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It's interesting that every account of the Luther story has him nailing his 95 theses to a church door, when there is zero evidence that this ever happened. What were you smoking when you made up that? Is this what Roman Catholic apologists think passes for "history?" Have you ever actually bothered to read the 95 Theses?

All historians of any repute, Roman Catholic or Protestant, agree that the 95 Theses began the process of Luther being stonewalled by the Roman Church authorities, not some personal spat with the discredited J. Tetzel.

Dr. Philip Melanchthon, who lived about 1/2 block from Luther, was a professor at Wittenberg University at the time--and was Luther's closest friend, co-reformer, and successor in leading the Lutherans after Luther died, said that Dr. Luther nailed the Theses to the door... That's pretty good eyewitness authority.

Nailing an announcement on the biggest door in town right off the town square, was a normal event--a lot like an office bulletin-board. Besides all that, the physical nailing is a minor point. The major point is that is was indeed the 95 Theses interference with the money trail...(for a VERY spend-thrift Pope) that got Luther in hot water.

Within 3 weeks Luther's Theses had been copied and recopied (including a version that actually goofed up the numbers...) and spread all over Germany. Without the printing press (then less than 50 years old) such a wide transmission of copies of a document would of been impossible.

I've been to Wittenberg, as I did graduate work there... and the Castle Church door is about the largest in town, and very prominent--a logical place to post an announcement, especially since tourists were arriving by the hundreds for the one of the biggest events in Wittenberg all year--the veneration of the relics in that same Castle Church, that next day, All Saints Day. Frederick the Wise had the largest relic collection outside of Rome.

Tetzel was soon arrested (probably for embarrassing his employers...Bishop Albrecht and Pope Leo X) after claiming that the plenary indulgence he was selling for those same employers....could give you forgiveness if you had raped the Virgin Mary herself...

Renaissance lover Leo was quickly spending the Roman Church into bankruptcy...and German money started to dry up with Luther's Theses, and later writings--hence the stern desire on Leo et al, to quash Luther and his kind....

All one needs to do is to follow the money trail, and the rejection of and persecution of Luther makes total sense.

That's a ton of bad information to pack into one post, but to select the most glaring error: Melanchthon was most certainly not a professor at Wittenberg at the time. He was a professor at Tuebingen, on the opposite side of Germany, on Hallowe'en of 1517.

Your one witness was not actually a witness.

The legend may have been uncritically accepted by many historians over time who did not bother to do the homework, but there remains exactly zero primary sources to confirm the legend.