What’s your source for that article? It isn’t the 1911 Brittanica article to which you were link. The notion that Luther didn’t have any problem with proper indulgences is uproarious; the 95 theses mostly dealt with indulgences, and surrounding issues. I’ll grant you, that if one presumes sincerity on Luther, than one could suppose that the initial germ of what so upset him was the corruption of the sale of indulgences.
I did not challenge that the monetary indulgences were common. What I was denying as orthodox was the assertion, attributed to Tetzel, that one could go ahead and sin and make up for it by indulgences.
But your history does confuse indulgences with pennances. Pennances were necessary to be received back into the church, after one had committed a mortal sin. Pennance, therefore, had to do with eternal salvation. Indulgences, on the other hand, had to do with shortening time in purgatory; they were unnecessary for salvation.
Also, pennances were issued by one’s confessor, for specific sins. Indulgences were available to anyone at any time, and were proclaimed by the Pope.
The source for the article I posted is here:
http://www.1911encyclopedia.org/Martin_Luther
This came earlier in the article:
“Luther began his work as a Reformer by proposing to discuss the true meaning of Indulgences. The occasion was an Indulgence proclaimed by Pope Leo X., farmed by the archbishop of Mainz, and preached by John Tetzel, a Dominican monk and a famed seller of Indulgences. Many of the German princes had no great love for Indulgence sellers, and Frederick of Saxony had prohibited Tetzel from entering his territories. But it was easy to reach most parts of Electoral Saxony without actually crossing the frontiers. The Red Cross of the Indulgence seller had been set up at Zerbst and at Jizterbogk, and people had gone from Wittenberg to buy the Papal Tickets. Luther believed that the sales were injurious to the morals of the townsmen; he had heard reports of Tetzel’s sermons; he had become wrathful on reading the letter of recommendation of the archbishop; and friends had urged him to interfere. He protested with a characteristic combination of caution and courage. The church of All Saints (the castle church) was closely connected with the university of Wittenberg. Its doors were commonly used for university proclamations. The Elector Frederick was a great collector of relics and had stored them in his church. He had procured an Indulgence for all who attended its services on All Saints’ Day, and crowds commonly gathered. Luther nailed ninety-five theses on the church door on that day, the 1st of November 1517, when the crowd could see and read them.
The proceeding was strictly academic. The matter discussed, to judge by the writings of theologians, was somewhat obscure; and Luther offered his theses as an attempt to make it clearer. No one was supposed to be committed to every opinion he advanced in such a way. But the theses posted somehow touched heart and conscience in a way unusual in the common subjects of academic disputation. Every one wanted to read them. The University Press could not supply copies fast enough. They were translated into German, and were known throughout Germany in less than a fortnight. Within a month they had been heard of all over western and southern Europe. Luther himself was staggered at the way they were received. He said he had never meant to determine, but to debate.
The theses were singularly unlike what might have been expected from a professor of theology. They made no attempt at theological definition, no pretence at logical arrangement; they were anything but a brief programme of reformation. They were simply ninety-five sledge-hammer blows directed against the most flagrant ecclesiastical abuse of the age. They were addressed to the “common” man and appealed to his common sense of spiritual things.”
I believe the writer’s point was that Luther was objecting, not to the theology of indulgences, but their abuse. But once the closet door opened, there was more waiting to fall out...