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Luther: Gospel, Law, and Reformation
He was only one man—a humble monk and Bible professor—yet he sparked a religious rebellion that changed the course of history. Who was Martin Luther? What made his theology so explosive in 16th-century Europe? Was it really his intention to start Protestantism, and with it a new church?
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First published January 1, 2004
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May 12, 2023
در حد پنج ستاره بود، اما پنج ستاره رو نگه داشتم برای کارهایی که یه شهرت و اهمیت خارجی داشته باشن.
این مدرس چهار دوره تدریس کرده برای گریت کورسز:
History Of Christian Theology
Luther: Gospel, Law, and Reformation
Philosophy and Religion in the West
Augustine: Philosopher and Saint
دو تای اول رو گوش کردم و به شدت علاقه دارم دو تای دیگه رو هم گوش کنم. همچنان دارم تلاش می کنم از تورنت دانلود کنم ولی فعلاً موفق نشدم.
این مدرس چهار دوره تدریس کرده برای گریت کورسز:
History Of Christian Theology
Luther: Gospel, Law, and Reformation
Philosophy and Religion in the West
Augustine: Philosopher and Saint
دو تای اول رو گوش کردم و به شدت علاقه دارم دو تای دیگه رو هم گوش کنم. همچنان دارم تلاش می کنم از تورنت دانلود کنم ولی فعلاً موفق نشدم.
November 19, 2022
Luther: Gospel, Law, and Reformation
by Phillip Cary
The 24-lecture course “Luther” is about the pivotal reformer Martin Luther. The lectures start with the basic principles of Luther’s ideals and then retrace the Christian reformation of the sixteenth century by contrasting Luther’s views with some other reformers. The course concludes by summarizing and commenting on Luther’s views on several fundamental principles. The course changed several of my conceptions.
I always thought of Luther as the father of Protestantism, and I thought the Edict of Worms was the beginning of Protestantism, which follows the blueprint of the former. According to the lectures, however, Luther is but one of the Protestantism branchers, albeit the largest and most influential. Many contemporaries of Luther examined the same question: the base of our Christian faith and the influence of faith in our life and behavior. While they commonly deny the papacy as the only avenue to God, they present different alternatives. Luther believes that we gain faith and salvation by believing in the gospels. This view is not shared by all protestants.
I was also told that Luther pioneered humanity, the central theme of the Enlightenment. By denying the monopoly power of the Roman, Luther advocated a more personalized Christianity, where each Christian connects with God individually. According to Luther, individuals trump the Roman Church institution. However, Luther’s ideal is the opposite of humanity. He believes that we acquire and maintain faith not through our choice and reasoning but through the gospel and Jesus’s teachings. Luther devalues rationale and personal choices. It is not clear, though, from the lecture whether Luther allows the freedom of interpreting the Bible. It sounds like Luther assumed that people will always reach the same interpretation.
Another common notion is that Luther promoted secular governments. It is true that Luther was against and effectively broke the Roman Church’s stronghold on governing. In particular, the Luther reformation weakened the Church’s power to collect indulgence money. However, Luther also advocated using state power to advance his religious views. He considered the princes as a counterforce against the Church. Therefore, Luther is not for secular governments, although his reformation may have helped the latter and ushered in the age of modernity.
Overall, the course is accessible to lay people and does not involve complex religious contemplations. On the other hand, the professor does not conceal his self-identity as a Lutheran. Therefore, his views may be biased. The lectures serve as an entry point for understanding Protestantism. However, we need much further learning to understand today’s ideals and institutions of Protestantism.
by Phillip Cary
The 24-lecture course “Luther” is about the pivotal reformer Martin Luther. The lectures start with the basic principles of Luther’s ideals and then retrace the Christian reformation of the sixteenth century by contrasting Luther’s views with some other reformers. The course concludes by summarizing and commenting on Luther’s views on several fundamental principles. The course changed several of my conceptions.
I always thought of Luther as the father of Protestantism, and I thought the Edict of Worms was the beginning of Protestantism, which follows the blueprint of the former. According to the lectures, however, Luther is but one of the Protestantism branchers, albeit the largest and most influential. Many contemporaries of Luther examined the same question: the base of our Christian faith and the influence of faith in our life and behavior. While they commonly deny the papacy as the only avenue to God, they present different alternatives. Luther believes that we gain faith and salvation by believing in the gospels. This view is not shared by all protestants.
