The Genius Of John Eck's Argument

John Eck was Luther’s main opponent in the Leipzig Debate in 1519. John Eck was born on November 13, 1486. He adopted “Eck” to his name – the name of his birthplace. Eck’s father was a magistrate in Eccius or Eck. Eck’s father cannot support his education, so he lived with his uncle, Johann Maier, and attended the small school under his uncle’s supervision. Eck was an intelligent, young boy who was sent to Heidelberg to further his education. He entered the university at the age of twelve (Dau 2-3). Eck lived most of his life at the University of Ingolstadt (Dau 5). Eck became a member at the University of Ingolstadt and was soon the pro-chancellor of the university in 1512 – due to his great ability and unfairness debate (Dau 5). “In fact,
Later, debate rose because of the tensions these theses brought to Rome, which question the authority of the pope (Stimming 17). Eck asserted that, “For three hundred years, he said, indulgences had been regarded as efficacious, and the councils of Vienna, Paris, and Constanz had declared them so” (Dau 178-179). In other words, Eck pointed out that the selling of indulgences was for the sake of the people. According to Eck, “an indulgence had come to mean a concession, granted under special circumstances, for penitential good works to be commuted to some other good work” (Stimming 17). Plus, indulgences had been around for many years and had been helping souls in purgatory. Although Luther had agreed with Eck on the time frame of indulgences, Luther maintained that the Pope did not have the power to allow the selling of plenary indulgences and cannot “call[ed] indulgences a treasure and blessings of Christians; for true Christians are not benefited at all by them” (Dau 179). To Luther, indulgences misled the common people and uneducated Christians into “a false security of salvation and a false conception of God” (Stimming 40). Luther even pointed out indulgences was a problem because the Pope and the Church Councils had not agreed on the use and power of indulgences (Dau 179). Thus, Luther believed that the Pope did not have the authority to allow indulgences to be purchased by the common
Luther “insisted that the Eastern Church must necessarily be heretical if the primacy of the Pope is of divine right” (Dau 167). Eck replied to Luther by saying that “the Greeks had often been revealed as schismatics and heretics, and that Aquinas had written against their errors” (Dau 167). According to Eck, he claimed that the Pope was the divine right based on the ancient rule suggested by Augustine (Dau 167). Eck declared that the divine right of the papacy “is established primarily from the passage Matt. 16,18; this the fathers had believed; the councils had acknowledged it; at Constanz it had been maintained over against Hus” (Dau 168). Eck pretty much ignored what Luther had to say about the divine right of the pope because he believed he was correct according to his sources. Luther replied to Eck with a set of counter-theses, which was the Thirteenth Propositions, which Luther claimed to be concerned to support the dignity of the pope. Luther stated that the belief established by God must be abandoned if the papal primacy were to be defended (Stimming 47). Eck argued that Pope would retained its divine right since the keys are kept in the church (Stimming