dr. Luther uses the gospels to show that Jesusâ€™ cup was meant for all: â€œDrink ye all of this,â€ was not meant by Jesus to be merely for the clergy. Luther argues from the Apostle Paul that the transubstantiation of the elements of bread and wine are more Aristotelian than they are Pauline. Luther did not believe that the elements were transubstantiated, and that the real presence of Christ was in the bread and the wine (a doctrine of Lutherâ€™s that would later be called consubstantiation in contrast to transubstantiation; that Christâ€™s presence is in, with, and under the bread and wine). Finally, Luther pointed his corrective finger at the superstitious sacrifice of the mass, and struck the heart of the Roman Churchâ€™s aberration of true worship in spirit and truth. Luther was appalled at this unbiblical teaching, describing it as a bloodless re-sacrificing of Christ on the cross when the priest uttered the words of the mass in Latin. In Lutherâ€™s next point in his book, he addresses what he thought the Bible taught about baptism. For Luther, as well as for the Roman Church of his time, baptism was a means of regeneration (the Reformation Church would have to await Calvinâ€™s honed theological mind to correct this error). Finally, Luther says that there are only two sacraments commanded and given by the Lord: Baptism and the Lordâ€™s Supper. Luther denied that the Bible gave to the Church seven sacraments, and that confirmation, ordination, marriage, and extreme unction were traditions of men. Dr. Luther pointed out that marriage was to be a gift of God to man as the Apostle Paul taught in Ephesians 5, not a sacrament for laity to enjoy, and clergy to avoid.

Lutherâ€™s The Freedom of a Christian
As Luther was being formally condemned as a heretic of the Holy Catholic Church, he wrote his next and perhaps most influential and enduring book The Freedom of a Christian. In this book, Luther exegetes and exposits the gospel primarily from Paulâ€™s Epistle to the Galatians, and says that the Christian is freed in Christ to live as sons of God, obediently and joyfully serving our Lord Jesus Christ. The memorable and most important thesis of the book is: â€œThe Christian is the lord of all, and subject to none, but virtue of faith; he is the servant of all, and subject to everyone, by virtue of love.â€ For Luther, the Gospel freed a person from bondage to sin and self, so that they could love and serve God and neighbor, or as the Apostle Paul teaches: â€œfaith working through love.â€ Rather than being under the Roman Churchâ€™s tyranny and enforced bondage to the sacramental system of penance and good works, Christ has freed us from Law and other forms of tyranny in order to love and serve; as Jesus taught in Matthew 11, his yoke is easy, and his burden is light compared to the awful yoke of slavery and the heavy and hard burden of law. Dr. Luther shows a mature understanding of the gospel theologically and practically in Freedom by pointing out the purpose of the Law to lead a man to the end of himself and recognize his deserved condemnation, only to look and find the righteous requirements of Godâ€™s law in the Person of Jesus Christ, which is the freeing and glorious gospel of Godâ€™s grace and mercy. In the Person of Jesus Christ, a righteousness from God is found, and Christ is condemned in our place, so that we might receive Godâ€™s mercy and love. The Roman Church would criticize Luther and other Reformers unfairly by saying that promoting the gospel leads to a disregard for Godâ€™s Law (antinomianism), but here we have Lutherâ€™s clear teaching of the place of the Law in the Christian life, but how the Law is obeyed and lived out of love and the power of the Spirit in Christ. The Christian is freed from bondage to love and serve, and thus fulfill the Law by the power of the Holy Spirit. In this little tract written in 1520, Dr. Luther countered any unfair criticism from the Roman Catholic Church implying that he and other Reformers were antinomians, or those opposed to good works out of obedience to Godâ€™s commands.

