Three Treatises

by Martin Luther

Martin Luther posted his Ninety-five Theses on the church door at Wittenberg in 1517. In the three years that followed, Luther clarified and defended his position in numerous writings. Chief among these are the three treatises written in 1520. In these writings Luther tried to frame his ideas in terms that would be comprehensible not only to the clergy but to people from a wide range of backgrounds. [i]To the Christian Nobility of the German Nation[/i] is an attack on the corruption of the church and the abuses of its authority, bringing to light many of the underlying reasons for the Reformation. The second treatise, [i]The Babylonian Captivity of the Church[/i], contains Luther's sharp criticism of the sacramental system of the Catholic church. [i[The Freedom of a Christian[/i] gives a concise presentation of Luther's position on the doctrine of justification by faith. The translations of these treatises are all taken from the American edition of Luther's Works. This new edition of [i]Three Treatises[/i] will continue to be a popular resource for individual study, church school classes, and college and seminary courses.

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Paperback, 2nd revised edition, 322 pages

Published January 1st 1970 by Fortress Press (first published 1943)

tags: theology, philosophy, european literature, christianity, classics, church, religion, german literature, church history, nonfiction, history, christian

Book Quotes

“Behold, from faith thus flow forth love and joy in the Lord, and from love a joyful, willing, and free mind that serves ones neighbor willingly and takes no account of gratitude or ingratitude, of praise or blame, of gain or loss.”

― Martin Luther

“When he instituted this sacrament and established this testament at the Last Supper, Christ did not offer himself to God the Father, nor did he perform a good work on behalf of others, but, sitting at the table, he set this same testament before each one and proffered to him the sign. Now, the more closely our mass resembles that first mass of all, which Christ performed at the Last Supper, the more Christian it will be. But Christ's mass was most simple, without any display or vestments, gestures, chants, or other ceremonies, so that if it had been necessary to offer the mass as a sacrifice, then Christ's institution of it was not complete.”

― Martin Luther

“No one should be deceived by the glamor of the ceremonies and entangled in the multitude of pompous forms, and thus lose the simplicity of the mass itself,”

― Martin Luther

“Let us act wisely, therefore, and in the fear of God.”

― Martin Luther

“And if what they claim were true, why have Holy Scripture at all? Of what use is Scripture?”

― Martin Luther

“For we have vowed enough in baptism, more than we can ever fulfill; if we give ourselves to the keeping of this one vow, we shall have all we can do.”

― Martin Luther

“Therefore I permit every man to hold either of these opinions, as he chooses. My one concern at present is to remove all scruples of conscience, so that no one may fear being called a heretic if he believes that real bread and real wine are present on the altar, and that every one may feel at liberty to ponder, hold, and believe either one view or the other without endangering his salvation.”

― Martin Luther

“I rejoice greatly that the simple faith of this sacrament is still to be found, at least among the common people. For as they do not understand, neither do they dispute whether accidents are present without substance, but believe with a simple faith that Christ's body and blood are truly contained there, and leave to those who have nothing else to do the argument about what contains them.”

― Martin Luther

“Why do we not put aside such curiosity and cling simply to the words of Christ, willing to remain in ignorance of what takes place here and content that the real body of Christ is present by virtue of the words?72 Or is it necessary to comprehend the manner of the divine working in every detail?”

― Martin Luther

“For my part, if I cannot fathom how the bread is the body of Christ, yet I will take my reason captive to the obedience of Christ [II Cor. 10:5], and clinging simply to his words, firmly believe not only that the body of Christ is in the bread, but that the bread is the body of Christ.”

― Martin Luther

“Wherefore it ought to be the first concern of every Christian to lay aside all confidence in works and increasingly to strengthen faith alone and through faith to grow in the knowledge, not of works, but of Christ Jesus, who suffered and rose for him, as Peter teaches in the last chapter of his first Epistle (I Pet. 5:10).”

― Martin Luther

“As I have always both offered and desired peace so that I might devote myself to quieter and more useful studies, and have stormed with such great fury merely for the purpose of overwhelming my unequal opponents by the volume and violence of words no less than of intellect, I not only gladly ceased but also joyfully and thankfully considered this suggestion a very welcome kindness to me, provided our hope could be realized.”

― Martin Luther

“I fear that most of them have been too literally his vicars. A man is a vicar only when his superior is absent. If the pope rules, while Christ is absent and does not dwell in his heart, what else is he but a vicar of Christ? What is the church under such a vicar but a mass of people without Christ?”

― Martin Luther

“How much more properly did the apostles call themselves servants of the present Christ and not vicars of an absent Christ.”

― Martin Luther

“Let us then consider it certain and firmly established that the soul can do without anything except the Word of God and that where the Word of God is missing there is no help at all for the soul.”

― Martin Luther

“Every city should support its own poor, and if it was too small, the people in the surrounding villages should also be urged to contribute,”

― Martin Luther

“It is not fitting that one man should live in idleness on another's labor, or be rich and live comfortably at the cost of another's hardship,”

― Martin Luther

“Of special significance was the action of Henry VIII of England. Not content with ordering Luther s writings to be publicly burned in London, he also turned theologian and wrote a book of 78 quarto pages dedicated to the pope, denouncing Luther and defending the Catholic positions on the sacraments. Henry's book so pleased the pope that he issued a special bull declaring that it was written with the help of the Holy Spirit, granting an indulgence of ten years to everyone who would read it, and bestowing upon Henry and his successors the title 'Defender of the Faith.”

― Martin Luther

“See, according to this rule the good things we have from God should flow from one to the other and be common to all, so that everyone should "put on" his neighbor and so conduct himself toward him as if he himself were in the other's place.”

― Martin Luther

“This is true love and the genuine rule of a Christian life. Love is true and genuine where there is true and genuine faith. Hence the Apostle says of love in I Cor. 13 [:5] that "it does not seek its own." We conclude, therefore, that a Christian lives not in himself, but in Christ and in his neighbor. Otherwise he is not a Christian. He lives in Christ through faith, in his neighbor through love. By faith he is caught up beyond himself into God. By love he descends beneath himself into his neighbor. Yet he always remains in God and in his love,”

― Martin Luther

Martin Luther

Martin Luther changed the course of Western civilization by initiating the Protestant Reformation. As a priest and theology professor, he confronted indulgence salesmen with his 95 Theses in 1517. Luther strongly disputed their claim that freedom from God's punishment of sin could be purchased with money. His refusal to retract all of his writings at the demand of Pope Leo X in 1520 and the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V at the Diet of Worms meeting in 1521 resulted in his excommunication by the pope and condemnation as an outlaw by the emperor.

Luther taught that salvation is a free gift of God and received only by grace through faith in Jesus as redeemer from sin, not from good works. His theology challenged the authority of the pope of the Roman Catholic Church by teaching that the Bible is the only source of divinely revealed knowledge and opposed sacerdotalism by considering all baptized Christians to be a holy priesthood.

His translation of the Bible into the language of the people (instead of Latin) made it more accessible, causing a tremendous impact on the church and on German culture. It fostered the development of a standard version of the German language, added several principles to the art of translation, and influenced the translation into English of the King James Bible. His hymns inspired the development of singing in churches. His marriage to Katharina von Bora set a model for the practice of clerical marriage, allowing Protestant priests to marry.
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