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To: TheCrusader
I don't really know your point, except to discredit a man for holding common attitudes to those of medieval central Europeans of nearly 500 years ago.

Luther has no peer in bringing wonderful change to the Western world, including seeding concepts of democracy which first sprouted and bloomed in America.

Bringing up silly remarks say about women, or demonology (from a time when the most educated people thought in ways about heath laughable today)by Luther is as unhelpful as say bringing up racist remarks by Jefferson or Lincoln--which they had quite a few. Such anachronistic attitudes don't tarnish the greatness of their other way more substantial contributions.
7 posted on 07/09/2003 9:48:01 PM PDT by AnalogReigns
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To: AnalogReigns
Yes, let's not let the truth about Luther get in the way of a good story.
8 posted on 07/09/2003 10:08:44 PM PDT by SMEDLEYBUTLER
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To: AnalogReigns
"I don't really know your point, except to discredit a man for holding common attitudes to those of medieval central Europeans of nearly 500 years ago."

I'm sorry to hear you believe that rubbish about Luther being responsible for democracy, and the founding of America. Martin Luther was a horribly abused child, beaten bloody by both of his parents. He grew up angry, confused, and so utterly afraid of Hell that he invented his own doctrine on salvation, ('sola scriptura' and 'sola fide'), that morphed into the heretical "eternal security", a horrendous proposition that is foreign to Scripture, the writings of the early Church Fathers, and the more than 1,500 years of Christian doctrine that predated Luther's heresies. This madman has led the greatest division in Christianity ever, and his heresies have developed into more than 25,000 different Protestant denominations, each teaching a different doctrine, and each claiming they alone hold the truth.

Luther arrogantly addmitted that he added words to the Bible, an egregious sin in itself. His doctrine of "faith alone" cannot be found in Scripture, and is demolished by the words "NOT by faith alone" in James 2:20. It is no coincidence that Luther attempted to strike the Book of James from the canon of the New Testament, (at least he failed in that heresy). However, Luther only resentfully accepted James as Scripture, and he labeled James (in his 1522 German translation of the New Testament) as the "Epistle of Straw".

Sadly, Luther did manage to strike seven books from the canon of the Old Testament, a codification of Scriptural books that was listed in 393 A.D. at the Council of Hippo, and again in 397 A.D. at the Council of Carthage. This early codification of Scripture, though not yet officially "canonized" at the time, had been used and read in the Christian Church since the 1st Century A.D. The Council of Laodicea in 363 A.D. listed the Old Testament books exactly as the Catholic Church codifies them today.

A little history on the Old Testament: ~ Greek was the language of the day during the time of Christ. The Hebrew language was on its way out, and there was a critical need for a translation of the Hebrew Old Testament for dispersed Greek speaking Jews. This translation, called the "Septuagint", was completed by Jewish scholars in about 148 B.C. and it had all of the books still used by the Catholic Church during Luther's life, and today. But Luther, 1650 years later, decided he had the authority to remove seven of these books. The oldest Christian churches, (Greek, Syrian, etc), used this 148 B.C. Old Testament canon from the beginning of Christianity, and still use it today. The New Testament has about 350 references to Old Testament verses. By careful examination, scholars have determined that 300 of these are from the Septuagint. They have shown that Jesus Christ Himself, quoted from the Septuagint. Early Christians used the Septuagint to support Christian teachings. The Jews were upset that these new Christians were using their translation for Christian advantage.

About 90-95 A.D., the Jews, (Pharisees), called a council to deal with the matter. In this council, called the "Council of Jamnia", Jewish Pharisees, who survived the destruction of Jerusalem and of their temple in 70 A.D., decided to remove books that were helpful to Christians. But the Christians kept them faithfully, until 1650 years later when Martin Luther, fulfilling the Pharisaic desires, decided to remove them from Protestant Scripture.

While Martin Luther condemned the Papacy as non-scriptural, he was a pope unto himself as he arrogantly granted himself the power to add words and strip away seven books from Christian Scripture. He even determined that some of the seven Sacraments were authentic, and others were not. Talk about the abuse of power, where did he get such authority from? Founding his own church, (a church that even calls itself by his name, "Lutheran"), this man was nothing but a great divider.

Luther was unquestionably a madman, as he clearly displayed in his instigation of the "Peasant Uprising". In his first writings, where he called the princes "the greatest fools on earth and the most heinous scoundrels," and in his first appeals relative to the Peasant War, Luther defended the insurgents. He wrote, for instance, "It is not the peasants who arose against you masters, but God himself, who wishes to punish you for your evil doings." Luther hoped to find in the peasant movement a support for his struggle against Rome. But when, in April and May, the peasantry revolted all over the country, burning and destroying castles, Luther switched sides and defended the princes against the peasants. He attributed the movement to the peasants' "easy life". He urged the princes to "strangle them as you would mad dogs." When the insurrection was quelled, he bragged that he "had killed the peasants because he had given the orders to kill." "All their blood is upon me," he said.

Luther also tore the Church asunder at a time when the Mohammedans were threatening to attack and destroy Western Christianity. And this guy is your hero?

10 posted on 07/10/2003 8:04:36 AM PDT by TheCrusader
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To: AnalogReigns
Amen.

For the record, Calvin's Geneva was a haven for Jews escaping Catholic Europe. While Calvin was a harsh dude, it is something that Geneva was a haven and it should tell you something about how bad the Catholics were at the time.
141 posted on 07/16/2003 11:08:50 AM PDT by rwfromkansas ("There is dust enough on some of your Bibles to write 'damnation' with your fingers." C.H. Spurgeon)
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