Martin Luther

Martin Luther , 1483-1546

German religious reformer, Translator, Theologian, Composer

• "We are beggars: this is true." -- "The Last Written Words of Luther," Table Talk No. 5468,16 February 1546. James A. Kellerman, Tr. Dr. Martin Luthers Werke, (Weimar: Hermann Boehlaus Nachfolger, 1909), Band 85 (TR 5) 317-318. [1]

• "By God's grace, I know Satan very well. If Satan can turn God's Word upside down and pervert the Scriptures, what will he do with my words -- or the words of others? -- Confession Concerning Christ's Supper, Part 3. Robert E. Smith, tr. Dr. Martin Luthers Werke: Kritische Gesamtsusgabe. (Weimar: Herman Boehlaus Nachfolger, 1909), pp.499-500. [2]

• "Faith is a living, bold trust in God's grace, so certain of God's favor that it would risk death a thousand times trusting in it. Such confidence and knowledge of God's grace makes you happy, joyful and bold in your relationship to God and all creatures. The Holy Spirit makes this happen through faith. Because of it, you freely, willingly and joyfully do good to everyone, serve everyone, suffer all kinds of things, love and praise the God who has shown you such grace." -- "An Introduction to St. Paul's Letter to the Romans" from Dr. Martin Luthers Vermischte Deutsche Schriften. Johann K. Irmischer, ed. Vol. 63(Erlangen: Heyder and Zimmer, 1854), pp.124-125. (EA 63:124-125)[3]

• "If you are a preacher of mercy, do not preach an imaginary but the true mercy. If the mercy is true, you must therefore bear the true, not an imaginary sin. God does not save those who are only imaginary sinners. Be a sinner, and let your sins be strong (sin boldly), but let your trust in Christ be stronger, and rejoice in Christ who is the victor over sin, death, and the world. We will commit sins while we are here, for this life is not a place where justice resides. We, however, says Peter (2. Peter 3:13) are looking forward to a new heaven and a new earth where justice will reign. -- Letter 99, Paragraph 13. Erika Bullmann Flores, Tr. from: Dr. Martin Luther's Saemmtliche Schriften Dr. Johannes Georg Walch, Ed. (St. Louis: Concordia Publishing House, N.D.), Vol. 15,cols. 2585-2590. [4]

• "What does it mean to have a god? or, what is God? Answer: A god means that from which we are to expect all good and to which we are to take refuge in all distress, so that to have a God is nothing else than to trust and believe Him from the [whole] heart; as I have often said that the confidence and faith of the heart alone make both God and an idol. If your faith and trust be right, then is your god also true; and, on the other hand, if your trust be false and wrong, then you have not the true God; for these two belong together faith and God. That now, I say, upon which you set your heart and put your trust is properly your god." -- Large Catechism 1.1-3, F. Bente and W.H.T. Dau, tr. Triglot Concordia: The Symbolical Books of the Ev. Lutheran Church(St. Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 1921), 565. [5]

• "But since the devil's bride, Reason, that pretty whore, comes in and thinks she's wise, and what she says, what she thinks, is from the Holy Spirit, who can help us, then? Not judges, not doctors, no king or emperor, because [reason] is the Devil's greatest whore." -- "Martin Luther's Last Sermon in Wittenberg ... Second Sunday in Epiphany, 17 January 1546." Dr. Martin Luthers Werke: Kritische Gesamtsusgabe. (Weimar: Herman Boehlaus Nachfolger, 1914),Band 51:126,Line 7ff.
  • German: "Vernunft ... ist die höchste Hur, die der Teufel hat."

Attributed

• "The limitation of riots, moral questions aside, is that they cannot win and their participants know it. Hence, rioting is not revolutionary but reactionary because it invites defeat. It involves an emotional catharsis, but it must be followed by a sense of futility." -- The Trumpet of Conscience

• Reason is the greatest enemy that faith has: it never comes to the aid of spritual things, but--more frequently than not --struggles against the Divine Word....

• Reason must be deluded, blinded, and destroyed. Faith must trample underfoot all reason, sense, and understanding, and whatever it sees must be put out of sight and ... know nothing but the word of God

• Whoever wants to be a Christian should tear the eyes out of his reason.

• Sin cannot tear you away from him [Christ], even though you commit adultery a hundred times a day and commit as many murders.

• Idiots, the lame, the blind, the dumb, are men in whom the devils have established themselves: and all the physicians who heal these infirmities, as though they proceeded from natural causes, are ignorant blockheads...."

• "If [women] become tired or even die, that does not matter. Let them die in childbirth--that is why they are there."

• "Moreover, they are nothing but thieves and robbers who daily eat no morsel and wear no thread of clothing which they have not stolen and pilfered from us by means of their accursed usury. Thus they live from day to day, together with wife and child, by theft and robbery, as arch-thieves and robbers, in the most impenitent security."

[Martin Luther,"On the Jews and Their Lies",1543]