Pope Leo, Charles V, and the Papal Bull of Excommunication
It had been almost three years since Luther had posted his Ninety-Five Theses, and much growth spiritually and intellectually had occurred in Dr. Luther as he countered Rome and brought about a Reformation of the Christian Church. Ultimately, in response to Lutherâ€™s writings, a Papal Bull of Excommunication was written for Luther to be condemned as a heretic. In the bull, the Pope arrogantly assumes the very position of Christ over the Church, and pompously speaks as if his words are equal to the Bibleâ€™s revelation. In the bull, Pope Leo calls St. Peter and St. Paul and the whole body of the saints to aid against â€œthe boar out of the woodâ€ and the â€œwild beast of the fieldâ€ that had broken into the vineyard of the Lord to waste and destroy it. The Pope condemns the writings and doctrines of Luther as heretical and a threat to Roman Catholicism. Pope Leo X explicitly and tyrannically states in the bull that the writes of Martin Luther are to be burned, he is to be brought to Rome with the promise of safe conduct, Luther is suspended from ministry, all Catholics are not allowed to read, print or publish Lutherâ€™s writings, and if anyone conceals, hides, or protects Luther, the place will be under an Interdict from the papacy. The bull was published all over Europe and especially in Germany, but few took notice of it due to Lutherâ€™s cogent biblical argumentation and his popularity. When Luther received this bull, he disregarded it and burned it on December 10th, 1520 along with other papal decrees and the writings of Eck (who was the Popeâ€™s messenger to make the bull known to the world), and he sought refuge under the secular power of Frederick the Wise. We dare not underestimate this brave and courageous act; one man; one monk; a minerâ€™s son; a theological professor and great preacher; this one monk stood up to the most powerful man on earth at the time- -a man more powerful than many kings, greatly reverenced and feared- - a man who the whole world served and fell at his feet as though dead.

The emperor of the Holy Roman Empire at the beginning of Lutherâ€™s career as professor at Wittenberg and as a powerful Reformer was Maximilian I who died in January 1519. At the height of Dr. Lutherâ€™s peak of powers against the papacy, the emperor to succeed him was Charles V, who ruled from 1520-1556. Charles V ruled during the height of the German Reformation, and reigned ten years after Lutherâ€™s death in 1546, and almost to the end of the Counter-Reformation, Roman Catholic Council of Trent. It is important to remember at this time in the history of the Holy Roman Empire, that the emperor swore to protect and uphold the teachings of the Roman Catholic Church at his coronation. Charles was a powerfully shrewd and wise emperor like Charles â€œthe Greatâ€ before him that God raised up providentially to be in place during the remainder of Lutherâ€™s life. He was a devoted Roman Catholic, although he as many other emperors had their vices and sinful practices, but died speaking the name of â€œJesusâ€ as his final word. Charles fully endorsed the Papal Bull written against Luther, and regarded Lutherâ€™s Reformation as a rebellion against the Church and the State.

Luther and the Diet of Worms (1521)
On January 28th 1521, Charles V opened his first Diet at Worms; this was to be the most memorable and consequential Diet, not only in Germany, but for the entire world. Here at Worms, a German town on the left bank of the Rhine, Dr. Luther would formally stand firm on Godâ€™s word as the absolute and final guide for faith and life. On March 6, Emperor Charles V cited Luther to appear to recant of his writings and teachings before the Diet under the safe protection of the Empire. Frederick the Wise also sent letters of safe-conduct on Lutherâ€™s behalf. Luther saw this as an opportunity given by God himself. Although Luther had been summoned to Rome the year before by Pope Leo, he and Frederick the Wise disregarded the summons. Now, believing the emperor to be fair and noble in his invitation, Luther agreed to go to Worms. Dr. Luther was determined as he traveled not to recant, but to bear witness to the truth of the scriptures. Luther left Wittenberg on April 2nd and traveled with a colleague and student from the university; Melanchthon was unable to travel at this time with his dear friend. As Luther traveled with representatives of the college in an open farmerâ€™s wagon, he was greeted and welcomed along the way by great cheer for his heroic stand for the gospel of grace; Luther even found time to preach as he traveled and stayed briefly in certain towns. Later in Lutherâ€™s life, he would recall Godâ€™s grace to him during this fearful time in his life; he remembered how God had made him so bold that he was willing to lose his life for the gospel, knowing that the truth of Christ would live on.

