Martin Luther helped shape our values
Influence of former Dominican monk is often underestimated or unrecognized
Citizens of the world’s fourthlargest economy are this year celebrating every aspect of the legacy of Martin Luther, who is credited with starting the Protestant Reformation 500 years ago.
Even Germans who no longer count themselves as Protestants recognize their country has been intimately shaped by the former Dominican monk, who risked his life by rebelling against the oppression of the Roman Catholic hierarchy of his era.
With more than 1,000 Martin Luther events occurring this year in Germany alone, many are realizing the hardy cleric has influenced their attitudes toward money, freedom, esthetics, politics, work, music and beer.
“Much of what used to be typically Protestant, we today perceive as typically German,” says Christine Eichel, author of Deutschland Lutherland.
Even in Canada, where the number of Protestants has declined to a quarter of the population (about eight million people, including 470,000 Lutherans), it’s worth appreciating Luther’s unrecognized influence on this country’s values and institutions.
Crucially, Luther took the Bible out of the control of authoritarian Catholics priests and translated it into German for the people, to be interpreted directly. He countered Biblical literalism.
A popular thesis links Luther to Germans’ prudent attitudes toward work and the saving of money, which Luther considered a moral imperative.
Notions of the so-called Protestant work ethic still feed theories about why northern European and North American countries have been more economically successful than southern European and Latin “Catholic” countries.
Since Luther believed Christians were already saved through the life and resurrection of Jesus Christ, he taught that Christians should not work necessarily for profit, but for their communities.
The welfare states of Germany and the Nordic countries (and to a lesser extent Canada) can be justifiably understood as secular expressions of what German theologian Gerhard Wegner calls “Lutheran socialism.”
In addition, Deutschland Lutherland and others books maintain that Luther influenced German and Scandinavian disapproval of artistic ostentation.
This may be seen in northern Europe’s elegantly spare churches, practical Ikea furniture and the modest dress of German Chancellor Angela Merkel, the daughter of a Lutheran pastor.
Vancouver School of Theology Prof. Harry Maier, a New Testament specialist who teaches at the university in Luther’s old city of Erfurt, has little doubt Luther has influenced Canada, which is home to 3.2 million people of German origin.
His influence has been deeply felt even as Canada, especially Quebec, has a strong Roman Catholic presence, and as the country turns more secular and pluralistic, with significant pockets of Muslims, Sikhs and Buddhists.
“If we are to look around today, Luther’s DNA and the movement he fostered are everywhere, not only in religion but in a variety of other ideas as well,” Maier says.
“(Luther influenced Canadians’ attitudes to) freedom, the importance of conscience, thinking independently … the value and goodness of creation, justice, integrity, honesty, intellectual study, reading and education.”
Luther’s influence can also be found in foundational western cultural enjoyments, such as love of music.
Unlike other Protestant leaders of the 1600s, such as Jean Calvin — a more legalistic reformer who frowned on music for pleasure (as do many Muslims today) — Luther believed music is divinely inspired. He especially wanted people to sing together.
Luther had a special passion for Johann Sebastian Bach, one of the most celebrated composers of all time (a Bach Festival is running until Aug. 11 in Vancouver).
Is it possible Luther might have also influenced Canadians’ relatively relaxed approach to life, sexuality and even cursing? Luther not only argued against celibacy for priests, he was no prude.
“Luther had no problem with a Christian faith that is profane. He invited us to fart at the devil when tempted,” says Maier. He says evangelical Protestants, in contrast to main-line Protestants, tend to be more shaped by Calvin.
While we can’t credit Luther with inspiring B.C.’s micro-brewery craze, I’ve been to his former hometown of Wittenberg, where he is said to have nailed his 95 criticisms of Catholic theology on the main church’s door on Oct. 31, 1617.
Replicas of the Luther family’s large beer-brewing kegs are on display in Wittenberg in the reconstructed cellar of the home of Luther and his impressive wife, Katie, who had been a nun.
“She ran a brewery to keep the family fed,” said Maier, who is himself Lutheran.
“Luther was no teetotaller. And he wasn’t afraid of colourful language. I expect most people would find him in turns hilarious, and a very troublesome person to have in church on a Sunday morning.”
It has to be recognized that in the 20th century Luther also became infamous for his tirades against Jews, which Maier says created “a legacy that helped to promote Nazi ideology.”
Without excusing Luther for his “reprehensible and death-invoking views about Jews,” Maier says they were not his major focus and “came in the last few years of his life when he was arguably not mentally fit.”
During the Second World War, Maier adds, “some of the most courageous Christians who led a movement against the Nazis were Lutherans, chief among them Dietrich Bonhoeffer.”
Such is the complexity of great historical reformers: Despite their dark sides, they can positively inspire entire cultures.
Maier makes a strong case that Luther influenced the West’s emphasis on individual freedom, which is significantly stronger than in the East.
“For Luther, one of the most important features of the Christian faith is that it liberates people from tyranny, whether that be political, religious or intellectual.”
Maier also maintains Luther encouraged Canadians’ sense of secularism, in a paradoxical way. By doing away with the church hierarchy standing between humans and God, Maier says, Luther taught that every individual is accountable for themselves, free of institutional restrictions.
Even while emphasizing Luther’s influence on the secular culture of the West, however, it should be stressed that, in the end, for Luther everything was about God. And grace.
“Luther said we are to be little Christs in the world,” says Maier. “To be a little Christ means not to seek power and glory. Rather (Luther taught) God’s power is found in the inexhaustible capacity to love the broken and unlovable.”
Most people would find him in turns hilarious, and a very troublesome person to have in church.