One of the cities they spent time in was Wittenberg, in northern Germany.......famous for its connection to the life and times of Martin Luther. Hence, this post's photos will show a few "Sehenswurdigkeiten von Wittenberg"/main sights of Wittenberg.
The top left photo below shows the "Schlosskirche"/Castle Church, on whose door Martin Luther nailed the "95 Theses" on October 31, 1517. Yesterday afternoon, I read the "95 Theses"........they are a list of concerns, dealing mainly with the medieval Catholic Church's practice of selling indulgences. As I see it, over time the Church had become intoxicated by its power and authority over people. (Imagine that.) The institution of the Church became unable to see clearly and operated in a presumptuous manner, thinking it was God, with the right to dictate rules to dominate the masses of everyday people, and feed its greed for money. I highly doubt that that was Jesus' intentions for how the church should operate. The Church was drunk, and like a drunkard, was doing stupid things. Martin Luther's original intent was to reform the Church......not establish a new branch of the Church. Things got out of hand, probably because things needed to get out of hand........the status quo needed to be shaken up. Whoops......we need to get back to the photo.......
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The lower left photo in the above photo shows the doors of the Castle Church on which Luther nailed the 95 Theses. The wooden doors of Luther's time were burned in the 1700's, and the ones there today are made of bronze. The two scenes on the right, above, are inside the Castle Church.*********************
Below are pictures of Luther Haus/Luther House. On the Wittenberg city map my mom and stepdad gave us, Melanchthon Haus is next door. Luther Eiche/Luther Oak is down the street.
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Below is Luther's gravestone.........inside the Castle Church, I assume.
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*******************And last, but not least, here below is a statue of Katharina von Bora Luther, wife of Martin Luther. Her stance shows a determined posture of motion and moving forward. Good for her. Her face looks firm and well-preserved.......botox, possibly??
Sorry......I'm kidding, of course. I believe my stepdad said Katharina is buried next to her husband in the Castle Church.
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I hope to post a few more tour scenes in the next post. My mom and stepdad were on a Viking Riverboat Cruise on the Elbe River. Other cities they toured included Berlin, Dresden, and Prague.
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2 comments:
Undoubtedly your family has some great stories of their trip. Luther was, IMO right in what he claimed as errors in the Church. And things did get out of hand, but my studies suggest he became obsessed to some degree with his own salvation and decided that the Catholic Church's dogma could never give him peace. So he did, remove a few books from the canon and re-interpret some of Paul's writings to achieve what made him feel better. Can't say as I blame him. Unfortunately, as you say it got out of hand. Latest count places the number of Christians sects at in excess of 35,000 worldwide, so that genie once released sure had a life of its own. Thanks for a look see at Luther's homeland.
Sherry,
Really good comment!! I agree Luther was obsessed over certain things. He once thought the devil was in the room with him, so he heaved an inkwell at him. I've read that Luther probably was a manic-depressive. Some of the Lutheran pastors nowadays seem to think that Luther was practically God, and that just makes me shake my head in consternation.
I think, too, that there was alot of politics involved in what we call the Reformation......it was about way more than religion.
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