Luther reached his destination at Worms on Tuesday, April 16th, 1521. Luther was dressed in a monastic gown and preceded by an imperial herald. The most significant dates during his visit at Worms were his testimonies to the truth of Scripture during the Diet on April 17th and 18th. Luther entered the Diet surrounded by clerical episcopates and distinguished , powerful men of the state. Dr. Johann von Eck asked Luther two important questions: 1) Did he acknowledge the books and writings as his own that were laid out before the august assembly? 2) Would he be willing to retract his teaching? Luther proceeded boldly because of his profound sense of responsibility in standing up for the truth of the Word of God.

On April 18th, after much prayer to God for grace, and meditation on his present circumstances before God and man, Luther told the assembly that he would not retract writings that biblically supported what the Word of God taught, nor would he retract his honest observations and criticisms concerning the abuses of wickedness and tyranny in the papacy, and he said: â€œIf I have spoken evil, bear witness of the evil; but if I have spoken well, why smitest thou me?â€ which were very similar words that Christ himself had used before his accusers of the church and state at his crucifixion. Dr. Luther was even so bold as to address the most powerful secular ruler in the world, Charles V, and he pleaded with him not to begin his rule by condemning the Word of God. That most important day, Dr. Luther did not recant or retract his writings, but boldly stated before all the secular dignitaries and powerful Roman Catholic clergy: â€œUnless I am refuted and convicted by testimonies of the Scriptures or by clear arguments, I am conquered by the Holy Scriptures quoted by me, and my conscience is bound in the Word of God: I can not and will not recant anything, since it is unsafe and dangerous to do anything against the conscience.â€ Luther ended his talk by saying: â€œHere I stand. I can not do otherwise. God help me! Amen.â€

Although many of the papal delegates of Rome considered Luther to be an obstinate and erring heretic, many of the German delegates were quite impressed with how Luther handled himself. One delegate, Duke Erik of Brunswick sent Luther some of his finest beer to enjoy, and Lutherâ€™s own Elector Frederick expressed to Spalatin: â€œHow excellently did Father Martin speak both in Latin and German before the Emperor and the Estates! He was bold enough, if not too much so.â€ Dr. Lutherâ€™s popularity spread like wildfire especially among the people of Germany; the common people recognized Luther as a great hero of the people for his courageous actions. Although the papal party formally triumphed at the Diet of Worms, it was Luther and the Word of God that ultimately triumphed in the end. The gates of hell did not prevail against Christâ€™s true church all because one man, a minerâ€™s son and monk stood humbly, yet boldly for the truth of Godâ€™s Word. It cannot be denied that Luther stood for the truth of the word of God over the tyranny and abuses of man, against the false traditions of man, and the council that had erred in Jesusâ€™ name, and the supremacy of Godâ€™s Word was restored to the Church and the people!

Luther the Apostolic Catholic
Luther was a true Catholic. He did not stand against Catholicism per se, but the degenerated Roman Catholicism that undermined the word of God of his day. Luther affirmed the decisions of the first four ecumenical councils of the Church (Nicea, Constantinople, Ephesus, and Chalcedon); Luther recognized the authority of the Church Fathers when they rightly interpreted Godâ€™s Word; Luther understood himself as an ordained man with a responsibility to witness to the truth of Godâ€™s Word; and he stood on the truth revealed in the Apostleâ€™s Creed. Luther did indeed take a stand against Roman Catholicism as a true Catholic and man of God, and by Godâ€™s grace was successful to bring about the greatest event in the history of the Church since the time of the Apostles. For standing against the papacy, the Pope encouraged Charles V to hand him over to the Roman Church to be executed at the stake, but the emperor refused and Luther was sent back home to Wittenberg with safe-conduct. This protection of Luther was the greatest service that Charles rendered to the Reformation (Schaff, Vol. VII, 317). However, Luther was formally under edict as a heretic from Church and State, but he lived because of the faithfulness and mercy of God, and the protection of Frederick the Wise. The world would never be the same, and the Reformation was now fully underway. The gospel of the Lord Jesus, under the authority of Christ, was continuing to go forth to the ends of the earth, and as Martin Luther stood for the Word of God, the Great Commission continued.