I was also told that Luther pioneered humanity, the central theme of the Enlightenment. By denying the monopoly power of the Roman, Luther advocated a more personalized Christianity, where each Christian connects with God individually. According to Luther, individuals trump the Roman Church institution. However, Luther’s ideal is the opposite of humanity. He believes that we acquire and maintain faith not through our choice and reasoning but through the gospel and Jesus’s teachings. Luther devalues rationale and personal choices. It is not clear, though, from the lecture whether Luther allows the freedom of interpreting the Bible. It sounds like Luther assumed that people will always reach the same interpretation.
Another common notion is that Luther promoted secular governments. It is true that Luther was against and effectively broke the Roman Church’s stronghold on governing. In particular, the Luther reformation weakened the Church’s power to collect indulgence money. However, Luther also advocated using state power to advance his religious views. He considered the princes as a counterforce against the Church. Therefore, Luther is not for secular governments, although his reformation may have helped the latter and ushered in the age of modernity.
Overall, the course is accessible to lay people and does not involve complex religious contemplations. On the other hand, the professor does not conceal his self-identity as a Lutheran. Therefore, his views may be biased. The lectures serve as an entry point for understanding Protestantism. However, we need much further learning to understand today’s ideals and institutions of Protestantism.
July 8, 2021
Most interesting things. Will listen to again.
did-not-finish
December 15, 2025Putting this on hold at 20%, for now. It's not bad, just not feeling it right now, and I don't want to force myself. May return to it later.
August 27, 2017
Part One:
As someone with a considerable interest in the Protestant Reformation and as someone who wishes to better understand it in light of the approaching 500 year anniversary of the posting of the famous 95 theses [1], I thought this particular course would give me a moderately sympathetic viewing of Martin Luther. And so it did. It did something else, though, worthy of interest, and that was showing just how Nathanish of a person Martin Luther was, someone whose characteristic response to problems and issues was to write about them at length. Luther was an anxious soul, and one who found life to be a good deal more complicated than he would have wished it to be, and sought to simply that existence through setting up an influential false dilemma between law and grace that still greatly affects Christian discourse to this day. This particular course excels in putting Luther's actions into a context of late medieval Christendom that is both sympathetic as well as revealing. We see Luther as a man, as a complicated but often fundamentally decent man, struggling to deal with the consequences of a complicated personality as well as a particularly difficult time, and we see how the papacy contributed to the division of the Reformation through its intransigence and strident appeals to authority.
This particular course is made up of twelve lectures that provide a great deal of context to Luther and to the Lutheran Reformation. Beginning with a look at Luther's gospel, the professor then turns to the medieval church and to its abuses and to efforts at reform. Then there is a lecture devoted to the Augustinian paradigm of spirituality that would have been at least a little bit foreign to Luther's approach, which was based on his times. The fourth lecture looks at young Luther against himself with a harsh view of God and of the word of God that we are to believe about ourselves. After this we look at how Luther heard the gospel and sought to define the relationship between faith and works based on his own anxious lifetime of attempts to appease God through his own human efforts. The professor then discusses the meaning of sacraments, the indulgence controversy that really started the Protestant Reformation, the way that the Reformation eventually went public, Luther's writing on the captivity of the Sacraments during the so-called Babylonian captivity, and closes the first part of this course on Luther with a look at the Reformation in Wittenberg as well as the work of the Reformer.
The professor of this particular course has a great interest in the philosophy of Augustine, and one gets the feeling that he has a strong ecumenical spirit as well. In his discussions about Luther's approach to abuses of power within the Catholic Church of his time, he notes that while Luther called the Roman Catholic Church the Antichrist, not an unfair description given the biblical record, contemporary Lutherans have not been so harsh, leading to a kind of identity crisis given the relative moderate position of Lutherans compared to the more radical denominations that sprang from the Reformed tradition. In many ways, Luther's status as a follower of Augustine in many aspects and his high view of the sacraments kept Luther close to the Catholic tradition even after departing it, and led to a certain incompleteness about the Reformation when it came to restoring apostolic purity of religion. Too much human tradition came along, with a lot of its baggage, and it should therefore not surprise us that the Reformation is discussed here in such ambivalent terms. What we have in this course is a praise of Luther that comes off as a lament that it had to divide the Christendom of his day, and even a hope that Hellenistic Christendom may yet reunite.
