Luther And Confessions

Individual Judgment Both Augustine and Luther emphasize individual judgment in their writings of “Confessions” and “95 Theses”, however, Augustine and Luther each have a different viewpoint of individual judgment. For Augustine, his “Confessions” was an autobiography recounting his journey through life. He reflects through his experiences and his return of creation to God. Augustine believes that the choices we make are our judgments. God gives us freewill which allows us to make our own choices. God gave us free will which allows us to make the authority to make judgments. We decide to make good or bad judgments in God’s favor. In “Confessions” the moment of choice was given to us when Adam and Eve had the option to eat the forbidden fruit. They decided to make their own judgment by eating the fruit which God had warned them not to. Augustine’s view on individual judgment is free will because God gives us choices and we decide whether or not we want to make a good or bad

In the Theses 5, Luther says “The pope has neither the will nor the power to remit any penalties beyond those imposed either at his own discretion or by canon law” (490). Luther argues that the Pope can not make these judgments and the Pope can not remit. Luther has come to discover that God is the only one that can make these judgments. God is all knowing and decides what is good or not. Luther in trying to convey that men can’t have knowledge of good, we can only work towards it. Luther challenges this by saying that the only way to make individual judgments is through “the doctrine of justification by faith alone”. He believes this doctrine was the only thing you can know, God has merited you with his grace and you can’t know anything else. We can’t make judgment but only to follow faith in God by living a good life and hoping for the