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The Story of Martin Luther: the Restoration of Biblical Christianity and Apostolic Catholicism

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Happy 490th anniversary of the Reformation of the Christian Church! On October 31st 2007, the Church will celebrate the 490th anniversary of the Reformation of the Sixteenth Century. This reformation began in Godâ€™s providence through a peasant minerâ€™s son who became a monk and then a great teacher of Biblical truth.

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Christian History | Learn the History of Christianity & the Church

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"I labored at the task [writing The Institutes] especially for our Frenchmen, for I saw that many were hungering and thirsting after Christ and yet that only a few had any real knowledge of him."

With his brother and sister and two friends, John Calvin fled Catholic France and headed to the free city of Strasbourg. It was the summer of 1536; Calvin had recently converted to the "evangelical" faith and had just published The Institutes of the Christian Religion, which articulated his Protestant views. He was a wanted man.

The party put up at an inn in Geneva, and word quickly passed to local church leader William Farel that the author of The Institutes was in town. Farel was ecstatic. He was desperate for help as he strove to organize a newly formed Protestant church in town. He rushed to the inn and pleaded with Calvin, arguing it was God's will he remain in the city.

Calvin said he was staying only one night. Besides, he was a scholar not a pastor. Farel, baffled and frustrated, swore a great oath that God would curse all Calvin's studies unless he stayed in Geneva.

Calvin, a man of tender conscience, later reflected on this moment: "I felt as if God from heaven had laid his mighty hand upon me to stop me in my course-and I was so terror stricken that I did not continue my journey."

To this day, Calvin's name is associated, for good and for ill, with the city of Geneva. And Calvin's belief in God's election is his theological legacy to the church.

The "whole sum of godliness"

Calvin was born in 1509 in Noyon, France. His father, a lawyer, planned a career in the church for his son, and by the mid-1520s, Calvin had become a fine scholar. He spoke proficient Latin, excelled at philosophy, and qualified to take up the intensive study of theology in Paris.

Suddenly, though, his father changed his mind and decided John should achieve greatness in law. John acquiesced, and the next five or six years saw him at the University of Orleans, attaining distinction in a subject he did not love. During these years, he dipped into Renaissance humanism. He learned Greek, read widely in the classics, and added Plato to the Aristotle he already knew. He developed a taste for writing so that by age 22, he had published a commentary on Seneca's De Clementia.

Then word of Luther's teaching reached France, and his life made an abrupt turn, though his own account is reticent and vague:

"He [God] tamed to teachableness a mind too stubborn for its years-for I was strongly devoted to the superstitions of the papacy that nothing less could draw me from such depths of mire. And so this mere taste of true godliness that I received set me on fire with such a desire to progress that I pursued the rest of my studies more coolly, although I did not give them up altogether."

He became marked out as a "Lutheran," and, when persecution arose in Paris (where he had returned to teach), he sought refuge in Basel. There he penned the first edition of a book that was to affect Western history as much as any other.

The Institutes of the Christian Religion was intended as an elementary manual for those who wanted to know something about the evangelical faith-"the whole sum of godliness and whatever it is necessary to know about saving doctrine." Calvin later wrote, "I labored at the task especially for our own Frenchmen, for I saw that many were hungering and thirsting after Christ and yet that only a very few had any real knowledge of him."

In The Institutes, Calvin outlined his views on the church, the sacraments, justification, Christian liberty, and political government. His unique and overarching theme is God's sovereignty. He taught that original sin eradicated free will in people. Only by God's initiative can anyone begin to have faith and thus experience assurance of salvation.

In this and later editions, Calvin developed the doctrines of predestination, or election. More importantly, he argued for the indefectability of grace-that is, grace will never be withdrawn from the elect. This was Calvin's pastoral attempt to comfort new believers. In medieval Catholicism, believers remained anxious about their spiritual destinies and were required to perform more and more good works to guarantee their salvation. Calvin taught that once a believer understands he is chosen by Christ to eternal life, he will never have to suffer doubt again about salvation: "He will obtain an unwavering hope of final perseverance (as it is called), if he reckons himself a member of him who is beyond hazard of falling away."