[1] See, for example:
https://edgeinducedcohesion.blog/2017...
https://edgeinducedcohesion.blog/2017...
https://edgeinducedcohesion.blog/2016...
https://edgeinducedcohesion.blog/2016...
https://edgeinducedcohesion.blog/2016...
https://edgeinducedcohesion.blog/2013...
Part Two:
As someone who has taken a fair amount of Great Courses [1] before, and who will likely take a great many more in the future given how many subjects I enjoy learning about and how easy and productive it is to listen to such courses via audiobook, I am always intrigued by how the professors approach their subject matter. This professor shows both a great deal of respect and appreciation for Luther, which I can understand, as well as a certain deal of criticism, which I understand but have mixed feelings for. Luther obviously had some blameworthy qualities when it came to his frequent conflicts with others and his tendency to dismiss the legitimacy of others by labeling them as being influenced by Satan, an obvious conversation stopper. That said, I can recognize myself as a pretty fierce controversialist as well and definitely that is an area I am cautious about for myself. The professor of this course shows himself as an ecumenical person and his statements about the desirability of the unity of the Hellenistic Christian denominations is something I view with a great deal of concern.
This particular course contains the second half of the professor's lectures on Luther and his connection with the Gospel, law, and the reformation. The lectures begin on Luther's writing against the spirit of rebellion of oppressed German peasants, as well as controversies over the Lord's Supper with Swiss Reformed believers and over infant baptism with Anabaptists. The author then looks at the question of grace and justification, a matter of deep importance for Luther and for Protestants in general, in which the professor shows that Luther operated in a medial position between Catholics and other Protestants. The rest of the lectures are taken up by the professor talking about Luther's relationship with the Bible, Erasmus, Predestination, Protestantism, Politics, his enemies, the Jews, and Modernity. These lectures do a good job at placing Luther in a context that demonstrates his importance as a connection between the world of Augustine and the Middle Ages and our own contemporary modernism and even post-modernism. The professor's explorations and his honesty about his own perspectives allows the listener to come to their own conclusions and address their own ambivalence and their own struggle with the quest for both truth and certainty, which involve us in many of our own contemporary struggles that show us to be people much like Luther was, for all of the differences between his time and our own.
Overall, this course proves its worth to a wide audience in this particular part. The professor not only does a good job at discussing Luther's own ferocious behavior towards those he considered enemies of the faith but also shows how Luther is deeply relevant to concerns of our own time as diverse as the ecumenical movement, anti-Semitism, and the relationship between modernity and post-modernism. The author's thoughtful discussion of Luther's partial responsibility for the incubus of brutal anti-Jewish sentiment that flowered fully in Hitler's Nazi Germany is worth the listen of the entire course on its own, aside from the many other worthy aspects of the professor's discussion. Likewise, whether or not someone has an interest in Luther personally or in Protestant religion, the author's discussion of Luther's own search for certainty and the self-critical roots of different threads of post-modernism is also worthwhile. Although I have long been critical of the anti-truth aspects of post-modernism, I strongly identify with the professor's approach as a right-wing postmodernist with a belief in the importance of investigating truth while also recognizing the traditions I hold to and being somewhat self-critical about them. It is a fitting end to a thoughtful examination of Luther's influence on our culture and on the divisions within Christendom.
[1] See, for example:
https://edgeinducedcohesion.blog/2017...
https://edgeinducedcohesion.blog/2017...
https://edgeinducedcohesion.blog/2016...
https://edgeinducedcohesion.blog/2016...
https://edgeinducedcohesion.blog/2016...
https://edgeinducedcohesion.blog/2016...
https://edgeinducedcohesion.blog/2016...
https://edgeinducedcohesion.blog/2016...
