Martin Luther 1483 – 1546

Martin Luther was a German Augustinian friar, theologian, and the principal initiator of the Protestant Reformation. After years of monastic struggle over the question of how a sinful human being can stand before a righteous God, he came to the conviction that justification is by faith alone in the grace of Christ. His Ninety-five Theses of 1517, originally an academic protest against the sale of indulgences, set off the religious upheavals that broke the unity of Western Christendom. His translation of the Bible into German, his catechisms, his hymns, and his vast pastoral and polemical writings reshaped European religion, literature, and political life.