God's city

After fleeing France to escape persecution, Calvin settled in Geneva at Farel's bidding. But after a mere 18 months, he and Farel were banished from the city for disagreeing with the city council. Calvin headed again for Strasbourg, where he pastored for three years and married Idellete de Bure, the widow of an Anabaptist, who brought with her two children.

By 1541 Calvin's reputation had spread: he wrote three other books and revised his Institutes. (Still more revisions came in 1550 and 1559, eventually amounting to 80 chapters.) He had become close friends with leading Reformers like Martin Bucer and Philip Melanchthon. He was asked to return to Geneva by city authorities, and he spent the rest of his life trying to help establish a theocratic society.

Calvin believed the church should faithfully mirror the principles laid down in Holy Scripture. In his Ecclesiastical Ordinances he argued that the New Testament taught four orders of ministry: pastors, doctors, elders, and deacons. Around these, the city was organized.

Pastors conducted the services, preached, administered the Sacraments, and cared for the spiritual welfare of parishioners. In each of the three parish churches, two Sunday services and a catechism class were offered. Every other weekday, a service was held-later on, every day. The Lord's Supper was celebrated quarterly.

The doctors, or teachers, lectured in Latin on the Old and New Testaments usually on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. The audience consisted mainly of the older schoolboys and ministers, but anyone could attend.

In every district, elders kept an eye on spiritual affairs. If they saw that so-and-so was frequently the worse for drink, or that Mr. X beat his wife, or that Mr. Y and Mrs. Z were seeing too much of each other, they admonished them in a brotherly manner. If the behavior didn't cease, they reported the matter to the Consistory, the church's governing body, which would summon the offender. Excommunication was a last resort and would remain in force until the offender repented.

Finally, social welfare was the charge of the deacons. They were the hospital management board, social security executives, and alms-house supervisors. The deacons were so effective, Geneva had no beggars.

The system worked so well for so many years that when John Knox visited Geneva in 1554, he wrote a friend that the city "is the most perfect school of Christ that ever was in the earth since the days of the apostles."

Unofficial authoritarian

Calvin, for his part, preached twice every Sunday and every day of alternate weeks. When not preaching, he lectured as the Old Testament professor three times a week. He took his place regularly on the Consistory, which met every Thursday. And he was either on committees or incessantly being asked for advice about matters relating to the deacons.

He was in no way the ruler or dictator of Geneva. He was appointed by the city council and paid by them. He could at any time have been dismissed by them (as he had been in 1538). He was a foreigner in Geneva, not even a naturalized citizen, until near the end of his life. His was a moral authority, stemming from his belief that, because he proclaimed the message of the Bible, he was God's ambassador, with divine authority behind him. As such, he was involved in much that went on in Geneva, from the city constitution to drains and heating appliances.

His role in the infamous execution of Michael Servetus in 1553, then, was not an official one. Servetus fled to Geneva to escape Catholic authorities: he had denied the Trinity, a blasphemy that merited death in the 1500s all over Europe. Geneva authorities didn't have any more patience with heresy than did Catholics, and with the full approval of Calvin, they put Servetus to the stake.

Calvin drove himself beyond his body's limits. When he could not walk the couple of hundred yards to church, he was carried in a chair to preach. When the doctor forbade him to go out in the winter air to the lecture room, he crowded the audience into his bedroom and gave lectures there. To those who would urge him to rest, he asked, "What? Would you have the Lord find me idle when he comes?"

His afflictions were intensified by opposition he sometimes faced. People tried to drown his voice by loud coughing while he preached; others fired guns outside the church. Men set their dogs on him. There were even anonymous threats against his life.

Calvin's patience gradually wore away. Even when he was patient, he was too unsympathetic sometimes. He showed little understanding, little kindness, and certainly little humor.

Calvin finally wore out in 1564. But his influence has not. Outside the church, his ideas have been blamed for and credited with (depending on your view) the rise of capitalism, individualism, and democracy. In the church, he has been a major influence on leading figures such as evangelist George Whitefield and theologian Karl Barth, as well as entire movements, such as Puritanism.