As someone with a considerable interest in the Protestant Reformation and as someone who wishes to better understand it in light of the approaching 500 year anniversary of the posting of the famous 95 theses [1], I thought this particular course would give me a moderately sympathetic viewing of Martin Luther. And so it did. It did something else, though, worthy of interest, and that was showing just how Nathanish of a person Martin Luther was, someone whose characteristic response to problems and issues was to write about them at length. Luther was an anxious soul, and one who found life to be a good deal more complicated than he would have wished it to be, and sought to simply that existence through setting up an influential false dilemma between law and grace that still greatly affects Christian discourse to this day. This particular course excels in putting Luther's actions into a context of late medieval Christendom that is both sympathetic as well as revealing. We see Luther as a man, as a complicated but often fundamentally decent man, struggling to deal with the consequences of a complicated personality as well as a particularly difficult time, and we see how the papacy contributed to the division of the Reformation through its intransigence and strident appeals to authority.
This particular course is made up of twelve lectures that provide a great deal of context to Luther and to the Lutheran Reformation. Beginning with a look at Luther's gospel, the professor then turns to the medieval church and to its abuses and to efforts at reform. Then there is a lecture devoted to the Augustinian paradigm of spirituality that would have been at least a little bit foreign to Luther's approach, which was based on his times. The fourth lecture looks at young Luther against himself with a harsh view of God and of the word of God that we are to believe about ourselves. After this we look at how Luther heard the gospel and sought to define the relationship between faith and works based on his own anxious lifetime of attempts to appease God through his own human efforts. The professor then discusses the meaning of sacraments, the indulgence controversy that really started the Protestant Reformation, the way that the Reformation eventually went public, Luther's writing on the captivity of the Sacraments during the so-called Babylonian captivity, and closes the first part of this course on Luther with a look at the Reformation in Wittenberg as well as the work of the Reformer.
The professor of this particular course has a great interest in the philosophy of Augustine, and one gets the feeling that he has a strong ecumenical spirit as well. In his discussions about Luther's approach to abuses of power within the Catholic Church of his time, he notes that while Luther called the Roman Catholic Church the Antichrist, not an unfair description given the biblical record, contemporary Lutherans have not been so harsh, leading to a kind of identity crisis given the relative moderate position of Lutherans compared to the more radical denominations that sprang from the Reformed tradition. In many ways, Luther's status as a follower of Augustine in many aspects and his high view of the sacraments kept Luther close to the Catholic tradition even after departing it, and led to a certain incompleteness about the Reformation when it came to restoring apostolic purity of religion. Too much human tradition came along, with a lot of its baggage, and it should therefore not surprise us that the Reformation is discussed here in such ambivalent terms. What we have in this course is a praise of Luther that comes off as a lament that it had to divide the Christendom of his day, and even a hope that Hellenistic Christendom may yet reunite.
[1] See, for example:
https://edgeinducedcohesion.blog/2017...
https://edgeinducedcohesion.blog/2017...
https://edgeinducedcohesion.blog/2016...
https://edgeinducedcohesion.blog/2016...
https://edgeinducedcohesion.blog/2016...
https://edgeinducedcohesion.blog/2013...
Part Two:
As someone who has taken a fair amount of Great Courses [1] before, and who will likely take a great many more in the future given how many subjects I enjoy learning about and how easy and productive it is to listen to such courses via audiobook, I am always intrigued by how the professors approach their subject matter. This professor shows both a great deal of respect and appreciation for Luther, which I can understand, as well as a certain deal of criticism, which I understand but have mixed feelings for. Luther obviously had some blameworthy qualities when it came to his frequent conflicts with others and his tendency to dismiss the legitimacy of others by labeling them as being influenced by Satan, an obvious conversation stopper. That said, I can recognize myself as a pretty fierce controversialist as well and definitely that is an area I am cautious about for myself. The professor of this course shows himself as an ecumenical person and his statements about the desirability of the unity of the Hellenistic Christian denominations is something I view with a great deal of concern.
