authority (sola scriptura) for the faith. “By faith and by scripture alone became the watchwords of the Reformation”8.
By stating all of the above, Luther wanted to show the world that there was no need for intermediaries when it comes to belief and God. The word of God and faith did not have to pass through Church or state authorities. Luther was against indulgences, or the building of any Church whose purpose was clerics’ profit maximization, or the Church’s door being a bulletin board where announcements were placed. Luther proposed that the hierarchical organization of the church wasn’t beneficial to any believer and to the society as a whole.
Luther’s decision to publish his thesis and claims had a huge unexpected (by him) impact in Europe.
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According to Petersons there are two ways of developing a theology: first starting with human experience and work up to assumptions about God and his activity; and second beginning with assumptions about God first and then draw conclusions about humans and their situations. Luther used the first one while Calvin did the opposite, which makes this the main difference between Luther and Calvin as theologians. Calvin illustrates his point through the will of God by taking as an example the sin of Adam and Eva. The Adam and Eva sinned was either because it was they willed to sin, or because God willed their sin. From Calvin’s point of view, they sinned because God willed their sin. On the other hand, Calvin made clear that every person is responsible for their choices and their sins. These imply that even though humans may sin, God will love them still. Calvin believed that humans are God’s masterpiece because they are blessed with the intellect to differentiate between evil and good. However, a human society needs to be constructed in a certain way in order to prevent them from doing evil. And this is the main point where Luther and Calvin