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LUTHER NAILS
THE VATICAN'S SIMPLISTIC VIEW OF THE CHRISTIAN FAITH
A biopic about the life of Martin Luther
is a most ambitious undertaking indeed, and director Eric
Till has responded to the challenge with Luther as a study
of a man whose ideas successfully challenge the ossified
theology of Roman Catholicism under Leo XII as well as the
imperialistic ambitions of the Holy Roman Empire under Charles
V. The film begins with an adult Luther (played
by Ralph Fiennes) walking on a road in the night, so besieged
by lightning in a storm that he is convinced that God is
calling him to greatness, similar to the conversion of Saul
on the road to Damascus. He then abandons the study of law
to enter the Augustinian order in 1506. Soon, the clear-thinking
mind of a lawyer confronts something very odd about the way
Christianity is being practiced. On a pilgrimage from Erfurt
to Rome, he is horrified that salvation is being promoted
through a ritual of climbing up stone steps, using the knees,
to reach a summit where further indulgences are sold, while
priests visit brothels and accept coins before the faithful
scrape their knees on the steps. In short, the religion to
which he has committed himself is simply getting rich on
formalistic practices that have nothing to do with sacred
beliefs. When he returns to Erfurt, Johann von Staupitz (played
by Bruno Ganz) concludes that Luther should be studying at
a theological university, so he sends Luther to Wittenberg
University in Saxony, which is ruled by eccentric Prince
Friedrich (played by Peter Ustinov). As a student, he learns
quickly, spotting contradictions in conventional theology.
For example, he questions the view that salvation can only
come through Rome by noting that the consequence of such
a view, which is contradicted by Scripture, would be to condemn
all Greek Christians. Soon his teacher and fellow students
are swept into the logic of his rigorous interpretations
of the Bible. Meanwhile, the pope wants to rebuild St. Peter's
Basilica, a most expensive project, so he sends Johan Tetzel
(played by Alfred Molina) throughout Germany to promise eternal
salvation as a reward for making monetary contributions so
that Rome can pay back a loan from the Fuggers. Furious that
Tetzel is playing a trick on the people, in 1517 Luther nails
Ninety-Five Theses on the door of the Wittenberg Cathedral,
and soon Tetzel's contributions dry up.
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Whereas
previous efforts to question Rome were quickly forgotten
and easily
silenced, now the existence of the printing press means that
Luther's document is widely distributed. Rome is angry. In
1521, Luther is summoned to a confrontation at Worms where
he refuses to recant the Ninety-Five Theses as well as other
writings, resulting in his excommunication by Leo XII (played
by Uwe Ochsenknecht). Fearing that Luther would be assassinated,
Prince Friedrich, who has been trying to retain the cash
in Saxony that previously flowed to Rome to fund papal extravagances,
then arranges to kidnap him and to hide him out, thereby
giving Luther an opportunity to translate the Bible into
German. However, Luther's refusal to bow to Rome emboldens
some of his fellow theological professors in his absence
to speak out, which in turn triggers a peasant revolt in
Saxony, since the common people conclude that they have been
cheated by a false religion of graven images, indulgences,
and phony saints. After as many as 100,000 peasants die in
the uprising, Luther is summoned to restore order. However,
in 1530, the princes of Germany are summoned before the Holy
Roman Emperor (played by Torben Liebrecht) at Augsburg to
renounce the new Lutheran teachings, but the princes remain
defiant. The film ends as Luther marries Katerina von Borg
(played by Claire Cox), and Protestantism begins to spread.
Titles at the end indicate that somewhat over 500 million
Protestants now worship throughout the world, attributing
to Luther the eventual recognition of the need for religious
freedom. However, that recognition took nearly a century
after the Wars of Religion (1562-1598) and the Thirty Years
War (1618-1648), which culminated in the Treaty of Westphalia
of 1648, which then recognized that each state was free to
choose its own state religion independent of Rome. The purpose
of the film is clearly to challenge Roman Catholicism even
today, as the most profound statement in the film, by Cardinal
Cajetan (played by Mathieu Carrière), is that the
pope and his advisers at the time of Luther were intellectually
incapable of grasping the opportunity for a reform that might
have prevented a split in Christianity. But of course Roman
Catholicism in 2003 remains a theologically conservative,
and Luther hints that the reason
as before is found in the politics of running a vast church
where common people, deemed intellectually incapable of understanding
the basis for their beliefs, are expected to follow ritual
and tradition. MH
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