Martin Luther Saved Analysis

How Can I be Saved? The question that many based their lives around and tried to find a constant answer to. Although there is no clear concise answer, Martin Luther, a German priest, believed the answer lay in the Bible and in the hands of God (Eriks). He thought predestination was the correct way of thinking. This is contradictory towards what Desiderius Erasmus, a Renaissance scholar, thought. He thought that free will was the answer, and that how a person acted and lived their life would decide if they would end up in heaven or hell. He thought that the church was the one way a person could be saved(Eriks). Both Erasmus and Luther had many followers but very different views on how a person could be saved.

Desiderius Erasmus was a Renaissance
scholar who studied classical texts and the Greek new testament (Cheah). He was unhappy with the way that the Catholic Church was being run and wanted reformation. He wanted moral reform for the church, but was still willing to be loyal to the pope. He wrote The Praise of Folly which depicted the things the church was doing wrong and mocked the church leaders (Nauert). Although he did not intend for this to be a major controversial work, it sparked many disagreements. Pope Leo X was not angry with his writing but more amused with what he had to say and what he wrote(Nauert). Martin Luther, a German professor, disagreed with Erasmus and also wrote his opinions down to share with others. The book became extremely popular in the 16th century and was translated into many languages. His reputation became less steady, because he was not fully committed to the Catholic Church. Later the book was placed on the Roman Index of prohibited books in certain countries (Nauert). Another one of his written works was called, On the Freedom of the Will, in which he states that he agrees with the idea of free will and what it stands for (Nauert). Free will was the ability to make your own decisions without the constraint of fate and to be able to act on one's own discretion. Free will in religious terms means being able to chose whether to accept God's gift of salvation or not (Bennett).

Martin Luther was a German professor of theology who believed in predestination and not free will (Saari 378).
Predestination is the belief that everything that will happen is already decided by god or fate and can not be changed no matter what a person does (Bennett). He wanted others to focus on the Bible and what it was teaching, and not what the church. For example, the church offered things called indulgences which was basically ‘grace’ a person was paying for so they could show God and the church that they were truly regretful of the sins they had made. Luther strongly disagreed with this and thought the church should not be selling some type of redemption to the people of the church (Cheah). He wrote the 95 Thesis to start a discussion about how the church could stop corruption (and things like indulgences), but instead of just sparking a discussion he sparked a very intense argument. He posted his 95 Thesis on the doors of the church and many people saw it and agreed with him. He had a group of followers that were in his time called Lutherans, but later became known as Protestants (Saari 210). Luther thought forgiveness of sins had to be just between God and that specific individual (Saari 208). He thought any free will a person might have would be overridden by sin
(Eriks). Although it is a personal preference, I agree most with Martin Luther and his ideas. In my opinion, everything in the Bible was intended to be read and followed and that if a person continues to follow the Bible they will go to heaven. I also think that the idea of indulgences is not right and people should not have to pay for “grace” and pay for forgiveness of their sins. Especially if the money is going to the church, because I don’t think that the church has the power to get my sins forgiven by God. The way Luther thought sins should be forgiven is by the person relaying their sins to God and asking for forgiveness, I also believe that is the way sins should be forgiven, not by indulgences. Overall, I think Luther had more concrete ideas and reasonings whereas Erasmus’ ideas were more opinion based.

The debate between how a person can be saved is still discussed today, and people have many different views and opinions that trail back to Martin Luther and Desiderius Erasmus. Many people disagree that God is the only way to salvation, but like Luther many do think that is the case. Because of Luther, the Protestant religion was started, and that is definitely a legacy that is still around today. Also the written works by both Erasmus and Luther are still read and discussed. In conclusion, predestination and free will both have their different meanings and followers, but they inevitably lead to the reformation of the church which was what both Luther and Erasmus were trying to do, because they wanted the Roman Catholic Church to change.