This particular course contains the second half of the professor's lectures on Luther and his connection with the Gospel, law, and the reformation. The lectures begin on Luther's writing against the spirit of rebellion of oppressed German peasants, as well as controversies over the Lord's Supper with Swiss Reformed believers and over infant baptism with Anabaptists. The author then looks at the question of grace and justification, a matter of deep importance for Luther and for Protestants in general, in which the professor shows that Luther operated in a medial position between Catholics and other Protestants. The rest of the lectures are taken up by the professor talking about Luther's relationship with the Bible, Erasmus, Predestination, Protestantism, Politics, his enemies, the Jews, and Modernity. These lectures do a good job at placing Luther in a context that demonstrates his importance as a connection between the world of Augustine and the Middle Ages and our own contemporary modernism and even post-modernism. The professor's explorations and his honesty about his own perspectives allows the listener to come to their own conclusions and address their own ambivalence and their own struggle with the quest for both truth and certainty, which involve us in many of our own contemporary struggles that show us to be people much like Luther was, for all of the differences between his time and our own.
Overall, this course proves its worth to a wide audience in this particular part. The professor not only does a good job at discussing Luther's own ferocious behavior towards those he considered enemies of the faith but also shows how Luther is deeply relevant to concerns of our own time as diverse as the ecumenical movement, anti-Semitism, and the relationship between modernity and post-modernism. The author's thoughtful discussion of Luther's partial responsibility for the incubus of brutal anti-Jewish sentiment that flowered fully in Hitler's Nazi Germany is worth the listen of the entire course on its own, aside from the many other worthy aspects of the professor's discussion. Likewise, whether or not someone has an interest in Luther personally or in Protestant religion, the author's discussion of Luther's own search for certainty and the self-critical roots of different threads of post-modernism is also worthwhile. Although I have long been critical of the anti-truth aspects of post-modernism, I strongly identify with the professor's approach as a right-wing postmodernist with a belief in the importance of investigating truth while also recognizing the traditions I hold to and being somewhat self-critical about them. It is a fitting end to a thoughtful examination of Luther's influence on our culture and on the divisions within Christendom.
[1] See, for example:
https://edgeinducedcohesion.blog/2017...
https://edgeinducedcohesion.blog/2017...
https://edgeinducedcohesion.blog/2016...
https://edgeinducedcohesion.blog/2016...
https://edgeinducedcohesion.blog/2016...
https://edgeinducedcohesion.blog/2016...
https://edgeinducedcohesion.blog/2016...
https://edgeinducedcohesion.blog/2016...
February 24, 2020
I picked this Great Course up on a whim-- while not religious myself, I enjoy learning about Christian theology because of its enormous impact on western civilization. I was blown away. Dr. Cary provides really thoughtful, in-depth analyses of Luther's theories, contrasting them to Catholic and Calvinist doctrine. Dr. Cary's expertise and enthusiasm really showed too. Highly recommended.
September 2, 2025
This is an excellent introduction to Luther. Dr. Cary is a wealth of knowledge and a very engaging teacher. He is more sympathetic to the Finnish interpretation of Luther, which I am not. But, besides that and his positive take on the New Perspective on Paul that came up in the middle of the course, I found these lecture to be outstanding.
August 8, 2017
I've been trying to learn more about the Thirty Years War, so I thought it a good idea to learn about the origins of the Reformation. This was an excellent introduction to Luther the man and the genesis of the Reformation.
May 15, 2023
I read this as part of a small group study at my church. I always like learning about topics that I had very little prior knowledge on and most of what I previously knew about Luther was wrong. This was really interesting for the most part. Well presented, with honest, thorough investigation.
October 8, 2019
Good overview of Luther and some other major figures in the reformation.
October 23, 2019
Cary gives an excellent overview of Luther, his life, and his beliefs. Luther clearly changed the landscape of Christianity in his day, and his views have affected thousands even today.
April 6, 2021
Really solid, mix of history and theology. Humanizes complex man.
October 13, 2022
Too much theology, not enough history. I didn’t really come away from this learning anything. What Cary did talk about seemed largely to be a highly-personally-inflected interpretation of Luther’s theology. Not enough Luther, too much Cary. For some people, this may be your jam, but it wasn’t mine.
Read 22%.
Read 22%.
April 22, 2009
Excellent series of lectures on Luther, one of the principal figures of the Reformation. I have listened to many lecture courses from The Teaching Company and Modern Scholar, and this course is one of the best. If you are curious about the Protestant Reformation, these lectures are a great place to start.
