Lex Luther

It is relatively accurate to say that the United States has Christian roots. It would be far more accurate, although not necessarily true, to say that the United States has Protestant roots. In other words, we are Christian, but we are not Catholic; ergo we are Protestants.

And Protestantism started with Luther. Thankfully, it didn't end with him.

Luther did indeed do mankind an inestimable service in pointing out that the papacy is not the Bible, and that the practice of priests literally selling tickets to heaven to rich folks wasn't exactly in keeping with the word of the Nazarene.

Luther was, it can be said, one of the 10 most influential thinkers and doers of Western civilization. But that doesn't necessarily mean he had a uniformly, or even mostly, positive influence. Influence is morally neutral; Hitler's higher on the list than Luther.

Here is what the dominant historical paradigm tells us about Martin Luther: he essentially invented freedom of religion by rejecting the premise that the Catholic Church was the "one true church". He encouraged people to think for themselves and to reject blind obedience to other mortals.

Luther, the paradigm tells us, invented Protestantism by encouraging people to think for themselves and the use their own God-given minds to make sense of the world. After Luther, Catholic nations such as Spain stagnated while newly Protestant nations such as England expanded and excelled.

There is, of course, much truth to this paradigm. But this paradigm, like many others, has less to do with what the man did while alive than it has to do with what subsequent writers think he stood for. And a look at what Luther actually did and said renders him much less sympathetic.

Firstly, for his theology. Luther was a Catholic, just as Christ was a Jew. He rightly pointed out grievous abuses and corruption condoned and carried out by his church. But where did he disagree with the Church's theology?

Luther's biggest sticking point was free will. He DID NOT believe it existed. That's right; Martin Luther did not believe that we have free will. It would be hard to think of a belief more anathema to American culture than that. Yet the inventor of Protestantism believed it.

So we instantly know that the dominant paradigm has a hole in it big enough to drive a cathedral through. The second major Protestant figure of this time was John Calvin. Calvin, like Luther, did not believe in free will. He believed in predestination. Some of us are "the elect", and the others.....well...they're not.

And what of the practical application of Luther's theology, which we look back on as so enlightened and empowering? Well, after Luther rose to prominence, there occurred the biggest popular uprising in the history of Europe, before or since.

One of Luther's better ideas was to print the Bible in languages that average people could actually read and speak. And poor folks, having had a chance for the first time in a thousand years to actually read the Bible, decided they weren't being treated very biblically by their betters. So they revolted.

And where did Luther come down? On the side of the kings. He excoriated the peasants in the strongest possible terms from his pulpit and advised the princes and kings to slaughter them en masse, which they did. Apparently, for Luther, the pope was an illegitimate authority, but the king was just fine.

3 days before Luther died, he wrote that all the Jews should be expelled from Germany. Good thing that idea never caught on.... In this, as well, Luther was ahead of his time.

Luther, we now know, was not the revolution. He did not believe in free will and he did not believe in the inherent quality of people, or even of Christians. What he did do, and what he do owe him for, is to crack open the door toward real reformation and liberation.

But let us not confuse this man; Martin Luther was no Martin Luther King.