Day to day, church bodies with the names "Presbyterian" or "Reformed" (and even some Baptist groups) carry forward his legacy in local parishes all over the world.

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"I labored at the task [writing The Institutes] especially for our Frenchmen, for I saw that many were hungering and thirsting after Christ and yet that only a few had any real knowledge of him." With his brother and sister and two friends, John Calvin fled Catholic France and headed to the free city of Strasbourg.

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Justification - Contrasting Catholic and Protestant Views

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PBS - Martin Luther – Complete documentary. (Parts 1 & 2)

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“The Jesus of History & the Christ of Faith” – Christology, Video 4

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Arius and the deity of Christ

Arius was a cultured and ascetic presbyter (256-336 AD), a popular preacher from Libya. He was tall, handsome, earnestly religious, and eloquent in his arguments. He gave the impression of being arrogant.

He lived at a time when the Eastern Church was divided because of the Christological dispute which he was instrumental in starting. He taught that Christ is not divine, but created.

Arius was strongly opposed by his bishop Alexander, who was bishop of Alexandria from 313 AD. Alexander insisted that the Son was fully and truly God, in as absolute a sense as the Father was. The problem for Alexander was to show that this (orthodox) truth did not lead to a belief in two Gods, as Arius maintained that it did.

Alexander assembled a council of Egyptian bishops in 320 which deposed Arius for heresy. Arius, however, was not ready to give up without a fight, and went to Palestine, canvassing support from other Eastern bishops.

Arius wrote letters to Lucian’s ex-students who were now presbyters or bishops, addressing them as “Dear fellow-pupils of Lucian.” Lucian’s views of Christ seem to have been similar to Arius’s.

All came to a head and the Emperor, to safeguard the unity of the empire and the church, convened a general council at Nicea, which declared the Son to be equal with the Father and issued the Creed saying that Christ is “God from God, true God from true God, begotten not created, of the same essence as the Father....”

All but two of Arius’s supporters - Secundus of Ptolemais and Theonas of Marmarica - gave in and signed the Creed. Arius still refused. These three were sent into exile by Constantine the emperor. They were anathemized and condemned. The enforce the decisions of the Council, Constantine demanded, with the death penalty for disobedience, the burning of all books composed by Arius and deposed Eusebius of Nicomedia and another bishop who had been active in their support of Arius.

The dispute, though, continued throughout the fourth and fifth century.

Defining the heresy named after him.

His teaching was that the Father alone is God. The Logos or Son, Arius maintained, was a created being - formed out of nothing by the Father before the universe was made. He therefore said that there was a time when the Son had not existed.

According to Arius, the Son was the first and greatest of all that God had created; He was closer to God than all others, and the rest of creation related to God through the Son (for instance, God had created everything else through Christ).

By developing this arch-heresy, Arius thought he was defending the fundamental truth that there is only one God - monotheism. A belief in the full deity of Christ, he supposed, would mean the Father and Son were two separate Gods, which contradicted the many statements of the Bible about God’s oneness.

Arius was also unhappy with Origen’s idea that there could be ‘degrees’ or ‘grades’ of divinity, with the Son being slightly less divine than the Father (this became known after the Nicene Council as semi-Arianism).

Arius argued that since the Father is clearly God, it follows that the Son could not be God - so He must be a created being.

Opposing Sabellianism

This heresy is named after Sabellius (early third century), an obscure Roman theologian. Sabellius taught that God is only one person, who acts now as Father in creating the universe, now as son in redeeming sinners, now as the Holy Spirit in sanctifying believers.

The three divine Persons he believed to be three different roles acted out by one divine Being, much as one human person might be a husband, a father and a clerk.

His view, of one sort or another, was quite popular in the early church, because it offered a way of believing in the deity of Christ while preserving the oneness of God.

The Church rejected Sabellianism because, among other things, it failed to preserve the personal relationships between the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, so prevalent in the New Testament. It makes nonsense of the prayer-life of Jesus in the Gospels.

Sabellianism is also known as Modalism (3 different modes of the same God), and Monarchianism (one rule of God through different roles).