Cary does a terrific job of highlighting the most important themes in Luther's thinking, especially his internal/external distinction, his desire for certainty, and his view of the gospel as a sacrament. (If that last phrase makes you curious, listen to the lectures.) After listening, you'll see the whole Luther -- the good, the bad, and the ugly.
The first part lays down the medieval background, Luther's developing theology, his views on the sacraments, and more. The second part deals with the mature Luther and his doctrine (e.g., Luther's view of justification by faith alone, Luther on predestination, Luther vs. other Protestants, Luther and the Lord's Supper, etc.). If you come from the Reformed tradition, you'll probably take issue with Cary's acceptance of The New Perspective on Paul and some of his particular views. But Cary would welcome the discussion and see it as the best of "Lutheranism" (i.e., pursuing truth by discussing and respectively listening to one another).
Cary does a terrific job of highlighting the most important themes in Luther's thinking, especially his internal/external distinction, his desire for certainty, and his view of the gospel as a sacrament. (If that last phrase makes you curious, listen to the lectures.) After listening, you'll see the whole Luther -- the good, the bad, and the ugly.
The first part lays down the medieval background, Luther's developing theology, his views on the sacraments, and more. The second part deals with the mature Luther and his doctrine (e.g., Luther's view of justification by faith alone, Luther on predestination, Luther vs. other Protestants, Luther and the Lord's Supper, etc.). If you come from the Reformed tradition, you'll probably take issue with Cary's acceptance of The New Perspective on Paul and some of his particular views. But Cary would welcome the discussion and see it as the best of "Lutheranism" (i.e., pursuing truth by discussing and respectively listening to one another).
February 27, 2015
This was a "book" I ordered from Audible, and it was presented as a lecture in 24 half-hour sessions in one recording. I had expected this to be much more of a biography than it was; that's what I had been hoping for. I was at first annoyed with the additional subject matter, but, from time to time, I enjoyed the unexpected bits of history and theology.
I was really surprised at some of the topics the lecturer discussed regarding Luther, which ranged from illuminating to outrageous. That wasn't necessarily a bad thing. I did, however, disagree with several statements made by this professor. I would have loved to read the course's bibliography so that I could see where these ideas came from, but it was not available to me in my version, if one is included at all in the Great Courses series.
Since I had expected a biography discussing Luther's life and theology, I did not like when the lecturer interjected his opinions. To me, they seemed very out of place. However, since I was wrong about this course being strictly a biography, there certainly were times when his opinions provided useful details or compelling points to ponder.
I was really surprised at some of the topics the lecturer discussed regarding Luther, which ranged from illuminating to outrageous. That wasn't necessarily a bad thing. I did, however, disagree with several statements made by this professor. I would have loved to read the course's bibliography so that I could see where these ideas came from, but it was not available to me in my version, if one is included at all in the Great Courses series.
Since I had expected a biography discussing Luther's life and theology, I did not like when the lecturer interjected his opinions. To me, they seemed very out of place. However, since I was wrong about this course being strictly a biography, there certainly were times when his opinions provided useful details or compelling points to ponder.
June 9, 2014
Mostly disappointing. Some good elements but little that was new to me.
Sometimes felt this was more about Cary and his viewpoints than Luthers.
Was interesting to hear him claim that Luther was a more thoroughgoing
predestinarian than Calvin. But then disappointing to have him write off
Luther, Calvin and Romans 9 in favor of Barth. Can sympathize with his
saying that Luther represents a "half-way" house between Catholicism
and Protestantism. He is certainly to be celebrated for starting the Reformation.
But it was Calvin and later the Baptists who brought significant change
and more thoroughly practiced "sola Scriptura."
Sometimes felt this was more about Cary and his viewpoints than Luthers.
Was interesting to hear him claim that Luther was a more thoroughgoing
predestinarian than Calvin. But then disappointing to have him write off
Luther, Calvin and Romans 9 in favor of Barth. Can sympathize with his
saying that Luther represents a "half-way" house between Catholicism
and Protestantism. He is certainly to be celebrated for starting the Reformation.
But it was Calvin and later the Baptists who brought significant change
and more thoroughly practiced "sola Scriptura."
April 12, 2017
gave a fabulous insight into the Reformation, as I grew up Roman catholic in Belgium !
Displaying 1 - 17 of 17 reviews